Sounds to me like the timing belt blew and needed new heads... If thats the case, what else wasnt maintained by the previous owner..

Also, the reason he's selling after sinking that kind of money sounds fishy...

 

I'd say maybe you should try driving another 1.8t 5-speed just so you have something to compare it to. I know when I first bought mine I thought the shifter had some excessive play in it, turns out it's normal. You could just fly up to PA and buy mine for $3800.

 

yeah well i already know abt the money issue i still have mine lol

 

Don't no if its in your budget but here is a B6 with 92k 3.0 6spd for 7k.
http://charlotte.craigslist.org/cto/1390987947.html

 

The biggest thing I see in this (which I think you know) is that you're not buying a dime-a-dozen Tercel. With the complexity and costs associated with these cars, you have to be willing to travel to get the right one. Don't settle for one just because it's close, or just buy the least problematic car in your town. You're setting yourself up for trouble limiting yourself that way. It'll bite you in the ***. Be prepared to check out cars 3-4 hours away if need be, so you can actually get your car and drive it reliably, rather than just pick it up, head home, park it, and start ordering parts to repair all the issues.

 

yeah your right man im looking at this one instead i figured that one needs 4k to get it back together with new trans and all the little issues fixed

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/cto/1373685862.html anyone like this only promblem its an auto but i can deal with this one =]

 

what about buying one with a bad timing belt and coming up here to pick up this A8l engine for 900 and doing a swap? you know you want to. i'm sure you can get a 5 speed a4 with a bad engine for at most a 1.5g. take about another G to for S4 clutch and flywheel, fabbed up engine mount brackets and you're ready to go. then you would have about 1.5 more to do w/e you want. of course that's ballpark numbers but either way, you can do the swap for about 5k at this rate lol

 

Agree with looking farther out... Im in Indiana and got one outta New Jersey

 

http://charlotte.craigslist.org/cto/1401147342.html im thinking about picking this one up needs 02 sensor and power steering hoses