Hi everyone,

I am new to the forums but have heard good things about this place. I am graduating from college this May and have been looking heavily into getting a 2002-2004 A4. I am aware of the low oil pressure/sludge issue w/ the 1.8T engine. Additionally, my grandfather's friend who owns a few dealerships said he wouldn't even let himself sell me an Audi due to reliability issues. While I know the 1.8T is the choice for modding, I will only be doing some minor mods (mostly cosmetic, at least to start) and so for reliability sake think I woudl opt for 3.0 quattro model. I'm still apprehensive though about other reliability issues.......my buddy had a 2003 1.8T A4 and had some freak electrical issue where the entire car would shut off (engine and electric) suddenly. What can you guys tell me about these reliability issues? Any other thoughts? Thanks a lot


-Dan

 

Well I got a 03 A4 1.8T 5-speed) and while the car has been running fine (it has 44000 miles now) I have had few wierd problems. At one point my spark p[lug coilovers broke and I eventually had to replace them all...while I didn't have to pay anything it was a hustle as the nearest dealer from my location is 100 miles. I also have this problem with sunroof tilting up and down on its own...they reset it but the malufunction came back, I just deal with it (wierd thing is that it never happened when it rains...sometimes I wonder if it is aiding the climate control in releving pressure...I dunno). And last thing is that the car sometimes dies immediately after startup...no alarms or trouble codes show up (I also learned to just deal with it). I hope that helps.

 

1st post..
i'm also thinking about getting a 2002-2004 A4 1.8T Quattro as well.
Deciding between 02-04 bmw 3 series and 02-04 A4 ...

I'm concerned about reliability and maintenance. I like the look and styling of the audi over the bmw...and bmw has its own fair share of problems too..so just wanted to see what peoples thoughts were.

The car I am specifically interested in is an 03 A4 1.8T Quattro with about 40k miles...

thanks in advance

 

A lot of questions abou this every other day. Just run a search for "Reliability", and you get a ton of posts...

 

i did do a search on reliability on the A4 forum but not much great information turned up....thats how i found this thread.

from what i gather is that for a 2002-2004 a4, you have to watch for oil sludge and "coils?" and fuel pump around 50k miles...then a mandatory timing belt change at 60k...
or are there more common problems than that?

 

as long as you do your maintance you should be ok, but if buy it around 50,000-60,000 miles on it get the service records because the timming belt job is not cheap and could do a number on your engine but there are great running cars as long as you take care of them. just enjoy the ride.

 

The matters that affect the 2002-2004 audis are the same for older audis. That are a number of threads that approach this matter and some of them are extremelly comprehensive. Audi's have a bad temper sometimes, true. Timing belt is a pain if it fails and you have to pay an arm and a leg to get it fixed, true. :P