1991 Audi Coupe Quattro rebuild

So here we go again.  I already have a highly modified 1991 Audi 80 Quattro, so why not start over?  I was offered this car for a price I couldn't pass up, and luckily, the wife said ok!

The car had no head on the engine, and water in the trunk and cabin.  It is a common problem for the window regulators to fail, so that's how the water was in the cabin.  The PO had the forethought to pull the interior out to save it though.  I'm still not sure what is leaking in trunk though.  I did find a rust hole in the trunk though.  We will revisit that later.

The day a friend of mine and I picked it up, we found out that hydro boost brake don't work at all with the engine not running, the car almost ended up in the bed of his truck.  Luckily the crank jack stopped it, and we got it strapped down.

Luckily the only damage was the bumper cover than the fog light.

I gave it a quick sponge bath, to get the  4 years of dust, dirt, and mildew off the car.  The paint is about a 7/10, but that's still way better than the 80q.

I'll continue with more in the next post.  I've decided to start this thread to push myself to continue working on it.  It's cold here in South Central PA, and my garage is not heated, so I'm lacking in motivation.

So after the sponge bath, it got pushed in to the garage, where it will no longer be subject to the elements.  Here it is, being my 80q.

This was the state of the car when I got it.

luckily the leather is in good shape still, so I should be able to put the interior back together fairly easy.  

with not having a head, this bottom end is pretty much useless.  Finding just a head is quite expensive.  Luckily a good friend of mine told me to come up to his place in CT and grab one of his spare engines!  While I was there, he loads the bed of my truck with lots of other parts too!

the original plan was to use this engine as is, but was talked into a reseal.  So I pulled the head to find some pretty nasty ring ridge!

so I checked the original block, and there is very little ring ridge, so I decided to use that block, with the head from the second engine.

There are 2 versions of this engine here in the US.  The early build had the "bag of snakes" header, an equal length tube header, and a Hitachi EFI system.  The later cars came with a cast exhaust manifold the always cracks, and a much superior Bosch EFI system.  This will now have the best of both models.  I have the Bosch ECU, and now it will have a BOS header.  I had to modify the intake manifold to accept the heat shield for the header.

I also cleaned the head, lapped in the valves, and replaced the valve seals.  Sorry, no pics.

So onto the rust...  This is what I had originally found.

I can just fit my pinky through the hole.  Then I started cleaning it up from underneath, and this happened.

I then thought about parting it out, as I had already patched a hole in the front frame rail!  Then I realized that just under 1800 of these were imported to NA, in 90/91.  With talking to a bunch of other people, there may only be less than 600 of them left.  Might was well at least try to save this one.  So I did this!

I have started making patch panels.  I'm about 3/4 done making them.  I'm now just lacking motivation to go out in the cold.  The is not a chalange build, but I'm way under chalange budget at this point.  Hopefully I will press on soon.  There is a car show in my I would love to be able to take it to.

Makes me want to get back on Lil Stampie’s Audi. I always like your build threads. 

This is relevant to my interests; I have a '90 90 with a 10vt in it.

That looks like a solid base to start with!

Thanks stampie!  I had a lot of fun building the 80q.  This one will be more of a comfortable cruiser.

Iansane, that's what is in my 80q.  I'm running MS3X on a MC1 from a 5000q.  Lots of fun pushing 22psi from a K24!

I forgot these even existed.

That should be a relatively simple rust repair. Looks like the areas that rotted out are easy enough to fab up.

Cool car! Keep at it!

I know the feeling of lacking motivation because of a cold unheated garage...

Car looks like it'll be a lot of fun!!

de80q said:

Thanks stampie!  I had a lot of fun building the 80q.  This one will be more of a comfortable cruiser.

 

Iansane, that's what is in my 80q.  I'm running MS3X on a MC1 from a 5000q.  Lots of fun pushing 22psi from a K24!

That's pretty close to what I have. An MC1 w/ 034efi and a k26. I'm in the process of shoehorning an intercooler off of a toyota kit(I think?) behind the lower grille.

I also find it funny to have a sedan 'hot rod' and a coupe comfy cruiser. :) I'll be looking forward to the rust repair process.

They really got the seats right in that generation. Seeing them made me think of many great miles in a 200.  Good job keeping it alive. Do something on it every day no matter how small and it will be driving soon.

