I've had my fair share of VAG stuff that has given me headaches but every now and then it seems like they accidentally make a motor that is overall pretty decent. (VAG guys, don't come at me, I still talk about some of those cars to my therapist.)
I know that the 2.5 VW puts in a lot of stuff is very much a "it's not going to get your heart rate up but is a genuinely reliable mill". How is the Audi 3.2 V6 from the late 00's-early 10's?
I seem to remember one of the V6s (3.0?) had bolts that would back out of the *inside* of the cam sprockets or something insane and cause all kinds of carnage. Is the 3.2 just more of that pain and suffering or did anything get fixed?
(Pair of manual 3.2 A4 Avants locally have the gears turning, if it matters.)
02Pilot
PowerDork
1/27/24 4:41 p.m.
My brother is driving a 2008 A6 with the 3.2 that's been in the family for at least a decade (bought as a CPO car). I haven't done a lot on it, but it's done ~100k miles without any real issues. Right now it needs valve cover gaskets, but other than that it seems to run pretty strong.
In reply to pointofdeparture :
It's one of the better ones
The 3.2 v6 seems to be an ok engine, the only real knock on it is it's from an era where the 3.2 vr6, 2.7t and 3.0sc existed.
The back the bolts out is the 3 liter AVK engine which was a weird duck. It was the same engine architecture as the 2.8/2.7 engine (which were V6 versions of the four cylinder dating to the mid 70s) but it had an aluminum block, and four cam sprockets unlike any other belt driven DOHC VWAG engine.
The timing chain engines' main issue is that they love to leak oil from all sorts of places
I just sold an 02 a4 with a 3.2 that had 268k miles and ran great still. Pulled hard, didn't make any noise, ran smooth.
WOW Really Paul? said:
The 3.2 v6 seems to be an ok engine, the only real knock on it is it's from an era where the 3.2 vr6, 2.7t and 3.0sc existed.
Since you mention it, is there anything in particular to know about the 3.2 VR6 itself?
I had a 2006 Audi A6 Avant with the 3.2 from 30k to 185k. Only issue I had with the engine was that the front main seal started leaking prodigiously at 150k or so.
As I recall the issues that they are known for is carbon on the intake valves (it is direct injection) and the timing chain tensioners breaking, but I did not experience either of those.
It's OK.
The Audi engine that doesn't blow up and is actually interesting to drive is the supercharged "3.0T" in S4, A6, and A8 from the 2010s.
