New s4 avant owner

[blackslc5]

Pretty excited about this car. bought it off another member here, Tim or quickglx. I've been looking for an avant for a couple months now and when this one popped up I jumped on it. Interior and mechanically it is clean and pretty sound. The car is stage 3 and pulls very hard. Big difference between stage 2 and 3. The exterior needs some work but not as bad as I thought it would be. The front bumper will need to be replaced, the front fender have some rust and also the drivers door. There are plenty of silver part outs between the forums and craigslist so I should be able to find the pieces easier than a nogaro or imola. It did come w s6 wheels and snow tires that I'm going to list for trade or sale.
So I flew from ABE to Pitt yesterday morning got a ticket for $163 bucks layover in philly for 1.25 hrs. Thank goodness for the city of Pitt public transportation system as an uber would have cost me 20x the bus fee. I got a bus that took me from the airport to downtown for $3.75 and the airport is about 20 miles west of the city. I have never been to Pittsburgh so I decided to make a day of it to check out the stadiums downtown and get something to eat at primanti bros! The pirates stadium was open to walk through and was a beautiful stadium. Enjoying the beautiful weather I walked down riverwalk and looked around the steelers stadium. Got another bus for my trip from the city to about the 15 miles east where Tim picked me up after work and the rest is history! I had a rather enjoyable 3.75 hr ride back to the Lehigh valley in this blast of a car.
I haven't gotten many pics of it but all jokes aside one of my favorite things about the car is that it has a child latch system installed. So easy to get my daughters car seat put in and it feels more secure. Since the previous owner(s) took good mechanical car of the car I will just have to do some routine maintenance, gonna look for a bbk and clean up the outside. In the meantime if anyone is looking for a set of winter wheels lmk or if you have any fenders ddoor or bumper let me know!

[Zba]

What year is this one, 02? None of my 01s had the latch system and it sucks.

[SomeDayAS4]

What year is this one, 02? None of my 01s had the latch system and it sucks.

it was an addon/option, saw a post for someone looking for the latch system not to long ago

[Zba]

Interesting. I'll have to do some digging

[Zba]

Interesting. I'll have to do some digging

Found it, that was easy.

https://www.ecstuning.com/Search/ZAW269005/ES2730748/

Need to find a part out that has these.

OP, I'm glad you don't use the baby excuse as a reason to get rid of the b5

[blackslc5]

It's an 01. Not sure which of the previous owners installed it... I never asked Tim but I'm pretty sure it was him as he has a younger son. Very helpful seller, an Audi service tech. I used the kids as my excuse to get a wagon lol. It's not the biggest wagon but I just brought the fam up to the Poconos today over my jeep gc. I was also looking for an s6 but I knew I would regret not having a manual.

[hibiscusS4]

Nice wagon. Welcome to the club!

[VTurbo]

Congrats! It's a well sorted car and I'm sure you will enjoy it! Tons of potential!

[blackslc5]

Thx guys well over the weekend I picked up some new wheels for the avant. I was mostly looking for 18" Hartmann dtm or some ultrasport wheels and I got lucky as I found some dtms 10 minutes away refinished, powdercoated and new Bridgestone tires. I figured it was Saturday morning and had nothing going on so I got home threw them on. the car sat way too high- I think it was between 26-27" gtf in all 4 corners. i kind of knew it was gonna be too high so I was soaking the vogtland coi over collars and threads since Thursday w pb blaster. I took the wheels back off and marked out on the coilovers how much I would have to drop them. Well.... I knew this wasn't gonna be easy since the car has a bunch of rust. I basically had no luck besides the pass front wheel! Nothing worked👎 The rest of the day Saturday I just kept soaking them with a mixture of acetone and atf. Gave it another go Sunday morning w spanner wrench and then a mallet with screwdriver....nada. Decided to just remove the coils and take them down to my shop where I could vice them down and crank w a channel lock and pipe for extra leverage.


This worked a lot better! I set the coils to my measured height and returned home to install them. Putting them back on was not bad either. I should have just removed them to begin with and saved myself a bunch of time. I was shooting for a 24.25" front and 24.5" rear. I came up with these numbers after checking out vwvortex and looking at the b5 stance thread to get some ideas. I thought this would be a height to clear up the wheel gap but still be practical.

I ended up going a little too far as I ended up overshooting by almost 3/4". Car was around 23.5f 24r and looked too low. Made the adjustments and got it up to the measurements i was looking for originally.


When I was finally done late afternoon I had a bite to eat and this sad face looking at me! Poor guys on a diet...


While I was playing with the coil heights I also finished up painting a rear spoiler and attaching it. I wasn't sure how much I was gonna like it so I didn't want to use glue to mount it so I just went w some automotive 3m double sided tape. I'll see if I can get some better pictures up of it but I think it makes the rear a little more sporty and not so round. I'm gonna plan to do an oil change this weekend so I need to pick up some stuff. I always use liqui moly for my m5, is this a good oil to use for audi's as well? and if so what weight? While doing this I also might raise the car another 1/2" and search for some rear spacers. Right now the hartmanns are et38 with 225/40/18 tires so I'll prob look for some 10mm spacers. Any suggestions on others offsets....

[BENI_BOY]

congrats on the avant but make sure the pictures you post are horizontal, I got a headache looking at them lol

[Zba]

lol, they used to be normal!

[blackslc5]

Lol sorry about that... Do you mean when I take the photo or when i post it from the website?

[rollerton]

Found it, that was easy.

https://www.ecstuning.com/Search/ZAW269005/ES2730748/

Need to find a part out that has these.

OP, I'm glad you don't use the baby excuse as a reason to get rid of the b5

Just a FYI; the "latch" system brackets were originally only about $14 from the dealer. That ECS listing is straight up crack pipe B.S.

[blackslc5]

Lol I was thinking the same thing when I saw the price.....and that's per piece. so $320 for the set is insane. I would never pay that thank goodness po bought it

[Zba]

Oh, hell no I'd never pay that. I mostly posted it for part numbers and a reference. I'm sure a latch system from a b6 would fit and a used set will cost 20$

[Eurotuned_A4]

The latch system only recently started to skyrocket in price. I have a whole set sitting on my shelf that I'm hoarding since the prices have went bonkers. Without the latch system putting in car seats suck!!

[Yuppie]

Really like the wheels on the avant. I had them on my b6 avant and now I wish I would have kept the wheels.