So, now that you've heard the end, I'm hoping that someone can shed some light on what just happened to my 2000 a4 quattro...

So, I was driving back to my place, and at low speeds the wheel was shaking a bit, almost as if the alignment was horrifically off, at higher speeds, it was fine. So, I pull into my parking lot, and turn the wheel all the way to the passenger side to park, and there was a fairly loud snapping sound on the front passenger side.

...and now the car won't move. The engine is fine, clutch is fine, power steering fine when the car's on, but when I press on the gas to go, (and I tried reverse as well) it's not moving the wheels. It's AWD, and it's not moving any of them.

Hopefully someone can let me know something.. The guy at the shop said that it may be a ball joint, and that the axel rod (i think that's what he said, I was kind of frenzied and frozen) may have popped out... someone also mentioned that it could possibly be the CV joint ( had the front driver replaced and the front driver repacked about 2 months ago)

Any thoughts? Any thoughts on possible costs?

 

ya it's probably something with the axle. take a look under the car and you'll either see that the axle is out of it's connection spots on either ends or the cv boot has exploded. it's happened to a few people on here b4.

 

that would be a nice thing to happen going 90 on the highway

 

Ugh, the thought of that makes my blood run cold. I can't imagine an incidence where I would have to turn my wheel hard to the left on a highway, though.

So, as it turned out, the passenger axle had somehow snapped. After a sleepless night last night poring through every thread on here for some insight, and fearing a 1,500 dollar repair, It only cost me about 300 bucks.

Strange thing is...I have NO idea how that could have happened. Didn't bottom out or anything of the sort. Last thing I did was parallel park in some slush. I mean, it has 170,000 miles and still runs as tight as it did 5 years ago, so maybe it was just time...

 

Just did both of my axles after 1 was failing. Drove to a shop and had to drive clear across the city. My steering wheel was going crazy on the drive, glad there's another axle if one fails lol.

Glad it worked out for you.

 

When I picked up my 97 (170k) it wouldnt move just like you described. The seller thought it needed a new tranny ("proffesionally" diagnosed this way) so he took the cost of a used tranny of the resale value. Turns out the prop shaft/center axle was not connected to the trans for whatever reason. That parallel parking job was just the last straw on the camel's back. A broken cv joint is never a question of how (unless the boot is torn), but when.