The Project Pad

Well folks, it's finally happened... I got the wife to buy an Audi! God help me...

It's a 2004 sedan, quattro of course, 1.8t with an automatic (yeah, yeah). If anyone here doesn't know what a B6 A4 looks like, it looks like this:




The goals for this "project" are a little different than most here. Most likely this car will never have more than OE horsepower, corner or stop any better than it did when new, or ride any lower. What it will do if I'm successful is meet my better half's standards for functionality and reliability. I suspect in the long term that will make sticking an AAN motor with an urquattro drivetrain and 5-lug conversion on a B3 80 look like a walk in the park!

The biggest difficulty is that I have absolutely no familiarity with these cars. I actually used to fix Audis for a living, but at that time most B3s were still under warranty, and the B6 was just a gleam in some German engineer's eye. So I'm hoping I can tap into MG's collective wisdom to educate me!

The good news is I think I'm starting off pretty well. Although it's got 202K miles, this is a one-owner car that seems to have been very well maintained. It's very clean, the interior is probably 8/10, and it runs & drives beautifully, with zero squeaks or rattles. We paid $3,100 for it which I think is pretty reasonable, especially considering it came with separate summer & winter wheels and tires. The only exterior flaws are a few small rust spots which I'm going to take care of.

The weirdest & biggest issue with equipment brings me to my first question. The rear radio speakers don't seem to be working! And here's the dumb question: where the heck are they? Or did some models come with no rear speakers? I looked in the trunk but didn't see them... I suppose the other obvious location is the rear doors but I haven't had a chance to look there yet.

Rear decklid and doors.

Nice score!

Before you go crazy pulling panels off make sure your radio is properly coded. If not some speakers may not work

Coded as in entering the security code, or something you'd do with a VAG-COM?

Hey another question: how hard is it to replace a fender on one of these cars?

My only experience with such things was when I parted my B2 - people said "it just bolts on" but thanks to some glue/sealant it was a real biatch to remove. Is the B6 easier/harder/same?

It doesn't really show in the pics but the right front has a nasty rusted area at the bottom, and it looks like new fenders (unpainted I'm sure) can be had pretty cheap. So rather than trying to fix the rust, I'm thinking about replacing the whole panel.

Its easier it isn't under coated to the car like early cars. Audi may fix it that car is still under corrosion warrenty.

Yeah we'll probably try that, but from what I read on the intertubes they frequently won't make good on that warranty. I've also read that on an older car they may only cover 70% of the cost... and the remaining 30% at the dealer could be more than buying a new aftermarket fender and either having it painted or painting it myself!

You can have the work done at any body shop. The panel has to be perforated, for them to cover it.

Well... it didn't take long until I had my first "WTF moment" with this car!

Look closely at this (out of focus because my camera is lousy with closeups) vacuum line:

Do Audi vacuum lines normally come from the factory with slots in them that look like they were made with a hacksaw? I suspect not...

What I really can't figure out is how it got that way. This line goes from the engine to the brake booster, and there's nothing really near it. Someone obviously knew there was a problem because it was wrapped with electrical tape. The only thing I can think of is someone was hacksawing something nearby (cringe...) and hit this line. Twice.

And a new one's a piddling 55 bucks. Oh well, I guess that's how you know you're not driving a Corolla...

Instances like these are the perfect opportunity to buy used, if that line is the same as a b7 I'll ship you one for $15. I'll have to look at the one on the car I'm dismantling for a friend, can probably let you know tomorrow.

Hey thanks!

I probably should have thought about that earlier, but I've already ordered a new one. I do appreciate the offer though!

elaw wrote:Coded as in entering the security code, or something you'd do with a VAG-COM?

Coding with the vag-com or equivalent. Its the way to tell the radio what kind of car its in and what equipment it has to deal with such as CD changers or Bose. If someone replaced the radio with a used one but did not properly code it some of the speakers may not work as the radios were all the same even across model lines and option packages.

Heh... funny you should mention VAG-COM. I just ordered one of these: http://store.ross-tech.com/shop/VCHN_10.html... Eric is a very happy camper! 8)

On a mostly unrelated note... does anyone know what it would take to upgrade the non-Bose audio system in this car to Bose? I've done some looking in elsawin (God that thing's miserable) and will look some more, but I'm curious if anyone here's BTDT.

elaw wrote:Heh... funny you should mention VAG-COM. I just ordered one of these: http://store.ross-tech.com/shop/VCHN_10.html... Eric is a very happy camper! 8)

On a mostly unrelated note... does anyone know what it would take to upgrade the non-Bose audio system in this car to Bose? I've done some looking in elsawin (God that thing's miserable) and will look some more, but I'm curious if anyone here's BTDT.

More work than it would be worth. The entire stereo wiring is different with an amp and speaker configuration along with the speakers themselves. The stereo harness is fully integrated into the body harness so its not like swapping a sub harness. You could install a very nice but fairly well hidden aftermarket system for much less money and headache IMHO.

Personally I would just keep the OEM head unit and upgrade the speakers. Maybe a small hidden sub in the trunk or under the rear deck to add some more bass, which is what the base stereo really lacks from the Bose units.

elaw wrote:Well... it didn't take long until I had my first "WTF moment" with this car!

Look closely at this (out of focus because my camera is lousy with closeups) vacuum line:

Do Audi vacuum lines normally come from the factory with slots in them that look like they were made with a hacksaw? I suspect not...

What I really can't figure out is how it got that way. This line goes from the engine to the brake booster, and there's nothing really near it. Someone obviously knew there was a problem because it was wrapped with electrical tape. The only thing I can think of is someone was hacksawing something nearby (cringe...) and hit this line. Twice.

And a new one's a piddling 55 bucks. Oh well, I guess that's how you know you're not driving a Corolla...

Looks like someone but an oetiker clamp with a die grinder and wasn't paying attention. You might just want to spend the extra $100-150 and replace all the pcv stuff under the intake, piece-mealing it can get frustrating long-term, pull the intake and do it all once.


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Yeah... I was originally intending to do that, but the pieces I've looked at so far (which definitely is not all of them) actually appear to be in pretty good shape.

But... after replacement of that hose I'm still getting a recurring fault code for the brake vacuum pump running too often, so clearly something else is up.

So here's an interesting one: this car seems to have 5 oil dipsticks!

There's one in the usual location, but there seems to be one on top of each spark plug too. The ones on top of the plugs don't have "add"/"full" marks, but all show an oil level between 1/2" and 1" up from the bottom. Clearly baby needs a valve cover gasket.

Although the CEL wasn't on, the car had several stored misfire codes, and a couple of days ago it started misfiring worse and the CEL actually did come on. Since I had some suitable spark plugs around and didn't know how old the ones in the engine were, I undertook to replace them.

As described above, there was oil in the bottom of each plug hole. I cleaned that up as well as cleaning up the coils, but I'm curious whether just the oil can cause a misfire? Oddly, it seems like #1 and #2 had the most oil in them, but the codes indicate misfires on #3 and #4 (as well as "random misfire").

Anyhow, removing the plugs was interesting. #1 was reasonably easy and #3 wasn't too much worse, but I thought I was going to need a small thermonuclear device to get #2 and #4 out. Finally with some PB blaster and working them back and forth I got them out and don't think I damaged the threads. The plugs were definitely well worn, although their color looked pretty good.

Oh and did I mention the connectors for the coils all self-destructed to varying degrees when I tried to remove them? Ugh. :( The inside bits held up fine, but the locking tabs on all four and parts of the outside housing on two are history. Now held together with electrical tape pending arrival of new parts.

So after all that it seemed to run better, although I haven't had a chance to check codes again. My gut tells me there's still something wrong.

Oh and the CEL? Secondary air system. Another thing to troubleshoot... yay. That, and the fact that both rear doors will only unlock on alternate Tuesdays after you sacrifice a chicken in view of the car.

Jeez! Who has(n't) been taking care of this thing?

Well, I think the PO tried to take good care of it, but did maintenance "by the book". Which probably means oil change every 10K, plugs every... what... 100K?

Put it this way, the plugs were iridium and had gaps close to 2x new. So while there was oil in the holes, it may have had 50K miles to accumulate!

Door issues are probably drivers door harness, pretty common.

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Even though it's the rear doors (only) having the problem? Do you know what in particular goes wrong?

Shorts in the door harness...

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Gah... if that's it, I'm going to die of deja vu.

I spent many hours of my life repairing driver's door wiring in C3s back when I worked as a mechanic...

I remember one where the driver's seat would move all by itself when the car was being driven. For some reason the owner didn't particularly like that "feature".

The SAI issue could be due to the pump failing. If you don't have emissions requirements, it could be worthwhile to delete that lump.

My b6 had similar issues, opened up the harness and found 2 broken wires, and 3 more with broken insulation...