Audi A4 or other inexpensive Audi for $7,000-10,000
7 Answers
For 10,000 you can get your self the B5 platform A4 with probably the lowest miles on the market. The B5 platform were the A4s that were produced from 96-2001.5. If you have 12k or so, you can probably get yourself an 02 A4 (B6 platform) with around 80k miles or more. The turbo should be your smallest worries as you shoud be more worried about the timing belt and its components. The timing belt, water pump, chaing tensioner, and some otehr components should be replaced every 60-80k miles. An A4 with 150k miles should have had its timing belt and components replaced at least 2 times. If the timing belt fails, you'd be saying bye bye to the engine. If you go look at an A4 with turbo, check t osee if the turbo has oil seeming through the cracks by feeling it or looking at it. If it does, then the turbo is on its way out. I have an 01 A4 avant with 112k miles + a few mods, and my stock turbo is still running smooth and pulling strong. If you have any other questions regarding the Audi A4, feel free to private message me or simply join audizine.com and ask your questions. For the record, I'm speedydragon on Audizine! Goodluck!
I suggest going to any of the online car sellers and tracking values for a week or so. Ebay ususally has a wide selection of Audi's to chose from. I suggest you get a stick instead of an automatic. I have a friend that leased an Audi for 3 years (2003 to 2006), and he completely destroyed his automatic tranny because he always parked and never used his parking brake, amongst other things. He did a quick fix job and returned it to the dealer. So I don't really trust automatic trannys of that vintage. On the other hand, my 1996 Audi stick is still marching along without any probs (knock on wood). Check for rust under the rear wheel wells, which is a common place for moisture to gather and cause rust over time. I had to change the ball joints and a rear wheel bearing at 150,000 miles, so keep an eye out for that. Otherwise, the rest has been pretty much maintenance stuff. Obviously get one that has Quattro. Good luck!
ummm....ur not supposed to use the parking brake in an auto tranny. so i dont see how ur fried messed up his tranny. but yea manual is a better choice if ur a driving enthusiast. otherwise auto is not bad, i have an auto 2004 A4 and i never use the parking brake and have never had any tranny problems. but i am def getting a stick for my next car. either an RS4 or an M3.
You may have misunderstood me. The transmission was never designed to carry the entire weight of the car when its parked. That's what the parking break is for. The auto tranny will hold up a car but over time it gets worn out or damaged, if the parking break is not used. I have another friend who I try to remind every time to use the parking brake but she doesn't get it. Its a lease anyway so she doesn't care. But is a bad habit to develop of course. So, to be clear, use the parking break.
ok i think i see what ur trying to say. i didn't know abt that till now. ill look into it more but thanx for the info.
