GDawgA4
09-04-2007, 05:54 PM
Got there at 8am this morning (they open at 9am). Figured I would let the car cool in the hour before he opened. Got the car into the bay and started around 9:30.
Everything was going well until we hit the crank bolt! This was around 12pm, a few hours into the job. The crank bolt would just not come out (to do the crank seal). After multiple hits with a torch, we finally got it off. It took 1.5 hours to get this one bolt off, literally. Got it off at 1:30pm. He looked up the factory torque specs, 66 ft-lbs!!! Someone went loctite happy from factory or over torqued it. Lee even made a custom crank tool! He took a wrench and welded a few nuts to it so that he could thread bolts through the nuts and into the crank to hold it in place while he attempted to loosen the nut. Pretty cool stuff watching him work.
From there, everything went smoothly till it was time to get the TB on. It just didn't want to go on. It took a while to get that belt on. Once we got it on, it was off by 1/2 a tooth! Manually cranked the crank to line it up but it just didn't want to line up. Lee thought that 1/2 tooth mark should line up after the engine cranks over and lets it rotate a few times to stretch out the bolt. Buttoned everything back up minus the front bumper and started her up. I also told Lee about the front end clunking noise I've had for a long time now. Drove around the parking lot to determine the cause of the noise.
While we were looking for the noise, the CEL came on and a quick check of the codes said crank position sensor was tripping it. Yup, the timing was slightly off. We re-adjusted the belt and finally it lined up perfectly, think the belt needed some stretching first.
Looking at the clunking noise, we determined it was the subframe! We could reproduce it by hand using a bar and slipping it right below the transmission and the cross frame. Moving the bar up and down to lift the transmission slightly caused the clunk in the cross subframe. It was due to Audi's genius idea of crimp folding part of the subframe instead of welding it. Lee hit the cross section by welding the crimp folds and VOILA! Clunk no more!
Started at 9:30am and finished at 7:30pm with Lee working with my car the whole way. He didn't want to send me on my way without fixing everything that I came in for and he stuck to that. Props to Lee for his attention to detail and determination to fix all the problems. We certainly came across a few stubborn bolts and such but Lee worked right through it. He is also a great teacher, taught me a few tricks and tips working on the car. It didn't even feel like I was there for almost 12 hours, we just had fun working on the car. Lee did most of the work, I just helped hand him tools, remove some parts, etc.
Even though Lee spent all day working on the car, he charged me MUCH less than all the hours put in. I'll definitely be going to Lee for repairs out of my league even though it is 45 minutes away from me. The customer service, fun attitude and knowledge of Lee will have me returning. I recommend Lee for any of your repair needs!
Everything was going well until we hit the crank bolt! This was around 12pm, a few hours into the job. The crank bolt would just not come out (to do the crank seal). After multiple hits with a torch, we finally got it off. It took 1.5 hours to get this one bolt off, literally. Got it off at 1:30pm. He looked up the factory torque specs, 66 ft-lbs!!! Someone went loctite happy from factory or over torqued it. Lee even made a custom crank tool! He took a wrench and welded a few nuts to it so that he could thread bolts through the nuts and into the crank to hold it in place while he attempted to loosen the nut. Pretty cool stuff watching him work.
From there, everything went smoothly till it was time to get the TB on. It just didn't want to go on. It took a while to get that belt on. Once we got it on, it was off by 1/2 a tooth! Manually cranked the crank to line it up but it just didn't want to line up. Lee thought that 1/2 tooth mark should line up after the engine cranks over and lets it rotate a few times to stretch out the bolt. Buttoned everything back up minus the front bumper and started her up. I also told Lee about the front end clunking noise I've had for a long time now. Drove around the parking lot to determine the cause of the noise.
While we were looking for the noise, the CEL came on and a quick check of the codes said crank position sensor was tripping it. Yup, the timing was slightly off. We re-adjusted the belt and finally it lined up perfectly, think the belt needed some stretching first.
Looking at the clunking noise, we determined it was the subframe! We could reproduce it by hand using a bar and slipping it right below the transmission and the cross frame. Moving the bar up and down to lift the transmission slightly caused the clunk in the cross subframe. It was due to Audi's genius idea of crimp folding part of the subframe instead of welding it. Lee hit the cross section by welding the crimp folds and VOILA! Clunk no more!
Started at 9:30am and finished at 7:30pm with Lee working with my car the whole way. He didn't want to send me on my way without fixing everything that I came in for and he stuck to that. Props to Lee for his attention to detail and determination to fix all the problems. We certainly came across a few stubborn bolts and such but Lee worked right through it. He is also a great teacher, taught me a few tricks and tips working on the car. It didn't even feel like I was there for almost 12 hours, we just had fun working on the car. Lee did most of the work, I just helped hand him tools, remove some parts, etc.
Even though Lee spent all day working on the car, he charged me MUCH less than all the hours put in. I'll definitely be going to Lee for repairs out of my league even though it is 45 minutes away from me. The customer service, fun attitude and knowledge of Lee will have me returning. I recommend Lee for any of your repair needs!