Goodbye '05 A6, Hello '09 S6

A6 All/ S6 All
#1

I just traded in my '05 A6 with 165k miles for a 2009 S6 with 56,000.

S6: So far I like the updated feel of the S6. It has newer features like a backup camera, push button start and daytime running LED’s. The S seats are great and the styling is better on the bumpers and sides of the car. Oh yeah, and the other thing I like is the ENGINE - the V10 is a lot of fun and it sounds great with the stock exhaust! I can already notice the difference in fuel consumption but, hey, gas is cheap these days.

This car doesn’t ride as smooth as the A6 because of the stiffer suspension. However, I think a new set of tires will make it run better at high speeds on the HWY since it feels like the front tires are cupped.

I was worried about repair costs on a limited production Audi V10 so I also purchased an extended Warranty from USAA to cover anything except wear items because of a few expensive repairs with the A6. Now there should be no need to worry about repair costs.

I don’t plan to modify anything on this car for now. At some point, it would be nice to get some different, lighter wheels but that can wait. It can probably use a trip to the shop for an oil change, filter changes. Not sure what else to do at this point. Carfax says that it was serviced by Audi of Charlotte for the first 4 yrs up to the 45k service. The last year had some maintenance done. They apparently flushed the differential fluid which seems like an odd thing to do at 50k… hope that isn’t the sign of a problem.

A6: I tracked all expenses with the purchase and sale price and what I found was that this car cost me $572/mo to own and operate of which about $202/mo or $2.4k a year for service. In 7 years and 4 months I put 135,000 miles on the car (18K per month). The expensive repairs that I remember were replacing the ABS brake module for about $1.9k, the rear brake light enclosure for $400, carbon cleaning at dlr for $1.4k and trying to solve a surging problem that ended up just being a bad throttle body (used TB cost $70). I don’t want to total how much that cost before the VW dealer suggested bad throttle body. Overall it was a nice car to own but I probably would have been better off just leasing a car for $572/mo.

#2

Nice upgrade! If you plan to track the S6 in the same way, it will be cool to see the comparison.

Great to see another S6 join the site. If you havent already, be sure to checkout the S6 Info Dump in this section.

Have any pics to share?

#3

Welcome to the site! A lot of great info about our cars on here! What Color? Id love to see another white one!

#4

It happens to be black, which is my favorite color when clean and my least favorite color when dirty.

#5

Black is always the fastest color. I think the v10 community here is growing more and more every day. That with just how many technical guys that are on here you should be fine if little issues pop up. If you wouldn’t mind maybe think about making a post for your old A6 covering the car and all the issues you had with it. That should be helpful for the 6 series guys who don’t get the S6 but the A6. It’s always helpful in logging first hand past experience. I actually love the 4.2 A6 but love having the S badge on your trunk lid more lol.

#6

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…think about making a post for your old A6 covering the car and all the issues you had with it. That should be helpful for the 6 series guys who don’t get the S6 but the A6.
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I owned the '05 A6 for 7 years and 4 months. In that time I put 135k miles on it and spent about $16.6k on maintenance items.

I would say that $8.6k was for normal maintenance items that would be required on any car like oil changes, pads/rotors, several sets of Michelin PS2’s, plugs, air/fuel filters, coil packs, battery, wipers, ATF and a few washes.

Then I spent another $8K on items that I thought were unique to this car such as repair trunk latch, adaptive light failure, replace ABS module, bad rear light enclosure and AC compressor/dryer and new water pump. In an effort to fix a surging problem that occurred when the car was moving at a constant speed on a flat road or downhill, I also had carbon cleaning performed and replaced several sensors, new low and high pressure fuel pumps and finally the throttle body. Other sites pointed to a bad Torque Converter but my problem turned out to be different and it was hard to diagnose so the car was in and out of the shop for about 18 months. In the end the local VW dealership thought that it was a bad throttle body and for $70 a used TB finally fixed the problem.