coopster23's 2010 Avant S-line

[coopster23]

Hey there! I've been lurking on the forums for a while and hadn't posted anything about my car, so I decided to stop putting it off. Here it is!



Story time

I started looking for a new car around July/August 2021. I was first interested in newer Ford Fusions, but I couldn't find one spec'd just right within my price range. I quickly got bored with those and started to look elsewhere. I wanted something sporty and fairly unique (i.e. not a Miata, 350Z, Mustang, etc.) that I could modify to my heart's content. I came across the Avants and fell in love because, well, wagons are cool. From August to late October, I checked Carvana, Cars.com, AutoTempest, eBay, and FB Marketplace daily. My plan was to buy an A4 Avant, then immediately go Stage 2 with it. I found a nice dark blue Prestige for sale in CT and considered flying out to check it out, but the dealer was slow to reply and kinda sketchy.

I eventually discovered my car on FB Marketplace. It was listed with 104k miles and a lengthy list of mods, but out of my price range. Since I had a 4 day weekend off classes, I decided to fly out to NC from Tuscaloosa to pick the car up, then drive it back home to Louisiana to register it. The car is a Monza Silver-colored Prestige S-Line edition, with every bell and whistle available at the time and in immaculate condition. After some negotiation, I bought my car for $13,500. with the following specs:

• APR Stage 3 K04
• USP 3" Downpipe & AWE Touring exhaust
• CTS Turbo Cold Air Intake
• 2016 2.0T engine w/ 20k less than the chassis and timing chain service already done
• Drilled and slotted brake rotors with aftermarket calipers
• Honeycomb Grills: foglights and center
• Carbon fiber (vinyl?) wrap on door and dash trim
• Light bar behind the grill

I also got a thick stack of papers documenting the car's history: maintenance records, sales documents, and contact info for the 4 previous owners.

The car is a blast to own and drive. It's quick, snappy, and sounds great. Here's a list of mods I've done/will do/might do:
Done so far:

• Standalone RSNAV unit
• Facelift LED taillights (US-spec)
• 19" Rotor reps: Alzor Style 628, ET35
• hard-wired dash cam
• Full interior LED conversion (including vanity lights, trunk, and glovebox)
• Removed LED light bar. It was just too bright, and I didn't like seeing it through the grill
• Removed Plastidip on badges and crash bar, then painted crash bar gloss black
• Swapped all the window switches w/ the B8.5 chrome-rimmed versions
• B8.5 shift knob
• Aluminum paddle shifter extensions
• Projector puddle lights: Audi Rings

Planned:

• Paint calipers or swap to S4 calipers
• "eBay special" RS4-style spoiler
• Flat-bottomed steering wheel
• Facelift S-Line shifter. Pulled my B8.5 auto shift knob from a junkyard car, but I want air-leather in the future
• Control arm kit. The pre-purchase inspection noted that the bushings are crushed and recommended a full rebuild. Haven't gotten it done yet because I'm a college student, and there's only so many major purchases I can afford at a time.
• FMIC upgrade/Water-meth injection. The underside of my intercooler is crumpled appears to have had a run-in with a stump or a parking stop under a previous owner
• Under-seat storage bin. Can be found for cheap on Aliexpress

Possible future mods?

• Facelifted front end
• S4 swap, maybe 4.0T swap? Either way, I want an auto transmission; I'm getting married next year, so this could foreseeably be a family car. Plus, my fiancé can't drive stick
• Quieter exhaust or better sound deadening. See family reason above.

Performance-wise, I'm not sure what else can be done to the car without an engine swap or E85 fuel system retrofit. Maybe one of you can give suggestions?
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I'll attach permanent links to Imgur albums. I hate when forum threads have broken images
Album 1
Build pt. 1

[19birel]

Gorgeous Avant! Sounds like you got a great one with a well documented history and a great list of mods! Can't wait to see what you do with it!

[shreddykrueger]

solid. Thats identical to my avant when I first purchased it. It’s now a swapped 6MT s4 avant, and throwing around the idea of going 4.0

I had done all of the above mods prior to doing the swap (k04, FMIC, test pipe, exhaust, intake, suspension, etc). It was super fun BUT you eventually get used to it and fiend for more power.

Enjoi!

[coopster23]

Gorgeous Avant! Sounds like you got a great one with a well documented history and a great list of mods! Can't wait to see what you do with it!

