first post, love my black 2005A8L, daily driver, usually 75-80mph on the highway.
So i'm driving on highway, lose the power steering, battery light comes on, "rumbling feeling," limped it home a few miles (dumb)... front belt gone, crank pully hanging on by a few bolts.
Car has 110K miles, did the timing belt at 72K at the dealer, (bought it with 56K so didn't know the history and did it early) Did they pull it during the timing belt service??? How many front crank pulleys have failed in your experience? front of the crank is a little beat up. What am I in for?
Any comments are appreciated.

Thanks, steiner
(now driving the non-sporty diesel truck for now)

 

Oh yeah they did, thats the shop's fault without a doubt. The crank pulley has several allan bolts holding it on and all that has to come off during the timing belt service. Its easy to miss a couple of bolts, but he must have just put them on hand tight and forgot to torque them down. Take lots of pictures and make sure you have an extra set for you're lawyer if the shop doesn't want to play ball.

 

Agreed completely ...those bolts do not unscrew themselves. If they were all replaced and torqued, they can NOT come off.

 

Thanks auditech79, I was hoping you'd be reading this post. i've lurked here enough to know that you're the man. I'll take pics and call the dealer and attorney just in case. is there any written audi procedure that might state that the pulley has to come off? i called another dealer on the sly to ask if they pull the crank pulley when they do the timing belt and they said "no" you don't have to... but they also said they've never seen a crank pulley come off an A8..... thanks again.

 

Thanks D2, I'd rather be talking about driving this great car or putting in a chip, but this is a big issue for me right now.

 

Shop is either full of crap or stupid. The belt sits directly behind the crank pulley around the crank shaft, its impossible to get the belt out without removing the crank pulley. Not to mention the timing cover has to come off to get the belt off, and the crank pulley is in the way of that as well. Audi's technical instructions (elsa web) will show removal of the crank pulley under a timing belt service, if the shop won't comply, call AOA (audi of america) they will straighten out any dealer for you.