Craig's B8 pre-facelift adventure

[Audigit]

Well, hello there...

When I had my BMW E34 I had a similar thread on a relevant forum so thought I'd start one here. Basically just a place to document the changes to the Avant and get people's opinions, suggestions and ideas... Good and bad ha ha.

So on October 4th I became the proud owner of my first Audi. A 2011 A4 B8 140bhp 2.0 TDi Avant SE in Ice Silver.

She already had a nice base option list with heated half alcantara sport seats, sport suspension, massive sunroof, Cruise, auto lights and wipers etc but also had scope for loads more. That is what I wanted, a nice car but room to build upon.

Haven't done much so far, just little touches but they all add up...

My main aim is to add as many facelift items as possible to bring it further up to date and look to add S Line items but avoid making it anything like an S4 rep or anything tacky (no offence to those that have!)

Items so far:

Facelift buttons

Pipercross panel filter:

Team Heko wind deflectors (not sure on them yet though):

That's it for the additions but in the pipeline:

I'm still learning a lot about the car and VCDS so it'll take time to work things out.

It's gonna be a long journey!

All comments and criticism welcome

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[Zafi]

Why didn't you just buy a facelift S-Line?
I bet you are going to spend the same amount of money and end up with a car that's worth a lot less.

 

[Audigit]

Why didn't you just buy a facelift S-Line?
I bet you are going to spend the same amount of money and end up with a car that's worth a lot less.

That's a valid question...

For someone like myself, buying a car that already has everything would result in a very boring ownership.

Plus there wasn't one available within my budget for the initial purchase, which is an obvious answer really.

It would of cost a few thousand more and sacrificed the enjoyment of fitting all the upgrades too.

Worth doesn't factor in to for me. Bought this car to last, not to "do up and sell on". My last car I had for 7 years, I don't change them on a whim like a lot of other people do.

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[Audigit]

Why didn't you just buy a facelift S-Line?
I bet you are going to spend the same amount of money and end up with a car that's worth a lot less.

And this was the only one for miles which was an Avant with a sunroof and AirCon...

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[James.B8]

If you're facelifting the whole car you could buy an rs4 bumper and grill (without the badge obviously) that would look cool

 

[Zafi]

Pretty rare find with a sunroof.
No black headlining, though

 

[Audigit]

Pretty rare find with a sunroof.
No black headlining, though

I was miffed when I realised it didn't have black roof lining (the missus pointed it out to annoy me ha ha) but if it bothers me enough then I could get it retrimmed, if that is the word, to suit...

I take it that they never did black roof in the Avant?... Bummer!

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[Zafi]

Both my B8.5 S-Line Avants had a black headlining. I think it's standard on the S-Line.

as are Xenons, LED rear lights, 18" wheels, stone guards, 3G MMI with nav, lower suspension, stainless kick strips, sports seats.......

 

[Audigit]

Both my B8.5 S-Line Avants had a black headlining.
I think it's standard on the S-Line.

Both with sunroof?

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[Zafi]

No, not had a sunroof in an Audi. Pretty rare.

 

[Audigit]

So today I managed to find time to address my awful pitiful excuse for "auto wipers".

Basically, they're not worth a punch line, that's how much of a bad joke they were.

I had been reading that others also thought they were crap too but also saw a common theme, they all had their windscreens replaced. Further reading led me to the gel pad that sits between the rain sensor and the windscreen. Sometimes it's not a priority for the windscreen repair person to do.

Behold, I remember seeing an Autoglass receipt for my car in the owners wallet. £6.50 later and I now have fully functional and quite useful auto wipers that operate exactly when I need them.

That's another job ticked off the list!

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[scotty76]

Can you explain what the issue with the gel pad was as might help others?

 

[Audigit]

Can you explain what the issue with the gel pad was as might help others?

Sure thing scotty76...

The Gel pad was missing completely so the windscreen fitter didn't even bother to attempt to but anything there to replace it. It's a teardrop shape silicone gel pad that allows the sensor to be physically connected to the windscreen and detect rain/water.

Replacing a deteriorated pad or missing pad takes minutes but will bring the wipers back to life.

The fastest way to tell if yours needs sorting is if you can easily see the teardrop shape from outside the car and it looks to be a very different colour than the surrounding black area (I'll take a pic of how it looks now, which is how it should look).

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[scotty76]

Many thanks!

 

[Audigit]

Here is mine now, as you can see, you can't make out the shape of the sensor really (it blends in to the black surrounding) but you can see the light sensor for the auto headlights...

This is how it should look.

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[Audigit]

The latest part has arrived, with a couple of surprise extras too!

£40 for a oem black grill... Which happened to include all 4 parking sensors and mounts, Fogs and 1 fog cover, all from an S-Line bumper...

Awesome that my planned retrofit of front pdc brought forward a few months!

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[Audigit]

The latest arrival...

