So about a month ago while making a left turn I heard a "clunk" and I couldn't move. My initial reaction was that my clutch went, I had already been hearing my throw out bearing and my clutch was catching super high, so I ordered a new one and went to disassemble the car that weekend with my cousin. Upon inspecting under the car my cousin found that my front driver axle slipped out of its position. No biggie right? So I ordered a new one from Advance. We popped it in and put the car back together. Everything's good. We dropped the car and took it for a spin, got around a corner and "clunk", car couldn't move. Got the car back to the garage and back on stands and found the front driver axle wobbles. We think I might need a new tranny, we can freely spin the passenger wheel but the driver side is tight/locked but with force and can be spun but a clicking noise follows. It got late and we decided we needed a rest. So now I'm here asking for advice/help. Please can somebody guide me in the right direction.

 

You're in luck. I just solved this exact same problem myself.

Symptom: Drive axle breaks under throttle near the apex of a tight left turn. Right?

I blew up two brand new axles this way. Both times I was powering out of a tight left hand turn. As soon as i put the power down.......BOOM! Both times my axles exploded like a bomb going off.

My Audi guy didn't have any answers for me, so I started thinking about it myself and I ended up solving 3 problems with one solution.......It's your motor mounts.

I'm assuming your car is a 1.8t and what is happening is that powering out of a left turn (with bad motor mounts) causes the engine to rock to the right, while the drive axle is fully extended to the left. This causes the axle to hyper extend and BOOM.

I changed both of my engine mounts and both of my trans mounts. Problem solved. It also fixed the problem I was having with power steering fluid leaking into the cabin after I just had a new rack put it (makes sense now).

When you do your engine mounts, I bet you'll see that the right (passenger) side mount is totally fucked. Mine was destroyed - and that's the mount that the engine leans on when the engine rocks like that. We have inline engines w/FWD, which is why this happens to us. A transverse mounted engine just "clunks" around when the mounts are bad because the engine and trans axle are parallel to the drive axle. Ours break (in the front).

The mounts are all pretty easy, but of course the most important one is the biggest bitch to get to and get off. I found the full set of four (engine and tranny) mounts on ebay for $79 and they were brand new German parts too, so check ebay.

If I can help any further, feel free to let me know.

G/L

 

�� motor mounts you say? Wouldn't hurt to change them out since I'm at 190,000 original mileage. You wouldn't have the link to the ones you purchased by any chance?
Regarding the axle, when you installed your new one did you have trouble spinning the axle to put the bolts in?

 

Here's the link:

Newaudi A4 A4Q VW Passat Manual Trans Mount and Motor Mount Kit Left Right | eBay

I think one of the trans mounts might be US made (and the rest German), but all four mounts are solid - and backed by a one year warrantee. I've stress tested the **** out of them and they pass with flying colors

I guarantee this fixes your problem (for super cheap too).

Our axles are very peculiar. They have to be carefully installed a certain way. You have to do the trans side first. Position the inside of the axle right up next to the transmission before you pop the cap/protective cover off. Once you pop that cover off, make sure you gently get the axle in there asap, otherwise the bearings could fall out, etc. Once you have it in there, you should be able to move it by hand, enough to get it to set into position (where the bolt holes are lined up). Get all of the bolts in (finger tight, using the "criss-cross" bolting method), then you can tighten them down (again: in a "criss-cross" pattern), but make sure you don't run them down too tight, because they'll strip.

As long as the car is in neutral, you shouldn't have a problem rotating the axle or tranny at any point during this process.

Once you're done with the inner assembly, the outer is quick, simple and straight forward (as I'm sure you already know).

Let me know how it goes - and again: Just holler if you need me. I'll do what I can to help (if you need any).

G/L

 

Hey man,
I have this same problem now (after 7 years from you)
I changed the axle but same problem continues. What did you do at this time to solve this problem do you remember?