Thanks! I'm excited too!

solid. Thats identical to my avant when I first purchased it. It’s now a swapped 6MT s4 avant

I'm going to pretend like I haven't read through your build thread half a dozen times for inspiration, lol. Monza silver isn't my favorite paint color, but I can't justify the cost of a wrap or paint if I plan on facelifting it later on. In the meantime, where did you get your grill? I've seen that style for B8.5, but I can't find it for B8

throwing around the idea of going 4.0

I came across a thread where an Audizine member swapped an RS6 drivetrain into his S4 by splicing in part of a harness and using semi-custom firmware for the ECU and TCU. He made it seem simple electrically, which is the part that scares me despite being in college for electrical/computer engineering. He also probably spent more on the parts for the swap than I did for my whole car, so that swap might remain just a dream for me for a while

[shreddykrueger]

I'm going to pretend like I haven't read through your build thread half a dozen times for inspiration, lol. Monza silver isn't my favorite paint color, but I can't justify the cost of a wrap or paint if I plan on facelifting it later on. In the meantime, where did you get your grill? I've seen that style for B8.5, but I can't find it for B8

eBay. lots of solid parts on their for much more reasonable prices. I got my rs4 rep bumper, grill, carbon side mirrors, and carbon rs4 roof spoiler from there.

here's a link to the grill: https://www.ebay.com/itm/33415324519...kAAOSwNTZfttYx

the shop that did my swap is currently dropping a 4.0 into an sq5, so they'll have some experience. I think the biggest thing is some custom jabbing and cutting a bit into the firewall for the b8. the 4.0 power and exhaust note in a wagon would be NASSSSSTY. Be a lot cheaper to just port my SC, water/meth, and bigger TB tho haha

ya I feel you about Monza. I got mine with it because the spec was so good and had the real s-line interior which was important to me (pre-swap)

[shreddykrueger]

the day I bought it:





as it sits today:

[coopster23]

Thanks for the link! Sick ride, what an incredible transformation.

[coopster23]

Finally got the new rotor reps in, so I drove back home from school last weekend to get 'em installed and my tires swapped over. I am OBSESSED with the look now, though I do with they were matte and a little darker like the RS5 rotors. Definitely need to paint the brake calipers now, since they're more visible and sit closer to the rim.





I also took the opportunity to replace/repair some interior trim parts in my car. My car was missing the 12V outlet cover in the backseat, and the plastic panel below that was chipped, so I replaced those with parts pulled from a junkyard car.

In other news, I finally got the last tail light I needed for the LED swap. All parts acquired and ready to go, or so I thought. Got everything pulled apart today and discovered old pins for the outer lights were not compatible with the new housing, and I didn't have enough new pins to replace them all. I originally bought the pins+connectors from Aliexpress to pinch a few pennies, but I've been waiting since November to install these lights--I'm not waiting 2-3 more months. Gotta buy new connectors with wires now, I guess.

[coopster23]

I also had a “Dipped headlight error” on my drive back to college, so I cheaper out and bought a $30 set of Xenon bulbs from Amazon—big mistake. They threw a bunch of errors the first time I turned the car on (went away the second time), and are dimmer than halogens. Those are getting returned and ordering proper Osrams like I should have done in the first place

[19birel]

I also had a “Dipped headlight error” on my drive back to college, so I cheaper out and bought a $30 set of Xenon bulbs from Amazon—big mistake. They threw a bunch of errors the first time I turned the car on (went away the second time), and are dimmer than halogens. Those are getting returned and ordering proper Osrams like I should have done in the first place

Morimoto makes pretty good Xenon bulbs that don't break the bank, I've had mine for ~4yrs and they have been terrific.

[shreddykrueger]

Some things are chill to save money and use eBay/AliExpress/Chinese parts, but I would definitely try and avoid any electrical stuff.

[coopster23]

Some things are chill to save money and use eBay/AliExpress/Chinese parts, but I would definitely try and avoid any electrical stuff.

Definitely agree with you there. I figured that the headlights probably wouldn't break anything else if the little cheapo experiment worked.

[coopster23]

It's been a few months since I last updated this thread; I've done a few things to the car but procrastinated posting anything. The biggest change was right at the end of February: I converted my car from halogen taillights to the facelift LED versions from a 2013-2016 Allroad. Or, more precisely, several Allroads. Being on a college student's budget meant that I had to piece together whatever deals I could get on used parts from eBay (there were no other lights to be found on Craigslist or FB Marketplace. I checked several times a day for two weeks). The thread here was super useful, but I bought US-spec lights and the connectors were different. I tried to put together a list of parts to make pigtails instead of splicing, but I hit a roadblock when I tried to find a female connector for the inner lights. I gave up with that aspect and resigned myself to permanently altering the car.

I had to wait a few months between purchase and installation, since the inner lights had to come from Lithuania. Tack another week and a half on that because the outer passenger light I got from Arkansas turned out to be Euro-spec; curiously, the two used lights that shipped from Europe were US-spec. The different connectors I mentioned were:

• 2 x 1j0973705 with wires (outer lights)
• 2 x 3d0972708a with wires (inner lights) -- These I ordered from Aliexpress

The total cost of this DIY endeavor? $571.07 total compared to Europrice's $1299 before tax or shipping. I'm sure the Europrice kit is much easier to install, but I'm willing to trade a few hours of my time and lights with a few scratches for the price difference. I'll leave some before and after pics below. I started the swap in the afternoon in sunny weather; by the time I finished, it was well after dark and in the 30s. I ended up working by flashlight (the street lamps were not as bright as the pictures makes them look!), and after making the necessary coding changes, a VCDS scan showed that I had a short somewhere in the trunk. Long story short, while probing with my multimeter between the hatch and trunk, the trunk shut and left a nice multimeter-shaped dent in the sheet metal. Luckily the dent is hidden beneath the hatch when shut, but I'll be getting that fixed whenever I get around to getting general dent repair done.

I forgot to take a before picture, so the one here is from before I bought the car.




In other news, I performed regular maintenance and changed my oil with an oil extraction pump. I 10/10 recommend buying one of these, it really is a game changer. It took me roughly 20 minutes to change my oil from start to finish in my apartment parking lot and I don't have to worry about jacks or stands. I have another DIY job in progress that I'll hopefully post about in a week or so.

Lastly, I made a new Avant buddy back home. Earlier this year, a guy in my (very small) hometown bought a C8 RS6. We've talked back and forth a few times, but we haven't both been in town at the same time yet. Whenever that happens, I'm hoping to go on a ride-along, though I know that'll only make me itch for more performance

[19birel]

The B8.5 tail lights looks great! I'm right there with you on the oil extractor, such a great time saver!

[coopster23]

The B8.5 tail lights looks great! I'm right there with you on the oil extractor, such a great time saver!

Thanks!

[coopster23]

Washed the car earlier this week in preparation for a 2000 mile road trip to Idaho next weekend. My fiancé suggested we go to a car show yesterday, and we got to meet the local guy who has a 2022 RS6. The RS6 owner is also a photographer, so we got some sweet pictures!

[shreddykrueger]

killer progress! what's next??

[coopster23]

Routine maintenance this week, then water-methanol injection in another month or two. Probably paint correction and chrome delete towards the end of the summer.

The more I read about WMI, the more I like it. Solves the carbon build-up problem while adding a little power AND it's cheaper than a carbon cleaning service

[shreddykrueger]

solid! I’m probably going to get a water/meth setup in the next month or so as well. What setup are you going with?

[19birel]

Routine maintenance this week, then water-methanol injection in another month or two. Probably paint correction and chrome delete towards the end of the summer.

The more I read about WMI, the more I like it. Solves the carbon build-up problem while adding a little power AND it's cheaper than a carbon cleaning service

If you haven't had a carbon cleaning done, water meth won't eliminate what's there. (It's a time consuming but easy DIY to go in there and clean the valves). It's definitely a great way to reduce future build up though, that's partially why I installed my setup.

If you have any questions about the install lmk, I have some pics in my thread as well!

[coopster23]

solid! I’m probably going to get a water/meth setup in the next month or so as well. What setup are you going with?

Not fully sure yet. I'm leaning towards Snow but open to suggestions

If you haven't had a carbon cleaning done, water meth won't eliminate what's there. (It's a time consuming but easy DIY to go in there and clean the valves). It's definitely a great way to reduce future build up though, that's partially why I installed my setup.

If you have any questions about the install lmk, I have some pics in my thread as well!

Those are definitely going to be helpful, thanks!