Euphy

Hey guys, first post, looking to join the audi family!

Been on the market for a B8.5 for a while now, and a 2012 A5 B8.5 Quattro with the 2.0 TFSI Petrol engine has met all my search criteria.

However in general I've been seeing that there are a lot of concerns (oil consumption, timing chain wear) with the 2008 to 2012 B8 4 cylinder models. I hear these were mostly addressed in the facelift, however most places I've found still say to avoid models 2012 and earlier, so I was wondering if the facelift B8.5 from 2012 is included in that group? If so, what year would the B8.5 have reached it's 'probable' highest reliability? Will be looking at the 2.0 Petrol Quattros. I'm more than happy to be super diligent about servicing and oil changes however it's more so about if the previous owner's treatment of the car would have a concern in anyway (following scheduled servicing, I wouldn't consider a car that hasn't followed strict regular servicing intervals).

Finally, the car has 120,000km (75k miles). Is there anything to watch out for at this mileage or should I narrow my criteria down to a lower odometer?

Your help is super appreciated,
Euphy

findalex

Nope. 2012 is before they updated the tensioner and piston ring (gen2, there's a gen3 for later models). those updates started with cars manufactured in 2nd half of 2012, sold as 2013 model years.

i'd advise to look for 2013 at minimum. I have a 2013 A5 and so far, no problems with timing chain/tensioner nor oil burning. had to change the water pump and replace shocks/struts though. also the upper timing cover. but the PCV is still original. Car still runs GREAT at 113K miles.

I change all the fluids (oil, coolant, ATF, differential) early or even if Audi says not to. I would like to think that contributes to my car's longevity.

Neil L F

Oil consumption is a long standing issue

https://www.google.com/search?q=audi...hrome&ie=UTF-8

Euphy

Reply much appreciated. I'll try grab the engine code when I see it and confirm its a gen1 and if so, I'll follow your advice and limit my search to 2013+. I agree with your fluid schedule, I'll be following the same thing myself. Small price to pay to give the engine it's best life.


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Euphy

So I checked out a 2012 MY13 and a 2013 MY13, both had the CDNC 2.0T which is a generation 1 from what I understand. Really unfortunate as one of them was a serious consideration, but I don't think I can afford to take on the generation 1 risk. Makes things difficult because I was so sure that a 2013 built MY13 would have had at least a gen2, so now that I've cleared that up I'm sorta limiting my search to 2014+ which doesn't help my budget.

SMac770

There is no Gen1 2.0T longitudinal EA888. CDNC (EU) = CAEB (US) = 155kW Gen2 longitudinal 2.0T EA888 with AVS (audi valvelift system, on the exhaust cam).

Unless your market uses the Gen3 (CNCD), all your B8.anything 2.0T are using CDNx engines, all of which have the same piston ring concern. Once you fix the pistons (or find an engine that's been fixed), it seems to be fine after that. I have 150k miles now after my pistons replaced (at 234k miles overall) and I still don't burn any appreciable oil between oil changes in my MY09 CAEB.

If it really works for you on the car side, get an extended warranty that would be sure to deal with having to replace the pistons if the issue starts up. But you'll have zero heads up when it happens. My car burned no oil between oil changes up through 75k miles. Then it was burning a quart per fuel tank before I got to the 85k oil change. Pistons replaced at 84k miles.

Euphy

Ah okay, that's really helpful to know. My market is Australia, do you have any idea or is there any way to check if my market uses those gen3? Also, I know it'll differ wildly from country to country but how much was your piston ring replacement? Unless it was covered by warranty.

findalex

The best way is go by engine code and manufacturing date. What I meant by Gen2 is that I have the 2nd generation of the piston ring design. The 2nd generation of the piston ring design was supposed to fix the oil consumption problem, but many are saying that it doesn't fix ALL of the oil burning issues. The oil burning issue w/ piston rings is caused by carbon buildup that clogs up the oil scrapper ring. So when the ring is clogged with carbon, the oil can't return to the crankcase and gets burnt.

What smac770 was referring to was the generation of the EA888 engine. I guess even within the same generation engine, there are different revisions on parts, so I'm referring to 2nd generation engine w/ 2nd generation piston ring design.

I've been lucky not to have oil burning but maybe that's because I change oil frequently and use "Top Tier" gasoline (it's a marketing thing but supposed to have more detergent in the gas). I used to change the oil every 8K, and now every 4K because oil is cheap and engines aren't. I also used LiquiMoly's engine flush once and the new oil came out VERY black afterwards. I'd like to think that the engine flush helps dissolve some of that carbon buildup on the piston rings, but there's no way to confirm that unless I take the engine apart. For now, I'm just thankful that it's not burning a drop of oil.

dhuddleson

Suggest your best source of information for your Australia market is to speak with an Audi dealership service department to ask them to clarify year/month of the 2.0TFSI engines received in Australia...

findalex

I thought every engine has a label with a built date?