Checklist for Reliability of Older Audis

[Cody Forbes]

Electronic parts tend to fail suddenly. At one moment the trace on the PCB or the resistor or whatever is good, the next minute it burns out and it stops working. There's not much way to ever tell if it's going to go bad. Its like the surprise mother in law visit, one minute life is good, the next minute you hear the door bell and its all gone to crap. You could simply replace EVERYTHING, but with the quality of Chinese replacement parts you don't even know if the new part will last longer than the 20 year old German part (non-OE ignition switch for example). 

The fact of the matter is that by now a large number of the owners of older Audi's (us) are either mechanics, very experienced at fixing them ourselves, and/or carry a decent number of spare parts in the trunk. I'd bet the majority of us have more than one of whatever model we like (How many 80/90's does Huw have now?) so we can have a large chunk of spare parts neatly stored in a sort of weatherproof car shaped storage bin or a fully operational spare to use when the other one breaks. Personally I cover my bases by being a professional Audi mechanic, owning not one, not two, but three of the same model year 5000tq's, AND having a mini storage unit that is part 914, part boxes of encyclopedias, and part Audi 5000 door handles with some other spares for good measure.

If you want to be covered go find one of your car in a junk yard. Take every component between the battery and the spark plug (ECU, relays, coil, igniter/power output stage, distributor, etc). First test them on your car, then put them in the trunk under the spare tire. Then go buy a brand new ignition switch electrical half, distributor cap, rotor, and plug wires and put them in the trunk too. Add a few fuses, a Bentley manual, maybe a belt, and a roll of duct tape and you should be able to solve almost any problem on the side of the road that is ignition related. In normal car circles that may read like a joke or very sarcastically, but I'm actually not kidding. You simply never know and with those things the likelihood of being stranded needing a tow is pretty low. 

My trunk spares bin is not that large, but each of my running two 5000's does include a tool kit, a spare ignition switch, **latex work gloves**, engine oil, CHF11S, and duct tape. Anything else I balance the risk against the fact that I might McGuyver something or just get a ride to my warehouse of spares. For long trips I either take my A8q which has less years and less miles (yet vastly higher broke parts to miles traveled ratio) so my butt is comfy when I'm waiting on rescue or I take my 5000 that has a custom built electronic fuel injection system and coil-per-cylinder ignition so that I'm certain that if it breaks I won't be able to fix it because it's all one off unique parts that I made myself and the only other part like it on the planet is hundreds of miles away back in my tool box.

In the end, just do the usual maintenance and don't sweat it when something unexpected fails. 80% of the time there's zero possibility of diagnosing something that isn't broken yet. It is an old car and things will fail, but it really does tend to be fairly few and far between. The very very best thing to do is learn about the car and how to work on it so you can figure these things out on your own. Then next time you might figure out what's broke and walk/hitch a ride to a parts store and fix the thing right then and there.

-Cody (mobile)

On Aug 15, 2011, at 9:09 PM, Marc Boucher <mboucher70 at hotmail.com> wrote:

> As we'd discussed, my Audi 100 just died with no warning last Friday.  I feared the worst in terms of repair bill but today I got a call that the part (ignition booster) is $61 and very little labor.  Let's assume that they got the diagnosis correct and this chapter will shortly be closed.
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> I'd like to open a different subject: what could have been done to prevent this?
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> The car is well maintained, both by me and by a garage specialized in Audis.  
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> I'll pull the codes from time to time, but they've never really revealed anything of consequence.  Plugs, wires, distributor cap and rotor were done less than 10,000 miles ago.  Same for fuel pump, which is a well-known weakness in these cars.
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> I realize that the car is old, but I'm hoping to put together a basic checklist of items to verify to help ensure reliability.
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> This one threw me for a loop.  Even a failing fuel pump will usually give some signs.  A broken belt or hose will at least give you a chance to get the car somewhere.   But in this case, the car shut down just as I was exiting the freeway, with not even enough chance to get it onto the right shoulder.
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> Was this just a freak occurrence or does this part belong to a list of parts that are known to fail, or should be checked routinely to avoid being stranded on the street?  Would some kind of advanced diagnostic have spotted this, even without any symptoms?  If not, at least what could be done to minimize the risks of being caught in a similar situation in future?
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> Thanks for any suggestions.  
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> MC
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