thewhip

When parked and in gear (and turned off), my 2013 Audi S4 manual will occasionally roll backwards (until it hits something). This happens even on slight inclines. I have never had a manual that rolls when left in gear (and had a manual 2000 S4 prior to this one for 13 years).. I took the car into our Audi Dealership more than a year ago (when still under warranty and Audi care), and they said this was "normal" behavior. I was so surprised that I had the repair manager sign a statement to that effect. I am curious if anyone else has experienced this issue?

The car has 60,000 miles, but did this even when it was nearly brand new. Didn't set the E-brake today in a nearly flat parking space during a quick pick up and the car rolled into a concrete barrier.

SVTour

There's no way this could be normal...

superswiss

I wouldn't expect it to roll on a nearly flat surface, however, the only thing holding a car with a manual transmission is engine compression. Two things I can think of. You have a leak in the engine and it has low compression as a result or your clutch is bad and doesn't make a solid connection when the car is turned off. However, in general, always always use the parking brake in a manual transmission car. It should be muscle memory when getting out of the car.

How does the car drive otherwise? Does it pull as strong as ever? Does the clutch slip? Might wanna have a dealer perform a compression test to make sure your engine is still healthy.

EDIT: Also, I assume when you say in gear you leave it in first gear. Higher gears provide less resistance and the car will roll most definitely. Even reverse is less ideal. The ratio for reverse is normally somewhere between 1st and 2nd.

eric strauss

… repeatedly.

I have a very slight incline outside my office. WHen I park in the morning, I would put it in 1st gear and leave it with no parking brake. The first time I noticed it rolled back, I assumed I must have been in a hurry and left it in neutral.

A week later, one of the facilities guys walked in and said that my car had rolled back blocking the access road. I jumped up and sure enough it rolled back while in gear. In fact, by the time I got to the car, some colleagues had slowly rolled it back up, still in first gear, slowing turning the motor over. The car had only about 3K miles and was normal in all other respects.

Needless to add, I used my parking brake from then on as an addition to leaving it in gear.

My wife had a 2014 S4 with the 7-speed dual clutch and we take them both in the mountains each weekend - the S5 was not suffering any performance maladies. How odd.

Eric

DrGP

The only way for your car to roll front or back with transmission in gear if if the engine is turning or the clutch not fully engaged,

ECS Tuning-Audi

Definitely seems clutch related. I'd maybe expect a little rocking when left in gear on a slight incline to tighten up the slack in the drivetrain but not to the extent were a vehicle would roll back/forward several feet.

Jason

eric strauss

… in response to the last to queries, the engine is indeed turning over. It as though the variable valve timing gear is leaving the intake or exhaust valves slightly open and full compression is not happening.

The additional odd thing is that the car was hard to start both times it happened. Required 10-15 seconds of starter motor input to finally catch. Very odd.

The car was sold at about 25K and I have then had a 2014 S-Tronic S5, now a 2015 RS5, so no long term shenanigans to report from the six-speed S5.

Eric