I just bought my first car, an Audi A4, and it needs a lot of work. Right now I'm getting all the 90k maintenance done (including Timing Belt, Tensior Belt, V-Belt, Water Pump) and I was wondering if the labor to replace the head gasket would be significantly lower if done in conjunction with these repairs. I don't know a lot about cars yet, so I'd appreciate your responses. Thanks!

 

well it might be possilbe that you could replace the gaskets yourself, it might take awhile but i dont think it would be that hard(Please tell me if im wrong) prob save quite a bit too im sure they would till add quite a bit for labor. im also assuming it might be even easier if you have a 2.8

 

I'm not so sure I could do the work myself at this point. I'm just wondering since my car is already in the shop.

 

yes it will be much cheaper to do the head gasket at the same time

 

Thank you. I was quoted $1000 for the head gasket replacement; how much can I expect this to come down?

 

Sorry cant help u there, i dont know how much places usually charge. basically when u pull the head u hafta do the timing belt, so if u waited, ud be doing the timing belt twice

 

is the gasket bad? or du u just wanna replace

 

I wanted to replace it if enough was saved in labor. I just got a more precise quote on the head gasket - $700 in labor + $50 for the part, but only $200 in labor would be concurrent with the timing belt, etc. Plus, he thinks it may be a few years before I'll even need to worry about the head gasket, so it looks like I'll wait as long as possible so I can replace it with the timing belt again. Thanks for all the help though!

 

I have a question about doing a head gasket.. When you take the head off, how do you be sure that the timing/cam sproket is in the same spot and timing wont be mess up wnen you get it back together? Is it just as easy as taking it off and putting it back on, being careful not to let the sproket move?

 

Dont change the head gasket unless its bad. Its not a part that commonly gos bad on these cars.

To realign the cam timing, you do it the same was as you would doa timing belt. Just index using the tdc marks and count the teeth, turn by hand etc etc