benjijames28

I just want to say that your car looks well for a 53 plate.

I just put Goodyear eagle 3 on the front of my car, with another two going on the rear next week. So far I can't fault them at all! I paid 88 pound a corner for 225/40/r18, much cheaper than other top brand tyres, and apparently Goodyear usually wear very well. I suspect this may be the last set of rubber I buy for the car.

I own one of these, a 2009 model and have learnt quite a few things in the last few months. They are a good car and very very tunable. Depending on mileage, first thing I would do is put on some decent tyres, and have the money ready for a new dual mass flywheel and clutch when you need it. Loads of people give a car more power and start to get clutch slip or flywheels failing. First upgrade is going to be a stage one remap which will take the 1.8 to between 190 and 230bhp depending on remap, you will also see a huge jump in torque, and it's quite a torquey engine anyway for a 1.8 petrol. If your talking upgrading the turbo then there's turbo kits out there for a few grand which will take you to over 300bhp, but your going to need to upgrade the exhaust system, probably the injectors too. Depends how far you want to go. I will be keeping mine stock, if anything I might put on a miktek exhaust system, more for sound and cosmetics than performance. Maybe a stage 1 remap after my clutch goes. Insurance costs are my biggest concern. Message me if u have any questions.

Ive always liked my cars but never enough to get excited about them until recently. A few friends at work love their motors and one bloke is selling his 57 plate audi a4 TDI 140 next summer. He has had the car for about 5 years and has babied it (probably too much) from 27,000 to 57,000 miles. He never guns it, always serviced it, and its in perfect condition. The man wont even take it to ASDA, he goes in wifes car. He knew I wanted a bigger car and will be giving me first refusal on it next year. As for now, my girlfriend is pregnant, and has 2 kids from a previous relationship. So my need for a bigger car become more immediate. I could have gone for a focus or an astra, but I thought I might aswell go for a car I really wanted. I ended up buying my Audi A3 1.8 TFSI sportback, and I am loving it. For 6.5k (Ford Fiesta + £3k) its one hell of an upgrade. German engineering, a car thats fun to drive, and will hold more of its value than many other cars. Sure its not the popular TDI, but how many of us need a TDI?

It is probably after market but will plug into the back of your radio. Taking a complete guess.... plug your ipod in then set your radio to CD player mode, and I bet it will play.

You buy an Audi you pay Audi maintenance. Only other option is buying the part on eBay. That would be my first port of call.

I would take it to an auto electrician.

I think your right about the snake oil products. The plan is now to take my car to Awesome GTI near manchester and have them manually clean all the carbon that builds up from the intake manifold in the TFSI engine. At 80,000 miles, I can feel the symptoms people describe from the carbon build up. The engine sounds very lumpy when started from cold, I dont have misfires or anything yet, but I still feel that I will enjoy the benefits of having the work done.

Sounds like a decent car for the money. I looked at several A3's before buying mine, and noticed that some of the lower mileage ones were more worn out than the higher mileage ones, but obviously you have seen the car and you would know if it was trashed. Hope you enjoy it.

Didnt have time to go through the PDF, but I downloaded it for future reference, thanks for that. Magnet - I am happy enough with the car, it drives well. Fuel consumption isnt brilliant, I did 200 miles in the past week with a bit of a mix of short and slightly longer journeys, it returned 31.2mpg measured full tank to full tank. Thats driving steady most of the time. Apparently I should be able to improve fuel consumption by getting the intake manifold "de-coked". The car has done 80,000 miles, so its going to be interesting to see if I get any issues with it, apparently some people experience cold start issues and misfires. I found a company called Awesome GTI near manchester. They quoted me £450 to clean out the manifold, replace seals and do 2 rolling road tests to compare results. Nice car overall. Going to keep it for a while, unless I come across a diesel model that I would prefer.

I have no idea? My engine code is CDA. Did they make a 8 valve 1.8 TFSI? and then a 16 valve one? All I know is mine is the one with 158 BHP, and that according to the engine code associated with my number plate.... it defo doesnt use a cam belt.

Ok just got off the phone to JCT600 Audi servicing department. Gave them my registration number, and they looked up the engine code for the service intervals. They have told me that the 1.8 TFSI engine does not have a cambelt, it uses a timing chain which is not replaced. WTF?!?!?! UPDATE: Ive emailed Audi UK customer services, to see if they could shed some light.

I feel like I did plenty of research on A3's and saw/test drove loads. Problem was all my research was on the 2.0 TDI versions. Theres not that many 1.8 TFSI models around, not where I live anyway. It was almost an impulse buy as I will explain: I saw this one listed and it looked stunning, dealer had plenty of positive feedback online etc.... and the price was within the budget of what I was looking to pay for a 2.0 TDI. Truth be told I didnt look at list prices for 1.8's until after I bought the car, its at that point that I realised I just paid top end of the price bracket for that model / age / mileage. Its obviously been looked after and runs well. Only issue was noticed after I bought the car, a shock absorber started creaking, the strut top had gone, this dealer said it wasnt there on the test drive, so its obviously a wear and tear item, I kicked off and he paid the small bill to have that part fixed. I could try and confirm with Audi tomorrow when the belt should be changed, then complain to the dealer that I feel he mislead / missold me the car, whether knowingly or not? See if he will do anything, I highly doubt that he will. No doubt im gonna get labelled his customer from hell. The other options are to sell the car private, probably taking a £1000 loss after 2 weeks of ownership, or go trade it in and buy a TDI version, probably taking a £1500 loss. Or save up £500 and pay for the cam belt, and hope not to have any other issues come up (im thinking intake valve getting coked up, cold start misfires, aka the other problem I didnt know about until after I got the car).

Well thats real bad news. I really regret buying this car, I thought I had done enough research, I belived his bullshit that the petrol engines will have a lot less issues than the diesels. I also paid a pretty high price. £6500, fair enough he probably gave me £500 more for my part ex than it was worth, but even at 6k ive paid top money for this engine model. !Removed!!

I recently bought a 58 plate Audi A3 1.8 TFSI sportback. Doing under 10,000 miles per year, and with my budget it seemed wiser to opt for a petrol instead of diesel. My car has done 80,000 miles and has full service history, most of it been at a main VW dealer (not Audi). Last serviced about 4000 miles ago. Trying to find any information on this engine online seems next to impossible. I cant even find a definitive answer as to whether it uses a CAM belt or a timing chain. The dealer who sold it me says he thinks it uses a belt, and the belt needs changing about 160,000, sceptical anyone? I cant find any service interval information anywhere online either. I got a quote from JCT600 in Sheffield. They quoting £160 for a interim service, and £309 for a full service. Anyone got any experience or advise for me? Hopefully I wont regret not opting for the diesel version.