My wife and i own a 2004 a4 1.8t. We bought the car almost 2 years ago from carmax. The car was great for about 6-8 months, then the nightmares started. First we had 2 coils go out, not 3 months later, 2 more went out, but they did b/c the valve cover gasket was leaking. WELL, about 6 months after that fiasco, the coils went AGAIN. We purchased the extended warranty luckily, it is just VERY frustrating and dis heartining when you think you are buying a well engineered car. I know they are very nice cars, i guess we just bought a lemon. Now i have a humming noise coming from the drivetrain.....i dont beleive its the cv shafts, im thinkin it is one of the bearing hubs starting to go bad, any thoughts, it gets louder as you slow down. Thats all the mechanical stuff that has gone wrong, we noticed the other day the headliner is starting to fall in the back seat, the dash surrounding the steering column is coming apart.....it never ends with this POS!!! i wash it once every week or two, keep up with the maintenece, and this is what my wife drives everyday, it makes me nervous her driving it, i dont want her stranded anywhere.........we will never own another audi, anyone else have these issues??ok im done ranting!!!

 

Sounds like the regular stuf that goes wrong witth these cars. The steering column thing is new, how's it falling apart? like the trim or the part where you put the ignition key?

 

no,its part of the dash, its the paice just in front of the ignition, left of the radio, i will snap u a pic......and yes i have been doin alot of researchin lately, these are common problems.....what do you think the humming/deep growling sound could be? its not popping when u drive or turn, im thinkin its the hub assembly bearing, its seems louder on the driver side

 

I do believe is a wheel bearing. There was a similar thread with the noise coming from the rear, I'll look for it and edit the link in.

This is the search result for humming you can go through those and find one that fits your prob. Unless your noise is there while the car is not moving then you can ignore the fuel pump/filter ones.

 

carmax sells junk cars. probably wasnt taken care of to begin with. ive had plenty of probs with my a4 so im not denying your probs, but carmax is part of the problem.

 

The dash is prolly comming apart because someones been in there before and didnt do the job right.

 

carmax if def. the problem, i agree 100% trammell.......just sucks, i hate my wife driving it, with the economy right now, no one wants to give me hardly anything on trade in, and i am gonna dig deeper on the bearing issue

 

Well the coil pack issue is very common on the 2001+ A4 1.8t, this is exactly why Audi had a recall on the coils and then replaced them with an updated version. But the better choice is to just replace them with the Hitachi/Beru bolt down(E version)coils from the 2000 A4 1.8t.

 

weel until my warranty runs out at carmax, THEY can keep replacin em!!! on another note...Mr. Dan1969, how would i go about determining which bearing it is up front. Im certain its not the back ones, i jacked up the car and spun both sides,no noise. I jaccked up each side of the front and put the car in neutral, but still cant tell. Do i need to remove the hub assembly to check it? and what size is the allen nut on the cv shaft???THANK YOU very much in advance!!

 

Take the car to an empty lot and do left and right turns. If the noise lessens going right, its the right bearing and vise-versa.