[s-cars] In Search of a 6-Speed Allroad

[Vincent]

Since I've gone through the same search not so long ago, here's a few
advices:

- Try one first (a Tiptronic or you'll look for a test drive forever), test
it on a twisty country road, not in town or on highway where they won't show
their stock-form handling weaknesses. Opinions diverge. I love mine, even in
stock-handling/power-to-weight-ratio-sucking form, but I know at least one
ex-urSer who hate them as much as I love them. May be it's because I test
drove an upgraded air suspension/chipped one and a coilover/RS4 one so I
know their potential. Maybe it's simply because taste and colours. In stock
form, the go-everywhere capabilities are awesome (it's the only light SUV
that pass the Rover test) and you can keep this potential through upgrades,
but the stock suspension is soccer mom biased and the
feel-of-pant-power-to-weight ratio is noticeably less than stock urS level
although numbers say just a tad less. OTOH the HP-2 brakes are really decent
(but you need to switch to ceramic pads, OEM are brake dust blowers), it
should have been, and was in Europe, on the urS. 

- If you liked what you drove, look everywhere, every website, in North
America. Don't expect to find a 6MT allroad locally. When I looked for mine,
I found over 800 ads for allroad in all NA. Only _4_ of them were 6MT! In my
case, I used a site that references all ads from eBay, Craiglist and a few
others. Sadly, I ditched that link when I put my hands on mine and can't
find it anymore.

- Expect to spent 4-5K in the first year. These heavy soccer mom pigs
require a suspension upgrade from day one when you come from an urS.
Besides, there is a high chance the air suspension will be leaking from one
of the front corner when you buy it. Green Lime - 10$ at WalMart - would fix
it for a few months but you'll have to replace it one day. Since it's to
replace an SUV, you'll probably want to keep the convenience of the
adjustable height air suspension, which means Arnott gen2 plus Hotchkis
swaybar for decent handling (or just 300$ for one corner if you find stock
handling acceptable but I doubt it). It's an easy DIY so 4-5K covers only
the parts. The allroad is driveable as is but not enjoyable, BTDT and,
sadly, still is, because too many projects, not enough wallet.

- Put aside another 4K in case you have to replace the turbo soon. The small
K03 are known to fail sooner than later, as soon as 100Kmiles for chipped
ones (luckily, it seems no BTDT yet despite scary boost noise since gone),
and if you have to replace the turbo, you'd better switch to K04 so you can
complete the RS4 conversion when budget permits, or at least have more
reliable turbo. 
As it requires engine removal, I counted 3K for the K04 kit plus 1K for
labour as quoted by my mech (simple K03 R&R wouldn't save much anyway).

- An almost negligible - considering the other items - 600 should be spent
on a chip because the stock 250hp is barely enough for the 4000lbs+ it has
to carry (but it makes the 4K for K04s coming even sooner).

Otherwise, it's a really enjoyable car. Just the right amount of gizmos for
creature comfort without spending all your weekends fixing electronic
gremlins and, in the chipped + Arnott gen2 + hotchkis version I test drove
(hoping mine will get there soon ASAP), the best
all-roads-and-not-really-roads assault vehicle I can think off (On level 4,
I've been places most light pick-ups/SUVs wouldn't dare approaching). Or, at
RS4 level with coilover conversion, it'd the only acceptable post-95
replacement for a modified urS Avant IMHO (Sorry to all S6V8 or RS6V8tt
lovers, I can't do with Tiptronics, but... if S-tronic S6 Avant ever come to
life, I may reconsider).

So, a cheap car to buy (bought mine last July for 10K, 2002, 85Kmiles, all
options but Nav, but saw already sold 2001 6MT for as low as 7K) but you
have to keep in mind you may/should account to spend an additional 60-100%
to make it worth its potential. A low mileage 2005 could save you the 4-5K
for K04 for a while but you'll pay 4-5K more for the car, so not much saving
there. But, at the end, worth every penny of the 15-17K final cost, IMHO,
YMMV.

Last piece of advice, if possible, look for an allroad with leaking air
suspension. There's still a lot of allroad which are original soccer mom
owner, so they still rely on the dealer for everything (mine had wipers!!!
replaced by the dealer 3Kmiles before purchase). Dealers charges over 1K for
one corner air suspension so they'll sell a leaking suspension allroad for
very cheap and you can fix it (temporally, with stock handling) with 1h and
300$. I've seen one 3K below market price just because it needed a 300$
Arnott air spring (sadly, it was tiptronic).

P.S.: I did a quick search in Canada, found 36 for sale but, as expected,
all Tiptronic. Expect to spend "a few" hours in front of your computer
looking for one, but definitely worth it.

HTH



Vincent - presently parked in a snow bank where I should consider showshoes
- F


-----Original Message-----
From: s-car-list-bounces at audifans.com
[mailto:s-car-list-bounces at audifans.com] On Behalf Of P. Dooley
Sent: 7 February 2011 23:05
To: S-Car-List at audifans.com
Subject: [s-cars] In Search of a 6-Speed Allroad

S-Heads,

Our SUV bit the dust last week (2001 Isuzu Trooper) and I'm now in need 
of a replacement.  The Allroad seems to be the candidate that fits our 
needs closest.  Any leads on a 6-speed manual would be appreciated and 
the manual transmission is a must - we liked the old Trooper in a manual 
and would like to stay that way.  I'm located in western Pennsylvania 
and would like to find one soon as we are down to 1 car for the winter 
and some how I'm the one who ends up without a car each day.

TIA,

Paul Dooley
95 S6 that my girlfriend some how ends up driving every day while I bum 
a ride 30 mile to work each day
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