It's funny... I was on the Audi USA site this morning, looking at recall info and for the complaint department, and there's this whole section on there commitment to the customers: "We are committed to delivering more than state-of-the-art design, safety, performance and technology in every Audi. We are committed to creating a legacy of responsible, caring stewardship for both our customers and their families, as well as our employees and their families. Equally important is our collective responsibility to be acutely aware of our individual and collective impact on our planet and its limited resources.

To Our Owners
No matter the model, the Audi ownership experience is always as exceptional as the Audi driving experience. From our extensive service program to the convenience of genuine Audi accessories, we pride ourselves on an experience our owners will find professional, courteous and memorable.

The same spirit behind the exceptional vehicles that wear the Audi Rings drives our commitment to an equally impressive ownership experience. To ensure that you receive the excellence you expect, we have established service and accessory programs that are second to none."

If only they followed their word, and actually took care of their customers and the mistakes/problems their company caused!

 

Thanks to all that have posted their stories and are keeping people updated. Much appreciated.

Just an update, check engine light came on again at 22,881 miles so brought the car in. Service ran an Audi branded cleaner through the system as well as a can of the BG and check engine light cleared without the "walnut shell" cleaning needed at 12k. The software was also flashed to increase the fuel pressure which is supposed to be the "fix" from Audi.

The dealer had just also had their first complete 3.2 engine casualty from carbon build-up. The engine could not be salvaged. I believe the assistant mentioned the car had around 24k.

In CA, the A6 3.2s were flashed before the A4's due to some environment regulations Audi needed to work through.

Griffin Motorwerkes in Berkeley, CA now offers the BG process to decarb. They've seen quite a few Audi's coming in for the service, the RS4s being the hardest hit.

Haven't pursued the issue with my local BBB as planned since I haven't had a recurrence of the issue since the "fix" from Audi. As soon as it happens though...which should be soon I will follow up.

Just as an FYI, the carbon build-up is a safety issue since you could pose a case where you go to make a left hand turn and the engine quits/stalls and leaves you vulnerable to oncoming traffic. This case happened to one of the individuals on the boards who settled with Audi out of court for a new vehicle.

-A

 

I just got a call from the Audi USA Customer Service rep after sending them a nasty email. He is going to follow up with the dealership doing my services and ensure everything possible is being done, and being done correctly. I sent him the link to this thread and highly suggested he reads it to see how much of a problem this is for several owners. He said he will look into it, but they cannot take data from outside resorces. He said, as of now, Audi USA is not tracking this as being so big of an issue with very many cars. He discussed the rescent ignition coil campain currently going on with 2002-2007 models. It took 2.5 years for them to realize it was an issue. I STRONGLY suggest that everyone having this issue with the carbon build-up, should send an email to Audi USA's Customer Satisfaction Representative department and explain your issue, and how many times it has happened. Then they will have solid documentation of it being a manufacturer issue that needs to be addressed. He said, if enough people bring this to their attention, they will have the engineers look at a way to fix it if possible, and do a recall/service campain or initiate a lifetime waranty.

He also said, if anyone has had to pay for any of these repairs, to keep the reciept on hand, and when they initiate action, you will get re-embursed for it. Also, if/when you use the recomended top teir gas, keep those reciepts as well, so if the dealership or Audi tries to say it was the fuel, you can show them that you are compliant with their recomendations. If we all start bugging Audi USA... actions will be initiated. He assured me of this, but it's all about numbers to make things happen.

Let's make an impact. If anyone needs help finding how/where to email, I'll be glad to point you in the right direction.

 

https://secure-www.audi.com/us/brand...ner=layerModal

This is the link to send an email to the Audi Customer Relations Advocate.

 

It is an appropriate course of action, we have nothing to loose. Let's do it!

 

Once again, anyone knows why the 2008 models have this problem
so prominently (is it the cars from the first gen of B8 models)?
Considering Audi has been doing direct injection for a while and this
is a problem with all direct injected engines ...

And have they fixed it in 2009+?

 

Not sure why the 2008s were affected so badly....maybe because later model cars had increased fuel pressure and/or maybe it's too soon to see the issue en masse. Cars affected are not just Audi's...the VW GTI is also impacted as well as BMW's 2007 335i. The difference is that BMW has acknowledged the problem and has warrantied the the affected components to 100k.

Re earlier posting about Audi not knowing about this issue...that is just a load of crap. The response posted is almost identical to the one I received in early 2009. Audi has been working on a "fix" for over a year which was delayed rolling out in CA due to EPA regulations. Audi got approval for the A6 3.2s but not to do the A4 3.2s.

When my first junior service advisor told me over 30% of the 2008s were coming back in May 2009 with the carbon problem, he was reprimanded directly by Audi of America. I've had two other Senior service advisors at different Audi dealers say that mentioning the carbon buildup issue even to other dealership employees would be grounds for termination.

There is a well planned and coordinated effort by Audi America to cover up this issue.

-A

 

This could be big bad press mess for Audi, just like the unintended acceleration issues in the early 80's that devastated Audi sales and it took the company 15 years to recover. I don't have the issue, so I dont' have cause to do this, but someone should write a letter to the "office of the president" aka Johan de Nysschen at Audi and CC some favorite investigative news programs like CBS 60 Minutes, ABC Dateline, John Stossel at 20/20.

If you know how to write a press release (there's plenty of how to guides on the net), you can just email it to every newpaper you know of with pictures of the dirty valves. It's easy for a newspaper to just print a press release than it is for you to tell them a story and then they have to assign someone to it and it gets losts in the shuffle.

 

I thought I had a lonely lemon until I found this thread...

2008 A4 Cabriolet, 3.2. Purchased used at 17,000 (uh oh....now I know why he wanted to sell such a new car...). I'm at 55,000 mi now - and I've had the carbon removal process (first the additive, and then, with no improvement, the head removal) twice. So far, no charge.

My service advisor at the dealer promises that Audi will have a "fix" by November 1; from the looks of this thread, that promise has been made before. He also says that the issue is related to ethanol content in the fuel; that's great; can't find fuel in this area without it, and the EPA just approved increasing ethanol from 10% to 15%.

After the last cleaning, dealer gave me three cans of German-labelled additive, to add to the next 3 tanks of gas.

I'm holding my breath to see how long this lasts. I fully expect another set of rough idle on start-up, CEL, and misfires. The question is who will pay the next time.

I make my living in litigation. This sounds like a known design defect. My dealer has been great, but if the factory does not cowboy up and accept responsibility, this could get interesting.

 

Frank3: Thanks for the addition to this post. My last carbon issue was at 26,000 miles and I'm now at around 40,000. I'm waiting for something to "break". Fortunately I still have some warranty left. I'm curious to know if you had the software update that I mentioned in a previous post?

Anyone else have a software update done that Audi claims will fix the problem? I think Bearshark had it done too.

Here's the info again from my invoice on what was done.

"PERFORMED ECM UPDATE AND VALVE/INTAKE CLEANING PER TAC LINE CASE #MG-355049".

Not sure if this info helps or not. Everyone, do let us know what additional information you have to share.

Cheers,
Chris...