# My A6 so far



## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

Well I've had my 2007 3.0ltr TDi Le mans Auto for about 6 weeks now so I thought I'd let you see how it's shaping up. I love this car, it is so comfortable to drive and is returning a good mpg too - 32 on a short 9 mile trip to work with 46 on a longer journey so I'm well pleased with that.

Anyway, here's what I've done so far.

Day of delivery









Last weekend with 2010 MY DRL's and AFS2 headlamps









Next up will be fitting and coding 2010 MY door mirrors with indicators, I'm just waiting for a couple of bits to arrive from Germany and then they can go on. 









And as this model has wing mounted side indicators then I thought rather than taking them out and filling the holes or covering up with some form of blanking plate, I thought that I would still have them operational but knocked back a bit so they don't stand out so much once the door mirror/indicators are fitted so...

Before:









After:









So that's where I am at the moment with a few more things in the pipeline. My mods on this car will be mainly retro fitting OEM parts from a later model rather than aftermarket stuff like lowering and coil overs, especially on the interior where I want TV, rear view camera etc so that should keep me busy. :wink:

Graham


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## TToker (Feb 7, 2012)

Good work Graham, looking great matey


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## YELLOW_TT (Feb 25, 2004)

Looking good Graham it will take a bit more washing than the TT :lol:


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## Smeds (Oct 28, 2009)

Love the indicators.


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## hope88 (Mar 25, 2011)

Very nicely done! I like it. Does the headlamps just fit right in without any mods?


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

hope88 said:


> Very nicely done! I like it. Does the headlamps just fit right in without any mods?


The are dimensional exactly the same as the ones I had but are totally different on the inside and the connections. Each of the modules on the lamp is replaced with Revision 'D' plus there are two controllers (one under the dash on the passenger side and one on the drivers side) which have to be replaced plus a fair bit of coding using VAG COM

The difference in this lamp compared to my older lamp is:

LED DRL's which dim 50% when main or dip is switched on
Both the inner and outer lamps in each lamp assembly turn with the steering (only one on the previous lamp)
Bi-Xenon instead of single Xenon
ASF2 instead of ASF1. ASF2 which gives an extra lamp to come on when the steering wheel is turned to 90 degrees or more and floods the curb with an additional light on the corner you are turning into.

Needless to say, these lights are just friggin awesome when in use, the are even coded (by their reflector design) to either flood just the right height for hedge height or if there are rows of trees then they will light the trees instead, if you are driving on a motorway then you get another pattern of lighting to cover the main part of the road area. All very clever stuff and all automatic, I don't have to touch a single button for all this to happen, amazing technology.

It's very easy to get the ASF1 facelift lamps but these ASF2's are like hens teeth to find at a decent price second hand but I just happened to be in the right place at the right time and found someone not too far away from me who could do all the techy coding stuff - he's also going to fit the indicator mirrors too.

Graham


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## Kell (May 28, 2002)

It's funny. There's a guy on Tyresmoke that's just done exactly the same things.


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

Kell said:


> It's funny. There's a guy on Tyresmoke that's just done exactly the same things.


Yeah, and there's also another bloke on there who keeps trying to hi jack the post trying to flog his retro fitting service and A6 parts too. :roll: :wink: I used him once but never again - way, way overpriced. He knows that I think hence the hi jacking.

Graham


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## spearhunter#2 (May 21, 2010)

Nice looking motor Graham, I was looking at the same car but decided on the TT instead.


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## techfreak (Aug 13, 2010)

Hi Graham, what does the le mans have above the standard?

I'm looking at A6 possibly but may go for the 2010, do you know if they come with those asf2 lamps as standard?

Cheers


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

techfreak said:


> Hi Graham, what does the le mans have above the standard?
> 
> I'm looking at A6 possibly but may go for the 2010, do you know if they come with those asf2 lamps as standard?
> 
> Cheers


The 2006 -2009/10 models (like mine) came in various guises including S-Line and Le mans, the Le mans still has the S-Line badges and has all what the S-Line offers plus it has a few other 'bits' added as standard like black headlining and interior with of course the Le mans badging.

The 2010 model or 'Facelift' models were really just run out models before the proper revised A6 was introduced in 2011 (the one with the curvy shape headlamps). Most parts of the 2010 model are interchangeable with the previous 2006-2009 models with slight modifications of some form. The 2010 model came with AFS1 or AFS2 headlamps depending what the customer ordered but from standard they came with ASF1 but all came with of course the all important DRL's as standard.

Edit: Forgot to mention that with the 2010 models with DRL's fitted as standard then you will also get the door mirrors with combined indicators in them and the wing indicators are deleted.

Hope that helps.

Graham


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## jgp-tt (Feb 22, 2010)

Nice to see you haven't lost your love of quality modding 
The new ride looks very nice.


