My 2007 Misano Red B7 RS4 Avant Build

[Nollywood]

Hi ladies and gents,

I thought I might as well introduce my new to me project, a B7 RS4 Avant, in Missno Red Pearl Effect.

I purchased it from a good friend of mine, who originally bought it to part out. I looked it over. It had sustained a light, non-structural impact to the nearside front. Damaging…

- Hood.
- Nearside fender.
- Nearside headlamp.
- Bumper.
- Bumper crash bar.
- Nearside bumper mount.
- Nearside foglamp.
- Nearside foglamp grille.
- Radiator support.
- Screenwash reservoir.
- Nearside aux. radiator.

No engine damage, radiator, condenser and oil coolers were untouched. Engine ran great, and it is a one owner car. So, I took the plunge, and bought the car. Pictures to follow.

[Nollywood]

Pictures of the car before I picked it up.

At this point, I had removed the damaged parts, bar the hood and radiator support. I had also replaced the screen wash reservoir and more importantly, the nearside aux. radiator, as I wanted to run it up to temp.

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Originally, I was going to repair the bumper - it was shattered, but possible to repair, if there were no other options. Or rather, so I thought.

Unfortunately, the B7 RS4 bumper is not made of the regular ABS plastic. It’s a mix of plastic and nylon. Trying to hot weld it with a bumper repair kit, that employs a dual-pronged electric gun, that heats up staples to hold it together wasn’t going to work.

The red hot staples didn’t fully melt the bumper, instead it produced a nasty brown resin - the smoke is pretty toxic.

These pictures show how bad the bumper was, and how the hot weld method wouldn’t hold up, even if the broken sections were reinforced from behind:

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I tried Audi for a brand new bumper - NLA, and it was £1,700 + 20% VAT when last they were available! 😳

So used, it was. Easier said than done though. Decent ones were stupid money, and most sellers wanted to sell with wings, grille and hood. So, a complete front end.

I eventually tracked down one. It was Imola Yellow, poorly applied over the original Misano Red base. It was so poorly prep’d and painted, the paint was flaking off. The area around the tow eye was pretty chewed up, it was split along the bottom. And it had a curious neatly cut oblong section missing from the nearside corner. It had obviously been cut out to repair another bumper.

Still, I picked it up, hoping my shop could make a good number out of this yellow one, and my original damaged one…

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I took both bumpers to my bodyshop, and left them to decide the best course of action. I received a prompt phone call 2 days later. They too had looked into hot welding, and had also realised what materials they were dealing with.

It was a “no” from them.

I picked both up, and over the weekend, examined both. The yellow bumper was trashed on the offside, whereas my red one was perfect on the same side. The yellow one had a decent nearside, while of course my red one was wrecked. The good nearside of the yellow one was only marred by the small missing oblong section, but that could be repaired.

I researched repair methods for bumpers made out of this material, and found quite a few special resins online. Flexible once set, so no risk of the repaired sections cracking.

[Nollywood]

It was now time to reach the point of no return - cut both bumpers in half, in exactly the same place - dead centre!

I took several measurements, temporarily fitted the main grille. Marked up the areas. Removed the grille, took more measurements, until I was satisfied.

I fitted the thinnest cutting disc to my angle grinder, and…

…Cut both bumpers into 2 mirror image neat halves. 🙂







And I was left with 2 neat damaged halves, out of which I salvaged the trademark B7 RS4 bumper side vents. These will be used for the rear bumper of Project 3R9 400-R:

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I cut out the relevant sections from the discarded halves of the bumper, and bonded the good halves together:









I didn’t forget the curious little oblong section, that was chopped out of the nearside corner, of the donor yellow bumper…

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The finished bumper. The bodyshop will be doing the necessary front cracks filling, and final prep work:

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I had previously purchased the following:

- B7 RS4 hood (aluminium).
- Nearside fender.
- Radiator support / lock carrier.
- Pair of B7 RS4 HID / AFS headlamps.
- Screenwash reservoir.
- Nearside aux. radiator.

