Suspension Imbalance ?

["Doyt W. Echelberger" <Doyt@poboxes.com>]

Measured sitting on a hard flat surface, the passenger front corner of my 86
$KcsQ sits about 1.5 inches lower than the driver side.

This condition is not new, but is progressive over the last few years.

At the alignment/frame shop, the manager was very global about corrective
measures, without any specific estimates. He said "Most new cars are a
little uneven, and it would cost too much to fix this old 1986 car."

With that, I was driven off his test rack and ushered from his shop without
wasting any more of his time.

Went to a smaller, friendlier shop, got the same general answer in a more
polite way.

These specialists see my quattro as a 10 year old foreign car, and they
don't understand the quattro system at all, and I think it scares them and
they don't want to work on it, so they get rid of me as fast as possible.

That leaves me with my dealer, who has lost all his Audi mechanics because
of his chintzy personnel policies.

But I DO have this E-mail list, and so, there it is. The car sits low on the
passenger side front. I know that some of you replace whole suspensions and
tune the finest details of the most exotic system in automotive history.
Please focus in on a simple average driver who has discovered the incredible
handling of these old 4000's, and wants to keep driving one of them for the
forseable future. Get me a little deeper into understanding this condition,
accepting it,or moving into a tighter diagnosis and eventual prescription.

Car has 150,000 miles, never wrecked, new front lower wishbone bushings 2
yrs ago. Can I use some rubber inserts in the right front coil? Would gas
struts allow me to adjust the problem? Is a new set of front springs the
first move? Could the front sway bar be bent/torqued wrong? Could the front
tilt be caused by something in the rear system? etc. How do I get this car
level?

This system is about 90% beyond my ability to use judgement, and none of the
experts in my town want to get involved. I'm gonna hafta fix it myself, or
tell them what to do.

HELP.


Doyt
86 4KcsQ