Well, I got my 02 S4 today with 53K miles, and of course, I LOVE IT!!! I haven't stopped driving since...Actually, im typing this on my cell phone as I sit in traffic, lol... I have a quick question in regards to what I think is the clutch slipping. The car will start off in 1st fine, and shift into gears fine, however, if I go WOT (wide open throttle) in any gear 3 or above, the car will rev up to about 4K RPM's after a few seconds of flooring it -- and then it will catch and accelerate like I downshifted. It seems to me that the clutch is slipping, and I have never felt this in another car. In my 3000gt, when the clutch was going, the turbo's wouldnt really bost and it was hard to get in and out of gears. This car feels and rides perfectly fine accept if I floor it in any gear. Is the general consensus that my clutch is going? Anyone else ever experience this before? Thanks,
--Adam

 

Did you notice the clutch slipping when you went for a test drive. Would having to replace it real soon be a problem? $3000 should cover it...

 

It look to me to be a clutch. Do you have a special smell inside the car
after the slipping happens ? If you can do it yourself, you can have an
RS4 clutch for under 500$ Then you will be good for loooooooong time.
While being in that area, you may think about upgrading your fly wheel for
a Alu LW unit.
Good luck [8D]
PS since you just got the car out of dealers lot, you should try to make them
pay for it. You should be protected for at least a couples of days !

 

10 days ago i had the same problem in my 2002 s4, I bought a awe flywheel and a rs4 clutch kit. took it to a mechanic shop that is ase cert. and all that. well its day 10 now and I dont have a car and the shop had to replace my rs4 kit with a oem because he said it wasnt right and he tried 2 times to get it adjusted. So in frustration I told him to just replace the clutch with oem and call it good. He said ok and i will find out today if that fixed it. He qouted me a price of 930 dollars at first but now I am up to 1900 dollars. Oh yeah he said the flywheel was toast on the old one. it really is a pain in the ***. I called awe and they said this is the first time they had a issue with this clutch kit.

 

Here's an update... It definately was the clutch. Yes, I smelled the clutch burning, etc etc etc. The dealership wanted about $1500 for a "refurbished" OEM Clutch and resurfaced flywheel. I said "no thanks, i'll do it myself." I then got lucky as my roommate, who has a GTI, knows of a great shop for ours cars local to me (Maryland). I called them and talked it over with them and they let me know that you should never resurface our stock flywheels -- just not a good idea, I suppose. The dealership wanted about $1000 in labor charges for a stock clutch and flywheel. This shop is charging me $2000 for a Spec Stage 2 Clutch and Flywheel including labor. They called me today letting me know that they checked over the entire car for me because I just got it, and let me know that everything else in the car was perfectly fine. And they didn't charge me to check everything out. If anyone is in the mid-atlantic area, I would highly reccommend this shop. Not only are they doing my car, they fit me into their crazily insanely busy schedule to get me done because the S4 is my main car. Oh, and the dealership that I bought the car from is splitting the cost of the clutch with me.
--Adam

ps - shop is NewGermanPerformance in Aberdeen, Maryland.

 

Nice to hear that everything went into place 1997gtx. To bad im not in Maryland
i would like to have some good mech how know's there S4 in my area.
Most of the time im teaching what im learning on this forum to my mech.[&:]
Nice set up Spec Stage 2 Clutch and Flywheel.
Good luck !

 

Haha, thanks. Yeah, I was absolutely enthralled to find this shop. Their website is NGPRacing.com ... They are a really good bunch of guys. Too bad this is costing me $2000 though...there goes the chip, TBB, and DV's
--Adam

 

Can you let me know if you have some gear noise out of the new flywheel. and also if using the single mass flywheel if you have to be more careful shifting. I have to let the clutch out slow on this flywheel from awe. Still breaking it in. 750 more miles.

 

Yeah, I'll let you know. I'm actually not exactly sure what flywheel they are ordering for me. I am pretty sure it's the lightweight flywheel they that have on their website mated to the Spec Stage 2 Clutch. It was $700 just for the flywheel, so im sure i'll need a good 1K miles just to break it in properly. But I won't have the car for another week, so i'll let you know on the gear noise when I get it.
--Adam

 

Damn, that sucks... but then again, a nice way to start off modding the car. Problems always seem to work out for the best.