jas11n
Well-known member
Hello guys, newbie here to your very informative forums A friend of mine said you all maybe would be interested in what I've done to my tired and battered old 80 TDi. I hope it's of interest.
I'm a stranger to TDi's in general, but not what they are bolted into Audi wise, being the north east UK rep for the UK based Audi Owners Club.
My current baby of the last four years is a 1995 Audi S2 coupe which I adore, but using it as a daily driver was not only piling the miles on, the currently shocking price of petrol in the UK forced my hand into looking for something a little more economical for my 50 miles round trip to work five day a week. This means the S2 is now a weekend toy or occasional car and I get to spend a bit more time on her.
More economy meant a TDi, and in wanting to stay with what I know of the B4 chassis Audi's, that meant an 80 TDi in either Avant or sedan guise.
I much prefer the look of the sedan so the hunt was on.
I intially wanted just a scruffy work hack, nothing to look at but with good mechanicals. I found one, scruffy wasn't the word, but ohhh how that changed after a week or so when the modding bug got a grip.
(please forgive as I now copy and paste ) The timeline of the posts will be off, but I started the project late Feburary.
....................................................................................................................................................
Ok, to the car itself. It was picked up on the 9th of feb from Coventry for a paltry £250. Caught the train to Tamworth, audifans.net site owner and AOC cheif Andy picked me up and I headed home the next day.
The car came without a radio, so before leaving Tamworth a trip to Halfords and back saw me buy an new RDS tuner headunit with CD-R front loader for £40. Fitted in a crack by Andy, it's not as bad as I thought it would be for £40, radio reception is fine, plays CD's no bother and the sound quality is ok, but MILES away from the Becker headunit recently fitted to my S2, but then that was £300 so you'd expect some difference.
Drive home was great, the car is quiet, VERY economical, brakes are good, engine pulls very well, clutch good, gearbox good. The previous owner had had a bit of a problem with it late last year, he'd posted asking for a good midlands VW/Audi specialist and we'd directed him to a good VAG specialist. They replaced the diesel pump and also did the cambelt at the same time. So I'm not worried about the engine.
Monday saw me with a day off work, so first off was to change a few interior items. The ugly four spoke steering wheel had to go, in it's place a spare 3 spoke sport wheel was put on instead. Most of the small 5mm wedge bulbs throughout the car on things like the switches, the heater controls etc were out. I've replaced all of these, every last one in the car has been replaced even if it was working or not. This means they are all the same brightness and should in theory save me having to pull stuff apart again when another one blew.
Dash binnacle bulbs were out on all but two of them. So they've all been replaced too.
The interior was rank, so the seats and carpets were vacuumed (took "three" hours) and then cleaned with a vax and carpet shampoo. All the trim and dash was washed down with neat Megs APC and then treated to Aerospace 303 trim protectant.
A set of mats were added (ok, coupe ones, but I had them so used them)
A spare genuine used wing was given to me by Andy, it came from his recently sold 80 avant and is in emerald green. I'm also a big hater (personal preference don't forget
) of the standard front bumper, what possessed Audi to design it looking like a speed boats hull I'll never know, so that's coming off. In it's place a spare S2 front bumper from my collection.
With that I'll have to change the headlights or I'll have four front indicators. So a set of face lifted coupe headlights will go in, with some clear indicators and the fogs in the new bumper.
I'll be colour coding the door handles and the wing mirrors, along with the black rubbing strips mid way up the doors. That leaves the rear bumper being removed and replaced with a S2 avant rear bumper recently sourced.
All above will be done by myself, apart from the laser red top coat on the wing and bumper as I can't get the finish I want. £40 is what a mate wants to do this, so I'd rather he did it, than me doing it and always hating it.
Lastly, the wheels. Currently it's on it's original steelies, 195/65/15 with no wheel trims either. I want alloys though. I have a set of 17" five spoke alloys that would look great, but the tyres are really best their sell by date and I'm not keen on 17" after been there with them on my S2. Though after driving this car for a while now, I think the 17's won't be that bad. The S2's suspension is SOOOO much harder than this shuggy boat 80's suspension.
So, as this is a cash saving car, I'm not about to fork out for some tyres. I have a spare set (two spare sets really) of 16" avus wheels with brand new tyres on them. But as we know, 5x112 avus don't bolt to 4x108 hubs. Five stud conversion? Nope, that'll cost money, is not exactly straight forward and so far, not what I want to do.
Hub converters? Hmmm? There is one place that sells them in Belgium, but at 300 euros a set + shipping they are a little expensive. Plenty of 4x100 to 5x100 or 4x100 to 5x130, even a 4x108 to 5x130.
If I can't get them easy, then maybe I'll make some.
Also looking into the possibility of turning my 4x108 hubs themselves into 5x112.
I know I know, some will cry and protest that your wheel will drop off, you'll end up upside down on the motorway with a central reservation barrier embedded in your head, but as the VW boys run with 4x100 to 5x112 or 5x130 converters without really bad things happening, I'll give one of these a shot. But not before carefully planning and weighing the idea up.
Ok, pictures so far.
This is the exterior as it was when I picked it up. Pretty faded with a few knocks and scrapes. Apart from the front driver wing (awful isn't it) they'll all repair with a little elbow grease and time. No rust anywhere else apart from that drivers wing.
I'm a stranger to TDi's in general, but not what they are bolted into Audi wise, being the north east UK rep for the UK based Audi Owners Club.
My current baby of the last four years is a 1995 Audi S2 coupe which I adore, but using it as a daily driver was not only piling the miles on, the currently shocking price of petrol in the UK forced my hand into looking for something a little more economical for my 50 miles round trip to work five day a week. This means the S2 is now a weekend toy or occasional car and I get to spend a bit more time on her.
More economy meant a TDi, and in wanting to stay with what I know of the B4 chassis Audi's, that meant an 80 TDi in either Avant or sedan guise.
I much prefer the look of the sedan so the hunt was on.
I intially wanted just a scruffy work hack, nothing to look at but with good mechanicals. I found one, scruffy wasn't the word, but ohhh how that changed after a week or so when the modding bug got a grip.
(please forgive as I now copy and paste ) The timeline of the posts will be off, but I started the project late Feburary.
....................................................................................................................................................
Ok, to the car itself. It was picked up on the 9th of feb from Coventry for a paltry £250. Caught the train to Tamworth, audifans.net site owner and AOC cheif Andy picked me up and I headed home the next day.
The car came without a radio, so before leaving Tamworth a trip to Halfords and back saw me buy an new RDS tuner headunit with CD-R front loader for £40. Fitted in a crack by Andy, it's not as bad as I thought it would be for £40, radio reception is fine, plays CD's no bother and the sound quality is ok, but MILES away from the Becker headunit recently fitted to my S2, but then that was £300 so you'd expect some difference.
Drive home was great, the car is quiet, VERY economical, brakes are good, engine pulls very well, clutch good, gearbox good. The previous owner had had a bit of a problem with it late last year, he'd posted asking for a good midlands VW/Audi specialist and we'd directed him to a good VAG specialist. They replaced the diesel pump and also did the cambelt at the same time. So I'm not worried about the engine.
Monday saw me with a day off work, so first off was to change a few interior items. The ugly four spoke steering wheel had to go, in it's place a spare 3 spoke sport wheel was put on instead. Most of the small 5mm wedge bulbs throughout the car on things like the switches, the heater controls etc were out. I've replaced all of these, every last one in the car has been replaced even if it was working or not. This means they are all the same brightness and should in theory save me having to pull stuff apart again when another one blew.
Dash binnacle bulbs were out on all but two of them. So they've all been replaced too.
The interior was rank, so the seats and carpets were vacuumed (took "three" hours) and then cleaned with a vax and carpet shampoo. All the trim and dash was washed down with neat Megs APC and then treated to Aerospace 303 trim protectant.
A set of mats were added (ok, coupe ones, but I had them so used them)
A spare genuine used wing was given to me by Andy, it came from his recently sold 80 avant and is in emerald green. I'm also a big hater (personal preference don't forget
With that I'll have to change the headlights or I'll have four front indicators. So a set of face lifted coupe headlights will go in, with some clear indicators and the fogs in the new bumper.
I'll be colour coding the door handles and the wing mirrors, along with the black rubbing strips mid way up the doors. That leaves the rear bumper being removed and replaced with a S2 avant rear bumper recently sourced.
All above will be done by myself, apart from the laser red top coat on the wing and bumper as I can't get the finish I want. £40 is what a mate wants to do this, so I'd rather he did it, than me doing it and always hating it.
Lastly, the wheels. Currently it's on it's original steelies, 195/65/15 with no wheel trims either. I want alloys though. I have a set of 17" five spoke alloys that would look great, but the tyres are really best their sell by date and I'm not keen on 17" after been there with them on my S2. Though after driving this car for a while now, I think the 17's won't be that bad. The S2's suspension is SOOOO much harder than this shuggy boat 80's suspension.
So, as this is a cash saving car, I'm not about to fork out for some tyres. I have a spare set (two spare sets really) of 16" avus wheels with brand new tyres on them. But as we know, 5x112 avus don't bolt to 4x108 hubs. Five stud conversion? Nope, that'll cost money, is not exactly straight forward and so far, not what I want to do.
Hub converters? Hmmm? There is one place that sells them in Belgium, but at 300 euros a set + shipping they are a little expensive. Plenty of 4x100 to 5x100 or 4x100 to 5x130, even a 4x108 to 5x130.
If I can't get them easy, then maybe I'll make some.
Also looking into the possibility of turning my 4x108 hubs themselves into 5x112.
I know I know, some will cry and protest that your wheel will drop off, you'll end up upside down on the motorway with a central reservation barrier embedded in your head, but as the VW boys run with 4x100 to 5x112 or 5x130 converters without really bad things happening, I'll give one of these a shot. But not before carefully planning and weighing the idea up.
Ok, pictures so far.
This is the exterior as it was when I picked it up. Pretty faded with a few knocks and scrapes. Apart from the front driver wing (awful isn't it) they'll all repair with a little elbow grease and time. No rust anywhere else apart from that drivers wing.
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