It's always something...(longish)

[Steve Jensen]

Well, after being pointed to the exact procedure on Chris Miller's wonderful
page (courtesy of Kneale Brownson, thank you again Kneale), I _think_ I know
what's wrong with the no-start situation on the TQW.  Swapping in the known
good battery from the sedan didn't fix it, so it probably is the splice.  Oh
well, I'll be a minivan pilot for a few days.  S'okay, it's an Audi, its
always something but it can be fixed...

After Dave Head's spot on review of Road Atlanta, I wanted to chime in with
my .02 cents.  First of all, it was a heckuva lot of fun: I finally got to
meet some of the folks from the List whose posts have given me great
enjoyment and/or saved me money.  After being invited into a motorhome
Elliott Potter and I had been admiring, I met Unka Bart, Bob Myers, and Dave
Head (whose idea of buying a 5 spd. 4.2L V-8 in Germany, ripping out all the
required guts and computers and shipping it back to the US didn't sound half
bad).  Audi cameraderie was the plan of the day, and Bob Myers said it best
when he mentioned the sense of community and friendliness one gets from
reading posts (sometimes for years) before finally meeting someone from the
List in person.  It was a pleasure meeting all three of you.

Kudos should also go out to Tom Saltino, who arranged the Audi Corral - 4Ks,
5Ks, S cars (more S cars in one place than I've ever seen), quattros and
front drivers.  And the neat thing was that everyone left their ego back at
the house, I think everyone had a ball (except for that errant deer that
wandered out onto the track, she'll probably have nightmares for weeks about
racing cars dodging her).  I have walked thru the Porsche and Ferrari
corrals at other races and the attitude was sometimes so thick you'd need
hip waders.  Refreshing to walk amongst the various Audi types and see no
barriers.

In the rest of the infield, the "you don't see that everyday" award goes to
the guy with the gas turbine powered pick up truck, followed closely by a
guy on a gas turbine powered motorcycle!!!  What a hoot!

And after the Audis won, who else but Unka Bart would whip out a bottle of
champagne to celebrate?  Bart, you are truly a class act.

The bottom line is this - both my Audis are broken, one with a bum clutch
and the other that won't start without a jump - but so what?  If I wanted an
appliance, I'd put an engine and wheels on my wifes Kelvinator washing
machine, life is too short to own boring cars.  I have a Bentley, and I have
the good List people who don't mind spreading information to help others
keep their older and not-so-older Audis running.  This is a good place to
be.

Oh, and the guy driving the Audi 90 that helped jump off my TQW and get me
back on the road?  Turns out he's got 4 Audis of various types (the 90, a
V8, a 5K and the other I forget), but he'd never heard of the List.  That
has since been rectified.  Please give Tom Badger a warm welcome when he
posts.

Sorry for the long post/rant but I wanted to share.

-Steve Jensen
87 5kcstq (awaiting clutch transplant)
87 5kcstqw (awaiting splice surgery, but now sporting Audifans stickers)