my new 2008 audi a6 is showing low oil every 400 miles. I mostly use it for city driving. The dealership says this is normal, can anyone help id the problem. There are no oil spots underneath my car, so I don’t see any leaks.
Thanks
The dealer is lying . One quart per thousand miles is what is considered borderline .
The problem is the dealer ! Get in touch with Audi USA !
If I plunked down $40 Grand for a brand new car, and it was burning a quart of oil in four hundred miles, nothing short of a new car would make me happy. I would consider the engine a DOA.
Agreed. If you’ve been driving it and the oil light came on, and you ignored it (even “just til you got home”, I’d want a new engine. A new car shouldn’t be burning that much oil.
Make it unanamous. 1 qt every 400 miles in a new car is a sign of a serious problem.
Make him show you anything that says that’s normal usage. He won’t be able to.
I have no personal experience with this, but many threads here over the past years have said that one quart per thousand miles seems to be the standard for maximum “normal” usage according to many manufacturers. I’d definitely push this one.
It’s not normal. It’s time to raise the roof on this one.
If you bought the car as a dealer demo (say a 100 miles on it, etc.) then it’s possible that someone was thrashing it during the break-in period.
A brand new car should not have more than 5 or 10 miles on it.
This is a candidate for the lemon law. How many times have you been to the dealer? Do you have a receipt for each visit? If so, you’re on your way. I’m not suggesting that you should aim at a new car. But you should be positioned to take advantage of it if the dealer prooves useless. Check your state laws to see what the requirements are. YOu can do an iternet search for ‘lemon law’ and your state to find out the requirements.
400 or 4000? I can’t believe any dealer would claim a quart every 400 miles is normal.
No where does it say he’s adding one quart every 400 miles. He says it shows “Low Oil”.
This could very well mean he pulls the dipstick and it’s a bit below the “Full” mark.
Many (most all) German cars will never maintain “Full” on the dipstick, and want to run about halfway between the Add and Full marks. If you keep topping off the oil trying to maintain Full the engine will throw the oil and reach it’s desired level of halfway between the marks.
The Dealer should of explained this German car quirk rather than saying it’s normal.
Benzman
Do the current VW/audi engines even use a dipstick or is this a “low oil” indicator. It would be helpful to know just how much oil is being added every 400 miles, it may only take 1/4 of a quart to turn on the indicator. I don’t know about new cars, but my old benz engines definitely like to be at the midpoint on the dipstick.
the car is taking a full quart, it started that it needed it every 800 miles the low oil light turned on now it is happening at 400 miles. I have brought it into the dealership, they say they spoke to audi corporate and that they have not seen this problem elsware, now they want me to bring it in at 300 miles to see how low it is. All i know is that this seems like a lot of oil.
In that case it is not normal, especially if the oil consumption doubled. It is a lot of oil and they need to determine the cause and correct it, even if they need to replace the engine.
At least they are still communicating and trying to help you. That’s a good sign. And remember to document everything. Each time you go in you need to get a receipt that proves you visited them. Even though it’s best to get this car fixed, you need the lemon law back-up plan. Always plan ahead in case the current avenue doesn’t pan out.
Just in case this happens to turn into a Lemon Law issue you MUST maintain a paper trail.
This means that every time you take that car in you should sign a copy of a written repair order and you should receive a copy.
Also maintain a notebook with any additional comments, statements made, time it was made, etc.
Without paperwork you could be sunk because memories can be pretty short depending on the situation.
http://www.carlemon.com/
http://www.lemonlawamerica.com/
couple websites to help understand each state’s interpretation of a lemon law.
VW/Audi still have dipsticks . It’s BMW and Mercedes that have foolishly removed them .
If they insist that is normal ask them to put it in writing and tell them that you plan on publishing their written statement in the local news paper. I suspect you will get a different excuse.
Expect to be replacing the converter soon. That much oil usually does not take long to clog the converter, you will notice a lack of power on the freeway first. At least this one they will have to pay for.
Not to the extent you are speaking of for your 2008 A6, but there are many upset 2007 and 2008 Audi A4 owners that are reporting 1 quart of oil disappearing each 1000 miles. This is upsetting and Audi has nothing but excuses. I have a questions for the folks that say this is normal. Where is this synthetic oil disappearing to every 1000 miles?
I had similar issue with my 2008 A6 Avant. After 10,000 miles on odometer I needed to regularly add 1 quart of oil every 1200 miles or so. Even though Audi was pushing back I forced them to do detailed engine diagnostics. It turned out that one of the cylinders did not keep compression. A defect was so bad that not serviceable. After 14 months from new and 28,000 miles driven I got my engine replaced last Monday.
Audi is a fantastic car … of poor quality.