Re: UrQuattro Dash Upgrade

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

   ...
   After looking at two '84 Urquattro's, I have decided to upgrade my '83 Urq
   dashboard to a late model one.  (my build date is 7/82, #568, so maybe it
   ...
   Should I really look at the heater core, over taxed wires (to replace) and
   other things?

There are a coupla "trivial" wiring upgrades you can do that I heartily
recommend...that really made a difference on my UrQ ('83). Run some dedi-
cated 10g wires from the battery to:

  1)	radiator circuit. Trivial -- fuse #15 (? far right) comes out the
	back of the fuse block for *both* connections, just pop off the
	short wire (upper, I think) that feeds into the fuse (that then
	feeds the radiator fan circuit), and pop on one of the new 10g
	wires.

  2)	lights circuit. Almost as trivial -- headlight switch feed is a
	10g (12? Yellow?) wire from the ignition switch; disconnect this
	wire and replace with 10g from battery. This alone is worth 1.5
	to 2.0 volts to your (mine, anyways) headlights! (Measure voltage
	on lights first, to see how much difference this makes). Nice
	side effect -- better voltage feed to the ECU as well (which is
	*notoriously* voltage-sensitive).

  3)	Ignition switch. Almost as trivial -- heavy 10g (red?) feed input
	from fuseblock "unswitched" -- cut and splice in 10g directly
	from battery. (In theory, the whole connector piece should just
	pop right out of the ign switch connector -- I misremember ex-
	axtly why this became non-trivial on my car -- melted connector?
	some other Audimalfeasance? It was just easier to cut and splice
	the bloody wire...)

In retrospect, after doing "1" and "2", I'm not sure that "3" is really
"needed", let alone truly worthwhile, but on the theory that anything
worth doing is worth doing to excess . . . (and I was only gonna go in
there *ONCE*)

"1" and "2" are probaby half or more of normal load on fuse block, off-
loading them from the underwired and underspeced fuse block is both
trivial and very rewarding (very high "bang for the buck" payback - the
Hellas actually light up the night now!). Plus which, your fuse block
probably won't melt any further than it already has... (now might even
be a good time to replace that as well!)

I *STRONGLY* recommend fusing the 10g runs *at the battery end*. (I semi-
cheated and paired the wires (I ran a fourth feed for the stereo amps I
mounted in the trunklette) off of 50 (60?) amp fuses, since what I was
protecting against was catastropic shorts (like being hit in the side
by a car, post, whatever, and crushing/shorting the new 10g wires; all of
the circuits are otherwise fused: radiator fan fuse is what you're feeding,
headlights are all individually fused after the switch, ign switch was 
not fused to begin with..., and the amps are all indivually fused anyways.)

I ran the new wires along the side under the carpet, it's easy to remove
the trim piece (the bloody seatbelt anchor is another story...but the
proper application of brute force and ignorance triumphed...) and just
slide the wires along.

Other things to consider: The ignition switch feeds a 16g (black?) wire
that in turn supplies current to a 12g circuit (fuel pump?); that is a
good candidate for a field upgrade.

The A/C (relays mounted above glove box) is kinda wierd wiring: the A/C
power relay feeds through a little aux fuse panel in (above) the glove
box. That fuse panel is probably melted too, by now. Mostly because not
only does that fuse supply the fresh-air fan, it supplies the radiator
fan hurricane-force-speed when the A/C is engaged. I ran the "radiator
fan" feed into the other high-speed-fan relay (drivers side, aux relay
panel up under dash), and trip that instead (so radiator fan always runs
off of the radiator fan fuse and only the radiator fan fuse). I.e., 
there is already a relay to engage the radiator fan high speed setting
(as opposed to the medium-speed fan relay engaged by turning the igni-
tion on), tripped by the over-temp sensor in the coolant return line from
the overflow/resevoir. The A/C wire "splices" into the output from this
relay to the fan -- cut that out and splice into the relay coil instead,
and let the relay handle the current from the radiator fan fuse; also
save about 8 feet of additional voltage drop (and heating of the under-
dash area and A/C relays [yes, plural!]).

While it's all apart, it's trivial to put in a little switch in parallel
with the A/C lever (engages a little microswitch on the main heat/vent/
A/C control head) to allow you to engage A/C (on minimum cooling) while
applying "heat" (otherwise known to those of us in humid environments as
"defog" -- especially useful since the A/C also closes off the fresh air
flap and allows only recirc, while heat allows only fresh outside humidity
("air") to enter . . . (fixing that was another story).

Well, that should keep ya busy for an evening or two!

					-RDH