Moonie#5

Thanks Tech fella. I was hoping you might be correct ............. Audi main dealer confirmed same as my local independent. However, charged £60 plus 1.5 hours of labour at a very reasonable £120 per hour. Parts £850 and another 3.5 hours of labour makes an eyewatering £1,500. {sigh} For £1600 I could buy a 52 reg 1.8 Diesel Focus ......... Just talking to my mate who bought a 1.9 TDI at the same time - a smidge older than mine but he's had to fork out on a new gearbox and other expensive stuff. I am unimpressed - but hey, gotta suck it up I guess. It's a lesson learned. Have I just been unlucky or do I need to factor in spending an average of £600 a year maybe for repairs? Cheers Phil.

PAS light on dashboard. Steering very very very heavy - fighting against the hydraulics it feels like. Pfeifer in Hove can't get any message on diagnostics. Suggested Steering Rack or ECU. (sigh) However, won't know if it's ECU until fitting Rack (£700-800). They can't locate a decent non-audi one so they said I should take it to the main dealer. (bigger sigh) I'm not really keen on 2nd hand, recon or really cheap crap ones. Can anyone suggest a supplier as ACS power steering who Pfeifer uses have no stock and can't come up with anyone else. Have to say - pretty hacked off with this. My first ever car that I've owned, I paid a good 30-40% premium for an Audi rather than a Ford/Vaux/etc for supposed build quality. It's only 8 years old and has done 75k miles. This is going to cost about 25% of the cars value. For something so fundamental to go wrong it could almost be classed as a latent defect. Anyhooo - answers on a postcard please folks. Phil.