S6 bad O2 sensor? need to drop engine?

[IrishCreamPuff]

Hello, I had a CEL which was just diagnosed as a bad O2 sensor (dont know which one) and was told I needed to drop the engine and tranny to fix. Luckily its covered under my extended warranty but they only cover $90 per hour. Do they really need to drop it? I thought O2 sensors were near the cats.

[jmswashere]

Yep they need to drop it for the O2 sensor, especially if it's the one of the O2 sensors up by the headers... the V10 is so tight in there, it's redonkulous. My starter blew up while in the shop, and they had to drop the engine to replace it... 20 hours of labor later... luckily that was the shop's problem, and I was not charged for it.

[v8a6]

Holy crap. I just purchased an S6 and have some worked planned that may require an engine pull. I guess I should do the O2 sensors at the same time. Anything else I should check/replace while in there? Are the starters prone to failure? My car has high mileage (130K miles) and is probably still on the original starter.

[IrishCreamPuff]

Holy crap. I just purchased an S6 and have some worked planned that may require an engine pull. I guess I should do the O2 sensors at the same time. Anything else I should check/replace while in there? Are the starters prone to failure? My car has high mileage (130K miles) and is probably still on the original starter.

Check the timing chain and timing chain guides. Also check the 4 seals at the back of the engine where the coolant hoses enter.

[v8a6]

thanks for the tip

[IanCH]

Holy crap. I just purchased an S6 and have some worked planned that may require an engine pull. I guess I should do the O2 sensors at the same time. Anything else I should check/replace while in there? Are the starters prone to failure? My car has high mileage (130K miles) and is probably still on the original starter.

Hope you can tolerate (finanicially) losing the whole car when the parts go bad. It's hard to justify the purchase of an S6 with 50k miles, nevermind 130k. Some of the members on this forum have spent more on maintenance of their S6 after only owning it for a couple of years than you probably did on that entire car.

[v8a6]

Thanks for the advice. I'm not too worried. I bought the car for a fair price, with a bunch of money put aside for maintenance, modifications, and repairs. My previous S6 is at 212k miles and still running strong. I put 13 grand into the old S6 over the last 18 months in repairs and modifications, so I am used to the running costs of Audis.

You buy a new Audi for $65k, and youll pay about ten grand in taxes (in Toronto Canada) and other admin charges. Two years from now, youll lose another $15-20k in depreciation. During that time, any maintenance or modifications will also be more money down the drain. Chip the car and change suspension, now your warranty is gone too.

People get shocked at the running costs of the older Audis, but you are guaranteed to lose AT LEAST double during the same time period on a new one. Any way you look at it, these cars are an expensive hobby.

I guess you gotta pay to play

[v8a6]

Ian, I see you previously owned a 2008 S6. If you dont mind me asking, how many months did you own it for, and how much did you spend on repairs and maintenance? If items were warrantied, what work was done?

[IanCH]

Ian, I see you previously owned a 2008 S6. If you dont mind me asking, how many months did you own it for, and how much did you spend on repairs and maintenance? If items were warrantied, what work was done?

Had my s6 for 10 months, spent 3 grand, needed to spend another 4 in the near future and there was an oil leak that would require engine dropping to diagnose. Traded it in then and there.

My s6 only have 46k miles when I bought it and 58k when I got rid of it.

[v8a6]

Had my s6 for 10 months, spent 3 grand, needed to spend another 4 in the near future and there was an oil leak that would require engine dropping to diagnose. Traded it in then and there.

My s6 only have 46k miles when I bought it and 58k when I got rid of it.

OK. Spending three grand on maintenance/repair for any freshly purchased, used car over almost a year is not a huge amount, nevermind a European performance sedan. Your cost of maintenance was only $300 a month, for what sounds to be an Audi out of warranty. Not bad, actually. On top of that, it sounds as if you purchased a car with pre-existing issues. Was it Audi CPO or did you have an independent shop thoroughly inspect the car prior to purchase?

For whatever reason, there is a lot of fear-mongering going on with these cars. But when you take a look at all the issues that people actually had with them, there are very little (if any) items reported failing that are unique to the v10 car. Carbon clean and all the related component issues? Almost all of the FSI Audi engines share these problems. Engine oil leak? I have never owned an Audi without one. Intake manifold issues? Common Audi problem. Fixing any (or all) of these issues still doesnt come anywhere close to matching the purchase price of the car, unless you know where I can find one for five grand.

If I only have to spend three or four grand a year to maintain the S6, then Ill be more than happy. To put things in perspective, you are losing at least that much in depreciation alone on your 2011 S4 over the next five years. In the end, you have to pay to play, or don't buy a used Audi out of warranty.

[IanCH]

OK. Spending three grand on maintenance/repair for any freshly purchased, used car over almost a year is not a huge amount, nevermind a European performance sedan. Your cost of maintenance was only $300 a month, for what sounds to be an Audi out of warranty. Not bad, actually. On top of that, it sounds as if you purchased a car with pre-existing issues. Was it Audi CPO or did you have an independent shop thoroughly inspect the car prior to purchase?

For whatever reason, there is a lot of fear-mongering going on with these cars. But when you take a look at all the issues that people actually had with them, there are very little (if any) items reported failing that are unique to the v10 car. Carbon clean and all the related component issues? Almost all of the FSI Audi engines share these problems. Engine oil leak? I have never owned an Audi without one. Intake manifold issues? Common Audi problem. Fixing any (or all) of these issues still doesnt come anywhere close to matching the purchase price of the car, unless you know where I can find one for five grand.

