Other engine problem on the 2002 Audi A6
1 fire 1 of the 10 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
Only 6 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When other engine problem gets reported
There are 10 reports of other engine problem on the 2002 Audi A6, 6 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 1st most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 76,145 miles | — | — |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 1 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $300–$4,000 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 15 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2019, at a median of 200 miles, and latest on the 2003 at 125,000 miles.
By volume the 2019 carries the most reports, with 16; the 2002 has 10. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
After a short drive (about 3 miles in town), the car was pulled into my garage a few minutes later my wife noticed smoke coming from under the hood. I backed the car into the driveway, opened the hood and significant white smoke with the smell of burning plastic came from the passenger side of the engine compartment, below the engine, near the firewall. I used a garden hose to extinguish the fire. I could not determine the exact origin of the fire. On monday, june 27th I reported the incident to audi of america. A reference number of 50231796 was assigned by audi to the incident. On june 29th I was contacted by james cruz at audi who told be that he would be turning the incident over to engineers who would decide what they wanted to do next. On july 5th james cruz called me back and said audi was not interested in doing any other follow up and that I should just file a claim with my insurance company.
Tl*the contact owns a 2002 audi a6. While driving 25 MPH, the engine shut off without warning. The vehicle was restarted after four attempts. There were no warning indicator lights until after the vehicle restarted. The esp warning indicator light illuminated. The vehicle is currently at the dealer. The current and failure mileages were 82,000.
On 02/21/09 I purchase a 2002 audi a6 3.0 in frederick, maryland for the amount of 5,808.00. I drove back the vehicle to selinsgrove, pa I almost did not make it. I noticed a lots of white smoke coming from the exhaust system and the car was shaken really hard. I pulled over cause the check engine light came on. Then I has to get out of the road 11/15 as soon as possible so I only could drive 40 miles per hour or the car will shake more. I purchased the vehicle with a personal check. I want this vehicle back to the dealer as soon as possible. I do not want it . Can I cancel the check? I have a senior bank account and I wrote the check for $5,808.00 to south street auto sales in frederick, maryland. I will write a review online to consumers about the bad business of this dealership. *tr
Also reported on the 2002 Audi A6
Other electrical problem
Seat belt or retractor failure
Other speed control problem
Misfire or rough idle
Fuel leak or fuel odor
Other powertrain problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 10 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 10 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does other engine problem happen on the 2002 Audi A6?
Across 6 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 75,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other engine problem on the 2002 Audi A6?
10 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.1 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed