[V8] Two V8's: Plenty of problems

[Karl Middlebrooks]

I was in Texas for about 6 months, and left my two 90's in care of a friend. Told her she could (and should) drive 'em occasionally, since the beasts seem to hate you for making them stay still for long.  I recently returned to the Pacific Northwest, and have been fiddling around with the cars this week, and there's a number of things going on.

V8 #1 - 254k miles
This one scares me the most. There are only two problems with this one: 
1) the sunroof has somehow gotten totally out of alignment. It's closed, not totally flush with the top of the car, doesn't leak, but is out of kilter. And even trying to close it manually with the little wrench (I always thought that was nice of Audi to hide that up there, though kind of annoying to make me use a screwdriver to get to it) doesn't work. I figure just pulling the sunroof should allow me to at least get it back on track. 
2) There's a LOT of noise coming from the driver's side of the engine. I'd say it almost sounds like the pistons are scraping against the cylinder walls, but not quite that severe. There seems to be a loud whine/hiss that goes along with this, too. I haven't done a full oil change yet, but the oil level/pressure are both good, the oil on the dipstick looks normal, and I'm not seeing white smoke from the tailpipe or anything like that. When I first checked the engine, I noticed that my friend had checked the oil level at my request and had not replaced the dipstick correctly (it was out by a couple of inches, so not fully seated). I don't notice any power problems, though occasionally at idle, I feel what could be best described as a single "thrum" coming from the engine. My friend has driven the car consistently every day with this going on for I'm not sure how long. Any ideas on what's going on here? I've sidelined the car for the time being.

V8 #2 - 143k miles
At some point while i was gone, something happened and the driver's window migrated itself downward into the door. This would have been OK if someone had noticed it before it got rained in for most of a week. I'm sure the carpet is completely toast, and it smells awesome inside, assuming you think "mildew" is a great scent. Aside from that, my friend stopped driving this one because it needs the starter replaced (got a rebuilt Bosch, but like many folks, I think the original starter bolts were put on using super glue and torqued with unimaginable force). But aside from that, it's developed a couple of new quirks:
1) Power steering  is nonexistent at low speeds and the serpentine belt squeals more than Ned Beatty in Deliverance up until the car is moving at a decent clip. The rack, pump, and lines are all less than 4k old. Is this a case of just replace the serpentine belt and associated rollers? Squealing serpentine belt does get me some attention from the ladies (and guys), but I suspect it's not the sort I want.
2) The fuel gauge lies: it always says I have 20 gallons in the tank (I wish), but the idiot light in the center tells the truth when I get down into the sub-3-gallon range. The other gauges appear to tell the truth, though my friend reported once that the speedo didn't work (it worked for me yesterday). Seems like both the gauge and the idiot light should lie if the sender is bad.....??
3) The idiot light lies about the brake lights. It says BRAKE LIGHT most of the time, though I've verified that the brake lights actually work correctly.
4) Because of the rain, and because no-one tried to dry out the car before taping a garbage bag over the window, it's damn moist inside there (the mold seemed to be thriving) I dried it out as best I could with a hair dryer, but I noticed that there was moisture on the inside of the clear plastic cover for the instrument cluster.  This seems bad, but since only the fuel gauge is lying, I'm not sure that I really need to do anything urgently.

Next time I go to Texas, I swear, I'll take the things with me.


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