Antifreeze PEAK or OEM Volkswagen

Not that low because I topped it off before it got to that point but yeah it’s normal for our cars. It should only be the initial settling though, top it off engine cold with vw g12 evo 50/50 or distilled water and keep an eye on it. It shouldn’t drop any more once topped off for a while anyway.

I use peak violet european formula in my mk8 R.

These tsi motors tend to run hotter then standard engines. I would top off the car (once cooled typically around a hour) open it up and take it to the line above minimum, that\u2019ll be your maximum. Watch it over the next few weeks. If it goes below minimum again, you have some sort of leak.

I use Peak, and I think they recommend the violet stuff.

I just use peak pink made for Alfa Romeo and European vehicles overall and it works fine!

I've mixed Peak Violet in with the OEM G12+. My car ran normal for several thousand miles like that.

Maybe I'm wrong, here, but that looks like rust to me.

Did the mech use green coolant, and not the factory VW red/pink/purple stuff? That would cause the cast iron short block to rust out in short order.

coolant is always best. I would get rid of the green coolant, flush it all out and replace with something better. I use Peak Final Charge in everything.

VW coolant doesn\u2019t play nice and will chemically react with parts store general coolant.

I see your reservoir says G13 mit Silikat. Would recommend getting rid of G13 and removing the bag. G13 causes corrosion (resulting in a leak at the shaft of the water pump), leaves deposits (clogging the heater core and resulting in engine overheating), etc. Flush the system a couple times with distilled water and then fill up with G12evo coolant which doesn\u2019t have these issues.