2013 Audi A4
This year drew an ordinary 110 complaints for a Audi A4 — the model's median is 71. What they were about is the unusual part: 51.8% of them mention steering, against 7% across the model's other years.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 110 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 71 |
| Involving a crash | 5 |
| Involving a fire | 3 |
| Recalls | 0 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 25 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- steering — 51.8% of this year's complaints, against 7% across the model's other years (7.4×).
- wheel — 32.7% of this year's complaints, against 5.2% across the model's other years (6.3×).
- difficult — 25.5% of this year's complaints, against 8.5% across the model's other years (3×). Owners wrote it as: difficult, became, shaft, steering shaft.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
WHILE DRIVING 25 MPH, THE STEERING WHEEL BECAME DIFFICULT TO TURN LEFT. THERE WERE NO WARNING INDICATORS ILLUMINATED. THE CONTACT PARKED THE VEHICLE ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD FOR TEN MINUTES. ONCE SHE CONTINUED DRIVING, THE FAILURE RECURRED. THE CONTACT CALLED V…
WHILE THE VEHICLE WAS PARKED, THE STEERING WHEEL SEIZED AND WAS DIFFICULT TO TURN. IN ADDITION, "DO NOT DRIVE THE VEHICLE, STEERING WHEEL FAILURE" APPEARED ON THE INSTRUMENT PANEL. THE VEHICLE WAS UNABLE TO BE DRIVEN. THE VEHICLE WAS TOWED TO AN INDEPENDENT ME…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Audi A4 was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2013 Audi A4? What happened to yours?
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