Anyone own a late 90's Audi A4?

[Kaervak]

I'm being tempted by a rather nice looking 1998 A4 Wagon on craigslist. Any weird maintenance issues I should look out for? I have no problems with doing the work myself so if there is something that's horribly important, it's not that much an issue. I don't know much about the A4 I'm currently looking at since I haven't yet called on it. The pictures do show a clean body with no accident damage, I'll be running a carfax on it after I go look at it though. Aside from getting the service history anything specific I should ask about from experience? Common wear items, ectera?

 

[MrMatt]

I haven't seen a late 90s audi anything on the road in a while...

 

[gregulator]

RUN! I just got rid of my 98 A4 avant (2.8) with 200k on it. It is a love hate relationship. They are really nice, but a PITA to fix. The whole front end has to come out to fix anything with timing belt/pump/thermostat etc. Not that I did any work myself but I had local shops do it and it sucked for them. It was still a tank but a ticking time bomb of repairs. Luckily I didn't have any electrical gremlins that others complain about, but I did have an auto transmission that flared between shifts, forever leaky engine (oil and coolant), and a few other minor complaints. You just have to know what you are getting into, but every car is different. For every person that LOVES a car and has no problems, there is another that gets a lemon. I would low ball the crap out of the sellers and wait until you get a good deal. I sold mine for $500!

 

[MotF Bane]

Originally posted by: gregulator
RUN! I just got rid of my 98 A4 avant (2.8) with 200k on it. It is a love hate relationship. They are really nice, but a PITA to fix. The whole front end has to come out to fix anything with timing belt/pump/thermostat etc. Not that I did any work myself but I had local shops do it and it sucked for them. It was still a tank but a ticking time bomb of repairs. Luckily I didn't have any electrical gremlins that others complain about, but I did have an auto transmission that flared between shifts, forever leaky engine (oil and coolant), and a few other minor complaints. You just have to know what you are getting into, but every car is different. For every person that LOVES a car and has no problems, there is another that gets a lemon. I would low ball the crap out of the sellers and wait until you get a good deal. I sold mine for $500!

Um...

 

[StageLeft]

Damn you sold it for only $500?

But this is a good point I don't see many old audis driving.

 

[ViviTheMage]

what engine?

 

[JulesMaximus]

Originally posted by: gregulator
RUN! I just got rid of my 98 A4 avant (2.8) with 200k on it. It is a love hate relationship. They are really nice, but a PITA to fix. The whole front end has to come out to fix anything with timing belt/pump/thermostat etc. Not that I did any work myself but I had local shops do it and it sucked for them. It was still a tank but a ticking time bomb of repairs. Luckily I didn't have any electrical gremlins that others complain about, but I did have an auto transmission that flared between shifts, forever leaky engine (oil and coolant), and a few other minor complaints. You just have to know what you are getting into, but every car is different. For every person that LOVES a car and has no problems, there is another that gets a lemon. I would low ball the crap out of the sellers and wait until you get a good deal. I sold mine for $500!

A co-worker of mine just traded in his A4 (I think it was an '01 or thereabouts) and he had tons and I mean tons of work done on that car to keep it on the road over the years. He had over 200k miles on it but seriously every single part of that car had been replaced at least once.

That said, he just bought another Audi to replace it.

 

[halik]

I had a 96 A4 couple years back.

The main thing that goes are CV joint boots (possibly CV joints), ~50 bucks for the part and also control arms, $300-400 for the whole set. They're fairly reliable if you keep the maintenance up to date... the only thing out of the ordinary was a dead starter, but I suspect on of my room mates tried starting it in gear with handbrake on.

Also I've got a 2.7T A6 now

 

[Kaervak]

Still haven't called on it, and I'm probably not going to. I've been readng about the late 90's A4's and sadly it hasn't been very good. Shame too as I really like the look of those cars. Oh well, thanks for the info guys.