Good oil for the VW/Audi W12?

[jyoung8607]

Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
A little OT, but does a gas guzzler tax only have to be paid by the original buyer or does it have to be paid by all subsequent buyers as well?

Original only so far as I know, although I bet California has special rules since they have special rules for everything. The dealer gave me the original window sticker, gas guzzler tax of $3,000 on top for a total of $104k.

My original plan was to drive the Passat for a while longer, and then go look at a 2013 Audi S4 sometime around the fall of 2012. I really did stumble across this one. A dealer in Indy had it listed for $44k and they'd had it for a few months. Near mint condition, came off 5-year corporate lease and had only 30,800 miles. It looked pretty lonely there without a driver. I got them down to $38k and decided to take the plunge. More car for less money, clearly the financially sensible thing to do!

 

[Quattro Pete]

Originally Posted By: glxpassat
What oil specs are in the owners manual? I believe that motor requires VW 503.01 in which case I would stick to GC.

Isn't 503.01 an outdated spec? GC label doesn't even list it anymore.

 

[jyoung8607]

Originally Posted By: nleksan
Wicked car. In my opinion, the W12 (and even W8) Phaeton is one heck of a luxery car, but retains the sporty feel of the "tuner" V-Dubs (GTI, Jetta GLI, R32, etc). Fast, comfortable, and with excellent handling for its size. It compares to the BMW 750, Audi A8, and MB S550 but at half the cost. I don't know about reliability, but I wouldn't think it to be a problematic vehicle.
There is a guy around here who comes to some Euro meets with a modified W12 Phaeton that looks and drives like a beast. He has a true cold air intake system, ceramic equal-length tubular headers, Fabspeed 80-cell Ultra Hi-Flow Metallic Cats, a custom stainless steel mandrel bent 2.75" dual exhaust with 3.25" tips, a custom tune, under-drive pulleys, bored TB, a very upgraded suspension (3-way adjustable coilovers, about a 2" drop), 20" iForged Monobloc wheels, 8-piston/16" 2pc slotted discs (front) and 4-piston/15.2" 2pc slotted discs (rear) Big Brake Kit that I believe is Stoptech or AP, some bodywork, and a killer A/V system (Pioneer AVIC 7" headunit, 6 sets of Focal components, a pair of MB Quartz 6x9s, two 10" JL slim subwoofers with two 12", and 3 1200W JL 4-way, 2 1200W JL 2-way, and 2 JL 1500W 2-way amps; he upgraded to a large alternator, and while he runs an Odyssey 900CCA lightweight battery for the engine, he has three Optima Yellow batteries in a custom trunk enclosure; he also has a full "car-puter" which is essentially an integrated laptop using a Core2Quad 2.6ghz CPU, 8GB RAM, nVidia GT460 1GB GDDR5, a 128GB SSD, and a 2TB 7200rpm HDD, with a 10" 1920x1080 LCD touchscreen in the lower part of the console, and two 9" screens in the back of the front headrests; the PC is integrated w the car via OBD2 and he can display any number of parameters on the front screen as digital gauges, while the back screens are playing DVDs and the Headunit is playing music from the HDD. He is an automotive software engineer...). It is quite possibly the coolest luxery car I have ever ridden in, and it makes me want a carputer really bad! I friended him on Facebook, so it was easy to get the specs, as I couldn't remember them all.
I know he is working on a dual supercharger setup, with twin FMICs, and expects to have it up and running by summer! He is already putting out 65-75bhp more than factory, which is significant, but the dual SC would explain the upgraded and custom LSDs.

Sorry, I get excited about cool cars

I hope you continue to enjoy yours for many years and countless miles!

First off, if that car is in Cincinnati (where you and I are both located according to your profile) I'm going to need to see it.

What meets does the guy show up at? I've never been to a local VW meet, I should probably start.

That said, are you sure it's a Phaeton? That's a weird series of things to have on that car. It has air suspension, so coilovers are an unusual move. Stock brakes for NAR Phaetons are bigger than that. Equal length headers would be [censored] to stuff in that engine compartment, much less superchargers. The built-in infotainment display controls all sorts of things on the car and has an odd size. It would be possible to build a carputer, and I'm looking into it myself, but replicating all the car's controls would take enormous effort.

 

[nleksan]

The guy came to a couple Euro meets. The engine mods are from memory, so I could be wrong, but he specifically mentioned a dual sc setup. You might be right about it not being coils, it could have been an upgraded air suspension. The guy is from over the river, Crestview Hills. It was not a VW specific meet.

 

[UG_Passat]

Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
Originally Posted By: glxpassat
What oil specs are in the owners manual? I believe that motor requires VW 503.01 in which case I would stick to GC.

Isn't 503.01 an outdated spec? GC label doesn't even list it anymore.


503.01 is for "high powered" gasoline engines with flexible service intervals.

Since the US market doesn't do flexible service intervals, only fixed.... 502.00

 

[dparm]

503.01 is indeed deprecated. The latest update to the 504/507 spec now covers 503.01.

 

[glxpassat]

504 supersedes 503.01, but it is a mid saps oil. 503.01 is a group 4/5 oil and although it may not be listed on the GC bottle, I don't think the formula has changed since it's still SL rated.

