# Escalating Cost of Clutch Replacement



## hillsrob (Feb 18, 2011)

After just 48000 miles of mostly motorway and country road motoring, the clutch on my TT failed. It wasn´t slipping but over a few days the take up point got closer and closer to the floor. Bristol Audi quoted £649 for a complete clutch replacement. Mr Clutch quoted a few pounds less so I took it to Bristol Audi and went on holiday for 10 days. A few days later they called to say that the car would need a new slave cylinder, dual mass flywheel and clutch at a total cost of more than £2100! I managed to negotiate the cost down to £1650 by threatening to take it to Mr Clutch but how could a DMF and slave cylinder add more than £1400 to the cost?


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## Adam-tt (Apr 3, 2010)

Try streetwise automotive in Bristol I used them for my clutch jobs supplied the parts though

You can get all the parts you need for around £400 labour is around £400 too


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## McKenzie (Dec 25, 2008)

Seems pretty expensive from Audi. I would go with a very high quality aftermarket part like Sachs which would cost about £600 for all then just pay £400 for fitting by someone else.


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## sTTranger (Oct 21, 2008)

You gotta be careful with some audi garages, they have a funny way of sucking you in, picking your pockets and then bending you over when you leave the door :evil:


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## glslang (Dec 5, 2009)

Did the original quote include labour? Stealers charge crazy hourly rates. And why go to Mr Clutch? A good Indy will do it cheaper and to a higher standard.


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## jwalker84 (Dec 10, 2011)

Hi guys first poster here!! Seems way too expensive from my experience.

Saw this on eBay http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AUDI-TT-2...arts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item3cbbb4ac33

Seems like the way to go, people above saying labour would be £400 means it would be less than half Audi's original cost and have had a Sachs replacement clutch before and had no problems for the next 38k before I sold the car (A4 2.0 Tdi)


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## TTRS_500 (Aug 29, 2010)

The clutch is only 300 pounds


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## David L (Aug 28, 2010)

jwalker84 said:


> Hi guys first poster here!! Seems way too expensive from my experience.
> 
> Saw this on eBay http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AUDI-TT-2...arts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item3cbbb4ac33
> 
> Seems like the way to go, people above saying labour would be £400 means it would be less than half Audi's original cost and have had a Sachs replacement clutch before and had no problems for the next 38k before I sold the car (A4 2.0 Tdi)


Looking at the image that disc is for sure not a kevlar one. It even have the Sachs logo stamped on it. But even if the clutch is all OEM and a new flywheel is included the price is good.

Personally I would not put in a new DMF, they fail too often. There are nice single mass flywheels as replacements.


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## hillsrob (Feb 18, 2011)

Thanks for all your replies guys. Thereś lots to think about here if I want to keep the car on the road without living on bread and water. At nearly 5 years old itś time to find a good indy workshop who would use the best parts available. I like the idea of fitting a single mass flywheel but wonder if that would put excessive stress on the drive train? For now though Bristol Audi have started the work but I won´t be going back there!


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## hope88 (Mar 25, 2011)

If your car is under 3 years and want to retain some kind of resale value it does make sense to try and keep it FASH but 2100 is waaaay to much! They replacing whole gearbox too??? 

Stealerships do charge a fortune for labour (some more than rest) but there's always chances to negotiate.


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## hillsrob (Feb 18, 2011)

I thought I would post details of the final bill from Bristol Audi:

Labour:

Carried out checks & confirm that difficult to select gears due to clutch difficult to depress. Found clutch alignment dowels loose, excessive movement in flywheel & slave cylinder. Replaced all, tested, all ok. £690.00.

Parts:

Clutch Plate £144.50
Surcharge on above £30.00
Bearing £41.35
6 x bolts £1.14
Flywheel £467.02
6 x bolts £8.78
Clutch plate surcharge credit -£25.00
Bolt £4.32

Total Labour: £690.00
Total Parts £667.11
Total Surcharges £5.00
VAT £272.42

Total £1634.53

It could have been lot more as they gave me 20% off the labour and 15% off the parts after I threw my toys out of the pram


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## glslang (Dec 5, 2009)

You could have had a new gearbox and clutch for this price.


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## TTRS_500 (Aug 29, 2010)

Damn that's some expensive labour rates! Basically like 160 an hour they have charged for a 4.5 hour job if you take their labour costs with the vat already added.


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## hooting_owl (Sep 3, 2008)

yup - sounds like a typical mon motors (bristol audi) type of job. they are only interested in the contents of your wallet. as someone else already mentioned, streetwise automotive are truly excellent in terms of quality of work - they are also very reasonable on price.

thanks for posting up the dealer invoice. audi suggest that an entire clutch replacement on a fwd car should cost a mere £649 all-in.

http://www.audi.co.uk/owners-area/servi ... icing.html

but wait a minute - the invoice only shows the clutch plate - where is the clutch cover? surely they replaced that as well, otherwise it is not a complete clutch replacement.

i think you may need to return to the glorified premises of bristol audi and have frank discussions with them about being ripped-off.


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## wja96 (Mar 4, 2010)

Surely there is something very wrong about the fact that they have different prices for cars over 3 years of age? It's like a tax on the people who buy these cars under 3 years old. Very odd.


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## hillsrob (Feb 18, 2011)

hooting_owl said:


> thanks for posting up the dealer invoice. audi suggest that an entire clutch replacement on a fwd car should cost a mere £649 all-in.
> 
> http://www.audi.co.uk/owners-area/servi ... icing.html


So it seems Bristol Audi used the above webpage to provide the original quote and then produced a completely different set of charges because the car also needed a flywheel and slave cylinder. As you say the clutch cover is missing so that should at least have been offset against the original quote. Who in their right mind would replace a clutch plate without a new cover ???


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