Cardiff Audi have turned my drama into a crisis!

[LynneC]

I have had a 53 reg A2 for just over a year. I quite liked it, generally speaking (until this week) – it has some annoying quirks, which, from what I’ve read, are fairly common – it pulls to the left, there’s a knocking sound when pulling away, it sticks in reverse every so often – but nothing dramatic.

Then, a couple of weeks ago, my other half complained to me that the hazard lights on the car had turned themselves on, on their own, whilst he was at work – he walked back to his car park at the end of the day to find them flashing away merrily. This happened a couple more times, including during journeys, culminating, early this week, in an aborted trip to work where they were coming on every couple of seconds, & he had to practically hold his thumb on the button all the way to Cardiff Audi to seek help.

Fair play to them, they took the car in on the day and said they would look into it. However, for what appeared to be a minor electrical problem, I was mortified to have to pay £440 to get it – allegedly – fixed; they said it was some control unit or other (NB. not the engine management system, something else) that they’d had to replace. But you can guess what’s coming next…

I walked out of my front door this morning to find the hazard lights flashing away on their own again. Off we go back to Cardiff Audi (more time begged off work) – and now, not only am I £440 out of pocket with no resolution to my problem, but they have now quoted me just under £1,300 more to – supposedly – fix it, this time by replacing the front door looms, which they say appear to have ‘evidence of slight water ingress’ – hence a total cost (assuming the second attempt at fixing it works) of a tenner shy of £1,750 to stop the hazard lights turning themselves on! Is it me, or is this totally ridiculous, for a four year old car, bought for under £10k, that is one month out of its dealer purchase warranty?

[Badger61]

Sounds like a bit more than slight water ingress to me!! I have heard of similar problems in that part of the country with A2 in particular. Sorry to hear of your problems but when water mixes with electronics all sorts of things happen.

[LynneC]

Similar problems in this part of the country? - I'd be lying if I said it never rained in Wales, but it's not THAT wet ;-)

Seriously, I can't believe they would put a car's components together in such a way that it was possible for something like this to happen. The reason I bought the car was that I had a silly, misguided notion that, being an Audi, it would be built to a better quality than cars I'd previously owned, and I'd be less likely to have issues like this.

My other gripe is the enormity of the cost (both in absolute terms, and in proportion to the purchase price of the car) to fix what is a superficial problem - nothing related to the engine or the bodywork. Surely there must be another way....?

[Badger61]

Have you considered a part exchange? Have you wondered why the A2 had such a short production run? I'm not a fan!

[T-sport]

You could always get the car fixed at a different vag dealership i.e vw,skoda,seat and still be covered by the 2 year warranty as Audi tend to charge £100 + an hour labour charges and i suspect a lot of that price quoted is majority labour costs ??

[LynneC]

It's about half and half - £600+ for two new sets of door looms, plus a couple of other bits & pieces, plus 4 hours-ish labour @£95p/h plus VAT. Thanks for the advice - gratefully received.

[LynneC]

I thought it only fair to update everyone on the outcome of this story: having researched the fault on a few forums, I concluded that it would be sensible to try replacing the flasher relay unit. A local garage did this for me, for just under £50 including part and labour. The fault has cleared completely. After a couple of rather stern letters, the Director of Business at Cardiff Audi saw my point of view & refunded me in full

Thanks to everyone that contributed - forums rock

[Badger61]

Originally Posted by AudiDoody

If you'd come to A2OC first, this would have been diagnosed in minutes!

Badger, the short production run had nothing to do with faults, and everything to do with the A2 being a lost leader for Audi - on average it cost €1000 more to make than it sold for, unless the options list was plundered by the original owner.

Cheers,

Mike

I didn't say it was anything to do with any concerns the A2 had I just asked the question (almost 3 months ago) it was a design exercise that made it into production. There was a lot more to this case than meets the eye, and yes it was, and still is, a common concern which is quite easily diagnosed.

[Badger61]

"the worst example of Vorsprung Durch Technik to date"

I've corrected that for you!

I'd like your examples of what manufacturers have harnessed A2 technology.

[Badger61]

Aluminium construction came from A8.

Agreed it is important in Audi's history (Note, History)

The E models are further development of PD diesel engines which the A2 just happened to have, however the later common rail engines are far superior and you will see the PD vanish very soon. The Blue motion project has nothing at all to do with A2.

I have formed my opinion on running several A2 TDi diesels from the very first cars that landed here and knowing all the failings, problems and the things it was good at.

As for fuel efficiency I found it was no better really than, for example, an A6 1.9 PD I was also running you just had to stop more times in a A2 because the fuel tank was too small to give it it's small mass.