why I drive an Audi

[rob hod]

    In 1988 my sisters' father in law bought a lovely year old Coupe GT 2.2
in a rather bold tornado red. My father thought he was having a mid-life
crisis and the car was viewed as a liability waiting to happen.

    Nine years later I bought it off him with 90K on the clock and still in
top condition. I loved it. I spent many hours working out how it all worked
under the bonnet as I was new to Jetronic injection.

    When it became time to replace my 14 year old daily driver (don't ask
what it was), I was very happy to replace it with a 12 year old '88 100
Avant. Why?

    Because These cars are "built", not assembled.
    - When people moan about having to fix things they seem to forget that
cars from other manufacturers of the same age are already on the scrapheap.
    - these people need to try keeping a 70's Jaguar from dissolving right
in front of their eyes.
    - they just don't rust (unless damaged and badly repaired)
    - proper materials are used in construction ( my Avant has exhaust parts
date-stamped 6/88 !)
    - I enjoy working on a quality car.

    Because they still look good today, - I personally think a CGT in a nice
colour looks much better than some of the amorphous jelly-mould 'sports'
cars around today. And I get unsolicited comments to the same effect about
my 87 CGT .

    Now that the manufacturers have gone to the limit with curvy designs I
predict they'll get back to sharper profiles, and then our cars will start
to look even more ahead of their time.

    Because they go just about as well as a modern car.

    Because they are criminally cheap, at the moment in the UK we have a
glut in the used car market, - good eighties coupes can be had for 700GBP.
and type 44's are more or less free. ( Well lets say a range of 200- 1000
GBP more or less covers the whole market)

    Because the type$$ is the best riding long distance car I've been in,
with the most comfortable seats.

    Because Audi horses seem to be worth 1.1~1.2 BMW ones ;)

    Because I never keep a car less than 9 years (and thats not cos I cant
afford to change when I want)

    Because I'm not inspired to buy any other car. ( What Jap car has the
character of these cars? )

    Because after passing the yearly MOT and fixing the misfire, I took the
coupe out on wednesday night, down some local country roads and hustled it
for 15 miles, listening to that off beat thrum from the exhaust and watching
the nose rise when I got past the apex and got the power on.  With a bit of
luck I'll still be able to do that in 15 years in the same car.

    Bet I'm not the only with this point of view.

    Cheers!

rob