The Silver Shaudi - 2000 Audi A4 1.9tdi Saloon Content

[Jimmy No Hands]

Born into my life through sheer necessity, we have our latest cheap and cheerful shed entry. Let's take a visit to the economy check-list to see how we've done.

• Small local dealer part exchange to clear offered sold as seen, get it off my bloody forecourt. - Check.

• Barely bother to look at the car, definitely do not test drive. - Check.

• Sitting at the back of the lot, unwashed and looking incredibly forlorn. - Check.

• The rear number plate is stuck on with GAFFER TAPE. - Check

• Dash warning light counter - 1 (didn't score too highly here)

• Faulty gauges, questionable rear brakes, rust and a vast sea of missing trim. - Check.

• Most importantly, CHEAP. - Check.

Looks like we've done okay, improvements can be made. That EML figure is a rookie number.

On the plus side, £690 (I got a £5 discount) gets me a 132,000 mile B5 Audi A4 Saloon with a 1.9 TDI PD115 with full service history, one former keeper and 10 months MOT. Having owned a B6 PD130 Avant (and a C6 A6 2.0CR 170) prior to this I knew I needed to have another. These motors, with correct servicing, are incredibly robust and for mid range punch and economy they are second to none. This one feels strong with a resilient tug through the gears, a slick change and a clutch that feels fairly good. It is not all sunny skies, as the water and oil gauges remain relatively unresponsive, they will creep in traffic which leads me to the conclusion that the sensors are working, but the thermostat is stuck open causing the car to run very cool. A quick Google confirms that 'stat failure is fairly common. We also have an airbag light present which I will assume is the switch under the passenger seat which deteriorates over time. I have ordered a VCDS as my eBay code reader will not go beyond normal EML codes.

So plans are -

Air filter, oil filter, oil and thermostat coming tomorrow. I will do the service but may get a man to do the thermostat as the housing sits right next to the alternator and is a fiddly job that I am not certain I can be arsed with. I may change my mind when I service the car tomorrow. - £43 from ECP with a hefty 37% off!

Receive VCDS cable, reset the airbag light then hope there is nothing more sinister lurking. If not, seek fix.

Put as many miles on as we can. My last PD engined Audi was on 168k and felt like it would do another 168k quite easily. It will be driven hard, parked anywhere it can be, not washed and maintenance will be budget.

Dealer pictures as I haven't taken my own yet, behold! Even includes a fancy 6 digit plate.








I'll keep this thread updated, if anybody cares.

Edited by Jimmy No Hands on Friday 14th June 20:14

Edited by Jimmy No Hands on Friday 14th June 20:15

[205pat]

Top work, I paid £400 for a 260k A4 avant pd130 and it was solid. Do give yours a clean though, I swear mine ran best after I washed it!

[Cloudy147]

I ran one of these for a few years as a shed. Cost me £400, was a 1.8 petrol. It didn't ask for much, which was good because it didn't get much either. Looked great inside but with that low roof 90s design it was terribly uncomfortable for me.

I wanted to have a go at shedding, glad I did the experience, but didn't enjoy it due to comfort levels. However, what.it did do was bring a level of acceptance to a 3 car family with the Mrs. Lol.

Hopefully you will fare better than I did in yours!

Yours looks a nce one.

Edited by Cloudy147 on Thursday 11th July 09:21

[Gallons Per Mile]

Looks a lot tidier than the B5 I had in Avant flavour. Owner before me literally used it as a shed! Same engine as yours, and that had done 250k , so you'll have plenty of miles left in yours

[Blanco92]

Looks a good shed. Looks like it has less rust than my 2003 A6. Good going!

Are you sure it’s got a PD engine? Pretty sure everything pre-2001 was a mechanical fuel injection “VE” type in either 90bhp or 110 flavour. I had a 110 in a 2000 Octavia. The turbo was a little chocolate but otherwise the car was extremely solid.

[Jimmy No Hands]

Blanco92 said:

Looks a good shed. Looks like it has less rust than my 2003 A6. Good going!

Are you sure it’s got a PD engine? Pretty sure everything pre-2001 was a mechanical fuel injection “VE” type in either 90bhp or 110 flavour. I had a 110 in a 2000 Octavia. The turbo was a little chocolate but otherwise the car was extremely solid.

The engine code is AJM, also found in the Jetta/Bora, Passat and MK4 Golf of a similar generation. (130 is ASZ if I remember rightly) and is listed as 115 bhp on most car checks. I know internally they differ from the 130's, tuning potential is smaller and supposedly less reliable. There are some horror stories of head gaskets going south for the winter but I'll just cross my fingers and hope regular oil and coolant changes see me right.

I have serviced it as of this morning, the oil had only done approximately 3,000 miles but no record of a change in two years. Air filter looked pretty good too but got a swap for the sake of a tenner. It's going in Tuesday for the thermostat as I don't fancy tackling it on the street, I'm hoping it will solve the running cool issue. It appears to run a bit quieter after 4.5 litres of fresh 5w40 anyway.

[Dr G]

Great cars, cheap parts, still look good today.

With routine maintenance that'll keep going until diesel isn't legal anymore.

