There are third party warranty companies out there, don't know a whole lot about them, but i bought my 2000 a4 from a friend at the dealership. He set me up with a company called MBP, mechanical breakdown protection. They have covered everything that has gone wrong with the exception of brakes, etc. I know that some of the stuff that has broke is due to mods done to the car, and i drive her a little harder than i should sometimes. But dammit i love her.
Hey, here is the # for MBP. 1.800.325.7484

 

in 99.5 the a4 got a facelift with new headlights, tails, sidmarkers, lower fogs, and a few other things...here's a link to the MY changes:

http://ctny.audiworld.com/mark/a4/diff/

mechanically they are pretty much the same...in 00 they switched from a drive-by-cable setup to a dbw, but that doesn't really make a difference to you since you're not doing any major mods.

i got a 2.8 for the same reason you did..i wanted reliability, and i didn't want something with a lot of modding potential, because i wanted to stay out of trouble.

 

awesome website....thanks! It looks like I have a 99.5 and the only mod I would want to do is update it with newer headlights with HIDs. Anyone know what that takes? I'm guessing new lamps with ballasts?

 

www.oemhid.com

you should also consider doing the clear corner mod (removing the amber reflector in the corners of your headlights...there's a good pic of what it looks like in my sig, but it's not working right now and i can't find the jpeg file to reload it...but yea, the 99.5 is definitely the most desired year for the a4.

 

Regarding the gas octane, juice and jukit...

you guys say "as long as you don't hear your engine knocking you're fine"...I thought our cars had a knock-sensor, which automatically retards the performance of your engine so it doesn't knock. Therefore, you wouldn't hear your engine knocking even if you're using sub-par octane.

Now I'm not saying that 91 would 'cause this (sure as hell hope not), but wouldn't that be the case if you tried to run 87? (I could be wrong)

And yeah dude, I've got a 2.8 V6...I dunno man, the turbos just seemd a little to prone to failure around 50k miles, especially when modded. Everyone on the forum will tell you that if you take care of your car, and willing to try some minor repair work, your engine will run for a looooong time.

 

Another question....my uncle has a benz and has had problems trying to upgrade to an aftermarket cd player due to compatibility reasons with the bose stereo system. Am I going to experience similar problems with an Audi?

 

It depends on what stereo you have, but most of the aftermarket changers will work just fine, fm modulated anyway.

 

Actually the car I'm looking at has a 6 disc cd changer...but I plan on upgrading the in dash unit with a nicer cd player or possibly a screen.

 

Find out what stereo you have, the Bose system is a little tricky but it can be done.

 

haha...that's all you had to say. Looks like the in dash unit is going to stay stock. I spent over a year with no dash lights for messing with the cd player in my truck [sm=oopssign.gif]