[s-cars] New Purchase - 1992 S4

[Lee Levitt]

Mike writes:

> My wife and I just bought our first urS4 and it's a rocket ship! What a
> blast to drive.

Um, yes. :)

Welcome aboard Mike, you'll find a friendly crowd here, albeit with a bit of
a sense of humor :)

> 1. The S4 pulls noticeably to the left, so I had it aligned, but the same
> thing happens. The shop I had the alignment done is reputable and I've had
> other cars done there to my satisfaction, but not the Audi. The mechanic
> stated he couldn't get the steering wheel straight because some nuts were
> "frozen", but I'm wondering if he simply didn't have the right tools.

Find another shop.

>
> 2. Audi Bose Radio - this makes a horrible high volume, high pitched noise
> when turned on. What's going on there?

Um, they all do that. Tear out the head unit, the amps and the matched
speakers, and start from scratch.

Or if it's *really* bad, it could be a problem with the head unit. Does it
do this only when the ignition is on?

We haven't heard of this failure on the list recently. Anyone?

> 6. Headlights - The lighting while on low beams only is very poor in my
> opinion. Hitting the high beams works well, but obviously is irritating to
> oncoming drivers. I now ride with the fog lights on all the time to get
> extra lighting up front. Can this be remedied with higher output halogen
> bulbs for the headlights? Something like 85w for the 9005 and 100w for the
> 9005?

Higher wattage bulbs won't do that much. Upgrade to euro lamps, which will
run you about $600 and you'll get great lighting. The lamps are available
from www.puma-access.com, and instructions for swapping them out are on
www.urs4.com. If you run stock 55 watt bulbs, it's a simple plug and play
operation. 1 hour for the first lamp, 15 minutes for the second.

If you go with higher wattage bulbs, you'll want to relay them. Which will
cause angst with the bulb-out sensor. Someone has a fix for this, but IMHO
its a PITA to deal with. www.cartalk.com sells black electrical tape to tape
over the bulb out lamp in the instrument cluster.

Or you can go with HID  bulbs in either your DOT lamps or the Euro lamps.
Also will run another $500 or so. I'd start with the Euro lamps.

>
> 7. More Horsepower - There seems to be a wealth of information on basic
> chipping to boost horsepower. Is there a "most popular" tried and true
> technique?
>

Two primary ways to go here, either the MTM +1 setup or Ned Ritchie's
(Intended Acceleration) setup. I understand that Ned's setup provides a more
gradual application of power, and I'm thinking about going that route
myself.

BTW, you also need to join BIRA.org and decide which brake upgrade you want.
:)

You'll find that the stock brakes aren't up to the rest of the car.

Then of course, you'll come back to us asking whether Eibachs/Bilsteins or
H&R/Koni's are the hot setup. But I don't want to overwhelm you with too
much informatin  :)

Lee
'95.5 S6 avant
96 A6 quattro avant