Just a note for anyone building up a B7 S4 or RS4 front end - the radiator support is NLA. They were only ever made genuine Audi. The B7 A4 4 cylinder turbo or V6 radiator support do NOT work, not without a whole ton of reverse engineering, and cooling fans downgrade. My bodyshop managed to track a brand new “old stock” item from Germany.

So on an evening after finishing work, I temporarily fitted the blue hood, fender, headlamps and bumper. It didn’t need to look pretty, just reasonably in a fit state to drive the 20-odd miles to the bodyshop.

I dropped the car off on the 29th June. Some pictures of the car, looking quite rough:

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The original plan was to repair the damage. So paint hood, fender, bumper and blend nearside fender into the door. But, I wasn’t so sure that would be enough.

There were too many areas that needed attention.

- Lacquer peel on nearside rear, between roof gutter and rear side window.
- Small pressure dent on nearside rear quarter panel, just below swage line.
- Scuff on nearside rear wheel arch.
- Scuff on nearside corner of rear bumper.
- Graze on rear bumper, where owner regularly touched wall in his garage.
- Light bubbling on offside fender.
- Chip in nearside rear door, from opening against wall.
- Chip in offside front door, from opening against wall.
- Chip in paint on offside rear door.

With all this, it made more sense to paint the entire car, excluding the roof, rather than mess about masking off areas, and blending paint to match.

Some images showing the trouble spots:

[kRussia]

I applaud you for the effort to bring this back on the road ! Keep us posted sir.

[Nollywood]

I applaud you for the effort to bring this back on the road ! Keep us posted sir.

Thanks bud! Will do. 👍

[Nollywood]

My brand new lock carrier arrived from Germany today. It seems I was just in time - it’s the last one, there are no more.

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My guys at the bodyshop got to work.

Originally, I was going to try repairing the radiator / lock carrier, but it was also broken around the left hand side bumper bracket.

I tossed on a stock B7 A4 carrier, just to get the car fit to drive. And hopefully, it could be modified to fit permanently.

It soon became patently obvious, once the front end was stripped down by the MET technician, that it wasn’t going to work. I guess I secured the last available one from Germany just in time. 🙂

[AfricanRS]

Respect for the hard work. Enjoy her!

[Nollywood]

Respect for the hard work. Enjoy her!

Thanks bro. 👍

[Old_skool]

My brand new lock carrier arrived from Germany today. It seems I was just in time - it’s the last one, there are no more.

Hi mate, been reading about all of your projects over the years and enjoy seeing the results,

anyway, just looking at the photo of the rad-support...

On the drivers-side(UK)/right-side rs4 unit... there is another cut-out for the front-mounted oil-cooler lines to pass-through(plus grommet)just under where the chassis-rail bolt-holes are...

on the one in your pic i can see where the mould-insert at factory has the shape-indent (very light outline) where it should be a cut-out/hole for said lines?



Photo (and comparison with s4 rad support) from this thread...

https://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...d-Core-support

Shouldn't be an issue for you to create the hole, but maybe they sent a b7 s4 rad-support by mistake (both referred to as v8 sometimes)

[Nollywood]

Hi mate, been reading about all of your projects over the years and enjoy seeing the results,

anyway, just looking at the photo of the rad-support...

On the drivers-side(UK)/right-side rs4 unit... there is another cut-out for the front-mounted oil-cooler lines to pass-through(plus grommet)just under where the chassis-rail bolt-holes are...

on the one in your pic i can see where the mould-insert at factory has the shape-indent (very light outline) where it should be a cut-out/hole for said lines?



Photo (and comparison with s4 rad support) from this thread...

https://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...d-Core-support

Shouldn't be an issue for you to create the hole, but maybe they sent a b7 s4 rad-support by mistake (both referred to as v8 sometimes)

You’re indeed correct.

It wasn’t an erroneous order. The RS4-specific lock carrier is no longer available - anywhere.

Not brand new at any rate. The S4 lock carrier only differs where the oil cooler lines come through.

And as you rightfully pointed out, both S4 and RS4 lock carriers were made from the same mould, so the indent to cut out the hole for the oil cooler pipes, and fit the grommet is pretty clear.

[Nollywood]

The original damaged state:

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[eurojunkjon]

Damn I forgot about this. Looks damn good. Jealous you guys got avants