by: Brian Scotto
Editor’s Note: This article originally ran in the Q2_2023 issue of quattro Magazine. If you would like to subscribe to quattro Magazine, please join Audi Club here.
- Crossing the Border to Finalize a Pandemic Purchase
The steering wheel, a blue-anodized, two-spoked, dished Sparco, squishes as I grip what is left of the soggy, disintegrating foam-wrapped ring. I am later told this wheel came out of a Canadian rally car, but its potential provenance is overshadowed by my now-blackened and sticky hands as I approach the Canadian-U.S. border crossing between British Columbia and Washington. South blowing winds fill the cabin with noxious fumes as this 1986 Audi 4000 quattro sits idling, chattering on in the background…something about a valve job in its near future. The water temperature rises, as the volts lower. I am less than 20 minutes into my 1,800-mile adventure home to Los Angeles and the anxiety cocktail is kicking in. The pragmatic side of my brain is saying, “Get it into the States, and have it shipped home!” The self-loathing side is asking “Why do I need this car in the first place? After all, you already own six Audis, one being the holy grail, an RS2 Avant.” But the Carcaine-fueled side is already mapping out the mods it needs, and throwing caution to the burnt-oil-scented winds.
There are cars you pine for since childhood. And some you buy to reward yourself for personal successes. Others you acquire for status, or maybe even as an investment. But this car… this once luxury, all-wheel drive sports sedan satisfies none of the above for me. Nope. This car I bought out of boredom.
It was mid pandemic. To offset the scheduled panic brought on by my daily doom scroll, I would search marketplace for cars, parts and a bunch of other things I didn’t need. This pastime filled the void created by what people were dubbing the “new normal.” B2-generation Audis were high on my list of searches, but appeared almost impossible to find in sunny SoCal. Go figure, quattro just wasn’t a major selling point in the land of drought and concrete. Then, one day I received a DM, with a link to a red-on-brown 4000 quattro for sale, with the caption “Good price, even better being in Canadian dollars.”
I wish I could say it was the killer deal that made me buy this car after only seeing three videos and 17 photos of it. Or that it was a minty, low miles cream puff example—a true collector’s car. The truth is, the car seemed clean,,, ish, but had some rust and wear. The cluster read 185,000 miles. It was what I like to call “a driver’s car.” But I wasn’t buying a car, I was buying an adventure.
Customs here on the Canadian border proved easier than my experience only 48 hours earlier in Mexico attempting to import a rare Ford B150 SUV (Yeah, I have a problem). It helped that one of the agents recognized me. When I’m not smuggling questionably unreliable vehicles across international lines, I’m leading creative at Hoonigan, a brand I started with Ken Block 13 years ago. This trip was supposed to be my vacation – a solo journey to clear my mind after a massive, and relentless year. Most would chose a sandy beach, or spa resort. Not me.
The 80’s spec digital voltmeter located in the center console is attracting my sole attention as it sporadically dips into the red lights, showing what I feared at the border: the charging system isn’t well. There’s a car meet I promised to attend 80 miles away. It’s raining, and the problem seems intermittent, so I press on.
Before Hoonigan, I ran an enthusiast publication called 0-60 Magazine. This was where I developed not only a love for road trips, but some kind of weird primal need for them. Being on the road for a few days, eating miles and absorbing horizons became a type of therapy. Whenever life started to feel a bit too overwhelming, I would concoct some wild trip across the U.S. or Europe in a press car. But this was my first time doing a multi-day trip alone. And I was excited about the new adventure. It was also time again to see the road therapist.
I pull into the Woodinville Cut Shop an hour or so late. The rain is coming down steady and the sun has already gone home, but folks in the Pacific Northwest just embrace bad weather like an old friend. There isn’t an umbrella in sight. What there is though, is a parking lot full of early Audis, a community I have belonged to since 2003. One of my goals on this trip was to put some faces to old discussion forum usernames.
An hour later of waxing poetic, and now fully drenched, I make moves back to the car. My buddy Justin has a warm bed for me to crash on, and I haven’t slept much since boarding a flight to Vancouver with a Pelican case full of tools, a sleeping bag and some clothes. But word has spread amongst the group hanging out that I may need some repairs. Vlad approaches, with offers of a lift and a warm garage at his uncle’s shop German AutoHaus. My body would prefer the bed, but the idea of me removing an alternator on the side of the road and hitchhiking to a parts store influences my decision. It proves to be a worthy stop. Not only are my issues diagnosed and fixed, I get to drool over their fully built 20-valve turbocharged Coupe quattro shop car, that reminds me I too have my own Coupe quattro I should be finishing, but instead I’m just further complicating my life with this 4000 I don’t even know if I want to keep.
The next morning, the rain slows and as I head to the coast, the trip begins to take shape. The charging system is sorted, and as long as I keep moving the temps are under control. It’s funny how a nice day and good roads can change everything. I stop in Olympia to pick up some Audi D1 V8 parts from a fellow hoarder and am greeted with the first non-highway roads of the trip. The strut bearings are shot, which makes a vertebrae crunching clank on every bump, and the driver’s front shock is fully blown, giving the car an aggressive hop, but when the roads are smooth, the vintage 2Bennet coilover system sings. I have driven a lot of Audi models over the years: B, C and D chassis cars, new and old, but I have never spent any real time in a B2. It is nimble and small, but also has the grip you expect from quattro. The no-longer soggy steering wheel feels connected in a way modern cars just don’t. I’m starting to fall in love with this thing.
The next two days I spend galavanting B-roads with the whopping 102 hp the 4000 has on tap, stopping in to visit friends, family and collect more car parts. I finally fix my cooling system woes at a then stranger’s garage who has an Audi 20-valve turbo five-cylinder powered Porsche 944. With the major issues remedied, the 4000’s brown velour interior really starts to feel like home. Throughout this trip I have debated the plans for this thing in my head. Do I sell it? Do I make it into an 800hp monster. Do I make it a rally car?
On the fifth and final day of the trip, I answer that question.
Having dilly dallied, detoured and spent more time than expected fixing things, I find myself with a 14-hour drive ahead to make it in time for my son’s third birthday. The plan is to cue up a few podcasts, get off secondary roads and count mile markers. Well that’s until Foster Huntington, who I met on this trip calls. “Dude, I meant to tell you, go see Petrolia, CA on the Lost Coast,” says Foster, who is best known for dubbing the term #vanlife. “It’s a crazy place, and the roads are wild.” My initial thought is to ignore him. But the navigation says it’s only a two hour detour…
Four hours later I exit one of the most memorable drives of my life, and I have driven the Ice Roads to Tuktoyaktuk, Stelvio Pass, and miles and miles of winding roads throughout the globe. The Lost Coast feels like a rally stage. It’s rough. It changes without warning from tarmac to dirt and back again. It broke everything that wasn’t already broken on the 4000’s suspension. But what made it great, was it really felt lost. Known best for its involvement in the marijuana trade and just west of the towns made famous by Netflix’s Murder Mountain documentary, this section of California feels forgotten, a tad bit dangerous, and most importantly, it feels adventurous!
For the next ten hours, I daydream about my now cemented plans for this 4000. There will be no crazy engine build, or full respray and restoration, instead it will be made as reliable as any 1980s Audi could be, and sorted with parts that make it more capable to explore places like the Lost Coast. It will stay rough around the edges, it will fly under the radar, and embrace every rock chip as just part of the adventure.
