[V8] arrival of the faster rats....

[Roger M. Woodbury]

....or how to get a good, Sunday morning laugh at my expense.

Well, the saga of the daily driver and V8 in my house continues. Now as 
the 1994 100 Avant Quattro passed 203,000 miles and going very strongly, 
I have been again contemplating the future of the fleet here.  The need 
we have in this house is for one car, a station wagon, and not two, 
since the V8 has not been put back on the road for two years and really 
isn't needed.  But the "daily driver" has passed the two century's mark 
on the odo, and finish-wise will really need attention in the next year 
or two.

I recently watched two eBay auctions for A6 Avants that were very 
interesting. Both cars were in Florida, one a 2.8 litre and one a 3.0 
litre, both of which had fewer than 80,000 miles.  The 2.8 litre car 
(2002, I think) went for less than $4500 and the year newer car, which 
was a one-owner being sold by the original owner, did not pass the 
auction, the bidding stopping below five grand. All of which brings me 
to our 1994 100 Avant with it's 203,000+ miles, needing exterior 
restoration and a few other things.

It's relevant to recall that we have owned this car since it had 39,000 
miles, which for us is 14 years.  I have a VERY thick folder of 
maintenance records and know EVERYthing that has been done to the car in 
it's life. All work was performed by the same wrenching service save one 
or two items oil changes when we first got the car.  The car basically 
runs as it did when first purchased, delivering the same fuel mileage 
and using or leaking about the same amount of oil.  It is not rusty 
beneath at all, a testiment to Audi's galvanizing process.

So the choice is to keep the 100 indefinitely, getting the body restored 
so it doesn't look quite as tacky as it does (particularly the roof 
which is now beginning to lose it's dark green color in favor of 
something more like a greenish-taupe, if you can imagine that).  In 
order to really consider keeping this car running for, say, another 
100,000 miles, making this possibly the last, daily driver we have, it 
will cost in round numbers, three grand to refinish the exterior 
(depending on whether or not I can buy the mouldings for the door from 
the aftermarket or from Audi. From Audi the door mouldings are $1100 by 
themselves! Ouch!).  I would also pull the engine and have it resealed, 
eliminating all the oil leaks.  I would also want to have the instrument 
cluster rebuilt so both the fuel and temperature gauges work properly, 
fix all window switches as well as all the other switches that no longer 
light up at night.  That's all the car needs as mechanically beneath the 
car is up to snuff now.  So total cost probably in the five or six grand 
range in total, or roughly the same cost to buy a 2002-2004 A6 Avant 
with less than 100,000 miles.  (Let's assume I can find one that has a 
good service and maintenance history that can be verified and won't need 
a timing belt as soon as it arrives! That will take some doing by itself.)

It's an odd sort of choice. On the one had, with the investment of 
"cosmetic dollars", which is mostly what I have described, I will have a 
1994 Avant that still has a lot of miles, but will DO precisely what the 
newer Audi Avants will do.  The added advantage is that excise tax and 
insurance are lower and will remain that way.

I will not consider going newer than 2005 for anything, as the more 
"modern" electronics scare me to death:  they WILL fail expensively 
faster than will the basic mechanics of the vehicles and I do not want 
nor need to consider blue, red or green tooth technology in an 
automobile.  (Oh, and I'd LOVE a 2005 allroad V8, but THAT engine's 
timing chain guide failure rate and the cost of repair of that issue 
alone scars me to death also.  The air suspension not so much!).

Now having those ponderings, and congratulating our Audi on how well it 
goes and how reliable it is, last week it failed to start at precisely 
the moment my wife needed to drive off to her hair appointment. Now if 
you can imagine how worthless a car becomes suddenly short of a wreck, 
have it fail to service your wife's hair-dressing appointment schedule 
leavinig her with her hair not doing a single thing she demands of it!  
Talk about looks that KILL!

Well, at 203,000 miles, I sort of assumed the problem was the crank 
position sensor. That little item failed on the car a long while 
back....well earlier than 70,000 miles as I recall, although I have not 
gone through the service history to determine exactly WHEN it failed. I 
automatically thought a failed CPS might be the cause as the starter 
would spin the engine, but there was absolutely nothing more happening 
than that.  So I called to speak with the wrench.  We discussed having 
the car towed in for service (bear in mind, it is 50 miles to the shop 
from here.).  He asked if when I tried to start the engine if the tach 
moved, explaining if the tach moved then the problem was NOT the crank 
position sensor, but most probably a fuel pump.  "Hmmm," I thought.  "I 
never thought of the fuel pump."  So, with John on the phone I walked 
out to the car and turned the key.....to find the car started up 
immediately.  "Yup," said John.  "Fuel pump. They will do that for a 
long while.  Just carry a boom handle around in the car and when it 
fails to start, smack the underside of the fuel tank with the broom 
handle and it'll go.  You'll need to replace the fuel pump at some 
point, probably before winter."

"Okay," I thought. "I remember that the fuel pump is accessed through 
the top of the fuel tank and there is an access panel beneath the floor 
of the rear of the car.  I think it's beneath the spare tire wheel well, 
and /I can do it/. I think I tested the fuel level sensor on that when 
the fuel gauge started to read oddly."  We cancelled plans for the flat 
bed to pick up my car.

I decided to go on-line and see where I could best buy a fuel pump.  
Turned out to be Rock Auto, and a hundred bucks and two days later the 
pump arrived (talk about FAST shipping!).  Friday afternoon I went out 
to examine how to proceed on Saturday morning with the new pump install 
project....to find.....NO access port in the floor of the back of the 
Avant!  WTF?  I CLEARLY remember seeing the access port for the fuel 
pump....or at least I saw the access panel in SOME German car I 
owned....hmmm.....was it the 928S4?  could it have been THAT car?  Or 
how about the 200 Avant that went away before the 100 Avant was even 
born?  Or maybe the V8?  (No, not the V8:  I looked and although the 
floor might come up, it was glued down in the Black Forest like the 
elves meant it to be glued down!).

So, now I have a new, Bosch fuel pump and a functioning Audi 100 daily 
driver that will need to be mated to its new pump by the wrench when 
they drop the fuckin' fuel tank to receive it since I cannot perform 
that surgery here in my own garage.  Grrrrrrr. AND then I will have an 
aging Audi 100 with a new fuel pump and probably the decision about 
whether to replace it or not will merely be put off for yet another year 
or five!

Well another good thing is that the Audi 100 has Euro headlights and if 
I get something newer, I'll have to convince myself that whatever it is 
with its polycarbonate headlights is somehow just as good in the dark 
(which I don't believe for a nano second now).

So I'll just truck along as it is.  I have a new broom handle in the 
back of the Avant should it fail again to start and will not hesitate to 
give it a good whack in the ass with the broom.  Oh, and another good 
thing. A long time ago, someone gave me a couple of Audi logo stickers 
which have sat in my desk drawer for a long time now.  I'll take one out 
this afternoon and put an Audi logo onto that broom handle and make it 
look just like it came from those elves who screwed the car together to 
begin with.

Roger