What would you do

[joinerman]

Following on from my " Getting expensive " thread in the last six weeks my 05 reg 3.0 tdi quattro Avant has cost me £2500 in repairs, Turbo & service £1000 then six new injectors £1500, last Sunday it started dumping oil out underneath which has turned out to be some of the exhaust manifold studs loose that go into oil gallerys, now these can not just be tightened up because of access & the manifolds need to come off anyway, you can't get these off without removing the engine, so while the engine is out it would be daft not to do the timing chain tensioners at the bottom ( already done the top two ) as i get chain rattle on start up sometimes, also a clutch as i get a little bit of vibration at idle just now & again, I'm looking at another £2500 or round abouts, car is quit well specced & in otherwise pristine condition but only worth around £5k on a good day,
I don't know whether to stick it eblag for spares or repairs or keep spending. If i do go ahead with repairs because of my known & trusted mechanic being busy & going on holiday i won't get the car back for probably six weeks.
What would you do ?

 

[Matt10160]

On a personal front, if i had the money+space, id buy something cheap as a run around, take the a4 off the road and start doing the work myself, rather than pay £2500 on a car thats worth £5000 plus the fact you've spent £2500 already. That way you'll learn about the car more, you'll know exactly whats been done, and probrably saved yourself £2000 in the process, sell the run around and use the a4 again!

Its a shame really, i thought the 3.0tdi was pretty bomb proof but i keep seeing these horror stories popping up!

 

[joinerman]

Doing the work myself is a bit of a struggle since i lost the fingers on my left hand, i have to pay someone nowadays unfortunately & i don't have anywhere to do the work even if i could.

 

[mat cheeseman]

if you love the car then do it if you dint turn it on and smile then sell it lol

 

[tony mc]

there must be a way to make that £2,500 bill smaller mate, if all the work is done then you know the car is good for plenty more miles, you could sell it and cut your losses, buy a new car for a few more g's and that could go wrong too, i'd try get that bill down, keep it and enjoy my nice fixed v6 happy it aint going to go wrong as all problems have been sorted

 

[maxdrz400]

Im in agreement with tony mate, if you buy another car you never know what problems youre going to run into, if the cars sound apart from the stated problems then atleast you know where you are with it.

 

[Matt10160]

Doing the work myself is a bit of a struggle since i lost the fingers on my left hand, i have to pay someone nowadays unfortunately & i don't have anywhere to do the work even if i could.

Ah my apologies! That might hinder you just a tad!

As a personal thing i'd be struggling between heart and head, i love the way the a4 drives and looks, i dont have a 3.0 but have wanted one since before i bought mine! But im dure if i did the heart would say fix it, but the head would say scarper! Im sure if you fix it though (providing there are no other issues) that you would have a car that would see another 50-100,000 miles, all the big things would be done i.e new turbo, new exhaust seals, injectors, chain tensioners and clutch! Dare i say it you could potentially have an awesome base for some big power hikes with all that work done!

Also you havent mentioned the current mileage?

 

[joinerman]

145k & thanks for all replies so far, do i don't i ! do i don't i ?

 

[Matt10160]

Also you havent mentioned the current mileage?

Dont worry i just saw the last thread 145k! Quite high mileage, but still if its fixed i would of thought it'd be fine for many more years!

 

[darren t]

Fix it You wouldn't be asking if you didn't want too Once it's done it's done and you can rest assure you have many miles trouble free !

 

[martin1984]

depends on how you like your car do plan on keeping it for a few years or change after a year or so as if plan on keeping for 4/5 years then well worth the money to have all the work done and the you should within reason have a trouble free car with all big jobs done and under some sort of warrnty otherwise take the hit on what you have spent and let someone else take it on.

 

[joinerman]

At last work starts tomorrow

 

[joinerman]

It's out.

 

[Dani_B19]

Nice work mate.

 

[Charlie Farley]

well things are moving forwards now with the repairs then chap , as mentioned earlier , the cost of the repairs does really exceed the value of the car and from that point of view not a viable proposition , but things don't allways have to be a viable proposition and sometimes the car is worth spending on for other reasons. I would probably do the same to be honest and I have done so many times before , you can get attached to a car very quickly and the repairs cost can soon spiral upwards but one will still stump up the cash as they like the car so much.

It's very easy to just write a car off and get something else that may on the surface look and run better but it can go wrong just the same and end up costing you a shed load too.
if you really like the car and are looking to keep for sometime then it's probably worth getting it spot on, as with all things, its not allways the cost of the parts , its the labour that kills the job.

I have nothing against paying for work to be done and will tackle most jobs if possible , but provided its not taking the *iss , my previous Subaru legacy (2007) started getting quite noisey and turned out to be the power steering pump belt.
dealers said oh that's a special tool and £250 repair bill, not on your life , went down to europarts and got the correct belt for £14.99 , fitted it 15 mins, job done, that is what really gets on my tit.....

anyway, enough rambling, good luck with it.

 

[joinerman]

Parts came today but someone has opened the cam chain & tensioner kit & robbed some of the parts, lots of slack in the bottom chain.