I'm joining this forum b/c I'm getting super frustrated with Audi. So last year I noticed that my car would start abruptly from standstill whenever I drive up this particularly steep road near my office. I've taken it to an Audi dealership 5 times now to no avail and even have a pending lemon law case now. I'd like to make other people aware of the problem and I'd love it if you could test it on your car if you live near a steep hill. Please respond to this thread and even report it to Audi if you've got the fortitude to deal with them stonewalling you.

So technically, Audi is saying the hill holder "feature" engages whenever you stop on a steep hill. Apparently it's "designed" so that the hill holder grabs the brakes and then the transmission goes into neutral. When you go from brake to gas, the transmission then goes into gear and you're off. All good in theory. So in real life, the problem is my car starts abruptly with a small grinding/slipping noise every time I stop/go on a steep hill. There's a lag and the transmission doesn't engage quickly enough to prevent an abrupt start. It kinda slips and then bang engages. You would think it should start smoothly which is what you would expect out of a semi-luxury car. In 20+ yrs of owning European cars (1-Saab, 3-BMW, 2-Porsche, 1-MB), I've never had a single car do this so it is definitely not normal.

So Audi's response to my problem is that there's nothing wrong with it. They say it's performing according to manufactured specifications and that they will do nothing about it. Even this morning I took my car in to replace the sunroof motor and they refused even to document my hill holder complaint again b/c Audi says nothing is wrong with it and they can't keep documenting my complaint. My lemon law hearing is later this year and along with my other problems (steering shudder at low speeds-fixed, faulty sunroof-fix today, cold stalling due to a megatronic unit falling off inside the transmission-fixed) I'm hoping Audi will do right and take back my car.

Sincerest apologies for the lengthy post, but I really needed to vent. Please test your car and report back to this forum. Even my loaner car today as the same problem so I suspect every person on this A4 B8 forum has it as well.

 

I believe the way the hill hold assist works is similar to the parking brake assist. It will not release the hold until you gas enough force to activate the brake release, in which case it will jerk if u gas too much. That jerk is normal. If you gas lightly, the release is smooth and there is no jerk.

I'm assuming you are in Europe or ROW? The Audi hill-hold assist is not available in North America to the best of my knowledge.

 

I'm in the NJ/NY area. There just happens to be a few steep hills near my office. It has to be on a steep hill for clarification. On steep hills, you have to gas it very lightly for it to start smoothly, but gas'ing it that lightly is not really normal driving in my opinion.

 

I'm in the NJ/NY area. There just happens to be a few steep hills near my office. It has to be on a steep hill for clarification. On steep hills, you have to gas it very lightly for it to start smoothly, but gas'ing it that lightly is not really normal driving in my opinion. I don't agree with you that a jerk in this scenario is normal as I don't know of any other cars in the same class that do this. I recently had a Mercedes-Benz C300 loaner car and it didn't jerk at all no matter how much I gas'd it.

 

K, since ur in the same state as me, I can safely say that you do not have hill hold. Hill Hold is an extra button behind the electro-magnetic parking brake button:



This is not available in North America. I'm assuming what you have is an automatic A4. Do you have the parking brake engaged when you experience the jerk effect?

 

Sorry, forgot to mention it's an automatic transmission (had to accommodate the wife). Not engaging the parking brake. The US automatic A4's definitely have a hill holder feature though. The technician admitted to me verbally that this is a problem with the A4 and not the higher models, but when it got to the service manager they hid behind the "it's working to spec" defense. I'm just pissed every time I go up the same steep street which is often.

 

I think the "hold" effect you are experiencing with your automatic A4 is the car preventing rollback since its not in reverse gear which is normal for automatics of any car. Thats not the hill hold. The audi hill hold assist can be activated and deactivated with that extra button behind the parking brake. If you do not have that button then you dont have the hill hold. This has been discussed in depth at the audizine forums. I suggest you search or post there since this forum is very inactive: http://www.audizine.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?97-B8-A4

I have a 6MT, I roll on steep hills and have to balance the clutch and gas to get smooth takeoffs on hills, but the parking brake auto release helps tons. I doubt they will give autos a feature that my 6MT doesnt have simply because its an auto.

 

Well, that's not how the Audi technician explained it. Most automatic transmissions actually keep the gear engaged and when on hills there is enough torque to keep the car from rolling back. Most cars therefore just go smoothly. Audi implemented a different design on the B8 automatics where the brakes are engaged and then the transmission is put into neutral. It's probably more efficient b/c the engine doesn't have any load on it, but that's where the problem is b/c there's a short lag between the brakes releasing and before the auto transmission starts. That's my understanding of what is causing this abrupt start, but my bigger issue is that Audi is refusing to acknowledge it's a problem and therefore not doing anything about it. I'd like to know what other people think.

 

Thats right. The brake release and the car moving forward initiates the jerk effect. Similar to using the auto release on the park brake. Again, I suggest you use the audizine forums. This forum is very inactive. See my previous post.

 

I don't have any hill holder on my 09 A4 nor do I have a problem with going up hills. Can't say I drove up many lately though.