5000 AutoTranny Question

[SBate82659@aol.com]

Hello All,

I am a new listee and Audi owner with an auto tranny question.
I have owned and worked on VW's for over 20 years but this is my first Audi.
I just bought an '85 5000S Avant with a bum auto tranny.
I searched the archives and found quite a bit of info concerning the diff oil
leakage problem into the auto trans but nothing that quite addressed my
particular situation.
The previous owner said it went out while rounding a corner to the right - he
was braking for the corner and when he reapplied power there was no drive to
the wheels in any of the forward gears or reverse.
No noise was associated with this failure and no problems or symptoms had been
noticed prior to it.
This is not in keeping with my understanding of the usual failure mode of
these transmissions (but, then again, my knowledge of these things is pretty
much nill - hence this post).
I'm trying to evaluate my options before outright transmission replacement.
Does this set of symptoms ring any bells with anyone?
Should I just not bother changing the filter and fluid on this one and assume
it's toast?

Any and all advice appreciated.

Sam Bateman
Fork Union, VA
'85 Audi 5000S Avant
'87 VW Vanagon GL