words: Ray Reyes, photos: Kieran Buttrick, Daniel Gray
Editor’s Note: This story originally ran in the Winter 2018 issue of the Audi Club North America quattro quarterly print magazine. If you don’t receive quattro quarterly and wish to subscribe, join the Audi Club North America HERE.
Most Audi fanatics know the history of the Audi rings, but what drives those people to the brand? For Daniel Gray, it was the idea of a station wagon with the performance of a supercar. It was the temptation of forbidden fruit, grown as a model that’s never been sold here. It was the RS 4 Avant.
Back in 2015, Daniel Gray purchased his first Audi, a 2007 S4 Avant. We all know that this 4.2-liter sports wagon was above most wagons against which it competed at the time. To Daniel, it was more than just a wagon, and it had to be. According to Daniel, the directive from his new wife of just one year was to “find a car that was, you know sort of a family car that you can put a dog in, but also to have fun with”.
To that, Daniel said to his wife “It’s a wagon, look at the utility”. In as much, he was right. It had a practical shape, an easy-to-drive automatic transmission and his dog Boomer certainly fit in the back. She agreed, and the rest is a grand adventure to which most enthusiasts can relate… at least in fantasy.
While Audi was new to Daniel, the car scene was not. Seven years prior Daniel owned a Jeep and enjoyed off-road trips and car gatherings. His family had also owned past wagons, albeit Volvos. The seed had been planted, and “The Wagon” found a home.
Turns out Daniel bought the car sight unseen from Kansas. It’d been registered, oddly, as a government vehicle and had been traded with 70,000 miles on the odometer for a Ford F-250. Though he snagged it for $27,000, the investment quickly went into six figures during the laborious process of meticulously converting it into his ultimate vision, an Audi RS 4 Avant.
The car was quickly shipped to his parent’s house and arrived a few days later. Daniel’s wife immediately thought he was nuts as soon as they fired the car up and the exhaust roared to life. While she’d originally figured “Audi wagon, sure what ever, why not?”, she had no idea just what it was she was getting into. “It was the last time that she will ever let me buy a car without her knowing exactly what’s in it,” says Daniel.
Within six months to a year, Daniel had headers on the car, a cat back exhaust, a tune, and even Nitrous. None of that necessarily hinted at the RS 4 direction you see here, but it did lead to a more extensive re-think on the Avant after the original S4 engine was blown thanks to the aforementioned Nitrous kit that was fairly new to the market. Daniel had put 15,000 miles on the car and now he found himself in a dilemma of finding an engine. Obviously, the story didn’t end there. That was still the beginning.
Fortunately for Daniel, and maybe unfortunately for his wife, his local shop had found an RS 4 short block that would change the direction of his project wagon. Actually, it was two engines from two different cars. The short block had 40k miles on it and the heads had around 70k. The whole engine was torn down and rebuilt with new seals, oil pan, pumps and more. The entire fuel system was replaced, including all lines and a higher-pressure fuel pump. The cooling fan harness also had to be re-pinned in order to work with the RS 4 engine harness.
Augmenting the motor, the team also fitted JHM 2.75 downpipes and EBWerks 2.75 exhaust with no cats or resonators just in case the car’s tone wasn’t aggressive enough already. Other components to help it run and breathe included a Gruppe M intake with 034Motorsport inlet hose, JHM crank pulley, and 034Motorsport engine mounts.
The battery and ECUs were moved to trunk where the spare tire normally resides, and just like the factory-built B7 RS 4 Avant. Also, this part’s key for a lot of folks, they also took this time as the opportunity to swap the car’s Tiptronic transmission for a 6-speed manual, along with JHM shifter trio, JHM limited slip differential, JHM R series pressure plate, a lightened flywheel and a 3R clutch. It’s all attached by an 034Motorsport transmission mount and Apikol rear differential mount.
Handling was also suitably upgraded. The Avant received KW Variant 3 coilovers, HD control arms, adjustable uppers, 034Motorsport’s HD rear sway bar with adjustable links and HD front sway bar mounts.
The car had been running with the RS4 engine for a month and Daniel got more involved in the car community and became one of the organizers for Avantoberfest (an event also reported on in this issue). “When you hang out with a bunch of wagon enthusiast, they feed you nothing but bad ideas” Daniel jokes. “You fall into that encouraging environment, ultimately it would seem to be normal to do this and acceptable”.
Daniel’s pal Alex Moore is a parts collector for crashed RS 4s, so it seems this wonderful story of an Avant with an RS 4 motor was always meant to go the whole way down the RS conversion road. Alex had pieced together the body components including hood, fenders, side skirts, European market rear bumper, not to mention proper air ducting for brakes and cooling that sits behind the front bumper and connects to the underbody shield, all from three different RS 4 wrecks. Daniel was more than willing to purchase those parts for his build, and added in European headlights and clear corners for good measure.
After filling his garage with salvaged RS 4 body parts, Daniel found Frank’s Auto Care in Connecticut to weld all of these parts together on the S4. And, if you’re going to modify most every panel on the car anyway, why not go one step further and go for a full color change… in this case to Audi exclusive Deep Green Metallic aka Cambridge Green (LZ6E).
The look is finished off with a set of HRE P43SC in 19×9.5 and shod with Bridgestone Potenza rubber in 255 39 19 fitment. Behind the spokes of those wheels, you’ll also notice a set of Brembo GT brakes at the front and a big brake kit from JHM at the rear and fitted with EBC red stuff pads.
Inside, the look is pretty factory. You can’t miss the Recaro Sportster CS seats, very similar to the optional shell seats offered by Audi as an option in European RS 4 models. Other details such as a TT RS steering wheel and OEM RS 4 shift knob and boot complete the highly finished look.
Heading out on the road with Daniel, it’s impossible to deny the attractiveness of this RS 4 Avant that he’s built. The exhaust tone is not brutal, but it is loud… a divine kind of loud. Daniel coolly pulled the car out of the garage, and gently worked out onto the road as if to try to keep the secret of this car’s true capabilities. Starting slow and then quickly and brutally building on the speed is always a great way to impress someone of a car’s capability, and to that end this green Avant does anything but disappoint.
The car is fast and amazing just how solid it feels. Old cars with high miles usually have the upholstery making cracking sounds, but not this car. It is solid and it moves as good as any other B7 RS 4 we’ve had the chance to sample.
Obviously, it takes a fair level of commitment to embark on this sort of build. “My wife says I’m gonna be buried in it,” h says, and adds, “At some point in time there will be kids seats in the Avant, in Recaros of course”.
Also, and this should be noted, Daniel’s got a running list of people who want to buy the car from him. That doesn’t mean he plans on selling it though.
Does he have any regrets? “Does it make sense that I bought an automatic S4 and turned it into a manual RS 4? Of course not!”
To be honest, Daniel is probably certifiable, which is just one of the reasons we like him so much. This is a perfectly U.S. road-legal RS 4 Avant. It is a car that we all wish we owned and beg Audi to bring over. This world needs more Audi enthusiasts like Daniel.
I asked Daniel why he chose Audi. “They are beautiful, they are functional and there is a pretty vibrant Audi Community here in my area”. Not surprisingly, that community well trained in the idea of forbidden European market fruit, is always curious to learn more. “How much did it cost?” …and “Where did you get it?” are the most common inquiries. “You get a lot of thumbs up, moments when you’re driving down the road and some guy knows how rare your car is, pulls up next to you and yells ‘AWESOME CAR MAN!’”
