Well poor old "Petey" is running for the most part again. He is a red 84 4000S 2 door sedan with the 4 headlights but no vent windows. The clutch pedal went to the floor well over a year ago and he sat patiently under a tree. I started him up periodically and ran the engine till it got up to temp. Also put the battery on the charger.
He stopped with exactly 320,000 on the clock. I am very fortunate to have a friend with a hoist in his garage and every tool known to man! So I got Igor to bring the cable down from the lightning rod on the roof and we went to work. I was in the garage till 3 and 4 in the morning each day. I spent 3 days under Petey (Named for the dog from our gang) I pulled the tranny and found that the throwout bearing was the only failure. The car had a 2P close ratio tranny in it. That gets old on the freeway commute. I had picked up a 2M tranny like my old 81 4000ES had. My fifth gear ratio is now .6, the old tranny had a fifth of .8. Of course the shift rod going into the donor tranny had to have gotten broken in all the moves to the basement etc. Took another 2N apart for the shift rod. Put the tranny in. Replaced the drivers side axel. Replaced 2 of the lower a arm bushings. Had to order the other 2, they came in today as well as a new ball joint.
Found the brake lines rusty and one was damp. Bought new steel lines and borrowed my friends bubble flare tool. All the lines to the back and in the back are replaced, what a job. Replaced a rusty fuel return line section. Replaced 3 headlights that had gotten water in them. (Cheap junk the epoxy seal around the lens failed on every one of them)
I replaced the exhaust system from the cat back as well. I now need to replace the other 2 a arm bushings and get an alignment.
It is very discouraging to try to start the car after doing all this work and have the starter not do anything. Much troubleshooting later I found that I did not get the engine ground cable mounting ring under the top tranny mounting bolt on the drivers side. (Where of course you can't see it!) Then Petey started up!! Igor and I yelled, "Is alive, Its Alive!!" On a test run the new tranny dropped the RPMs down about 800 RPM at 65MPH to around 2400RPM. Nice. THe synchros seem to be pretty good as well. Petey is pretty rough around the edges body wise but still willing to go. I run a 38 mile commute one way to work each day. And he will be going back to work. Can he make it to 400,000 miles?? The most amazing part on this car is the original air conditioning which is still working! I have a big pile of spare parts in the basement for this car. I am in a pickle on some parts though, they are getting very hard to find.
I also have an 87 4000CS Quattro that I have to replace the exhaust on and fix the hydraulic clutch before the snow arrives. I have an 86 4000S that I bought non running, I don't know if I will ever get it running as I may just move up to a newer car. Its body has hardly any rust at all but lots of small dents and a pretty bad interior. Well thats enough of the story of Petey Tim

 

[Congratulations!!!!Great tale with a happy ending..... Good for you ! It warms my heart to see and encourages me to plug away on mine, Denis

 

Thanks for the reply, I havn't been on here for a few days. I thought replys went to my E-mail account. In any case it is getting harder and harder to find parts. I have a good stash in the basement. But one of these days I will have to give up. Petey had a close call, I almost got a 2003 Jetta TDI with a bad transmission, the deal with the wife being that the old cars would dissapear. But it didn't work out. What are you doing to your car?

 

Awesome story! I'm currently in the middle of a similar story with my 84 CGT. A great example of lack of parts is that I just found out that they don't make the head gasket for my car any more. Fortunately, after a day or so of looking, I found one in-stock at Shokan Coachworks. Phew!

Awesome story!

 

2 door?!? Let's see some pics...even if the 400K means "Petey" is a bit long in the tooth! Very cool story. Where are you?

 

Hi, I will have to get some pictures and post them. I have never posted any pictures on here so it will be a learning experience. Yes my car is the 2 door model bright red. He is a bit rusty and has some body damage to the drivers side. 2 hits, both in my own driveway! My wife got the rear fender with her van and the darn paper delivery guy got the front fender pretty badly. I didn't have the heart to go after him for the damage. If your are delivering papers for a living you all ready have enough problems. I still have to replace one more brake line 2 front a-arm bushings and a ball joint. I have all the parts, I am just waiting for my friends hoist to come free. I live in NW Ohio, Lima to be exact. Its pretty rare to see any 4000s any more. I have a red 87 quattro 4 door and a silver 86 4 door that is not running, it was to be the replacement for the 84 when it passed on. I don't know now though, the parts are getting pretty hard to find. I may move up a generation or two. I just looked on my computer, and I don't have a picture handy. I will post some in a few days. I just washed and waxed the car, it looked realy bad after sitting under a tree for over a year!

 

I downloaded some pictures of my cars to the forum. I am not quite sure where they are at, and I have not gone looking yet either! I am going to attach some of the pictures to this post. The first two are of my 87 4000CS quattro. The rest are of Petey my 84 4000S 2 door. These are pretty bad pictures taken after dark. I have some real nice ones that I have to find. The old computer that they were on had a hard drive crash. But the pictures are backed up to a CD, but I have to find it.