kingman99

Hi 2005 A4 3.0 quattro convertible

My wife was putting the top down last night after work and half way up it stopped. One of my wifes coworkers read the manual and put the top back up.

This morning my wife dropped it off at the dealer and 4 hrs later called and told her that he got it working and only did a temp fix. It seems that a trim piece inside the top either broke or wore out causing the computer to stop the movement of the top. Like some kind of obstruction. He said that it happens over time. I have owned convertibles for 35 years and never had a problem with a top going up or down.

The cost to fix this little piece is $700 but only charged my wife for 1 hr because she is a customer.

Two things, am l getting ripped off and why can't l just do without this part.

Bottomline is that l will never own an Audi again just to fragile of a car not to mention how pricey everything is.

Should l contact Audi themselves??

Thanks

PS By the way the top is hardly used

obLu

2005 ... and you'll never own another Audi because they're too 'fragile'??! You do realize that's a 6yr old car now, which in german car years is like 85 in human.

Did you mention to the mechanic that you rarely use the top? I'm wondering if that might be more your issue than any perceived fragility.

I do suspect that you're getting fed a line though; I can't see any trim piece that would be $700 to fix that they'd just magically only charge you an hour of labor for.

kingman99

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Hi

The Audi just turned 5 yrs recently and living in the north east during the nicer weather the top comes down maybe 3/4 times a week.

The one hour they charged us was to get the top working once again but for how long is anybody's guess.

He told my wife that this is not unusual to happen.

I will look at the dealers paperwork to see if they were specific. My guess is that the trim piece is not expensive but the labor in order to get to it is time consuming.

obLu

I'm no expert, but the only "trim" involved that I can imagine would be the rear deck or the little spring loaded sliding trim pieces on the side that close when the top is up. One of those on my car sometimes binds up because one of the guide pins is busted. I could imagine that *might* be $700 to fix if the flap is ~$100 and then they're charging you massive labor to pull the trim (I plan on fixing mine myself but have no idea how much the part costs yet).

If you find out what it was, I'd love to know so that I can be on the look out.

Way back in the day I had a 2001 330 convertible and it's top mechanism operated exactly the same way. It's pretty bullet proof unless it goes out of alignment or one of the motors burns out. ... well except for the rear window issue.

Brian Cecil

A plastic brace came loose in my 2003 Cab's top about 4 years ago. The top didn't jam, but it wouldn't retract all the way into the boot, so I just put the top back up and drove it to the dealership the next business day. They put the plastic brace back in place while the car was still parked in front of the service advisor's office, without even driving it into the garage. They whole operation took less than two minutes to perform, with maybe another five minutes spent cycling the top down and back up again to make sure it was fixed. No charge at all.

obLu

Can you describe better where this brace is located?

Brian Cecil

This particular brace is located above the rear edges of the doors, fitting sideways in brackets across the car's width between the top's outer and inner layers. There are several of these plastic braces used in our tops.