[anonymous-user]

Airbag is usually the seat connector under seat. They are sikud cars, had 3 of them. Always wanted a s4.

[drewwa]

Brilliant cars. I had one of these new as a company car in 2000, identical to this but in 'Cactus' Green metallic. Beautiful thing it was.

After three years I bought it, put some RS6 alloys and an RS4 grille on it, lowered it a bit and took it to AMD Technic who remapped the PD115 to 180 bhp and stupid lbfts. 0-60 was well under 7 seconds and it still did 55mpg on a cruise. Managed to get 800 miles out of a tank once.

There was an exhaust in there too somewhere, but I can't remember what it was.

Got to 220k miles before I didn't need a long range commuter car anymore and sold it. Chap wrapped it around a tree the following week.



Miss it. The late facelift B5 was the best looking A4 IMHO (though I like the B7).

Cheers,

Drew.

Edited by drewwa on Saturday 15th June 17:16

[Jimmy No Hands]

That's a very nice colour Drew, I must admit I do like the lines of the B5. That's some power hike, how did the clutch handle that? I am surprised at just how much pick up and go this thing has in gear. It feels quicker than my 170bhp A6 did.

Had a bonus today upon actually opening the boot for the first time, it has a CD multi changer! Win.

[anonymous-user]

I had a cats green 1.8t lovely colour, perl I think

[TVR Sagaris]

I've had a 1.8T (petrol) Avant for the last few years. It's on 178k, about 40k done by me. Airbag light came on a few months ago so interested to hear about a potential straightforward fix.

It's not worth anything so I'm reluctant to spend much on it.

[anonymous-user]

i cut the connector off under the seat and attached a new one, worked for me.

[Jimmy No Hands]

I think I'll try to reset it with VCDS and if that doesn't work it'll be new connector time. Looks like I may give the thermostat a go myself too as I had a quick look at access today and it is not anywhere near as bad as people seem to make out, certainly not alternator out. It's tight, but looks fairly straight forward.

[drewwa]

Jimmy No Hands said:

That's a very nice colour Drew, I must admit I do like the lines of the B5. That's some power hike, how did the clutch handle that? I am surprised at just how much pick up and go this thing has in gear. It feels quicker than my 170bhp A6 did.

Had a bonus today upon actually opening the boot for the first time, it has a CD multi changer! Win.

I didn't do anything to the clutch, never had a problem with it. The car is still quite heavily engineered. It can handle a lot more than stock without problems.

Cheers,

Drew.

[BornRageFree]

Looks very clean!! I remember the CO of my Air Cadets squadron having one for a while, it always impressed me when he put his foot down! If shedding were required I'd get one of these in a heartbeat. Lovely on the inside, bulletproof engine, cheap to maintain. Can't go wrong.

[mercedeslimos]

drewwa said:

Brilliant cars. I had one of these new as a company car in 2000, identical to this but in 'Cactus' Green metallic. Beautiful thing it was.

After three years I bought it, put some RS6 alloys and an RS4 grille on it, lowered it a bit and took it to AMD Technic who remapped the PD115 to 180 bhp and stupid lbfts. 0-60 was well under 7 seconds and it still did 55mpg on a cruise. Managed to get 800 miles out of a tank once.

There was an exhaust in there too somewhere, but I can't remember what it was.

Got to 220k miles before I didn't need a long range commuter car anymore and sold it. Chap wrapped it around a tree the following week.



Miss it. The late facelift B5 was the best looking A4 IMHO (though I like the B7).

Cheers,

Drew.

Edited by drewwa on Saturday 15th June 17:16

That looks like a beauty. Clicked on this as I've just picked up the latest daily, yep, you guessed it.

Cactus green Avant, originally a 2.5TDI AFB but now an AHU 90bhp non-PD. Know the last 4 owners and 12 years of them so it's rock solid. 250 squids. sits on 16s and yours on the RS6 reps and grille looks smashing. hitting eBay for a cheap one. Also, have both RS6 and RS4 reps to choose from having bought both sets cheap recently. might even stick a few pics up if I can be bothered!

Had a load of B5 and B5.5 Passats and am a real fan of the longitudinal engined machines, had a B7 A4 2.0TDI but the 1.9 is better.

Herself didn't think too highly of me buying a 19-year old estate Audi until it turned up and now she thinks it needs 18s

Sam

[Jimmy No Hands]

Well, set out determined to do the thermostat this morning. I believe access differs depending on what variant you have, whether you have climate control and whether the block sits longitudinally or not. On the AJM, access is really good with the thermostat just sitting next to the alternator bracket. Tricky part is not dropping the bolts and reseating the thermostat. My housing was missing a holding clip and the one tab just wasn't working, so I opted to sit the thermostat in the block instead.

Temperature now sits at a steady 90 and engine oil temperature actually reads on the gauge now. Happy with that, just need to monitor for leaks for the next week or two.

Touch wood, result!

[Jimmy No Hands]

Also, I found this in the boot. One previous Yuppie owner.

[dandam]

We found a 3.5" floppy disc during a recent office move - one of the fella's who I work with had never seen one before (he's 22) - imagine if we found a 5.25" disc too, that would have really blown his mind !!

Anyway, great shedding, keep up the 'Business Plan'