Audi window lifters are notorious - they work fine when new but then have a nasty habit of giving up, usually when the window is down and it's raining. Repair of the lifter can be difficult (although not impossible) but fitting another unit seems to be the easy option. Well, it would be if there weren't two different types - sometime around the beginning of 1984, part way through the 84 model year, Audi started to fit an 'improved' design lifter - great, except that the patern of mounting bolts changed as well, so late lifters don't fit early cars. To get around this, Audi issued fitting instructions:
Make a drilling template of sheet metal (below)
Insert 3 M6x25mm screws into the holes marked '1' and secure with nuts. These screws are used to locate the template.
Position template with screws in the existing lifter holes and secure with additional nuts
Centre punch and drill 8mm holes marked '2'
When stripping my 81 quattro I discovered that somebody had 'almost' followed these instructions - instead of drilling the two new holes in the door, they had used the template as an adaptor plate, mounting the new lifter to the plate and then bolting the plate to the door
{© IJH 2002}