RS4 b5 progress thread

right, now the s3 is gone, i thought i'd put a progress thread up about my current rs4 b5

firstly i sold the s3 for a few reasons, it was only ever going to be a stepping stone for an rs4, i would have kept it longer but my insurance for an rs4 was only £100 more per annum (compared to £3,000 more last year), the other reason for the sale was the desire for a more powerful car with more space, many people throw large amounts of cash at their 1.8t's only to lose it all in the long run, so to me it was a no brainer, just buy an rs4, i also could not stand the haldex unit on the s3!

so after putting £3000 into putting my s3 in a sound mechanical condition (cambelt, fluids, tyres, brakes, suspension and fixing other various problems), i decided to sell it after doing around 15,000 in it.

the first thing i looked for when buying an rs4 was low mileage, a sunroof, aluminium mirrors, rails and windows frames as well as a dark colour with a centre armrest, full leather and a bose system, things like the anti glare mirror and satnav had no pull with me.

i also knew how much simple servicing this vehicle would cost, cambelt change around £700, brakes around £1,000, clutch around £1,000 and tyres around £700, so finding a car with the above work carried out recently was crucial

i managed to find one not too far away from me, popped over and had a look and was instantly attracted to it, 76k, new clutch at 55k, new brakes at 69k, cambelt at 70k, and brand new tyres, it also had new dump valves, egt sensors and a maf at 55k, it was also finished in a non-standard colour, santorini blue, it had everything i wanted, the car was 100% standard, but i knew that with all the recent work done to the car I’d have money to spend on getting it tuned up etc. after the test drive, i left a deposit and collected the car within 2 weeks.

coming from motorcycles i knew the car would not be "scare me quick", it wasn't, i liked it, real smooth power from low down with a final punch at about 6,000 rpm, ok let’s be real, compared to the mapped s3 i had it was an animal, power kept coming in the higher rev range, something the 1.8t lacked due to the single turbo not being able to provide boost, i could also tell it had a proper 4 wheel drive system, fuel consumption was what i thought, 33mpg on a run at 70mph (460 to a tank) and a poor 19mpg around town, so close to around 250, obviously this is with light footed driving, put your foot down and these figure's will drop very quickly

the car is heavier than the s3, but only by around 170kg and considering the rs4 was a little higher than my s3 i think a lowering spring on each corner would give similar if not better handling capabilities than the s3 simply because of the width of the axles and the wider 255 tyres, the standard suspension was still good for a 10 year old car, felt firm and coped with the power fine, something i could not say about the s3's 10 year old suspension, there was a small amount of body roll, but not much and the usual under steer when coming into a corner hard and over steer when coming out too hard

the brakes are better than that of the s3's, by far, then again, it has 380mm discs on the front with huge pads, i also noticed the engine braking was better, i suppose this is down to the constant 4 wheel drive system, the only thing i have to get used to is the heavier flywheel as the engine does take a little longer to spin down

the gear box is very smooth whilst driving, better than that of my old s3, although 1st and reverse from neutral require you to wait around half a second with the clutch down if you want a smooth engagement, however 9/10 times it goes in without waiting easily, i've just learnt to wait so i avoid that 1/10 chance lol, i’ve also had to get used to the heavier flywheel as engaging the clutch too quickly provides you with a slight jump forward when changing gear, so I need to work on letting the gas off a little earlier and lift the clutch up slower, the car also manages to do 60 in second gear lol!

the car is bigger upfront and maybe a little bigger in the back, the sound system is MUCH better in it, the thing that annoyed me with the s3 was that silly sub hidden away, luckily the rs4 speakers produce their own bass, the boot also looks a lot better although i can not picture my old s3 boot as i never really used it lol, the inside of the rs4 just feel better to, even the headlight flasher feels smoother lol and the carbon fibre really make the rs4 feel that little bit special

the paint work and panels also seem to be of better quality (maybe my s3 was a bad example) and the rs4 wide stance just does it for me, the big wheel arches really make it stand out, my car is de badged though and very few people know what it is, it's also very quiet inside and quite quiet on the outside

all in all i am very happy with the change of cars, i love having an oil temp display as it lets you know when you can give it some, something the smaller audis lacked i believe, i;ve already had to call the aa out as i ran out of fuel on the way home lolol!!

i will update this thread with random posts and plans etc, not really any good at this kind of thing....... i only have one pic so far, i will get more



the next post will be "future plans"............

current plans so far are to fix the bad radio reception (told to look at the wiring near the cd changer), get the centre hub cap put on (was left off by mistake so it's in the post) one of the wheels and try to fix the rear heated windows (2 strips don't work across the full length of the glass) - yes major problems aye !