If I only have to spend three or four grand a year to maintain the S6, then Ill be more than happy. To put things in perspective, you are losing at least that much in depreciation alone on your 2011 S4 over the next five years. In the end, you have to pay to play, or don't buy a used Audi out of warranty.

I dont have the link but there are people here who have spent well over 20k repairing their S6 (thankfully for them in warranty)

also, I didnt say I spent 3, I said 7 + over 10 on an unknown oil leak, I just chose to trade away the impending work.

[SinCityA6]

So we can all agree that the S6 is expensive to maintain PROPERLY. So if you have deep pockets and love the S6 then by all means, go for it. However, if the pockets aren't as deep as you would like and you are sensitive to cost of ownership, then you may want to look at another vehicle.
I CAN tell you this, I have had my A6 3.0t for almost 4 years now and regardless of whether or not my car is under warranty, I have not spent anywhere near $300 per month in repairs. I have had 2 oil leaks and a vacuum pump fail on my car and even at full pop, it would have been less than $1500 out of pocket to repair. But alas, I have CPO so my OOP was $160.

[v8a6]

Thanks for the feedback.

Ian, I think this is one of the threads to which you are referring
http://www.audizine.com/forum/showth...a-used-2008-S6

Definitely a lot of money spent (under warranty) on repairs. Almost all of it was component failure due to lack of carbon cleaning. It wouldnt surprise me that a large number of these cars were not carbon cleaned properly at the beginning, as most people were not aware of the problem until about four years ago (from what I can tell). Then, the dealerships seemed to want to hide the issue, or misdiagnose it, thereby incurring additional repairs and increasing owner frustration. I think his repair bills would have probably been about half if he had a good independent mechanic. Regardless, I agree, still a lot of money.

[IrishCreamPuff]

I dont have the link but there are people here who have spent well over 20k repairing their S6 (thankfully for them in warranty)

also, I didnt say I spent 3, I said 7 + over 10 on an unknown oil leak, I just chose to trade away the impending work.

Yep that's me.
Just got it back from the O2 sensors. Without warranty it was $2k. I've had a bad air intake manifold ($2k) oil pan/gasket ($500) carbon clean ($1500) 2 new headlights ($2k) and a shit ton more issues. Honestly for the first 5 months it was in the shop all the time. Still is. Warranty is a MUST

[IrishCreamPuff]

OK. Spending three grand on maintenance/repair for any freshly purchased, used car over almost a year is not a huge amount, nevermind a European performance sedan. Your cost of maintenance was only $300 a month, for what sounds to be an Audi out of warranty. Not bad, actually. On top of that, it sounds as if you purchased a car with pre-existing issues. Was it Audi CPO or did you have an independent shop thoroughly inspect the car prior to purchase?

For whatever reason, there is a lot of fear-mongering going on with these cars. But when you take a look at all the issues that people actually had with them, there are very little (if any) items reported failing that are unique to the v10 car. Carbon clean and all the related component issues? Almost all of the FSI Audi engines share these problems. Engine oil leak? I have never owned an Audi without one. Intake manifold issues? Common Audi problem. Fixing any (or all) of these issues still doesnt come anywhere close to matching the purchase price of the car, unless you know where I can find one for five grand.

If I only have to spend three or four grand a year to maintain the S6, then Ill be more than happy. To put things in perspective, you are losing at least that much in depreciation alone on your 2011 S4 over the next five years. In the end, you have to pay to play, or don't buy a used Audi out of warranty.

If you do not buy a warranty, the car will make you go broke really, really quickly. Look into a Fidelity warranty from the dealer. They are amazing at covering everything. I honestly have not had them decline everything. Howeverthey do only pay $90/hr labor. So if you take it to a more expensive shop like the $120/hr near me, be ready to pay even more.

[v8a6]

If you do not buy a warranty, the car will make you go broke really, really quickly. Look into a Fidelity warranty from the dealer. They are amazing at covering everything. I honestly have not had them decline everything. Howeverthey do only pay $90/hr labor. So if you take it to a more expensive shop like the $120/hr near me, be ready to pay even more.

Thanks for the advice. I have high performance plans for the car, so I skipped the warranty.

[IrishCreamPuff]

Thanks for the advice. I have high performance plans for the car, so I skipped the warranty.

What are you going to do? And did you already buy it? If so post pics.

[v8a6]

What are you going to do? And did you already buy it? If so post pics.

I have only had the car in my hands for about five days total since I purchased it a month ago. It was at one local garage to get it on the road and now has been shipped to the US (I'm from Toronto) for a full inspection, carbon clean, and then engine pull and custom exhaust.

So far, all I have done are H&R coilovers, H&R rear sway, and S5 wheels.

I dont have any pics after the mods, as I got the car back on last Friday, and drove it to Detroit the next day. Ill post a full build thread on AudiRevolution in about three months, if all goes well. This is what it looked like at the dealership





Just a bone stock 07 S6

[LakeTahoeQuattr]

Hope you can tolerate (finanicially) losing the whole car when the parts go bad. It's hard to justify the purchase of an S6 with 50k miles, nevermind 130k. Some of the members on this forum have spent more on maintenance of their S6 after only owning it for a couple of years than you probably did on that entire car.

I try and explain this exact concept to people who don't want a "high mileage car" and no one understands. Furthermore I would always prefer a 100k car with 20k in maintenance over the same car at 70k w/little maintenance..

The depreciation factor is a huge influence on cost of ownership this I prefer used and audacious whips

Every Audi leaks oil at some point. Took me a year to get rid of all the leaks on my ar after the engine swap haha