Interesting hydraulic brake assist alternative

[urquattro]

I have a friend who has a T-bird Super Coupe who was talking to me about a
problem he had ... seems his car loses brake assist momentarily on a rapid
application, with the associated illumination of the brake warning
indicator.  With all the similar experience with Audis I said that it
sounded like a pressure accumulator problem.  It so happens that the SC has
hydraulically assisted brakes that use an electric pump which is activated
by a pressure valve.  It uses the DOT-4 as the working fluid ... and, ta da
... has a pressure accumulator very much like the one on the urq!  It looks
like it is pretty tightly integrated into the ABS system, but it does make
me wonder about fashioning some sort of a hybrid if I ever had a problem
with the valve body on the urq.  The attraction of the electric pump is
lessensed by the fact that I wouldn't necessarily be eliminating the
hydraulic pump (unless I installed a manual rack too).

The funny thing to note is that the dealer says that the
pump/accumulator/ABS has to be replaced as a unit to the tune of ~$1200 ...
but by feeling around the firewall of his car I could tell that the "bomb"
is threaded in place, and I wouldn't be at all surprised to hear that it is
compatible with the ones that fit the urq!

Steve Buchholz
San Jose, CA (USA)