Nice set of facelift stalks

Also if anyone is in any doubt to the round airbag thing (I believe the technical term is steering angle sensor or Squib) being in the central position, just look to see if one of the ribbons is in the confirmation window to show that it is central as seen here just above the top socket:

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[Pricy]

Here is mine now, as you can see, you can't make out the shape of the sensor really (it blends in to the black surrounding) but you can see the light sensor for the auto headlights...

This is how it should look.

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Will have to check whether mine has this issue, the auto wipers really are awful! Thanks!

FYI, the black headlining must be an S-Line item. Mine has a pano sunroof with black lining.

 

[Audigit]

Will have to check whether mine has this issue, the auto wipers really are awful! Thanks!

FYI, the black headlining must be an S-Line item. Mine has a pano sunroof with black lining.

Feel free to post up a pic of your sensor for comparison.

Also, piano sunroof?

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[Pricy]

Feel free to post up a pic of your sensor for comparison.

Also, piano sunroof?

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Pano=panoramic. A piano sunroof would be interesting though!

 

[Audigit]

Pano=panoramic. A piano sunroof would be interesting though!

I blame a long and difficult work day... The difficulties arising from dealing with slow and stupid people...

Interesting about the black roof lining, I was led to believe that it wasn't available on an Avant?

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[GaryDe]

My A4 avant also has black headlining and a pano roof.


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[Audigit]

And the latest acquisition...

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[PenttisHSR]

And the latest acquisition...

I see you found a copy (Ref: your earlier [locked] post!)

 

[Audigit]

And the latest acquisition...

I see you found a copy (Ref: your earlier [locked] post!)

I certainly did, I also had no idea that my other thread had been locked (would explain the lack of replies) and no explanation as to why...

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[Audigit]

And today's success:

Facelift stalks

Tomorrow... Facelift LED tail lights, presuming I can find the right gauge wiring in lengths I need

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[LukeyC]

I too have the pano roof and black headlining in my avant.

Maybe it's an S-line thing?

 

[Audigit]

I too have the pano roof and black headlining in my avant.

Maybe it's an S-line thing?

It must be. I'll investigate it myself at a later date and see if it can be sourced

I almost forgot my scrap yard finds today...

Spare BCM2 plugs for the lights, to make life easier when pinning them and...

One PDC module which does both front and rear sensors (ready for my front pdc retrofit) and as a hidden bonus, it is also capable of running a reverse camera too!

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[Dsport]

I'm loving this thread excellent keep up the good work, I will be looking looking for another Audi in the spring and hoping to do a facelift on it, like you say it can get boring buying a done car you have nothing to play around with then, subscribed

 

[Audigit]

I'm loving this thread excellent keep up the good work, I will be looking looking for another Audi in the spring and hoping to do a facelift on it, like you say it can get boring buying a done car you have nothing to play around with then, subscribed

Thanks Dsport,

Yeah I can appreciate why someone would just want a car to have what they want and enjoy driving it but that isn't me...

I prefer to have a really nice base car and then build on it. That way I can learn about how things work, where things are, what they do and gain experience that'll help others and help me with maintenance and repairs.

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[Audigit]

A very rare Sunday chance for more changes...

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[Audigit]

Since I've been working away, literally nothing has been done... But... I have had the start of yet another retrofit arrive in my absence....

Going for the full monty LED interior lights and adding in the footwell, glovebox and puddle lights plus replacing as many bulbs as I can with OEM LED units...

Still trying to figure out if my bonkers plan with the facelift LED tail lights will work, got some boffins on the case!

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[Audigit]

So tonight I managed to squeeze in some time on the back end...

Wiring run and some pin changes done for the facelift LED rear lights... Sadly my poxy soldering iron ran out of gas and couldn't find my refill so at the moment it's incomplete...

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[Audigit]

Success!!

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[crf150]

Success!!

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Care to share the cost and time spent to get the lights installed ?

 

[Audigit]

Care to share the cost and time spent to get the lights installed ?

Certainly. The lights cost £120 (but only £60 of my money as a part birthday present lol), £30 for assorted wires, pins and plugs... Took about 4 hours in total spread over 2 evenings due to work and I'm lazy. Plus I wired it in properly which saw both T17 plugs at the BCM2 have several pins moved so that took a bit of time to work out.

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[Pricy]

Great work Craig, need to convert my halogens to led at some point!

 

[Audigit]

Not posted on here for a while due to work and family commitments. Basically Christmas sucked the life out of my wallet and needed to work to replace the hole in my bank ha ha.

Today is going to be a fun one, timing belt, alternator belt, water pump and associated pulleys are all being replaced!

Because I'm a bit of a pic whore, I'll chuck up a couple of progress pics as I go. Also, 5ltr of concentrate G13 coolant from ECP is less than £14 this weekend.

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[Audigit]

Thankfully the operation was a total success!

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[Mathias Johansson]

Hi, about the facelift stalks, did you do some coding or such to get it to work? I retrofitted mine but Antispin is lighted up