Good sirs, pray tell me about the Audi UrS4?

I'm about to have a very long daily commute (about an hour and fifteen minutes each way). My only car at the moment is a '92 Miata. Long highway trips in a Miata suuuck in top-up weather. So, I've been looking for a highway car.

I'm wanting something with good handling and speed (think GT-car style, not auto-x winner), fairly luxurious, good looks, and space for five people. I got to thinking that an older Audi might fit the bill...and was astonished to see how far prices have dropped for the UrS4 and UrS6. I remember looking at one of these on a specialty car lot seven or eight years ago and it was still a 12k car...now I've found decent decent drivers for $3-5k (which is right where my budget is).

I love the way they look, they're big and luxurious, and they are fast enough to be entertaining stock. And yes, I know an E36 M3 is better in X and Y ways, but I've already read up on those (they're in the running too, if I can find one on the cheap). Also, the quattro is a big plus given that we do get some pretty serious snow here from time to time. The fuel economy is decent enough, although it's not great.

So, on to the questions.

1) I'm guessing a high mileage example with good maintenance records is not something to shy away from? Are there any common failures that are unusually expensive, difficult, or time consuming to fix? Any flags I should be looking for that should tell me to run away from a particular example?

2) If I get the modification bug, how expensive are mods? Do they respond well to more boost?

3) Are there any S4-specific parts that are prone to failure that are difficult to find or uber-expensive?

As far as I know, that's the same 20v 5 cylinder engine that one would find in the UrQuattro and it looooooves boost. Other than that, I've got nothing.

I didsome research about a year ago on these. It seems they have the usual VAG issues of the era. Plus Quattro parts can be pricey but aren't really "failure prone" unless you do stupid things with it. The cheap ones always seem to be automatics with dead trannies so I'd stick with a 5 speed. Be aware that some parts are NLA and can be hard to find since there were lots more E36 M3s made than S4/S6s.

Paging alexdgr8....

About all i know is that they have my personal diety of motors in them.

Upgrades range from pretty cheap to go pretty fast to really expensive to go OMFGWTFBBQNOWAI!!!!!! fast.

Also quite possibly the coolest sounding motor ever.

I have seat time in a 1995 S6 but don't have all the maintenance history.

Yes, it definitely has acceptable performance in stock trim. Off-boost it's slow but with boost it hauls. 7000 RPM in second is nice, but the car really shines at highway speeds. 7000 in third is most impressive for a large, four-door luxury car. It understeers like a quattro, whaddya expect. It is very comfortable even for long trips. Mileage is 22-23 highway at best. The one I've been in is one-owner and well-maintained, but is used as a winter car in the snow belt, and it is still shiny, looks great, drives well, and overall has really held together well for about 190,000 miles. The car succeeds at luxury and succeeds at speed. Not autocross speeds, but GT speeds, as you said.

Very cool cars. Very sought after mountain areas like Colorado.

David

I bought a 93 S4 last July and it's been my daily driver ever since. I bought it with 239k on it from the second owner (will all receipts from the previous 10 yrs...dealer serviced too!). It now has 255k miles and I just got done driving 4 days/2400 miles from Indiana to Seattle, WA. It spent a few weeks in Detroit this past winter, along with Indiana winters and like all Audi's (except for the TT) it is fantastic in snow.

For a daily driver, I love it. It is a BIG HEAVY car...around 3800 lbs so it isn't something you need to take to open tracking or autox. And because it is a big car, the gas mileage isn't exceptional. Highway is usually around 25 (I did get 26.5mpg at 75mph with the AC on cruising through Montana yesterday though). City mileage is around 16-17mpg. All the gizmos and gadgets on the car are amazing for only being the early 90's. Everything in my car still works too! Highway cruising is great...and I confirmed yesterday they are perfectly steady in triple digits :) You could take your hand off the wheel if you had the balls and it would be just fine.

The only "expensive" parts I can think of off hand would be power steering lines. They have a tendency to leak and are several hundred dollars to replace.

Stock and with 242k miles on it I ran a 14.6 @ 95mph at the drag strip which is very acceptable for the car's size and age. I installed a Ben Swann 2.5bar chip this winter and it pulls ever better. The stock MAP sensor is 2.5 bar and that's about all the stock K24 turbo is good for. Most people replace the stock MAP sensor with a 4bar programmable VMAP. Common upgrades include replacing the turbo, exhaust manifold, chip, map sensor, and injectors to "RS2" spec which gives you around 285whp/335wtq. Stock S4's usually dyno 180-190whp, and a 2.5bar stock turbo S4 should be around 215-220whp.

The rods are pretty much the only limitation in the engine...they are usually good to about 350whp(400wtq). Once those are replaced, the engine is pretty much bulletproof. There is a guy in Europe that dynoed 700whp on the stock pistons/block/head.

My $500 1990 200 turbo quattro parts car is an ancestor, closely related. I've only driven it twice for about 2 hours total. But somehow, for such an effin' boat, it makes me giggle. Not like a school girl, but still a giggle.

BTW, it has about 170k on it and lived its whole life in New England. It's beat up, but mechanically everything works except one brake caliper that's leaking.