Mr.D-'97 A4q 12v

Is anyone aware of any precedent of Audi helping to cover costs of a major engine failure such as this when the car is out of warranty? But, with only 65k on the odo and the car being 5 years old, this should not have happened IMO.

I was hoping to hear if anyone else had any problems such as this to build a case with AOA but it sounds like I am possibly just unlucky. :-(

Mr.D-'97 A4q 12v

For those that are interested, I was able to get significant help with the cost of replacing the engine. I contacted Audi Customer Relations and explained my situation as well as my Audi ownership history. They had me take it to a local dealer to diagnose. They put a bore scope into the bad cylinder and the cylinder walls are gouged badly. They quoted me $17000 to replace the long block but they heavily discounted it so I'm getting a new engine with 12 mo./12k mile warranty for not much more than a used engine would have cost.

I'm still bummed that I have to pay this when I've only had the car for 6 months and put only a little over 6000 miles on it. But, it is what it is and I'm just going to have to deal with. Any projects that my bonus and tax return would have gone towards will just have to wait until next year.

At this point, I just want the car back.

Thanks for all of the advice!

LT2BLT2A6

Glad you were able to reach an agreement that may not be perfect but one that you can live with. Thanks for sharing the outcome. Hope you get the car back soon.

NABS4

Yours was the first 3.0T that I've seen grenade. It has proven to be a reliable engine. Hopefully your ownership experience will improve.

Mr.D-'97 A4q 12v

I requested the service history this week and found out the first owner had the Stasis software flash done at 14k miles. The car had 65k miles when the engine issue occurred. I wonder if it could have contributed to the failure?

The service history is not complete, I think the first owner had some of the maintenance done at an indy mechanic. Who knows, maybe they weren't using the correct oil, or something.

FL C6.5 Avant

was the flash still in the ECU when it blew? wondering if a chunk of carbon would be more likely cause?
don't suppose there was any post-mortem autopsy?
how's the new long block?

Mr.D-'97 A4q 12v

I assume that the Stasis flash is still installed. The car always felt stronger than I expected but I never drove another one for comparison. I didn't see any evidence in the service history that the ECU was flashed back to stock and it noted at 40k miles when the first owner traded it in that the car was not CPO eligible due to "Stasis Modification". I may not have mentioned that the dealer did the Stasis flash.

WOW, could a chunk of carbon be THAT bad? Never considered that. The only thing the dealer could tell me via scope was that the cylinder walls in Cyl 1 were gouged badly. I doubt they spent the time to tear down the engine.

The new engine is running great. I'm nearly ready for my first, 5000 mile oil change.

njblue82

Sorry to hear about your difficulties. I have a 4.2L A6 without oil consumption concerns (but with a timing chain that had to be replaced at 130k for $3k!) and I've been looking at either an S5 Cabrio (3.0T) or an A6 with the same engine. On another board I read that the spec for oil changes on both "T" (not really turbos, right?) is something like 1200 or 1500 miles. I have not seen such a discussion thread (yet) on AudiWorld. My concern is if these engines use that much oil, I would have to rely on the original owner maintaining that ridiculous oil replenish regimen. Whether Audi dealers do it as part of the included maintenance or not, 1500 miles is still a PITA. In your dealings with Audi, did you hear of such frequent oil change specs? Thanks.

Kris Hansen

Oil CHANGES? No, Audi says 10k for full changes, but probably the min distance for adding 1 full quart?

Dibbyman

Hi, Everyone! I recently purchased a 2012 Audi A6 3.0T prestige which I saved up a lot of money for! Unfortunately, I got a EPC light and I noticed that my coolant was low during my first oil change. I didn’t think too much of it and I proceeded to top off the coolant and continue with my oil change. A week later and 300 miles of driving I started the car and I got a message on the dash saying “coolant low, turn off vehicle immediately” I turned the car off and checked the coolant reservoir. It was in fact low. So I drove across the street to autozone and purchased some premix coolant and topped it off. On the way home I felt a little bit of a buckle on the highway as I was accelerating and no lights came on the dash. I went home and checked the reservoir, it seemed to be in the same place where I left it. I was keeping an eye on the coolant and I noticed it had dropped a very little bit. I wanted to have a cooling system test done on the car to see if we could locate the leak. The mechanic searched throughout the car and didn’t seem to find any leaks but the pressure had dropped by 2 pounds. There was no distinct smell of coolant either. Just as a curiousity he took the spark plug out of the car on cylinder number 4 and noticed there was coolant and oil on top of the piston including some gas. He emptied out the cylinder with the mixture and told me that there was a bad head gasket. I asked a few of my friends who have cars with the same motor and they said, they had never heard of a bad head gasket on these motors before. Please help! I am 22 years old as well as a college student, I wanted to be more mature and drive a car like this for luxury and reliability! I don’t have thousands in the bank because I spent it all towards “my baby”(this car)