i also want to get the paint work looked at and have any stone chips and scratch marks professionally repaired, there's maybe 4 on the bonnet and the 3 scratches on the bumper with the odd chip scattered here and there

handling wise, i will probably go down the bilstein route and upgrade all shocks and springs

power wise i will almost certainly have wagner 3 inch downpipes with 100 sport cats and a miltek system fitted as well as a map, this should increase the power from 325/380 to 450/450

the odd mod so far will be sourcing an anti glare rear mirror and changing the bulbs all round to LEDs (everything minus the headlights)

other than the above i can not think of anything else !!

lol thanks

have fixed the bad reception, as pointed out on audisrs.com it turned out to be the connection above the cd player, the clip had broken for the aerial, so a cable tie fixed it....... will get it replaced if possible

i am sure it will be fine, no one else has mentioned any problems, the standard clutch is good for about 500lb ft at the crank

there's a few other things i want to get done, there's 2 non standard electric appliances in the car, a nokia car unit and a snooper speed camera detector, i plan on removing these this weekend after i work out what they are wired into, have ordered the radio remove tools as it looks like it wires back to that..... i'm not a fan of clutter, so hopefully i can remove it all easily

neither of them work, so there's no point leaving them in

LOL - like any car it totally depends how you drive it ! i am sure you could nuke a oem s3 clutch in a day if you keep launching !!

first problem so far, although covered by the dealer warranty.........

dodgy thermostat, seems to be open all the time, £19 part, but 6 hours labour to change as it's behind the cam belt LOL!!

a3 tdi hire car ftw !!

had the car back for about 2 weeks now, the thermostat fixed the problem, it warms up much quicker and so does the oil, timing was also slightly out, so it;s spot on now

i have recently added a parrot mki9200 bluetooth system and next on my list will be a wiper change all round and a change of bulbs to whiter bulbs to go with the HID's


here's a couple of pics (centre hub has been put back on)





car will go into mrc for a full fluid change and full service as well as a tune up hoping to take it to around 480 bhp / 480 lb ft

costs are quite okl to be honest - £3,500 will do it for sure, possibly even £3,000, probably even less after you sell the RS4 oem exhaust system with down pipes to an S4 owner....

trying to get another 150lb ft torque and another 100 bhp out of an s3 or similar would cost a hell of a lot more, and then you'd be left with a car that has no grunt and needs to be above 4,500 rpm to get anything out of it!

hi dest plans are as follows in regards to to tuning and maintenance over the next 4 months, had to work it all out due to finances, i should be able to recoup some money back, people will want the injectors, downpipes and intercoolers


This should see me past 500, hopefully the initial tuning will see me past 470, next year i may look at changing the turbos for hybrids as the base would have been pretty much set with the above

here's some more pictures of the old girl

hopefully i might be able to save some money by buying second hand too

little update (i got banned lol)

had the following work carried out in april by MRC

• car got a full fluid and filter change
• itg performance air filter installed
• i also had the after run pump temperature lowered so it comes on almost all the time
• an airbag control module was replaced
• faulty side light wiring was fixed

i had a small problem which caused me complete loss of boost, one of the lugs on the left aluminium charge pipe broke, this was due to a previous cam belt change, whoever did it did the charge pipe to cam belt cover bolt up to tight, sadly, going over a bump pulled it off completely which then snapped the aluminium lug, which then caused a boost leak, QST fixed this for me

i purchased a lot of autoglym products and gave the car a full clay, polish and wax, the results ended up like this after around 12 hours of work
























the car is now at MRC and will be collected at the end of the month, it's having the following work carried out

• 3 inch de-cat wagner downpipes installed
• full cat-back miltek system installed
• wagner side mount intercoolers kit installed
• bosch 044 fuel pump installed
• siemens deka 630cc injectors installed
• stage 3 remap

hoping the above will see me hit around 520 bhp

little update the intercoolers are on !





and the 3 inch de-cat down pipes

little update, car is now finished, i had the tuning work done - also had all the rear bushes changed, front and rear drop links changed, cv boots changed, front and rear arbs upgraded and a wheel alignment, next on the list is a front control arm kit !

usual dyno graph....





then a 2nd through to 5th run - it still made over 500 bhp in 5th !





really pleased !!!

car is currently at mrc having the following work done.........

• cams checked (been told they are ok and have no wear)
• full front control arm kit fitted
• all wheel bearings changed
• track rod inner and outer ends replaced
• full kw v3 suspension install with new top mounts
• 380mm 8 pot brembo front brake upgrade
• ferodo ds2500 pads installed front and rear

this should do for a while until i go for the rs6 hybrid setup !!

brakes and suspension are on as are the control arms

yea, don;t come on much now though, still enjoy a good read in the 8l section, people tend to tinker with the 1.8t alot