lastls1

Also: How are the control arms and tie rod ends?? Have them inspected by an indy mechanic

Eurobarge

Agreed...quick look on autrader.com shows many cars at or below this price with similar milage

Eurobarge

^^^good point, common and potentially pricey repair^^^

Whitjr

You'll like it, enjoy it. sounds like the maint is done for a while.

richardsc

Yeah all of the service was done at Graham Audi of Sioux Falls, SD, and they seemed to be friendly and quite knowledgeable about the car.

Thanks for the info and opinions everyone!

silverkris

Well, it looks like the pricey major repairs were already done by someone else. If everything else checks out (by an independent mechanic), it's worth a look. Negotiate the price, of course, with the dealer.

Also, for the future, you may want to change out the transmission fluid around every 30-40K miles. Good way to keep that "new" tranny going.

Shadowman88

I bought mine a little over a year ago, and have really enjoyed it. I get TONS of compliments on it, and it drives so good, it'll spoil you. I had to do the valve cover gaskets on it, which was an adventure considering I had never gone in that deep into an engine before. Made a huge difference. Those cam follower seals are going to be done by a mechanic I believe- they are a bear to get to and it's out of my league. Gotta know your limits right? But really, it's a helluva bargain compared to other German makes, and the quattro drivetrain is awesome (obviously). Sounds like the car you're looking at has had alot of work done to it. Good stuff there, and you should be good to go. I'd definitely get a Bentley manual- worth every penny on this car. A VAG-COM would be good if you like to do some stuff yourself. I will say get the suspension looked at- mine's starting to make crazy noises and the front CV joints are starting to go south. New CV boots make me wonder what really happened before I bought it.

richardsc

I was thinking the same thing about the 2.8 - this car is going to be my daily driver for a while, so I don't need crazy power or mod-ability ... just reliability!

I'm going to go to the dealer to talk again tomorrow, and see what they can do for me regarding a warranty along with the other bits that need checking out, seeing that repairs on this car can be amazingly expensive!

-Charles

JLaws

First of all its a "2 point late" with sub par performance even if you are not an aggressive driver.

Are you buying this car for the looks and or the awd? Bottom line this is a 9 yr old car that is not known for reliability. For the money you can spend you can get a Subaru outback awd or a fwd vehicle far more reliable,not as expensive to repair and not as old.

For me my A6 just became the most expensive vehicle maintenance wise that I have owned. I paid $15K for my 2000 4.2 almost 2 yrs ago. I spent approx $800 to get it perfect, no biggie. It was well behaved for a year and a 1/2. I just did the REQUIRED timing belt job for $1200 a couple of weeks ago. Last week my reverse gear went out and it seem to be a common problem according to the forum but I didn't expect it to happen to me!! I got a good quote of $4000 to $5000 to rebuild it which I will get done next week. That seems really unacceptable for a car with 85K miles that i've religiously maintained.
Once I get the car fixed, I plan on putting it out on the market for private sale.

I really love my Audi but not enough to deal with future breakdowns, like bad cats, control arms, expensive leak repairs, etc

OOOOya

6 months ago I bought another after our first one was t-boned. My new old Avant now has 65K on it. I paid $8900, which left me with about $1k to spare when settled up with the at-faults insurance.

IMO, reading AW daily, the 2.8's seem to be the most reliable.