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Re: 4ks (86) distributor



>Date: Thu, 18 Dec 97 10:10:57 CST
>From: roger@mostro.sps.mot.com (Roger Albert)
>Subject: 4ks (86) distributor - long, but possibly informative
>
>Hi all,
>
>So, my car has been running crappy:  Poor idle and < 3krpm performance.
>
>1st, let me share a symptom,  The wear marks on two of the plug-wire's
>contacts (on the inside of the dist-cap) are virtually non-existant
>whereas two are not only heavy, but actually seem to have been cut into
>by the rotor contact (~1mm deep)  Furthermore, the two which have "good"
>albeit too much contact, seem to show fairly normal plug readings.  The
>one with no visible contact also shows a consistently fouling plug.
>Yet furthermore, the one pair shows wear very high on the contact, and
>the other very low.  To top it all off, I don't think it was a misinstalled
>rotor, because I went back and looked at the cap and rotor that were on the
>car when I bought it (don't ask why I kept them, just glad I did) and they
>show the same sort of symptoms.  I even have the old plugs which show the
>same one (#2) fouling.
>
>Anyway, I think I may have found the culprit of my running problems.
>A bent distributor shaft.  I even have a theory as to how that might
>have happened (in caes anyone out there is saying "hey, disty shafts
>don't just bend, barring visits/aid from the amazing Kreskin"  I, on
>two occasions, when I bought the car, and last night, had GREAT difficulty
>pulling the rotor off.  It took a lot of coaxing and cursing.  The top
>of the shaft that mates to the rotor was rusty.  Anyway, if someone more
>ham handed than I had had that much difficulty removing a rotor in the past,
>then they might have resorted to prying it off, thus bending the shaft.

[snip]

Roger,
Have you pulled the distributor and actually _seen_ that the shaft is bent?
If not, consider the possibility that the distr. shaft bushing (or
bearing--I'm unfamiliar with the Audi setup) is shot. This happened to my
'73 V6 Capri. Same symptoms--exactly. Turned out that the distributor shaft
bushing was made of plain steel and had worn down badly in (as I recall)
less than 25k miles. I machined a lubricated bronze (oil-lite ?)
replacement for it. That worked until I sold the car a couple of years
later.

Phil Rose

         **********************************************
         *  Phil & Judy Rose     E-mail:              *
         *                       pjrose@servtech.com  *
         **********************************************



From owner-quattro@coimbra.ans.net  Thu Dec 18 16:07:50 1997
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From: "Rob Winchell" <rbw@avs.com>
To: "Quattro" <quattro@coimbra.ans.net>
Subject: lights (about shape, not quality)
Date: Thu, 18 Dec 1997 14:53:51 -0500
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Q -=20

Which cars have the short, wide rectangular lights? I know the 200 =
series do, but it seems I have seen pictures of 5k models with those =
lights. I thought all the 5k series had the big rectangle lights? Are =
they interchangeable?

Rob Winchell
91 200Q (with a bad tranny)
87 4kCS