Saving a 1993 S4
 

Hi Everyone, My name is Maciek.

A while ago, a friend of mine had to get rid of this '93 S4 because his mom was selling her property. He was not inclined nor in a position to work on it himself, so if I did not get it out of there, it was going to go to the scrapper, along with his brother's V8 A8 that supposedly just needed a starter (which a friend of his brother's ended up snagging, so don't worry). The good was that it was all straight, ran a bit a year or two back, had a tuned computer in the trunk (he swapped for stock to "save fuel"..) and some gauges installed. The bad was that it had not been registered since '07, he cut out the pass floor carpet to get to the computer and water that was getting in there, and the car would not start.

No-start condition turned out to be spark but no fuel, which led me to a dead fuel pump. Fortunately another friend of mine, who has a carcaine problem, used to daily a green C4 S4 (till he parked it at his rents to fix something and a branch broke the rear window and dented the c-pillar), and also had a white, '94 (iirc), parts car he let me pull the pump out of (gonna be a while till he swaps the driveline in to his quattro coupe). That got it running, sounded well for having sat, then smoke from the fusebox shortly after trying the heater let us know that the backs of some of the contacts were well corroded. Pulled the 30A heater fuse and crisis was averted for the time being.

We also found that the cat mid-section was cut out of the exhaust and missing, more of his brother's doing along with one of the hard brake pipes broken on the front caliper from him swapping them with his A8. Calipers seemed fine, so I just replaced the latter temporarily with a hard pipe from a later VAG car in the yard, had to bend it a bit but it fit well enough, will replace it with the proper part once I find it. Oh yeah, and the plug for the brake fluid sensor broke off the reservoir so I had to jumper it to get rid of some lights.

After a fluid check, air up, fresh fuel, and a bit of a cleanup, it made it the 60 miles home, muffler in the trunk, with the only major issue being the X-plug on the PS pump gushing fluid. Can't believe I paid over $10 for a whole new one, but I couldn't find an o-ring that would fit and seal. The other issue is it won't stop beeping while driving, and not sure what it's beeping about yet, solid 'key in' noise while lights are on, but it stays beeping even with door shut and lights off.

Was lucky to have a 100 show up in the yard this winter I could get some tail lights off that aren't as dry cracked and broken, even spare head and corners (fer sale), in retrospect I should have grabbed the fusebox and carpet too, but didn't have enough time.

Anyway, it's sat for a bit on the battery tender, occasionally started to warm it up, and just starting to get to it seriously. First thing I addressed is that fusebox panel, pulled the two wires for the heater from the back and added a 30A fuse in a holder behind the box, that's till I can get the right terminals for the ends of the wires relocate the heater fuse to a not-melted spot (part nos?). That got the heater controls working, but the fan's still dead, I seem to remember it working when I first tried it till we pulled that fuse, so that's another thing to sort out.

Not sure if i'll replace the cat with an aftermarket high-flow weld-in or straight pipe it to the muffler, since it won't need to pass emissions, advice welcome. Also needs the clutch bled, suspension gone over, alignment etc, but the most annoying thing right now is the beep, really got to get to the bottom of that.


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It's certainly fun to drive. I daily an e36 M3 and have had and worked on a number of 80s/90s VWs and other VAG and german cars, as have a few of my friends, so I'm pretty familiar with what it takes to keep them on the road.

Got it somewhat cleaned up, oil changed, and replaced the badly cracked truck lights with some decent ones i pulled off a 100 that went through our local yard in the fall. Probably/hopefully won't need any of the others I pulled any time soon if anyone needs corners or headlights.

Looked at bleeding the clutch, gonna try to get in there today. I can barely touch the bleed screw from the top, any tips on getting a wrench in there?

Is there anywhere I can find good manuals cheaper than the bentley and factory sets asking over half a grand on e-bay? Anyone have the under-dash relay box diagram? Want to get the heater fan blowing and need to check on the relay. Computer seems to work, cleaned up the connection at the fan, need to check on the relay. There was some standing water gathering in the rain tray before i cleaned the drains shortly after I got it, so I've been going through checking connections and relays for corrosion and spraying them down. Would be nice to get the sunroof back in action too. Nother thing that does not work anymore that I seem to recall working is the fuel gauge, might have to pull that pump again to check on the sender.

Any tips on troubleshooting the central locking system? Seems to just buzz for a while.