Anyone know how reliable Audi A4's are??
A jeep dealer near me has a 2002 Audi A4 3.0l Quattro with 97K miles all maintenance records and such for $5500. It's black with tan interior.
I had a 2003 A4 1.8T for several years before getting the FX. Got it around 100k miles, sold it at 135k. This 3.0L A4 doesn't have many miles for a 2002.
The interior is really well built, no rattle no noise nothing. The ride was a bit less comfortable than the FX, due to stiffer suspension. Even if the car was less powerful than the FX (less pw/weight), it was quite fun to drive and agile.
On the maintenance, I had to fix some oil leaks here and there: gasket seals twice, replaced the PVC as I suspected a too high oil pressure, then done. The first Tiptronic transmission liquid change got costly, as several seals were done and as Audi changed the design of the rear shaft connection: new parts, more hours, that costed around 1300$ instead of the usual 300$.
On the electronic side, the only parts that failed was an oil sensor, and an electical window actuator (I wask asked for 300 to 500$ to fix it, I did it myself and it cost only a 20$ new plastic part fixing the window to the engine cable, very common at this mileage).
Several parts of the front suspension were to be changed over three years: 3 control arms, two bearings etc. A 200$ bill every few months. Classic for Audis near 200k km / 125k miles.
This averaged to 1500-2000$ a year in maintenance. But it never let me down. Always started, even by -18°C (which is 0°F I think). Always easily drove out of parking even with more than 20 cm of ice and snow, while coworkers were working hard removing snow from around their cars
The 3.0L V6 is a tad faster than the 1.8T, but not that much (220cv but heavier vs 163cv, and the 1.8T can be tuned to 215cv with no change). It doesn't have the turbocharger, which means simpler maintenance. Still it has two timing belts, and changing them requires getting the engine out of the car as there is one at the rear of the block. This costs 1300$ at a German car specialist garage, much more at the dealer.
Not sure about the oil of the V6, but I suspect it's the same as the 1.8T: use only synthetic oil! Also these cars like 91 gas. Running 87 or 89 will degrade much the performance thus it will end being more expensive on the consumption.
If you have a strong winter like we do in Quebec, Audis are quite perfect cars during that period. I'm eager to see how the FX will behave in comparison :smile (2):
Also the 2002s are the first year of the B6 generation A4. Thus they're the beta testers and they might have more issues than the following years. See carsurvey dot org.