[s-cars] Why audi I5 started as 2.1 liters - Audisport Historical Trivia

[Jimmy Pribble]

Sorry if this has been covered, but I'm a little late to the game.
Also, my comment actually has to do with the RS2 "definitive answers"
thread, but I thought it might fit better here.

I'm not sure how any of us can "definitively" know which turbos Audi
used on any given car for any given race or rally.  Certainly, some of
the configurations are known, but as has been pointed out, Audi could
choose any trip-K turbo configuration the driver wanted...and they did.
I have an Automobile Magazine article about the S1 in which Mikkola was
testing
the car for a specific rally.  After a wild first ride (awesome write-up),
Mikkola gets out of the car and complains that it has too much power for the
broken slate surface.  The wheels are just spinning. The engineer walks over
to a container full of turbos, selects a different one, and they install
it on the car.  After a second drive, Mikkola reports being very pleased.
The car was down on power, but he could use it all.
So, what else was in the container?  Were they all K27?  K26?  Bigger,
smaller?
Can we say for sure?  I'm not sure that we can.  Also, Audi was so not tied
to any
one turbo that they swapped the turbo before they bothered just giving
Mikkola 
different programming.   Admittedly, back then it was probably faster to
just change
the turbo.  Still.  Anyway, while there might have been "favorite"
configurations,
Audi could have used a different turbo for every rally.  Just because we
know
of some configurations, I suggest we can't know them all,
at least not enough to base decisions about our own cars, because "that's
what the
factory did."  Besides, there is the matter of comparing apples to oranges x
infinity.

Of course, I could be wrong.  ;-)  

Jimmy "Wears a W.W.A.D. (What Would Audi Do?) bracelet" Pribble