D4 Headlamp unit
 

Ok, I'm new to the forum, bought a D4 last week.

I've just found out about the novel automatic transmission selector in a rather expensive way. Put the car in park (so I thought) hopped out to shut a gate. Turned around and my new A8 D4 (11 plate) was reversing on its own. eeek ...

I've owned several automatic cars, Toyota, Several Skoda's, two BMW 7 series, two Volvo XC90's, VW tiguan and an Audi 100. Never ever has this happened to me. With every other automatic car you have a detent system and postive position selector. With the Audi D4 you do not you sort of push it around and it picks a gear. So a word of warning, be very careful with this.

I managed to stop it before it did some serious damage to the environment or my neighbours house, but not before it removed a fence post, scraped a bit of paint and worse of all .. cracked my passengers head lamp unit. It has about a half inch crack in the bottom of the unit.

Amazingly it hasn't actually dented any thing, but I suspect the headlamp unit is going to really hurt financially. All the lights work fine and its just the surface of unit that has the crack.

So any suggestions for sorting the headlamp unit?

Depends how long you intend to keep and if it's just a surface crack or going to let water in over time?

A standard gas discharge unit is about £650, cornering light £730, LED £1640!

I've just bought it, so maybe three years. All the lights are fine no cracks. Its the unit body itself that's cracked.

(Sorry about the double post, tried to edit this post, but was denied. Thought my original post didn't take, tried it again and ended up with two!).

I guess it also depends where the crack is and whether it's distorting or interfering with the dipped or main beam.
I'd probably start by carefully going over the crack with transparent nail varnish or car topcoat lacquer to try and seal it against water ingress and make it less visible, then see how bad it looks and how well it works.

Its definately out of any beams .. on the side of the unit.

I've added a picture of it to a public gallery on my profile - Now attached.

Looks "hideable". Of course you'll still know it's there..... :-(
You know you can upload pictures directly into a post - use "Manage Attachments". :cool:

I will definately replace the unit. Love the car. I was after a Phaeton, but proved impossible to test drive one in my local area. VW dealer suggested I try an A8. So I did and bought it. I've done a couple of 160 mile trips in it so far, very nice indeed.

Thanks for the prices, but how much for the actual unit itself with no lights?

Spied this guy on e-bay.. any views? http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Audi-A2-A3...-/281162646377

Also found a unit for £49, but it has scratch on the front, maybe if I buy the scrached unit and send it to him?

Unfortunately I don't think you can buy just the front cover :(

Have attached a pdf of the page from Etka for reference

If you are not afraid from a bit of DIY buy a windscreen repair resin on e-bay to seal the crack and make it less visible.

Adrian,

Firstly thanks ever so much for the information. My day job is computers, so If you want to ask me about pretty much anything I'd more than happy to help!

Noticed on page 3 there is ...

26 4H0 998 121 repair kit for headlamp
housing

Wonder what that actually is ...

Dunno for sure put "usually" those repair kits relate to the mounting brackets which can snap off.
They are a smaller bracket that screws onto the unit at one end and the mounting point on the body at the other.
Like this:
http://parts.audiofalexandria.com/pr...21138_zoom.jpg

Given the location of the damage I'd definitely consider filling and polishing it ASAP.

I've put some clear nail polish over it for now. I'll keep you all posted as to how I resolve this. (My credit card is crying already).

The things I've done to hire cars, especially overseas on holiday, with nothing more than toothpaste (polish) superglue and nail varnish are truly wondrous to behold!:D

That sounds interesting, and something i've not heard anyone else saying about them. Is thre not a display that tells you what gear you have selected?

Yes it does, but I'm so used to pushing the lever fully forward for park. I didn't look as I was just hopping out to quickly shut a gate. I think it is a poor design, but I did notice it before the incident and I should have taken more care.

There is an auto parking brake function, but when your rolling up to a barrier or in traffic on an incline it can grab the brakes, so I'm not keen on that one. I'm used to riding the brake when crawling in traffic so it requires a bit of thought to realise the parking brake has engaged.

I'm booking an appointment with the local Chips Away guy to see what he can do. I'll report back.

Always had my doubts about you.........:ROFL:

I've also booked in for an estimate for proper repair. Will be interesting to see what the difference in price is. :-(

Ok, Chips Away have come in at £360, but won't fix the headlamp :-(

So the wing is made of bumper plastic; hence the lack of dents. Just cracks.

Just bought a headlight off e-bay for £70, I figure its worth a punt. Plan will be to have a look at it and if it looks like ok to give it to the chips away guy to fix the scratch and fit.

I'll do a before and after picture if anyone is interested.

I'm interested +++

Also that headlight is cheap

Too cheap I suspect, I will find out when it arrives.

Proper bodyshop guy seemed to think the bumped bit had been bumped before, hence; the cracking. Anyway he was talking new wing, headlight and respray. I haven't seen the estimate yet, guess they are booking it onto the super computer in Los Alamos to calculate the final amount.

Oh yes, and Proper Bodyshop guy noticed the dent on the corner of the bonnet a nice extra surprise to make my day. (groan)

Any reliable view on what the wing is made from? I'm wondering as the Chips Away guy seemed to think he could "weld the plastic" on the wing. If its Aluminium then I don't think that will be likely. Its been a long time since I last had to deal with this sort of issue, I'm remembering why I work hard not to have a collision or bump.

Good grief
 

Quote is in from Proper Accident Repair Centre guy... Good Lord.

1,850 .... WOW.....

Putting aside the parts at £800. Wants £250 just for paint. £750 in labour @ £30 an hour = 25 man hours. Seems madly over the top for a scratched wing, bumper and slight dent in the bonnet.

Noticed tonight when I was parking up on the drive, my driveway is quite curved. So I stopped, put the car into park, went to confirm it on the indicator, but of course you can't see the indicator on the dash as the steering wheel spoke blanks it. I think that was the critical piece of the puzzle as to why it happened. As I must have glanced, but didn't see the selector indicator. And yes I engaged the electric parking brake and switched the car off before getting out. :ROFL:

I also noticed on the way home that I was in Sport mode on the gearbox. Again, its not a brilliant design at all.

Ok, before and after's ...

Well done on getting it sorted out - don't forget to mention how much you've saved over the other quote to mission control! +++

It's arrived. Pretty well scratched... Seen a guy who changed the front of the glass by putting the lamp in an oven for 5 minutes at 200c. It was for a 7 series E39, but the process looked right. To put it back in just do the same thing again. It must be right as I can't see how you could service anything in the lamp, unless you had freakishly small alien hands.

Plan right now is to see how I get on with the windscreen repair kit. if it looks good I'll run with that. if not, I'll have a go at polishing the spare headlight and removing it from the light body. If that works ok, I'll have a go at swapping the glass.

I think I pushed the Chips Away guy to his limit, but it looks good and he did the job in a single day. I would definately use them again. Happy to name names and recommend if you want?

By all means mention your particular chips away agent. I think the problem with Franchises (such as they) are in getting the consistent service and results with another Chips Away agent in another area etc. I suppose having said that you could go to the same spray shop and get two totally different results depending on who sprayed your car and what checking/inspection procedures they have afterwards. +++

Many thanks to Neil Dobson in Basildon - www.chipsaway.co.uk/neildobson

He was punctual, on-time and did the job as advertised, recommended.+++