Bose Premium Radio_Transmission ...Long

["60mile.net" <chris@xxxxxxxxxx>]

I've been lurking here for a while and now I have a question. I own a '99 A3
GLX that recently got slammed from behind and required about $12k of work to
make it right. Yes, they would have totalled it if I wanted, but I didn't,
and that9s a story for another time.

Anyway, the body shop did a fine job with metal and paint but when I got the
car back there were two things wrong. One was that the alarm no longer armed
properly and two, it seems that there is a bearing problem with the
transmission.

The alarm problem has been traced by the dealer to "a chip in the radio".
Now the interesting part is going to be proving to the insurance company
that this is accident related. I have trouble imagining how it would be. I
think that the damage might have happened while it was in the shop (it was
there for two months). During the work they would have had to disconnect and
reconnect the battery. I am also sure that the battery was run down and they
would have had to jump start it. When I picked it up it turned over like a
car with a nearly dead battery. Since then the battery has been fine. My
question is this, are these radios especially sensitive to voltage spikes
that might happen when jump starting or reconnecting the battery? Has anyone
had this problem? The radio plays fine. Any opinion on the radio as a
critical part of the alarm system? Also they had to replace the CD player as
it had gotten tweaked in the accident.

As for the transmission, I discovered a slight banging noise when I got the
car home and shut it down. I thought it might be a motor mount problem but
when I brought the car back they diagnosed the problem as a bearing in the
transmission. While I did get hit from behind and pushed into another car
resulting in front damage, the car did not travel more than 6 feet. I made a
point of not moving it after the accident and having it flat bedded to the
shop. I'm not worried so much with the tranny because if the insurance
company denies the claim I'll still have VW's 10/100 drive train warrantee,
and if VW says it's accident related the insurance company will have to
cover the claim. Has anyone had transmission bearing problems with their
GLX? Mine has 32k on it, seems a little early for bearing problems. I should
say that I don't race the car, it's garage kept and is in (or was in)
immaculate condition.


Any advice or similar past experiences would be most appreciated.

Thanks for your time,

Chris

'99 A3 GLX
Neuspeed Stage III suspension kit

Now it's double welded for strength!

chris@60mile.net