I played it safe.

There's another shop I used before to order some sensors from in the past. I was very impressed with the Audi genuine parts they had and the 1 day ship time. They are ran out of IL but have 90% of all parts shipped out of California.
Since I'm located in San Diego that means, no sales tax and quick shipping. What more can you ask for.

The other shop had great pricing on the heater core and other parts. The coolant hoses were genuine Audio but the heater core wasn't. However, the HC was 28 bucks. That rocks.

Since my car is in pieces and I need to get it put back together ASAP(before I forget how to put it back), I had to order parts by noon from the dealership to get them by Wednesday morning. I wanted to talk to the other parts shop to make sure the hoses were Audi and check on the quality of the HC since it wasn't Audi. Noon was rolling around so I ordered from Audi.

Guess who called soon after
Turns out the hoses were all Audi genuine but HC was a Thermex which I understand is a good part. Oh, well. I don't have to worry about bad parts now.

I suggest you check these guys out as they have many genuine Audi/VW parts. And if you are close to CA, no tax and quick shipping. The guys over there are very cool and helpful too (Wade).

http://www.aboveallmotorwerks.com

 

I received my parts today and was able to make some progress. I got held up on an electrical wire connection. There are wire connections to each A/C vent that connect to a light to eliminate the vent control dials when the lights are on. However, there are 4 of the same wires (and color) and only 3 vent connections to plug them into?

Each side vent had their own connection. Thats 2. The center vent cluster had one off to the left vent. That left me with one more wire of the same connection type/color (tan). I thought it might connect to the right side of the center vent cluster. I looked under the dash for about 1.5 hours and then.....bam!... Hello!!!!! CUP HOLDER light!!! That was a wasted 2 hours. I had the cup holder in the house because I had to fix it.

Unfortunately soon after I figured out the wire issue, I ended up over tightening the round rod that connects between both center console frame ends. Snap! Stupid mistake.

Junk yard tomorrow to get another and then hopefully, I can get this thing back together Thursday!

I'm attaching another photo so you can see the little progress I'm making. I'm getting there.

 

wow - big project! I should really do this. My heater sucks, it isn't leaking .. yet. but hose connections are pretty crumbly. Good job on tackling one of the more intimidating projects on these cars!

 

I finished the job and only ended up with 2 extra screws

I took it for a spin around the block and all seems well. There is only one thing I noticed that was different from when I started the job. The front windows used to have one click roll down. This feature no longer works. I actually have to hold the button down for it to roll down.

I've heard some say it takes a few drives before the ECU re-learns the car and windows operate with one click again? Any thoughts?

 

I nearly completed the job Thursday night. I had to flush the coolant but it was too late so I just filled her up with water and dove around the block a few times to get the water flowing through the system and new core.

This morning I ran it around the block to heat it up and get the water flowing again. Drained it out, bled the system (there are actually 3 bleed points) and then filled it up with G12 (50/50%).

As mentioned previously, the front windows didn't want to roll down with one click. That feature just started to work on its own after the 2nd or 3rd time driving it around.

I'm glad this job is DONE!! Hell and back!!

Here are a few pictures of the final product.

 

I did the exact same thing when I was doing this job a month ago, except I just epoxied the rod into place and said f*** it. So for everyone who reads this thread before tearing their car apart (or when trying to put it back together) - watch out for this flimsy POS.

 

nicely done. this job should come with a merit badge to put in your sig or something haha

 

Car runs great. I was so bold to drive it to Vegas. 5 hours non stop. She ran at around 210 degrees according to the gauge.
I picked up a fuel filter from the dealer on the way. Since I have never changed it and I have 99k on it, this will be the next project.

 

Awesome job......glad to hear everything went back together as well as it did.

 

Fuel filter was a major pain the a**. Basically took both straps off and loosed the fuel line and linkage. Dropped the tank a bit and used the T40 to get the bolt holding it in out. It took about 15 minutes to get the bolt back in. I would say that was the hardest part.