And if the car was spec'd for 503.01 in the owners manual, there's absolutely nothing wrong with using it. You just use it for the oci specified in the owners manual or use oil analysis if you want to go longer.

 

[hattaresguy]

Oh a Phaeton so cool.

They are Bentley Continental development mules.


VW wanted Bentley to be instantly profitable, which is hard to do when you invest billions in a new car. So VW spent the money, built the Phaeton, took the write off against their income, and created and amazing car. Bentley got the Continental for free and started to post good profits from day one.

VW never intended to make a dime off them, it was a halo car meant to push the limits of what VW could do.


They are still every bit as good as a $200k Bentley, but can be had for $40k or less, very much a bargain.

 

[Audios]

Id love to acquire one in the future. Keep us updated on how the car holds up.

 

[jyoung8607]

Originally Posted By: Audios
Also moar picz

Gratuitous motor-pornography below. She needs to be cleaned before I can post more interior/exterior shots. Also, I decided to stick with the GC 0w30 for now. I will start sending off for UOAs starting with this fill.

 

[glxpassat]

Awesome!

 

[bodeh6]

Look at all that oil going into that car.
Looks thirsty.

 

[fdcg27]

Hope you found a decent sale on GC.
What did you use for a drain pan?
I hope this thing doesn't need much work as long as you own it, since it looks like a nightmare to work on from what little is visible from around the covers.
A picture with all of the covers removed would be interesting, although I know that that might be too much to ask, depending upon how difficult they are to remove.
This is an awesome car, and it also has the appeal of being pretty unusual, compared to a BMW, a Benz or an Audi.
38K seems like a pretty decent price for this beast as well, especially given the low miles and likelihood of proper service having been done.

 

[RollerRocker]

yeah, German Castrol 0w-30 is a good choice. I would go with what the VW/Audi/Porsche dealerships stock, as I think it is Castrol's 504/507 in a 5w-30. Why? Lubrizol pegs that spec has very strict on wear.

 

[jyoung8607]

Originally Posted By: fdcg27
Hope you found a decent sale on GC.
What did you use for a drain pan?

No sale hunting this time, but I'm going to have to start keeping an eye out. Both my VWs were due at the same time, and the counter guy was looking at me kinda funny when I cleaned them out of GC (20 qts).

Originally Posted By: fdcg27
I hope this thing doesn't need much work as long as you own it, since it looks like a nightmare to work on from what little is visible from around the covers.
A picture with all of the covers removed would be interesting, although I know that that might be too much to ask, depending upon how difficult they are to remove.

You know, I think the trouble of working on it is over-rated. It's cramped, sure. And if there's ever trouble that requires pulling the engine or transmission, it's basically going to the dealer. That would include the timing chain (in the rear) and the VVT adjusters which it's connected to. But, basic maintenance isn't that bad. The covers are no trouble, just six screws.

The biggest maintenance hassle is getting the stupid air filter housings open. The upper housing is easy enough to detach from the lower, but the clearance to get it up and out of the car is incredibly tight. I have to take the TB hose and MAF housing out, and on the passenger side a small coolant-return hose has to be detached and clamped off, and it still takes me 5 or 10 minutes of wiggling and twisting and experimenting to fish them out. VW knew this was a pain, so in typical German style, they over-engineer a nifty solution: a vacuum gauge for each filter housing. You'll see them in the pics below. It's an upward-ratcheting mechanism to show you if there's been high vacuum at some point in the past, which indicates filter restrictions or clogs. If there's no restriction, you don't need to bother opening the box. You can reset the gauges back to zero at will.

There's some tasks that are easier on this, IMO, than on my Passat ATQ V6. They say you have to pull the engine to change the O2 sensors, but the four pre-cat sensors sure look easy to me, right out in the open with the air intake filter boxes removed. The post-cat sensors are another story, but I can see them from the top and I'd sure as [censored] try before dropping the motor. It just came due for 40k maintenance, so I had everything opened up recently. Changing the spark plugs requires removing the upper intake as an assembly (three pieces) or removing the two side pieces. I removed the sides. Just two bolts and a re-usable metal gasket, no big deal.

Here's a few pics for the bank 3/bank 4 (driver's side) of the spark plug job. The internals of the center intake manifold are fascinating; you can see the tuned equal length runners. It's one angle I didn't think to get while everything was open.

Next time I have half an excuse, I'll open up one side and snap a better pic.

 

[Tim]

Where is the drool emoticon?

 

[45ACP]

Its "slobber." Type slobber surrounded by :

 

[45ACP]

Originally Posted By: bodeh6
Look at all that oil going into that car.
Looks thirsty.


i feel this car is worthy of all 3.25 gallons of motor oil. Need to look at the grade of oil on those Syntec bottles.

 

[Quattro Pete]

Originally Posted By: 45ACP
Need to look at the grade of oil on those Syntec bottles.

It's GC (0w-30).

 

[Audios]

The passat W8 is almost identical to that, just chopped it in half pretty much. Does yours hace a balance shaft belt? The w8s do and when it breaks it causes all types of odd resonance and howling noises. Its down to the right of the crank pulley, if you can see down that far, there should be a plastic cover