Teach me about Audi 4000 quattros

Knurled wrote:

Argo1 wrote: I bought an '84 Quattro new and it was the worst car I've ever owned. Nothing but constant electrical problems. When it ran, it was great. It just didn't do that very often.

Did you happen to have a 5000? 5000s are a different animal altogether from the 4000s.

I beleive that they changed over to GM style electrics in '86.

Nope, it's all-Bosch all the time.

The all Bosch comment isn't 100% true. The automatic climate control and power seat controls in the 85 up 5000, 100, 200, etc. are straight out of the GM parts bin.

On my 86 5000cs quattro, I replaced the ballast resistor for the blower with one from a similar vintage Cadillac. Even the control head/display is the same (It just has Audi silk screened on the face).

5000s aren't 4000s, though.

I hate that this thread has me looking for Audis...and I find a running 90 quattro 20v sedan for under $1000.

In my head I know it would be smarter and cheaper to flush $1000 down the toilet than to spend it on a 20 year old Audi, but my heart tells me different.

No, you want to buy it, and 034's bolt-on turbo setup for the 7A (20v nonturbo) engine.

Neat thing about the 20v engines. High compression, low compression, it cares not, it just seems to boil down to about 90hp/hole before you have to worry about the rods buckling. (Nonturbo use the same rods as the turbo 20vs. Getting to 400-450hp is the easy part, getting over that is where it starts to get expensive, but past that hurdle, it seems like the next hurdle is getting a strong enough clutch...

The 90s have the weakest transmission. Bounce a curb at over ~500hp on sticky tires and you'll explode it.

In reply to Knurled:

Damn you sir...damn you with your siren song of Audi bulletproof engines and awful electrics

There's no shortage of silly-powered turbo 20vs in Coupes, 80s, 90s, 4000s, and ur-quattros on Motorgeek.

Not a small number of V8 swaps, too. At least one with a pair of hairdriers hanging off the side.

Just to be perverse, the owner of North America's quickest Coupe Quattro is on there, and he has a 1.8t. A maybe 700hp 1.8t, mind you.

It's like the Lord is Sending me a sign, after going years without seeing an Audi 90, coupe, etc. this thread pops up and now I have seen 3 clean Audi 90's for sale for around $1000 in one week.

I know that they are slower, older, less reliable, and infinitely more aggravating than what I have now but I can't seem to get away from them.