The Project Pad

Ok, so a little background on my new project. About 6 months ago my B5 daily got totaled. It was bittersweet since it was a nice car and I put a ton of work into it, bit I miss the look and feel of older Audi's. So I saved the engine and went on the hunt for a solid B4 to swap the 1.8t into. A couple of weeks ago I found a 95 90q sport with the rare heated cloth interior, and aux gauge package. Unfortunately it was really rough and rusty. I bought it anyway mainly for the interior and set out to find another one. A few days later I managed to find a second 95 90 with heated sport cloth interior and gauge package. The problem is while the second one is straight and clean, its a fwd automatic. But the money was right, so I picked it up. So now I have to take 2 B4's and make one, with the engine from a B5.



The donor quattro



The fwd that I will be building



The donor engine



The ADR engine mounts are sitting in front of it.

Making some room



Removing some unnecessary parts



So the goals for this car are

1.8t swap
Frankenturbo
Euro front and rear bumpers
Fuba antenna conversion
Slightly lower
Fully sort the whole car to be a solid daily driver

So Quattro swap?

So today was a very productive day.



Pulled my euro bumper out of storage and dusted it off.



Got all of the front track stuff out of the way





Rear subframe mounting points made.



And now its all installed.

Now to just fab up the front mount for the differential. The rear suspension will need to come out again when I get my new springs and I can install my new struts and other refresh bits.

Looks like fun, I love seeing people do out of the ordinary stuff. Not your usual AAN or 3B build.

I've done this before, its not too bad to do. Things I noticed:

1x brake line to the rear on quattro rather than two
abs sensor plugs are different
prop/diff front brackets need welding in
fwd gearbox mount needs cutting out or hammering flat
fuel tank needs swapping
the small tabs for the heat shields need cutting/grinding away

thats just a few of the bits.

Make a trailer out of the other shell.

Hybrid_Hatch wrote:Make a trailer out of the other shell.

a given I think

..other acceptable repurposing would be a chicken coop.... A chicken CQ would be the best though

Very cool, George.

So far it has been pretty interesting, and heavy. Transplanting complete rear subframes from one car to another is kind of taxing. Not to mention the almost full fuel tank. Should be a fun car when its done.

It was definitely a lot of work for one day. My two saving graces were having David (de80q) to help and me soaking everything under the rusty quattro car for days in PB Blaster. All in all it went very smooth.

The single brake line has been swapped, but now I have to swap the entire abs unit and front brake lines since they are very different.

This is going to be in the theme of all my projects, especially my daily drivers, where no corners are cut. I fully intend on making every option work including abs and a/c.

The goals for this week are shifter swap, pedal swap and clutch master. Also, while I have the dash out I will be installing a new heater core and taping the HVAC box doors. Hopefully next weekend the engine will come out of the black car and I can start preping the bay for the 1.8t...

Fingers crossed this thing will be on the road before Christmas...

Hybrid_Hatch wrote:Make a trailer out of the other shell.

My plan is to part it after I have the other car running and then scrapping the shell. I need to try and recoup some of the money I am shelling out in order to keep the wife happy...

Why did you swap brake lines to the rear?

grillage wrote:Why did you swap brake lines to the rear?

The brake line setup is completely different fwd to quattro. The fwd has two lines that run from the abs unit to an adj proportioning valve mounted to the swing axle. The quattro has the proportioning valve under the hood next to the abs unit and a single line running back to the rear subframe, where it splits to the calipers. This means to keep abs I need to swap entire abs unit, all lines and complete abs wiring harness.

The reason I ask is that I'm doing an ABS delete for my coupe V8 swap and have some questions on the ABS and non ABS setups...
I'd love your input: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=56846&view=unread#unread

I love the idea of doing everything factory correct but holy poop that old ABS stuff is pretty bad. I think an upgrade would be to ditch it.

pkw wrote:I love the idea of doing everything factory correct but holy poop that old ABS stuff is pretty bad. I think an upgrade would be to ditch it.

In my experience the abs on the b4's was pretty good. Unlike the b3's which only come on after you have slid at least 100 ft

I see where my parts came from now! (I think)... Looks like a lot of work for a DD but then again like something I would totally do with the space/time.

Looks good! oh and the pace that this is happening... very impressive!

Who knows, with any luck it will all but be road worthy this weekend. I say almost for a reason...

Also, what are the details on the Fuba Antenna conversion? Is it as simple as pull out the old one and pop this thing in?

dalspaugh wrote:Also, what are the details on the Fuba Antenna conversion? Is it as simple as pull out the old one and pop this thing in?

No, a fuba antenna is a roof mount antenna

Had a little time this evening, so I got the cars back in the shop and made some minor progress.



First up I resealed and gave the rear diff a fresh coat of paint.



Next I went ahead and installed my ss brake lines in the back.



Finally I installed the rear diff and started getting an idea of how I am going to fab the front diff mount.

Wow, I didn't realize how 'easy' a B4 quattro conversion was...lol btw yours & mine idea of easy differs some hahaha! You're mad!

Cool to know it's possible though & opens up options for (real) rust free southern fwd cars.

Impressive work & the speed is stupifying. I took the better part of a weekend just to fit a B5 exhaust on my 90 lol.

First off, I would like to wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving.



Made some more room. Can't wait to see my 1.8t in that space.



Went ahead and installed my new engine mounts.

Also got some smaller stuff done like removing the automatic shifter, installing my new trans mounts, and repairing the licence plate tub so I can bolt my plate on.

Today was a very productive day.



David helped me weld in my rear diff mounts I fabbed up.











And my shiney new axles



After David and I got the rear end all finished up we moved onto the next major project, wiring and pedals. We each got into a car and pulled dashes and pedal clusters.





V6 wiring harness removed.



And engine bay all cleaned up.



Goals for tomorrow include splicing the aeb harness into the body and then reinstall the interior in the black car. This is going to be more complicated than I first thought since I not only have to install the aeb harness, but make it work in a car that started as an automatic
Fwd, but is now manual and quattro.