Mechanic Recommendation? - 2018 Audi SQ5
 

Posting for a friend here, as he's looking to a mechanic that can diagnose/repair his engine here for a decent price.

TLDR - He had his Audi tuned to Stage 1, ended up driving the tuned vehicle for a few weeks and started to hear knocking, which he ignored for a number of weeks. Finally one morning the car threw a bunch of check engine lights, he got it scanned and it turns out there's an internal valve leak, and cylinder 5/6 misfire.

Compression test was done, borescope revealed a wet cylinder.

All in all, I'm thinking this is going to cost him some serious change here, engine pull, and so forth. I recommended he get the car fixed, and sell it at this point.

Any recommendations of a decent shop that won't destroy his pockets on the repair? As an FYI he had his vehicle tuned at PG Performance, they've informed him they don't have the tools to fix his engine, and warranty has been denied by VW/Audi.

I take all my really technical stuff to Derek at DC Motorworks… for my MR2 Turbo… and he did a lot of the work on my k-swapped Civic spent a shit tonne of personal time figuring out ECU stuff and didn’t charge me for it

Tell him to sell it and buy a unimog

Ouch that sucks. Any chance these were pre-existing symptoms prior to this happening? And why did he drive it in limp mode for weeks until something really bad happened?

I don't think your friend is going to be able to save a few bucks given the complexity of his problem. He can pick good, cheap, and fast, but only two of the three.

The only thing he's got for him is getting a shop to fix it and build up some goodwill with them. Other than that, the only shop I can think of is Blitzkrieg where they will quote you to fix it or buy it from him as-is and he just walks away. Might get lowballed though. Tough situation.

Vancouver West Motors Vancouver West Motors - Vehicle Maintenance, Tuning, Repairs specializes in VW/Audi. I find them fair and honest, they get pretty good reviews. 4.7 out of 5.0 on Google review.

Try RPI Equipped in Richmond. Another VW/Audi specialist shop but they seem to know their shit more than PG who isn’t quite as organized.

+1 for RPI. Originally took my S4 there cause I played hockey with the front office guy (Jonny) but since he left last year I still take my car there and Travis hasn't really steered me wrong. Was even willing to take my wifes Fiat in for maintenance. Can't say their pricing is cheap (never gone anywhere else) but def cheaper than dealers

Is there any performance shops which specialize in Audi’s in the lower mainland? Anyone pushing the limits of these motors must have popped one or two in the passes. You’d think they would be the experienced ones in similar repairs?

This is super helpful, I've passed this info onto him.

Sounds like he's going to make some calls today to see his best options based on what you guys provided.

Big thanks.

Should have bought an AMG :pokerface: isn't stage one like a air filter and a tune

Unless it was one of those ebay no name tunes.

He was flashed @ PG Performance, so def no eBay type tune.

I take my car to reiter performance in abby, worth the drive. He specializes in Audi/vw and he does all the work for the vancity Audi YouTube guy, his rs3 is there right now.

He says lots of 3.0t are popping lately, they're starting to get affordable and lots of kids are buying them, tuning them, running shitty fuel and ignoring knocking. Our gas here is pretty bad, watch the fuel videos on vancity Audi for proof. Recommendation is to mix e85 in every tank if you're running stage 3

Ya he suspected a bad tank from Chevron as the culprit for this problem.

This is going to be a costly one for him, sucks.

turn3 in langley - Jeff and his crew are fantastic.

https://turn3autosport.com/

but ya, it's going to be a drag

That doesn't sound quite right - how does a Stage 1 tune end up with that much damage? Is he WOT-ing every single time, every single stoplight? Even with bad gas the tune should still pull timing if it detects misfiring.

^i second that, ive seen alot of 3.0t supercharged's popping here and there due to them reaching their age but never heard of the new 3.0 turbos blowing up from a stage 1. The engines way too new still.
There has to be something more to the cause.

Roastpuff is on the right track. I'm fairly certain he's WOTing way too often, and when the engine isn't fully warmed.

He's quite the erratic driver, so that wouldn't surprise me.

I would liken that with any car, be it a Civic or a pickup truck, when you floor it before the engine etc. get a chance to warm up properly, it's just asking for trouble. Sorry to hear the fate of this car, but I'm afraid no empathy for your friend.

^^ lol that reminds me, I had a friend back in the day that would red line his car at cold starts. Ah good times.

If it’s not good how does it work with phev or hybrid vehicles?
You can drive pretty far on ev and then the engine kicks in and your going 80+ or flooring it?

^ I think in hybrids the computer is smart enough to not red line it when the engine is cold and they are usually tuned for efficiency not performance. Also it takes like what? 3 minutes for a modern engine to warm up

I know the Toyotas in particular have a few trucks to hear the ice engine quickly in their hybrids which also helps with emissions. Like using exhaust heat to heat the coolant and a vacuum sealed coolant storage tank.

If anyone is curious to know what happened.

He didn't follow any of these suggestions :lol He was persuaded to take his vehicle to IB Motors.

Long story short, the issue is piston ring damage. 14K in damage all in.

He's owned the car for a little over a year.

Tough break.

Ripoffffffff

$800 to swap a motor in labour... complete SQ5 engine used is about $5,000USD and I don't even think he needs that, just needs a block... he shoulda been able to fix the car for less than $10k easily