2001 TT 1.8 QAWD 225, manual 6speed, 86kmiles

This is not my car but my wife's girlfriend's car, "she's" orig. owner, a lot of city miles (Boston none-the-less) not certain of her manual transmission driving skills...

Clutch bites close towards end of pedal travel

When I drive the car and aggressively accelerate (any gear) RPMs will surge well beyond the acceleration of the car. While this is happening and I pull back a little on the gas the car will begin to accelerate like it you'd expect.

In the same test scenario above; If I pull the clutch pedal back towards me with the front of my foot the RPMs and acceleration almost match. Ball-sie little car...

Any suggestions or ideas how to further troubleshoot and or fix? Really appreciate your time and help.

 

Greetings,

A lot of questions come to mind.
Not your car (Wife/girlfriend) so how long has she owned the car?
This is critical knowing the actual methodology of how the car has been driven.
If she is NOT the original owner, then questions surface as to how the car was driven/treated before she bought it and inherited issues, problematic for this particular model car.

Driving habits:
Have you been in the car when she was driving it before the problems became evident?

 

This sounds alot like a clutch problem to me. One way to tell if it was driven correctly is to fell how the clutch grabs when you let it out. a brand new or evenly worn clutch will engage smootly and in a linear fashion. if the clutch has been ragged on, then it will feel different. normally comes on very lightly and then grabs really hard, and after that the rest of the pedal feels limp like it does nothing. I purchased a car like this, an A4 1.8t, and I know for a fact that the previous owner didn't understand how a clutch works and how to treat it right just by the way he revved it up super high just to park the car when I went to see it. since i've had it, the clutch has improved a bit, and it works fine. but it is just strange to drive. since then I purchased a newer A4 and the clutch is a bit funky but much more linear. the guy said that he did alot of stop and go, in the DC area, and that wears out a clutch faster. so it may need to be replaced in the next year or so. But even though the clutch is much more worn, you can tell it has been worn in better just by the way it engages. If much of the first bit of pedal travel doesn't do anything, this may be because the clutch has heat fracture. A common problem when people ride the clutch way too much and constantly. this causes two things. it causes the clutch to wear out much faster, and it causes it to feel spongy and feel as if it isn't doing anything for a good portion of the pedal travel. If this is the case, you should get the clutch replaced soon, or at least test driven by a mechanic or someone that knows clutches well. otherwise the friction material may get so worn down that the rivets used to assemble the layers of material and hold the material to the clutch, may come in contact with the fly wheel (pressure plate) and cause gouging (similar to waiting to long to change brake pads or getting a rock caught in the caliper and the rotors getting ridges).
The only other cause of this I could think of is a bad clutch master cylinder or something of that nature, I feel that is less likely given the symptoms you are describing. but anything is possible.
Best of luck, hope this helps!
-Chris