Just a little short story on my experience at the Audi service dept. So I take my b5 a4 in to get an alignment and my car nearly came back worse shape to me then when I brought it in. So as im riding home after the alignment thinking to myself the suspension didnt seem as tight and sporty as when i brought it in. Also im hearing this strange God awful rattle that was not there before as im going over bumps. Once I got home I did an oil change and while I was under the car I saw that 4 of the subframe bolts had not been tightened at all and were just hangin in there by a few threads!! No wonder the suspension felt sloppy!! Once I tightened those up i was still hearing that strange rattle that just started after the alignment and after a few hours of trial and error I realized it was the heat shield rattling against the exhaust. Some how during the alignment they managed to bend the heat shield just so, and it made a loud rattle when going over bumps. The wierdest part was the way it was bent in was almost done as if intentional!! Im not even kidding. They should have been no where near the area that the shield was bent in.

And finally after resolving those two issues I decide to take a look at the cracked rear coil spring that they were nice enough to tell me I had after they were done with my car. Sure enough, right at the base there was about a 4 inch piece just laying there completely detached at the base of the strut assembly. This damn piece has been rattleing in there for about 4 months and driving me bonkers. Why the hell did they just leave it in there and not remove this piece of broken spring? I just dont get it.

Thanks Audi for doing a half *** alignment job, bending my heat shield, and then not even having the decency to remove this broken off piece of spring thats just rattleing around in my back strut. Just think about what could have happened if I wasnt mechanically inclined enough to notice the loose subframe. Besides the obvious premature failure of any suspension parts it could have resulted in some sort of accident if it eventually got loose enough. Dont get me wrong I love Audi, I love owning an a4, but this experience just made me sad. That is the type of service I would expect from the shady 1 man garage across the tracks, not Audi. I called the service dept after all this and they said they were sorry, and to bring it back in so they can re-align the car. Which means that I will now have to risk something else going wrong while its in their hands and waste another hour of my time.

 

It seems that they shouldn't have performed the alignment if they knew about a broken spring. Before even starting an alignment, most shops will do a once over of all major suspension/steering components (ball joints, tie rods, springs, etc.). If they find anything, they just quit because you can't get a true alignment with bad components.

 

Who takes their car Audi anyways everyone knows they **** shitup and then everyone just comes to tell the masses how much Audi ***** up

 

Our cars are unique when it comes to alignments so I figured it would be best to get it done at Audi since they dont charge much more anyways. If I cant trust the manufacturer of my own car to do something as simple as an alignment Im not sure who I can trust to do it. They also told me that the cracked spring really doesnt effect how well it could be aligned, I thought that was a little strange myself.

 

So sad. My local STEALERship recently tried to pull one on me as well. I lost the key portion of my FOB (can still lock and unlock the doors just no key for the ignition). They have the nerve to tell me that I need to wait 3-5 days and that I will have to bring in the car to have it programmed (our cars don't have immobilizers). Just as a reference a locksmith told me he could cut the key for me for WAAAAYYYY less. Now my question was how could the locksmith cut me a key and not program it and get me on the road but not Audi? Horrible.

 

How could a locksmith cut your key? They are laser cut from factory lol and they probably thought you were getting a new fob. Have to program that to the car

 

^ Some locksmith does have the laser cutting tool. There's one near me that does laser cutting, you'll just have to call in and schedule an appointment since apparently only one guy knows how to do it.

OP - I agree with bshusted, they shouldn't have performed an alignment with a broken spring in there. It's pretty much a waste of money in that scenario.

 

I called the service dept today to do a little "test" if you will and I heard just what I expected. I talked to someone that I hadnt spoke to the past day and asked him straight up " If I have a cracked rear spring would you recomend me to get an alignment before or after I replace the spring" and he said "definitely after you replace the spring"

Its funny how I wasnt told I had a cracked spring until after the job was done and then they told me it didnt effect how well it could be aligned. Its almost laughable how quickly things change though when these service reps realize that they are dealing with a customer that knows a thing or two about cars. I feel bad for all the people that dealerships in general take advantage of, but then again they have the power to since the vast majority of car owners wouldnt know the difference between a cam shaft and a drive shaft, let alone be able to tell that their subframe is half unscrewed.

Alright im done ranting, im curious how this will all play out now that ive got them with their pants down around their ankles.

 

Get yourself a refund and have them redo the alignment for FREE after you replace the broken spring.

 

OP try and get a refund but good luck. FYI nothing special about these cars that firestone can't do the alignment. I used them every time and they were always awesome. They will even do alignments to a certain spec if you ask them too. **** the dealership *****