Toadicus

After seven (7) VW ... I am now moving up. My eye is on an S4 B7 07 4.2 with 160K KM on it.


I have to travel about 200 km to see it so I wanted to know what to look for? I did all my own service, I have bitchin' tool kit and im an engineer IRL.


I read up on these forms and see that the 4.2 is pretty stout. Timing belts?


What else should I look for? ...

veryMickey

find out what maintenance has been done (with receipts).
get a PPI done on the car too.

in my opinion there are two big gambles with these cars.

one is the timing guides (not the chain itself) the guides are plastic and eventually break leading to more major problems due to the fact you haev a chain bouncing around. its not a cheap job to fix. you might hear a clack clacking on startup.

two the cylinders in the engine block can be scored if the previous owner drove the car hard without letting things warm up properly. only way to check is at a mechanics and having them look.

good luck