Bye Bye 80Q --> Jetta TDI??

[Brayton, Cory]

I think it the end of the road for me & my 88 80Q

You all have provided a lot of help on my 80Q & I will hugely appreciate
your opinions on Jetta TDI wrt safety/reliability -- after 15 yrs, I think
I'm ready for a less demanding vehicle, I really don't have much time to do
a lot of research & shopping, and I hope that's a reasonable or good choice

much as I like to drive my 80Q, the reality is that I'm not a mechanic,
don't have the time for it & I probably won't be able to afford to fix it
sooner rather than later & it has not hurt or stranded me yet -- all its
lights, windows, sun roof etc work, its odometer stopped in May @97K -- prob
has about 100K & I have all records since 88 showing mileage progression til
May 03

Engine check lite has been flashing on & off very sporadically x 3 months,
there has been a shimmy without a side pull when I brake hard -- I don't
brake hard very often so I don't really know how long its been like that --
so I asked them to check those + anything else they could see when I went in
for oil change:  there was a vacuum leak (as I expected) + collapsed hose;
ball joints have a lot of play; brake disks are warped -- from ?; time to
replace T-belt + water pump & oil pump that's leaking; also time for a 'full
service' --> ~ $3000 est for everything -- not that I necessarily have to do
it all at once but that would make this a $5000+ year for the little monster
-- & btw A/C is starting to warm up again

So I said to run emissions test (it nearly failed last year & its due in
October) before any more work -- they had to replace the collapsed hose to
run emissions test & it failed with HC > 400 @idle.

So I picked it up & planned to bring it back for more work 'soon'.  As I'm
stuck in traffic 5 mi later, the engine lite starts flashing again -- so the
hose repair clearly had not fixed that, or vacuum leaks etc -- so instead of
going where I'd planned, I took a detour to the audi-VW dealer -- bypassed
Audi altogether (they're also some of the service folks who had caused me a
great deal of trouble & expense in the past)

I looked at Jetta's -- I thought the regular 5 speed felt like a civic, the
5 speed turbo was silly with substantial delay (prob just takes some getting
used to), the tiptronic was ridiculous, the 6 cylinder is quick & fun & very
likely to very quickly get me my 1st speeding ticket in ~20  yrs, & I really
enjoyed the TDI (4cyl turbo diesel) & have heard some good things about VW
diesels.

I am leaning hard toward getting that -- 1 dealer will give me $1500 trade
in, another will give me only $1000 -- my current mechanic who is
Swiss-trained & has been quite good -- says to take it

I know there are a lot of opinions out there & will appreciate hearing them

When a woman comes into a service center in TX & asks them to replace the
ignition coil or multifunction temperature sensor or whatever, the reaction
generally is not positive, especially when I'm correct (thanks to the list).
I've even been asked if that's what my husband said the problem was.  Of
course they have to do some 'diagnostics' to figger out what the problem
really is, but so far the list has helped a lot & I wish more (even 1) of
the Audi 'mechanics' that drive V8 Chevy trucks with gun racks subscribed to
the list.

Thanks again

Cory B
88 80Q
Houston, TX
 <mailto:cbrayton at bcm.tmc.edu>