I have had this problem for months and the car has been to the dealer for the 4th time and am getting fed-up.
Usually happens in the morning, but when I go over dips in our road, there is a VERY obvious squeaking noise coming from the front suspension. It does eventually go away, but it is so annoying...
Every time a tech drives the car it doesn't do it and they said they have inspected the A-arm bushings as well as the tie-rod ends and can't find anything wrong.
IMHO, I don't believe them...
Any ideas from where this noise could be coming from??? Thanks

 

Don't be too hard on the tech's. If it doesn't make the noise all the time, it's a b---h to find. I did find one that had the sway bar links squeak at times. If I ran into this at work, I'd need to have the car overnight (so I could drive it in the morning for the best chance of hearing the noise) after hooking up probes to the suspect squeak points for a chassis ears the before going home for the evening the day before. This way, if the noise is reproduced I could at least narrow it down to a specific location. After that, the probes would get moved to the moving joints/pivots on the componant that was loudest to further narrow down the cause. Yes, this takes time and the car may need to stay a couple nights. It's really the only way to find noises without just throwing parts at it (which I refuse to do). Your dealer, or a tech at the dealer does have a chassis ears right? Side note: Noises and vibrations are the auto techs worst nightmares to find and repair, especially when they're intermitant. Trust me!

 

I have found that once an A8 reaches the 50,000 mile mark the upper control arm bushings start to wear out. The links are larger than the other audi models but the bushings holding the control arms are the same size as the A4's links. Audi could have been trying to save money there i don't know. The easiest way to tell if they are bad is to try pushing down on the fenders as hard as you can, if you can hear the squeak, thats where its coming from. I would try this in the morning because thats when you're experiencing the problem.

 

Hi All,

I've just purchased an '04 A8L. Wish I had found this site before so that I would have seen the warnings about the '04 but what are you going to do. I'm purchasing an extended warranty so cross my fingers and hope for the best and prepare for the worst.
Anyway the car I just bought has the same problem as described above. After a couple of miles or so it just disappears on it's own. I'm not too worried about it at the moment but what do you thing the long term effects could be?

 

If its the upper control arms that are making the noise ( most likely) then as the mileage goes on the bushing will tear more and more until the bushing completely fails. This will cause the link to foat back and forth while turning creating a hellacious clunk, if you let it go on enough it will beat the crap out of the strut housing until the link is replaced. Im not quite sure how much abuse the strut housing can sustain, but since its aluminum i wouldn't wait to find out.....

 

Read Auditech79's advice... I had the SAME issue. After 4 times at the dealer and had told them to check the bushings,they always came back to "there fine". BS!!! FINALLY, they actually looked at them and replaced all of the bushings and upper control arms...
PRESTO!!! Problem solved!
I think some of the techs may get a little lazy, but THEY KNOW this is a common issue.
Audi uses the SAME bushings on the A4's, A6's, as they do on the A8 (design flaw).
MAKE them replace the upper control arm bushings!!!