4kq air filter replacement (complaint on Audi Engineers)

[Andrei Talalaevskii <andrei@insti.physics.sunysb.edu>]

Sorry to write on such a simple subject. For the first time, I have changed
an air filter in '84 4kq. I never thought that this would be so complicated. 
 
I apologize if this has been discussed before, or if I am just plain stupid
and there is an easy way to do it. In any case, please don't crucify me with
too bitter remarks. 

Being not an Audi expert, I still don't consider myself a total newbie.  I
maintain this car for more than a year and has put it gradually from horrible
to decent shape. I didn't do everything at once, 'coz it's not mine but my
gf's and "I have less time for her car than for my Golf". However, I (with
some friend's help) made many things on it already and assumed that I know it
reasonably well. 

Naturally, 4kq is not as simple as Golf and to do most things on it is often
harder than same things on Golf. This is the price one has to pay for it's
technical advantages. I was still claiming to all friends with Japanese cars
that those Japanese make cars unserviceable. After helping a friend to change
spark-plugs on his V6 Camry which turned out to be an unreasonably big
undertaking for such a regular job, I teased him that people who design cars
should bear in mind those who will work on them themselves and how much are
German cars better than Japanese in this respect. 

Changing of an airfilter is a regular maintenance thing and it takes me 10
minutes in the Golf. I was surprised by the amount of time and effort it
takes in 4kq. Two clips out of four are almost non-accessible. Even, after I
managed to open them, the fuel distributor assembly takes another hell of
efforts to be lifted because it is so tightly placed. And, finally, after the
filter was changed, it was very hard to close those two clips. 

Result: 10-15 minutes for oil change and 2.5-3 hours for air-filter 
change. Doesn't sound right to me...

Andrei