LordBass
08-20-2007, 10:42 PM
For those with lives away from the computer, The Car Lounge (http://www.thecarlounge.net) [formerly a bastion only of VW Vortex] has degraded into an immature primodial soup of teenage internet racers.. But I'm still addicted like crack for occasional thread like this.
One lowly chap asked if he should buy a $500 1970 Audi 100LS. Sounds innocent enough. VWLarry chimed in with another very amusing post of memories:
I make no judgement, but merely add this bit of historical perspective. In the late seventies through the early eighties, I worked as a service advisor at a major Porsche+Audi dealership in the southern suburbs of Chicago. Audi 100LSs then were considered to be "the technician's friend", and/or "the biggest pile of stinking poo on wheels". http://www.vwvortex.com/zeroforum_graphics/biggrin_upper.gif
The owners of "Hundreds" as they were called then were unfailingly loyal to their untrustworthy steeds, and were perhaps the most patient and even-tempered car owners I have ever met in my life working at dealerships, bar none. These cars ate them alive. We always joked that Hundreds never needed new front tires because they were always being towed with their front wheels in the air! http://www.vwvortex.com/zeroforum_graphics/biggrin_upper.gif
A '70 is going to be a particular challenge, because they were the WORST of the lot. Audi actually was able to improve them year-by-year through the end of their run in '76, with perhaps the biggest advancement of all being the changeover to conventional outboard front brakes instead of the incredibly problematical inboard discs of the early cars like this one. The biggest and most fundamental failing of these cars was their ability to overheat at the drop of a hat. They had one of the most inadequate cooling systems, coupled with a totally incompetent electrical system (cooling fans almost never operated when needed).
The whole thread (http://forums.thecarlounge.net/zerothread?id=3391934) is worth a read.
One lowly chap asked if he should buy a $500 1970 Audi 100LS. Sounds innocent enough. VWLarry chimed in with another very amusing post of memories:
I make no judgement, but merely add this bit of historical perspective. In the late seventies through the early eighties, I worked as a service advisor at a major Porsche+Audi dealership in the southern suburbs of Chicago. Audi 100LSs then were considered to be "the technician's friend", and/or "the biggest pile of stinking poo on wheels". http://www.vwvortex.com/zeroforum_graphics/biggrin_upper.gif
The owners of "Hundreds" as they were called then were unfailingly loyal to their untrustworthy steeds, and were perhaps the most patient and even-tempered car owners I have ever met in my life working at dealerships, bar none. These cars ate them alive. We always joked that Hundreds never needed new front tires because they were always being towed with their front wheels in the air! http://www.vwvortex.com/zeroforum_graphics/biggrin_upper.gif
A '70 is going to be a particular challenge, because they were the WORST of the lot. Audi actually was able to improve them year-by-year through the end of their run in '76, with perhaps the biggest advancement of all being the changeover to conventional outboard front brakes instead of the incredibly problematical inboard discs of the early cars like this one. The biggest and most fundamental failing of these cars was their ability to overheat at the drop of a hat. They had one of the most inadequate cooling systems, coupled with a totally incompetent electrical system (cooling fans almost never operated when needed).
The whole thread (http://forums.thecarlounge.net/zerothread?id=3391934) is worth a read.