My ride is -97 2.6 Quattro with ~105k miles and finally i have some cash to spend on getting some extra life out of the old engine. I want to keep it N/a and under 2k$ on mods, what should i do? new exhaust system would help a bit i guess? I know im not getting much out of it, and not aiming to. I just want to make it feel a bit better and respond faster.

Thanks

 

unfortunately, your options for more power are severely limited especially if you are staying naturally aspirated. Most of us are from North America and didn't get the 2.6 L engine. As a result not many of us are going to be familiar with what is available, specifically, for your car. trying to draw parallels from your car to what we have though chip tuning will probably be your best bet for better throttle response and transmission shifting profile (tiptronic ?)

good luck

 

I think its basically same as the 2.4 engine with a bit more power and its a 5 speed manual.

Didint know there was chip tuning for non-turbo cars? does it actually have noticiable effect and which one should i go after?

But again im not looking for magical power ups, just some tune up to make it feel a bit more crisp and responsive. I'm not good at car mechanics but learning all the time, and if a rebuild with new parts will do the trick i have a mechanic friend that is able to do that for low cost.

 

Get a chip tune, exhaust, & cold air intake. That's pretty much about at least 80hp more. At least. You will feel a difference

 

There, fixed it.

 

I doubt that will get me more then 20hp, but i might make it more responsive and thats what im looking for. I have heard too many bad things about cold air intakes so i will pass on that one.

So far a ECU tuneup and exhaust sounds good and are doable, but what kind of chip should i go for? or get a custom one at a tuning shop for ~500 euros?

And what else could i do? thanks for the replies so far.

 

You likely won't see more than 10hp. It'll be hard for most of us to make any recommendation on a chip since your engine was never offered here and thus is likely nothing that our US tuners offer a file for. Try the regional subforums for Europe and see what others have done. Fact of the matter is, atmospheric Audi engines respond extremely poorly in terms of gaining power from modification. Some sort of abnormal aspiration (boost, spray, etc) is needed to make more than a small bump in the output. The typical answer we give for US owners applies here - sell it and get a turbo car.

 

PS I love the smooth euro front bumper without the headlight sprayers. Looks so clean that way.

 

Might have exaggerated the hp's a bit