So you work on Audis. Aren’t they a difficult vehicle to service?
Mark: Hi, it’s Mark Bossert from Top Local Lead Generation. We’re here with award winning Vancouver auto repair, the owner, Mr. Bernie Pawlik of Pawlik Automotive. How’re you doing Bernie?
Bernie: I’m doing really well, how’re you Mark?
Mark: I’m good. So we’re going to talk about Audis today and how are Audis to work on?
Bernie: Well they’re good. A little bit about Audis; Audis the high end division of Volkswagen but interestingly enough low end Audis are very similar to the higher end Volkswagen. They share a lot of the same parts, they look similar, the engines and transmissions are the same, the body styles are similar. A couple examples are the Audi A4 and the Volkswagen Passat are quite similar vehicles, another example would be the Audi Q7 and the Volkswagen Touareg Sport Utility vehicles those are very similar, built on the same platform, actually the Porsche Cayenne is actually a same vehicle as well only dressed up a little higher and more performance. So it could be a good thing having sort of a fancy sports car that’s similar to another lower end car because there’s a lot of parts available for a lower price.
Mark: So, you mentioned that aren’t Audis expensive to fix?
Bernie: Well, they can be, you know that’s a good question. The answer is yes and no. Generally they are a fairly expensive car to fix but sometimes they can be quite cheap. Last week we were working on a 2006 Audi A4 and it needed an ignition coil, the coil was only $35 which is just outrageously cheap, 4 coils in the vehicle, that’s just doing the quick math, $140. A lot of Japanese cars you can’t buy one coil for that price, you might even pay twice the price for a coil, so you know sometimes you get surprised with European cars like Audis, they can be incredibly inexpensive. Now on the other hand of the scale, last week we also had another Audi A4 that had a transmission control module that was blown, it was 22 hundred dollars for that part, plus labour and diagnosis, it ended up being a really hefty bill so that’s the kind of thing you expect with an Audi but not all repairs are like that. A lot of German cars can be like that, the electronics can be a bit of a problem and they are expensive.
Mark: So what are some of the other issues you see with Audi?
Bernie: Well, ignition coil failures are one of the issues I just alluded to, many Audis they have a complex crank case breather system and the parts, things go defective with that, so that requires some repairs, many models of timing belts and they need to be replaced every once in a while, the engines also have oil leaks from time to time, wheel bearings wear out also.
Mark: So Audi had that tarnished, bad reputation in the 80’s for running on. What was all that about?
Bernie: In the early 1980’s the Audi brought in a new series of cars, the 5000. They were marketed as marvels of technology and advanced engineering but they had one issue, occasionally some models would suddenly accelerate without warning. Interestingly enough these cars were generally sold to people who were fairly well to do so they’re pretty educated, smart people, they had nice houses and things, some of them ended up in people’s swimming pools, they would just take off and go flying along the driveway and through their garage and into the swimming pool. It happened on a few occasions and the media picked up a lot of stories about it. Audi basically told people there’s nothing wrong with the car, it’s your fault, so it took a long time to get things figured out. I did a little research on it and they figure it was partially due to an idle stabilization motor that would sometimes kick the idle speed up a bit too high and that may be coupled with people, they figured that maybe the pedals weren’t properly positioned in the car. It was bad PR situation from Audis point of view and their sales plummeted through the 80’s and 90’s and apparently they didn’t actually pick up back until the year 2000. But in the meantime they got their act together and built some better cars and one thing that we owe to that whole incident is the shift lock mechanism that you find in any car with an automatic transmission, it’s been around for a good twenty years anyways, where you have to put your foot firmly on the brake before you can shift out of park so that’s all because of the great engineering coffule about Audi.
Mark: So do you have any last thoughts or comments about Audi?
Bernie: Well, Audi cars are generally they’re nice cars but to me they always seemed a bit quirky for a long time, kind of unusual until they brought the A4 out which happened around 1996, 97. It was a pretty nice car, normal, not too many problems and from there I think Audi became more mainstream; their sales have gone up and there are a lot of different models on the road. They’re good cars generally pretty reliable, they got a few problems like any car, maybe a little more than a Japanese car, but generally very nice car and you can get some really nice high end models, really nice cars to drive, so those are my thoughts.
Mark: Great. So I’ve been talking with award winning, multiple, 12 times voted best in Vancouver, award winning auto repair shop and the owner of that shop, Mr. Bernie Pawlik, Pawlik Automotive, you can reach him at pawlikautomotive.com or you can give him a call 604-327-7112. Thanks Bernie.
Bernie: Thanks Mark, have a good night.
