Audi's Quattro is a legend that re-wrote the form book in International Rallying, as well as causing rival manufacturers to rethink their offerings and was, quite literally, a trailblazer. The story began with Audi chassis engineer Jorg Bensinger, who spent a Finnish winter testing the Volkswagen Iltis, a four-wheel drive West German military and forest service vehicle, and found it could outperform all other machines on snow, whatever their type or power output. He put the idea of a 4WD version of the Audi 80 Coupé to the company's hierarchy and, well, you know the rest. The resulting model was launched to great excitement at the 1980 Geneva Salon and then released to European customers later the same year, powered initially by the WR-prefixed, 2,144cc in-line, five-cylinder, 10-valve SOHC unit with turbocharger and intercooler.
Whilst the engineering is pure-Teutonic, the styling was overseen by Yorkshireman Martin Smith who was tasked with turning the elegant but mundane Coupé into the distinctive, flared-arched Quattro charger. This was the first time the mass car market had been introduced to the intoxicating combination of turbo power and four-wheel drive, and the results were spectacular.
For the 1988 model-year, Audi introduced the most significant changes yet. The 2nd-Generation Quattro was cosmetically little altered but, at its heart, the new Quattro MB had an engine that was 93cc bigger than before at 2226cc. It was fitted with hydraulic instead of solid lifters, compression was increased from the original 7:1 to 8.6:1 and a new KKK K24 turbo replaced the early car’s K26 item. Turbo-boost was reduced from 0.68 bar to 0.56 bar and there was a new electronic ‘wastegate’ control. Although the MB Quattro’s official power output of 200bhp at 5500rpm was unchanged, the new car offered peak torque lower in the rev range: 270lb-ft at 3000rpm instead of 285lb-ft at 3500rpm. The Quattro’s five-speed manual transmission was uprated with a Torsen torque-sensing differential and the brakes were uprated with twin-piston calipers and a larger master cylinder.
Production of the MB Quattro continued from August 1987 until July 1989, at which point it was replaced by the 20-valve RR variant, making the MB the rarest iteration.
On offer here is a very special, UK-supplied, right-hand drive, Quattro MB that’s showing just one previous registered keeper on the V5 and had only covered 49,960 miles from new at the time of cataloguing. First registered on the 25th August 1988, the car is finished in Nautic Blue and is accompanied by its original service book (12 stamps), marketing material, booklets and previous MOTs.
The last service recorded in the booklet was in April 2000 at 49,347 miles so, remarkably, it’s only covered 613 miles during the past 24 years having been cherished in long-term storage for over two decades. In the past couple of years, the Quattro has been thoroughly mechanically recommissioned in order to return to the road and the results of this hard work are clear to see. The car now boasts a current MOT valid until July 2024 and we really do recommend interested parties come along to Sywell Aerodrome to see this example in the metal.
To find a rare 'MB' Quattro that shows just one previous registered keeper, has covered less than 50,000 miles, and is fresh to market from long term ownership, is a rare opportunity and this one will surely reward a closer inspection.
