[V8] I'm with you, times two!

[Roger M. Woodbury]

I agree with you!  All things considered, there is really no comparison 
between the V8 Quattro and anything....anything else on the planet if 
the ultimate number of dollars is taken into consideration.  I paid 
$6600 for my '90V8 (69,000 miles) in 2007.  I had to have the timing 
belt and front brakes done and a few other niggling items but the car 
was nearly new otherwise...the timing belt in the engine was the 
original belt.  There has been more done and now it will need more items 
that are age related. One winter I slid on water covered ice in the 
driveway, cracked the front bumper cover and a fog light lens.  When 
that was replaced, I had the body shop repaint the bottom 1/4 so all age 
related issues and the normal little chips and scuffs from 80,000 miles 
were removed and the car really now sparkles like new.  Oh, yes:  I must 
add that all my work is done by the same independent shop I have done 
business with for fifteen years.

I have tested the market twice on this car simply because we really no 
longer need to keep two cars on the road. The station wagon we have is 
the ONE car that gets used exclusively now, so the V8 is really excess.  
Sitting still in the garage isn't helping it, but I am not going to gift 
it away either.  There is no market and that's a shame because for small 
dollars someone could get a nearly pristine premium V8 touring 
automobile that would last a long, long time.

The station wagon is a '94 Audi 100 CS quattro that I bought from the 
original selling dealer in Kansas City fourteen years ago. The car had 
39,000 miles on it when I drove it off the lot and it is nearing 200,000 
miles.  That car needs some things, all of which are age related.  It 
needs an a/c compressor, a bit of touch up in the instrument cluster, a 
tailgate latch, some window switches and a new (er) hvac control panel 
would be nice...one with less than 100k of service I suspect, and front 
struts and bushings.  Some of these items it will get in December when 
it goes in for annual inspection.  The only things it really needs is 
the tailgate latch and the front struts. My mechanic has a parts wagon 
so the tailgate latch will be small dollars.  Over the past years I have 
paid again the original purchase price in maintenance.  Today the car is 
NOT rusty beneath, and runs perfectly, without hesitation and still gets 
around 24 miles per gallon of gas, which is the same that it got when 
first put into service. The car uses a quart of oil about every seven 
hundred miles which is exactly what it used when first purchased.  It 
has had miriads of oil leaks alll of which were taken care of last 
spring, when a lot of vacuum lines were replaced, which made the engine 
run like new also.  What the car really, really is getting to need is 
new black lower body rub strips and a complete refinishing.  So for less 
than $2000 can have this car looking like new, if I buy the rub strips 
on line in the aftermarket (They will cost more than $1100 from the Audi 
dealer!).

I have done the "old car/new car/which one replacement" dance on the 
station wagon also. I have done the research and determined that I might 
be interested in a Mercedes E320 4Matic wagon from 1999-2001. They were 
the last of the electronically "simple" wagons that were repairable 
without terrible money issues.  ALL the money for one would be around 
ten grand with less than 100,000 miles and they exist in good quantity.  
I have decided that another Audi will NOT be the choice, simply because 
the electronics and cheapened body parts (so I am told) has diminished 
the value in my mind AND for a Quattro Avant of those years, if you can 
find one, the entry price is really too high.  I have thought about BMW 
wagons, but am still stinging from the screwing that the '83 318i was.  
BMW might be the ultimate driving machine, but I don't give a damn if it 
ultimately has electronic gremlins that ultimately can't be fixed.  
Anything with a roundel on the nose is at least ten to fifteen percent 
more than it is worth at 55 miles per hour on Maine's rural roads.

So in the end, we are keeping the 100 in service.  Next year we might 
have it resprayed and a new a/c compressor installed prior to summer. We 
lived without it this year and missed it only ONE day: we really don't 
need to go far or often and this summer was cool enough so a/c was 
needed only one day.  By next year at this time, there will be more than 
200,000 miles on the wagon.  I will have spent around $28,000 or so on 
the car, including purchase price, labor and parts maintenance since 
purchase.  I expect the car to still be running like new.  It is a known 
quantity:  I knew what to expect to do to the car over time/miles, parts 
are not difficult to source, specific operating expense is low (regular 
gas and I buy five quarts of oil every other month or so), excise tax is 
on the bottom rung and physical damange insurance is cheap for us and 
this car.  More to the point is what could I get that will duplicate 
what this car does for us at any sort of reasonable cost?  Only 
Mercedes, VW, and BMW and Audi build station wagons now at all, and I 
doubt they will continue to do so indefinitely (although Mercedes 
probably will longer than the rest).  When the 100 closes in on the 
230,000 mile mark it will need its fourth timing belt service.  If it 
remains running as it is today, I will likely have that done and 
continue to chug along.  But that will be the next time that I will 
seriously consider a replacement, I think....even if the transmission 
drops out of it, I have another one close by, and even transmission and 
engine replacement will be cheaper than buying anything else.  We have 
little need for more cupholders or more airbags than this one has, so 
without clear advantage, this station wagon is as good as it gets.  Just 
like my V8: small dollars and big rewards.

By the way, you said you purchased from Carousel?  I wonder which 
Carousel that was?  I bought my '89 200 Quattro Avant from Carousel in 
Minneapolis back in 1992 (I think it was).  I bought it over the 
telephone and flew out to arrive on the fourth of July.  They picked me 
up at the motel and when I arrived at the dealership, the sales manager 
wanted to speak to me.  He wanted to know why a guy from the Maine coast 
would fly all the way to Minneapolis to buy that car. He wanted to know 
where I got my "basis of trust" from. I told him that I saw his ad on 
the Audi Quattro news letter and I figured in Minneapolis they had 
plenty of "marks" to screw if they wanted to screw someone, but to screw 
a guy who knew about the Audi Quattro fan club would do more to hurt 
them than me.  Besides, I told him I wanted a black, 200 Avant with low 
miles and that car was the only one I could find like it for any 
reasonable price.   The sale manager laughed and told me they had been 
Quattro Club member since inception and respected the "power" of the 
organization for they sales purposes.  He said that because I was paying 
cash with no trade, they would adjust the price of the car I had agreed 
to buy, and on the spot, they dropped the price $900!  When I got into 
the station wagon to drive home, I had decided to go through the 
Michigan upper peninsular, cross into Canada and then down through 
Maine, crossing the border at Jackman.  I think I got about twenty miles 
from the dealer when I noticed the development thinning out and I then 
decided I should look around for a gas station.  For the first time I 
checke the fuel gauge to find the dealer had FILLED the tank before I 
left.  THAT was what you call a FIRST CLASS buying experience!

Roger

P.S.  If my wife wasn't terminally clutch challenged, we would still 
have that car and today it would have around 350,000 miles on it!



---
This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.
http://www.avast.com