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## hope88 (Mar 25, 2011)

Wow... I didn't know they are so advanced! I do notice the xenons on the A6 looks bigger compared to the rest in the range. Well done and certainly looks like an amazing motorway cruiser. Been in an S6 and I love it! Just the right size imo.



Love_iTT said:


> The are dimensional exactly the same as the ones I had but are totally different on the inside and the connections. Each of the modules on the lamp is replaced with Revision 'D' plus there are two controllers (one under the dash on the passenger side and one on the drivers side) which have to be replaced plus a fair bit of coding using VAG COM
> 
> The difference in this lamp compared to my older lamp is:
> 
> ...


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## Hark (Aug 23, 2007)

Lovely looking car.


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

I just could resist this (I'm blaming this totally on Jamman :wink: ) He showed me his and I showed him mine. He had a flat bottom with no bits whereas mine was lardy and round with bits so I decided to go for the flat bottom look with bits and alluminium flappy paddles to get one over on him.










What else did you think I meant then? :roll: :wink:

This should be a straight swop for mine as my A6 already has a multi function wheel with flappy paddles but not as sexy as this - plain black with black flappy paddles and God forbid - it's round!  It needs the same slip ring so shouldn't be too much of a problem to fit - famous last words!! Hopefully I'll be able to do this next weekend if I get the time.

Graham


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## spearhunter#2 (May 21, 2010)

[smiley=thumbsup.gif]


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## techfreak (Aug 13, 2010)

I like


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## jays_225 (Nov 4, 2009)

looks gd [smiley=thumbsup.gif]


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

I've already posted this on the Tyresmoke forum but I thought that I would post this here as well so that you could see the finished job.

I met up with my mate today and we (he!) installed the facelift mirrors. This really wasn't as easy as what I thought it would be - let me rephrase that - it wasn't difficult but it was time consuming. He suggested that I get some later window motors as the controller I was using would sense the position of the window in a different way to the existing motor operates and would cause the window not to close or open as it should (it would stop halfway) and as he has done many A6 retrofits I thought that he would know what he was talking about so I got some A5 window motors from Germany.

He basically took the complete door apart including sliding out the window frame of each door, installing the mirrors, new motors and controllers and then reassembling them together and then slightly changing the wiring to the motor from my existing loom (he wouldn't have needed to have done that if I could have bought the small loom with the window motors). Anyway, after putting it all back it worked first time with the windows opening and closing how they should do.

So a couple of pics of the new wing mirrors which were conveniently already in Phantom black with absolutely no marks on them after I had cleaned and waxed them before installation. The black (instead of chrome) side wing indicators now sit very nicely with the indicator mirrors - nicely understated.




























The next thing up to fit was a Multi function S Line flat bottom steering wheel which I managed to nab along with it's air bag, it also had the aluminium trim and aluminium flappy paddles which sits nicely with the trim of the MMI. This again was not a straight forward fit, the small wiring loom inside was different in that the connector going to the slip ring was very slightly different so this was removed from my existing wheel and transferred to the new wheel with some minor tweaks to the connector going to the slip ring. A quick check to make sure I had all the functions working (which it did) and the complete assembly along with the air bag was finally tightened down.

Pic of the old wheel.









and a couple of pics of the new wheel.


















After all that was done he then got out the laptop and coded the wing mirrors to tilt down using VCDS to show the curb when reverse was selected, although he has got both passenger and drivers mirror to do this on his A6, he could only get the passenger side to tilt on mine. As we were both getting cold by this time I suggest that we look at this again some other time so we stopped there at this point and packed up.

All in all a really successful day, everything went according to plan with no breakages and everything working as it should and making my A6 look just that little bit more nicer (in my opinion that is). I'm not really looking to make this car look like a newer car than it is, that doesn't bother me. I just like the newer style but if I'm honest, it's more of the tinkering and making things work that interests me - I just can't leave my cars alone, it's a standing joke in the family. As soon as I got this A6 I was being asked what I was going to do to it! :lol:

So what's next? Well apart from a RS6 auto gear knob coming next week from Germany, which again is in the same style as the steering wheel and MMI, then I would really like to get the OEM TV installed but that is going to be a very expensive thing to do because I shall no doubt put the rear view camera in and also front distance sensors all at the same time so this won't be for a while yet but I will just get the bits required as and when I see them and when I can afford them. I could easily opt for an after market system but I don't want that - it must be OEM if I do it. I might be tempted to put the face lift front bumper on as that looks quite nice with the larger looking side vents but I'm not totally convinced on that yet and doubt very much if I will do the rear end as that looks fine to me at the moment.

That's it for now.

Graham


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

...and to finish off the look (for now :roll: :wink: ) a nice new shiny RS6 auto gear knob



















Graham


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## tricklexxx (Oct 21, 2010)

Only just spotted this Graham and have to say it looks a very nice new motor... very different than the TT though :wink: .

