If Knowledge is Power...

[mkb]

...then it would seem that you could save yourseleves a bunch of money and come out with a good deal to boot.

Buddy and I picked up a 96 A4 2.8 12v FWD with about 90k miles for $1500 about a month ago.  Seems the owner of this vehicle had been driving home one night when it stalled on her for some unknown reason.  She had it towed to what she believes was a reputable shop.  Turns out they charge her about a $100 for a "diagnosis".  The diagnosis comes to be that she needs a new engine.  How they came to that conclusion beats me.

So the poor owner of the vehicle puts it on craigslist whereupon my buddy spots it.  She tells him the story.  We do a quick recon of the vehicle just from the outside and come to the conclusion that at worst, it's broken t-belt, some bent valves, nice little w/end project.  So he buys it, but we warn the owner that it mostly likely does not require a new engine but she decides to part with the vehicle anyway.

Anyway, Xmas day we finally have time to look over this car.  Open it all up and the the first thing we notice is that it has a new t-belt and that whoever did it, was as pure a monkeylad as one could possibly find.  The right bank cam is misaligned by about 4 or 5 teeth from the left.  Even the marks that the ML put on the right side are off by 5 teeth.  Also notice that the belt is a little loose.  Align everything up, tighten belt, test fire the engine and it starts right up.

That made for a very pleasent Xmas day present.  He's gonna pick up a new belt, rollers etc.  To the ML's credit though, the water pump looks new.  All told, we spent about 3 hours on this little project.

All this makes me wonder though.  How many innocent folk out there are getting ripped off by these "reputable" shops and how many MLs are out there botching jobs like this?

Glad that their are folks like you out there that inform and enlighten!

--
mohammed
97 a4 18tqa

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