Four Decades Ago, Audi Created The Coolest Rear Window Defogger Of All Time

Rear window demisters [Ed note: We call ’em defoggers and/or defrosters here in the US of A, Lewin – Pete] are rarely very interesting. They’re a bunch of conductive lines slapped onto the rear windscreen to help remove fog in the morning. However, many decades ago, Audi turned this boring practicality into a visual treat for the owners of its finest models.

Automakers love logos. They’re not just used to identify brands as a whole, either. Individual models and even individual features all get their own stickers and badging, highlighting whatever an automaker thinks is most important about a given car. In the 1980s it was “16-VALVE” this and “TURBO” that, before automakers rushed to slap an “i” badge on anything with fuel injection.

For Audi, so many decades ago, its headline feature was its quattro all-wheel-drive system. Purchase a duly equipped vehicle, and you got lots of really cool “quattro” badges on your car—plus a nice little easter egg that came out every time the weather got a little frosty. [Ed note: Audi specifies quattro is all lowercase, “Quattro” would be wrong. This bugs me. – Pete]

@retrogarageofficial

You probably didn’t know that the quattro on the back window of my Audi Coupe Quattro or an Audi 80 / Audi 90 is actually part of the rear demister. #cars #cartok #audi

♬ Beat – beaty

At some point, an Audi designer or engineer realized they could do something special with the quattro logo on the rear windscreen. It’s a simple logo that looks great as an outline, which made it perfect for such an application. On one row of the rear windscreen demister, instead of a straight line, the resistive heating trace is in the shape of the quattro logo instead.

Day to day, you probably wouldn’t notice this small touch unless you’re looking directly at it. However, this all changes when there’s frost on the rear windshield and the demister is engaged. By virtue of the shape of the heating lines, you get the quattro logo beautifully emblazoned in the icy crystals on your rear windscreen.

Of course, it only lasts as long as the frost does. Soon enough, the rear demister clears the screen and the effect disappears. But that’s what makes it so magical—it’s an easter egg that reveals itself in a really neat way.

The feature was available on a variety of models. It can be found on the Audi 100 and 200, as well as the Audi 4000 and the first two generations of the Audi coupe.

Quite a number of Audis of the 1980s and 1990s had this feature, like this Audi 4000. The defroster lines had lost continuity on this car, spoiling the effect, but the owner was able to execute a rough DIY repair to restore functionality.

It’s worth noting that this required Audi to produce bespoke rear windscreens for quattro models. This would have added extra cost to production, and complicated inventory for models that received this feature. It’s perhaps for this reason that the feature died out sometime in the early 1990s. For example, you won’t find it on a first-generation Audi TT, quattro-equipped or not.

Audi still sells a wide variety of quattro models with all-wheel drive. However, the technology is no longer treated with such reverence as it once was, and the badging is typically more subtle and refined. Just as dual overhead cams and fuel injection became less of a selling point as they became normalized, it’s been a similar story as all-wheel drive has become more common.

 

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A post shared by Dave Pecoraro (@broken_quattros)

It’s a shame to see that this neat easter egg didn’t keep appearing on newer models. Still, it’s a nice little design detail for owners of classic quattro Audis to enjoy each winter.

Image credits: amdisthebest (provided), