Giving the S2 some love

[Ian Simmonds]

Some more - the subframe mounting areas before a tidy up.




And rear subframe and drive going back in.

[Ian Simmonds]

Few more from this afternoon.

The S2 as an exploded diagram…


Rear subframe and wishbones.


Front subframe and wishbones


Lemforder tie rods (NOS) and all the bolts and fittings after refinishing.


Refinished shields


All starts to go together tomorrow.

[Ian Simmonds]

Getting excited now. Just awaiting a flywheel. Back end starts going back together this week.







The S3 passed its MOT as well.
Hopefully giving it a good scrub up over the weekend helped it.

[Tractor Dave]

Very nice. I would put a new Sachs slave in while you are there.

[Ian Simmonds]

All going together on the suspension.





Gearbox out



Newsh clutch going in.



New flywheel coming.

[Tractor Dave]

Nice

[Ian Simmonds]

Bit of an update….

The underside is empty now.


An organised pile of parts for refurbishment


The subframes coming off


After 29 years the subframes were a bit crusty but solid and refurbish-able.




Hubs and diff brace ready for refurbishment.


And after….


The rear diff was sent away and refurbished.


As were the alloys.


And the driveshafts fully rebuilt.


Everything else including the subframes, wishbones, heat shields and fixings are due back from the metal refinishing next week and hopefully it’ll all start to go back together.

[Ian Simmonds]

Amazingly, John has managed to get all the bushes from his various sources all over the world. Most are polyurethane, the KW kit is about to be shipped too, so probably not long now before the tear down starts. He’s even got a full set of OE CV joint boots.

The potential ‘flies’ in the ointment are non-availability of a clutch kit and refurbishment or replacement of the leaking power steering rack. Apparently, there’s a couple of internal parts that are NLA from ZF making refurbishment nigh on impossible.

Any suggestions welcome.

We’ll see how this pans out…

[Tractor Dave]

Nice one. I think the underside condition is mainly due to your mild climate down there by the coast and less road salt. Watching the KW experiment with interest

[Ian Simmonds]

KW? Not too hard? Look forward to seeing pics of everything

Thanks Dave. Yes, it’ll be interesting to see. John has already spoken with KW tech in Germany over the brief and is confident that we can get a compliant set-up. We’ve got a couple of advantages in that everything rubber below the shock towers is changing, so it’ll all be new together and I’m considering reverting to the 16” OE rims. I’ve been in or driven a couple of KW3 Audis that JMR has set up and they’ve been really good. Better than our standard S3, which takes the local level crossing like a rockslide. I still can’t get over the underside condition of the car given that it’s all 30-years old, they’re tough old birds and hopefully this’ll set the old girl up for a good few more years to come.

Incidentally, we’re also going to sort out the leaks, which are either rear main seal and/or power steering rack and rear diff seal. Oh, and new clutch.

[Tractor Dave]

KW? Not too hard? Look forward to seeing pics of everything

[Ian Simmonds]

Well, the time has come for a significant revamp. The old girl failed on front subframe mounts as they’re nearly 30 years old… Problem is, so is everything else below the shock towers. So it’s time to drop the lot and KW3 the old girl.



Our regular buddy at JMR in Littlehampton also happens to be a KW approved master tech.

Once up on the ramp apart from the worn ‘thirty odd years’ bushes everywhere and a couple of dubious fluid leaks the underneath is fantastic, the subframes are in good condition given their age. So it’ll be an interesting couple of months whilst the parts come in and the ‘also just’ jobs like clutch and brake lines come to the fore…

Can’t wait for a “better than new” old S2 back from a chassis point of view.

[Tractor Dave]

You are very welcome. Happy to help

[Ian Simmonds]

A couple of winters ago I tore the driver side door seal one frozen morning. Afterwards, if I parked the car at a certain angle, in a certain spot and with the appropriate West Sussex storm force southwesterly, it’d leak. So, I inserted some additional wadding (screen wash tubing) to bolster it up and then glued it/ Vaselined it (ooo-err-Mrs) up. This worked but it wasn’t pretty. So, Tractor Dave recently managed to rustle up an excellent condition replacement which I collected the other week.

Every time I take any trim off this car I’m absolutely gobsmacked as to its excellent condition. Audi really knew how to build proper automotive tanks back in the mid-1990’s.

When you bear in mind this (photo below) is under the seal that hasn’t been exposed to daylight since new, so 28-odd years and has never to my knowledge been garaged. That ain’t bad.



New seal on and good for another 28-years.



Thanks Dave.

[Ian Simmonds]

Nice result. We can do the Porsche upgrade next year

Lol…. Let me get my money’s worth out of these EBC’s….