Hi, thinking of an A4 quattro

[AndyN01]

I've copied this across from the Welcome forum.

Hello everyone and thanks for lots of posts that can be easily viewed berfore joining.

My wife & I are looking to move house but the one we've found is towards the bottom of a short but steepish hill that never sees salt or a gritter.

So..... we're looking for a quattro. Reliability is the most important issue as we're coming from 2 Toyotas, a 1.8 pertol Carina, sold at 129K having had nothing go wrong and currently a 2.0 petrol Avensis still going strong (touch wood) at 142K again with nothing gone wrong.

We'll have about 5-6K to spend so it looks like a B6 A4, probably a TDi but I know nothing about diesels.

So far I've picked up that the 1.9TDi is pretty well bomb proof providing oil changes/cam belt (water pump) done. There's the sticking turbo blades dealt with by Mr Muscle, the EGR valve dealt with by normal muscle, temp sender unit and slow wiper blades (I fancy using acf50 anti corrosion grease on those). An odd mention of CV joints and glove box woes and grease up the suspension/steering bolts. Anything else?

Autotrader has some A4 Avants well in the price range and we quite fancy the practicality. However, they do have serious mileage. Some are 2.5 TDi's and I can't seem to find much about these at all (save a sticky about injectors). I've never had a diesel or V6 in 30+ years of driving!

Real world MPG and running costs? Any thoughts or advice?

Looking forward to joining all you guys and girls.

All the best.

Andy N01

 

[shaz]

Hi, the one to have is a 1.9 Tdi Quattro, I have one and I swear by them.

Also a friend of mine owns a garage and has two Quattro tdi avants for sale, good cars.

If your interested pm me or look in the autotrader they both black quattros and avants,
And mention my name il ensure you get a discount

Thanks

 

[moggs]

Welcome. Good choice of car. The 1.9 diesel quattro is quite a rare car, think there are a couple on autotrader at the moment. You didn't say what mileage you'll be covering as the diesel will cost more to service and run if your not doing the mileage to make the cost back. I don't really know much about diesels but I ruled one out when I was looking. I went for a 1.8 TQS and am reasonably pleased with it. I see around 30mpg in it which is ok for a heavy car. I do wish I had held out a little longer and went for a 190bhp.model but I didn't really have time to wait at the time. The 3.0 petrol is a bit more thirsty as is the s4.
In my eyes for the budget you have, a very nice 190 s line would be top of the list which will hold its value reasonably well as they are quite rare also. Unless you need economy. Whatever you get will not be without fault. They all have issues which can be researched when you narrow it down to model.
Ian

 

[AndyN01]

Thanks Shaz, I'll do some web searching.

Much appreciated.

Andy.

 

[AndyN01]

Thanks Moggs,

Hadn't really thought about a petrol but I'll widen my search and see what comes along.

All the best.

Andy.

 

[shaz]

No probs pal, one of em has real high spec for a Quattro, leather seats, electric seats etc

 

[hodgy0_2]

i have a a4 2.5tdi quattro, and it has just gone past the 160k miles mark

I have had it 4 years (since 80k) and apart from a recent cambelt replacement, i have spent ****** all on it --- it has been faultless


(oh and a InterCooler replacement - which i did myself)

I do twice yearly oil changes myself

get about 35mpg, -- 38 on a run

hth

 

[archemist]

Mine's a 2.5 Q sport avant and apart from an (expensive) turbo failure i've serviced it myself and done 30k miles in 15 months now 138k - not bad for an 11 year old complex motor

and I've averaged 41.2mpg.

but the modding can get pricey

signs of tlc and decent servicing (mine was independent but had all the bills to show for it)
cheers
And

 

[AndyN01]

Thanks hth,

MPG is similar to the Avensis so I wouldn't really notice the difference.

Thanks for taking the time to help.

Regards,

Andy.

 

[AndyN01]

Hi And,

Thanks for the useful info and for taking the time to reply.

Cheers,

Andy.

 

[hodgy0_2]

Aha hth short for "hope that helps"

my real name is James,

just a word of caution, my father in law had an A6 Allroad, with the 2.5 TDI lump in and he suffered 2 engine failures, the second effectively scrapping the car

the cam belt has a week spot where it goes around the water plumb (I think), so it is vital cambelts are done to schedule


But as I have said my A4 has been faultless, and for a 10 year old car still drives really smoothly

and when I can be bothered to clean the leather interior it looks and feels like a 3 year old car

 

[Az]

I can say pretty much exactly the same as others as I own a 2.5 tdi Quattro sport, had for a total of nearly 3 years now and it has been as reliable as any Japanese car (I've had plenty of jap motors too). Just general servicing and the expensive and all important cambelt change. Of you can find one that has had short life service internals (10k miles) rather than longlife (20k) then that will help massively as they require regular oil changes, 20k miles is too long on these engines and cause cam wear. I'm lucky as mine has been pampered all its life and has had short life service intervals and from what I can see through the oil filler hole the cams still look fantastic, but all will be revealed in a week or two when I get the cam cover gaskets changed (from a slight oil leak), so the cam covers will be off and I'll be inspecting the cams then and taking some photos of them if they're as good as I'm hoping cos they are original cams on 147k miles.