CVT belt change ?
 

my daughter decided to go hybrid for her daily 100 mile commute on the motorway so she persuaded me to part with my elderly A8 and change to her unmarked A6 2 litre diesel ...I think only the drivers seat has been sat on!
however if is high mileage and looking on the internet the CVT doesn't have a good reputation and if the belt breaks the car will be scrap!

does anyone have any experience of these transmissions and is it worth looking for somebody to change the belt , is , who?

The 'belt' on an Audi CVT is actually a chain - the main thing with them is to stick religiously to the oil change interval (35-40k miles if I remember correctly, but may be model dependant)

Failure to stick to the intervals will generally result in the clutch pack self-destructing first.

Chains do fail but I'd treat the gearbox, bar servicing, as the determinant of the life of the vehicle, unless you can get an exchange/new box at a sensible price when it comes to it. I've read somewhere that the oil pump in the gearbox is good for 300k km (less than 200k miles) so if it's properly high miles that's something to factor in (apparently not cheap as comes with the valve body)

thanks adrian
she bought it new and it has a complete main agent service history , after 10 years it is at 170k [transmission oil change just changed when she gave it to me]
so looks like run it until the transmission fails......great shame as it is perfect , MOT no advisories , only thing ever failed was the aircon!
however , as the forums oldest follower , with the mileage I am doing now I will probably fail first !

I’ve recently just purchased an C6 A6 for £800 after my S8 was crashed in to.

It also has the CVT box and it’s extremely smooth even on 133k miles.

I had a C5 model about 6 years ago which also had the earlier CVT box and this is even smoother. That had the “6 speed” version whereas the later one is the “7 speed” version.

My old C5 A6 was on 150k and generally was fine if a little indecisive at times going from drive to reverse. The later versions are supposed to me more robust from what I’ve read. For the price I paid I’m happy to take the gamble :)

looks like 2 of us keeping fingers crossed ricky !
I too have read that the later version is more robust ; what I don't understand is this talk about a 6 speed and a 7 speed version .....on a CVT ???

From what I gather it’s just how the box is programmed.

I believe the boxes are set up to mimic a 6 speed or 7 speed tiptronic box with pre set revs/speed when you switch to manual mode.

In theory you should never notice if you leave it in D as it will deliver an economy drive instead of a sporty one as a usual CVT should.

I think there's a couple of things being confused there - one relates to the clutch pack, the other to number of 'gears' where manual paddles are fitted.

The former basically relates to the fluid clutch which deals with setting off - originally a 6 plate, and latterly a 7 plate clutch which sits in the fluid and is the reason why the oil changes are important.

The latter is a way of making the gearbox feel a bit like an s-tronic, by having set shift points where it jumps between 'gears' rather than smoothly moving along the cones. You can have as many 'gears' as you want - just depends what the manufacturer thinks the customer will want. Think the Wiki page for 'multitronic' gives a better explanation :)