As someone who REALLY should stop playing with his TT and get something far more sensible like this I admire you! :lol:

Keep the updates coming (as I'm sure there will be more mods to come :wink: ).

Marc


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## Charlie (Dec 15, 2006)

Nice work you old git  looking good and clearly you are a prime individual to prove my firmly held belief that - once a modder always a modder 

Charlie


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## phope (Mar 26, 2006)

Cool - have been thinking about getting a flat bottomed wheel for our A6 TDI, but £600 or so from Audi for a wheel and airbag puts me off

Have seen some with paddles on Ebay, but ours is just a 170 TDI manual...didn't stop me activating the lap timer and boost gauge in the DIS though 

I'm also tempted to see about getting DAB retrofitted - have seen a couple of genuine tuners on Ebay, but not sure if it is just plug and play with the existing tuner unit, plus some coding


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## phope (Mar 26, 2006)

You could also get the RS6 pedals to complete the look - I'm looking for the manual equivalents 










http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Audi-RS6-orig ... 720wt_1034


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## jampott (Sep 6, 2003)

Crikey, Graham... that's some modding!

Not touched anything on mine yet, but there's not really much (except for TV) that I would retrofit.

I'm fighting the urge to head to MRC for a few bits. Just a Miltek and remap. Oh, and somewhere between 680ps and 710ps. :lol:


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

jampott said:


> ...I'm fighting the urge to head to MRC for a few bits. Just a Miltek and remap. Oh, and somewhere between 680ps and 710ps. :lol:


Oh shudup!!! :wink:

Graham


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## clived (May 6, 2002)

jampott said:


> I'm fighting the urge to head to MRC for a few bits. Just a Miltek and remap. Oh, and somewhere between 680ps and 710ps. :lol:


Stop fighting. They're (even more) awesome when up to that level - have you been in one Tim?


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## hope88 (Mar 25, 2011)

jampott said:


> Crikey, Graham... that's some modding!
> 
> Not touched anything on mine yet, but there's not really much (except for TV) that I would retrofit.
> 
> I'm fighting the urge to head to MRC for a few bits. Just a Miltek and remap. Oh, and somewhere between 680ps and 710ps. :lol:


710PS in a 3 litre diesel? Seems a bit optimistic isn't it?


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

hope88 said:


> jampott said:
> 
> 
> > Crikey, Graham... that's some modding!
> ...


I think Tim's is a little bit more special than my A6 3.0ltr diesel - the only thing our cars might have in common is that it has a '6' somewhere in the model number. :lol: :lol:

Graham


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## NaughTTy (Jul 9, 2003)

Love_iTT said:


> hope88 said:
> 
> 
> > jampott said:
> ...


 :lol:


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## jampott (Sep 6, 2003)

I disagree, Graham.

Mine undoubtedly costs more to run, and goes a bit faster, but I've always loved the care and attention to detail, and the subtle (yet effective) way you mod cars.

So that more than lifts yours above mine in the "Special" stakes.

Of course a trip to MRC may rebalance the equation somewhat. :roll:


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

jampott said:


> I disagree, Graham.
> 
> Mine undoubtedly costs more to run, and goes a bit faster, but I've always loved the care and attention to detail, and the subtle (yet effective) way you mod cars.
> 
> ...


...and you started that reply off so well too! :wink:

Graham


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## jampott (Sep 6, 2003)

Love_iTT said:


> jampott said:
> 
> 
> > I disagree, Graham.
> ...


 :lol:


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## caney (Feb 5, 2004)

Love_iTT said:


> ...and to finish off the look (for now :roll: :wink: ) a nice new shiny RS6 auto gear knob
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 hard to fit Graham?


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## Love_iTT (Aug 18, 2002)

caney said:


> Love_iTT said:
> 
> 
> > ...and to finish off the look (for now :roll: :wink: ) a nice new shiny RS6 auto gear knob
> ...


Not really Steve, the hardest part is getting the old one off. I pulled the side push button out until you see a gap appearing between the button and the knob, I then used an old spade fuse to keep the button in the open position (this disconnects the internal linkage within the gear knob), then lift (pull) the gear knob off the stem along with the gator which I had already released at the bottom.

The old knob is fixed to the gator by just a metal tie wrap, snip that off and the knob can then be released from the gator, put the new knob on the gator and put on a new tie wrap (I used a plastic one instead of the Audi metal one but works just fine). The new knob comes complete with a bright yellow tag jammed between the button and the knob, this has to stay in place until the gator and knob are slid back over the gear change stem, once everything is located then this is the point of no return because you then have to pull out the yellow tag which then connects the button up to the internal linkage - get this bit wrong and it's an utter nightmare to redo (or so I was told), luckily for me I managed it all OK.

Easy enough to do but the above makes it sound more complicated than it is - just take your time with it and it will be fine. It took me about 20 minutes to do, so you not being an old git like me should do it in 10. :lol:

Hope that helps,
Graham


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