Looks like a real project, but that's the type of car that beggars cant be choosers with. You can't just hold out and get a really good one for nothing, so you pick a starting point based on your budget and it is what it is. That's an interesting, cool car deserving of a labor of love! 

The pic of the rusted out portion kind of makes it look flat.  It is very 3D and kind of a PITA.  The patch is being made out of 3 pieces that I will weld all together and then I to the car.  

These cars are quite hard to find.  Normally you find 2 flavors here, minty fresh and very expensive, or quite lemony needing quite a bit of work.  This one happened to land right in the middle though, and for the price, it was a no brainier.

Iansane, shoot me an email, and I'll send some pics of how I fitted my intercooler.  Not fun, and required chopping up the crash bar to keep it totally behind the bumper.

Quite intrigued by the 80/90 stuff, although I don't know much about them, asside from the fact of them being rare. Assuming from their small size, they would be the lightest in the Audi line up  and that the 5 cylinder turbo is a bolt in swap? I always thought this would be a great Challenge recipe. Never really looked into it, maybe sometimes a quick craigslist search, but just too rare of a find and never pursued.  

In reply to westsidetalon :

The 80/90 is the small chassis, so yes is the lightest of the era.  That's not saying the car is light though.  If you find a B2(4000) or B3(80/90 1988-92) the 5 cylinder turbo engine technically bolts in.  As for challenge build, I doubt it.  The 10vt can be had on the cheaper side, but the 20vt definitely not unless you happen across a good deal.  The NA 2.3l 20v engine I have for this car sells on its own for $3-600 and the pieces from it alone can be worth more than that.  Unfortunately, these classic Audi's are getting more scares, and harder to find parts for.  Luckily I'm part of a pretty good group of enthusiasts that help each other when when needed.

I love these cars, and the Audi 5 cylinder community was one of the best that I've ever been a part of. My urs6 is the one car I regret selling, but I was a broke college kid, and couldn't really afford it. I'd love to own another one day

In reply to de80q :

Thanks for the info. Just passed on a good runner 95 S4 for $2500, and just recently we rally crossed a 95 S6, which was actually real fun despite its "boat like" qualities. I Often wonder if this chassis would be way better with the 20vt or just alot of work and wishful thinking. Someone awhile back did do a Challenge 80/90 with a V8 swap, but had trans issues. Meantime ill just be paying attention to your thread.

So I forgot to mention, the car came with a free 18 gallons of varnish!

The tank was pretty much full!  The PO said he wasn't sure how long the car sat before he got it, so we will call it 5 years old, and boy did it stink!  I syphoned as much out as I could, and the tank doesn't look too bad.  It's possible the nasty old fuel saved it from rusting to pieces!

I never liked the idea of swinging a hammer at a gas tank, to I made up a tool to get the lock ring off with a ratchet.  Works well, but should have used a 1/2" socket.

Other than cleaned and painted engine parts, I think I'm caught up now.  Hopefully I'll find the motivation to get out and continue patching the hole in the trunk soon.

In reply to Turbine :

For the most part, the "old" Audi guys are great.  There is always those who think they are better than everyone else, but in general, a great group to deal with.  

So this morning it wasn't crazy cold in the old garage, so I decided to do something.  I had started the patch panels a week or so ago, so today I started welding them in.

The don't fit perfectly, and I'm not used to the 110v Lincoln welder I borrowed.  Welds look like crap, and I have a couple gaps.  Oh well, it will never be seen when it's all back together.

Also, as you can see in the upper right of the pic, more holes have formed.  I figure I might as well keep going with the patching while I'm there.  

More work done.  Man was it cold out there today.  It's not going to win any awards, but it's coming along.  I'll be plastering it with seal sealer when done.

Ok, so nearly exactly a week later, I got back into the garage.  Today was the day to finish this part of the project!  Made up the final patch and got it welded in.

I am generally happy with how it turned out.  I still need to weld on a muffler mount, but that will be a little later.  

I then scrubbed the other rusty looking areas, and hit them with some rust converter paint

I'll be picking up some seam sealer soon.  Coat the repaired area generously, then undercoat the whole thing.

Made some significant progress today.  Engine is mostly assembled.

I don't see a hair dryer hanging off of that....

Nope, this is a NA 2.3l 7A engine.  It should make a whopping 170hp.  The plan is to put the car on the road as stock.  That's if I don't sell it first...

DIBS!