'New' car!

[Tom Nas]

Hi all,

You might remember that I've been Audi-ing on the cheap the last two years.
I bought a neglected '87 Audi 80 1.8 for $60 and fixed it up for little
money. In the following two years it's been super-reliable and incredibly
cheap to run. I put 50k km on it commuting, without doing anything but
fixing stuff that broke. Not a lot broke, so I was happy.
I should've paid more attention to the drop of oil hanging from the
gearbox, however. A couple of weeks ago, I took it to the stainless steel
exhaust place for a new system (I have a good bartering deal with the
owner, but the place was 200 km away). I almost made it there. 125 km from
home, the gearbox decided that enough was enough and seized.
After towing the car home, it became apparent that I could replace the
gearbox with a scrapyard item, put a new clutch in and be on my way.
However, at 300k km it was using more than a little oil and badly needed a
head overhaul. Also, anything made of rubber in the suspension was shot.
Doing the math (and adding that I didn't have the time to fix it) I decided
to start looking for a better car.

Tuesday I found what I wanted on autotrader.nl. A 1990 Audi 80 FWD 2.0E
(rare, most were 88 hp 1.8Ses or 69 hp 1.6es) with only 148k km indicated.
Burgundy metallic ('Cayenne'), power steering (rare option), central
locking (ditto), tow hitch and OE tilt/slide sunroof. It was 75 km away, so
I asked an Audi-savvy friend who lived nearby if he could do an inspection.
He took his job very seriously (the trader was very impressed) and
pronounced it healthy. Today I asked another friend if he could accompany
me for the ride and we collected the car. It was as described and I got it
for a more than reasonable price.

Guess I'm mobile again- and with 113 hp instead of 75 I'm gonna have to
watch my right foot.

Soon to appear in the registry...

Tom
1977 80LS auto 1.6
1978 80GLS auto 1.6
1978 80GLX 1.6
1987 80 1.8 (RIP)
1988 90 quattro 2.3E
1990 80 2.0E