Hello – I am hoping for some help as I am new to Audis and I’ve recently purchased an automatic 2004 A3 S-Line 2.0 diesel with 150,000 miles. The main issue I have when the car is in automatic mode and I am trying to accelerate when I’m already going fairly fast. To add some context to that. I drive on the motorway to get to work and I only really notice the issue during this time. Generally it’ll happen if I’m already in the highest gear and need to overtake or attempt to change lane which requires some level of acceleration. Instead of accelerating, the car just revs but there’s no power. The car does feel like it’s changing gear but it sounds very sporadic. I’m no expert but I understand the kickdown should ensure that the car is in the correct gear to cope with the sudden acceleration?
Whatever speed I’m doing at the time doesn’t increase and if I don’t keep my foot flat on the accelerator the car starts to lose power. But by doing so the car is then at maximum revs. Worryingly, it’s not temporary either. I need to stop the car and switch off the engine before it seems to stop. I’ve tried switching the car to manual and using the paddles to change down a gear or 2 but this does nothing. The display shows the gears going down but the engine doesn’t behave in a way that would suggest it’s actually doing anything, it just keeps revving excessively. As I’ve mentioned. The only way to stop it happening is to stop the car completely and turn the engine off. This doesn’t happen every time (thankfully) but as you can imagine, once is enough during rush hour on the M3!
I plan to take it to a garage but I wondered if anyone has experience anything like this before and what the potential cause could be. It would be helpful to be armed with some knowledge ahead of any trip the mechanic.
This is my first time posting so I hope I've given enough detail on the issue
Thanks in advance.
