RIP my low-budget Audi 80

[Tom Nas]

Hi all,

A moment's silence for my trusty 1987 Audi 80, which just didn't make it to
300k km. I bought this car in severely neglected condition as temporary
transport while I was working on my -then- 90q. It cost me $60 and
'temporary' turned out to be two years and 50k km. I fixed the brakes,
replaced the front struts (OE struts were a gift from a good friend) and
strut bearings and recently chenged the lower carb gasket. Being a
high-mileage carburetted car it ran a little roughly and used quite a bit
of oil but provided me with reliable no-nonsense low-cost transport. Early
last month the gearbox decided that enough was enough and that paying
attention to the odd oil drop underneath would've been a good idea. It
seized, leaving me stranded by the roadside 125 km from home. We towed it
back and started checking it out and decided that in order to make it to
its next inspection, it would really need suspension bushes and a cylinder
head overhaul would be a good idea also. Lacking the time and the tools for
this, I decided to scrap the car and look for a better replacement. The
onset of RSI demanded a car with power steering also, which the '87 didn't
have.

Along came a 1990 80 2.0E FWD, to which we transferred every useful recent
bit from the old car, and today I drove the '87 on its last voyage to the
scrapyard. Snif, my blue horror is no more... (parrot sketch quotes to be
inserted here). It must've been the cheapest kilometers I've ever made,
even a bicycle is more expensive to run. I even got $35 for the car from
the 'yard. Not bad!

Goodbye, PS-JZ-66... rest in pieces. I'll remember you fondly.

Tom