yeah that S2 is so cool. sadly not mine, i nearly bought it a yr or so ago though! its a friend's. i'll quickly tell you about this motor. the ABY puts out a bit more power than the 3B (the early S2s had the 3B, which is similar to an AAN), the ABY has the AAN's COPs and overboost protection. the 3B still runs a dizzy. that particular car is pretty rare cos the ABYs are rare enough as it is, but the pearlescent white colour makes it even more rare - i think in the UK you can count the number of these on one hand. since my friend's ownership, he's been patiently getting her ready for more power, at 10 years+ old there's plenty they need aside from tuning. he's samco'd everything (nearly £500!), runs porsche 993 (?) front brakes and S8 disks, runs koni shocks and eibach (iirc!) ARBs. now that the engine is on song (its had quite a few new parts - little things like lambda probe, thermostat, ultrasonically cleaned injectors etc which are difficult to diagnose but if not on song cause power loss), with a few tweeks its putting out 250hp, but its the torque figure of nearly 300ft/lbs thats more impressive, and there's plenty more to come with a remap and newer turbo. turbos have developed quite some way since the S2, so there's potential for more boost while still spooling just as easily. its a win-win situation! these are pretty complicated cars, and i'm impressed how through his maintenence jobs he's managed to release a lot of power from the engine. kinda serves as a reminder to us all!
its nowhere near a ur-quattro, but i do like it. on the other side of the coin, the driveline losses are huge on the rollers, fuel economy is not great, and the car weighs a tonne. handles very impressively though, in a no-nonsense kind of way! most impressive how little fuss it makes, it can humble much more exotic machinery while still remaining quiet, while other cars would be screaming and wailing.
