Audis vs Batteries

[rdh@sli.com (Robert D. Houk)]

   After a few minutes, the fan had not come on, so I turned the
   car off. As soon as I did, the fan came on low. When I turned
   the key back on, the fan turned off.

   Is this normal behavior?

Uh . . . doesn't really sound "normal", but then again this is Audi
we're talking 'bout! If the fan doesn't eventually come on with the
engine running (watch the temp guage carefully! Alternatively, open
the coolant resevoir and wait 'till it "boils" out -- the fan should
have switched on before that happens), then you have an interesting
problem.

   As a related question (related to the original problem I was
   looking at), where is the connection for the temp guage?
   Her car either reads normal temp, or dead zero. Sometimes
   hitting a bump causes it to change state. I assume it's a
   loose connetion somewhere.

No idea where your connection/sensor would be; on my '83 UrQ, the temp
guage sensor is installed in the head water outlet fitting retrofitted
for the water-cooled S4 turbo; the computer coolant temp sensor is
mounted in the head directly below (next to?) the coolant outlet; the
overtemp sensor is in the coolant resevoir return line; and the "under-
temp" sensor is I think mounted at the rear of the head/block somewheres.

You can always empirically track it down; there's probably less than
a dozen sensors screwed into the block/head with a single wire, and it's
likely one of those (I'd start around the water outlet fitting); just
pull the wire and see if the guage "breaks" (if the engine stops, it's
probably not the guage's temp sensor...). Look for a paticularly grotty
connector, since it is exposed to full block heat and road salt and
whatnot, fair odds that just cleaning the sensor connection (or just
cleaning them all on g.p.'s) can fix your problem.

Bear in mind that there are probably half-a-dozen "connectors" (which
translates into a dozen crimped connections!) between your sensor and
your gauge . . . good hunting.

					-RDH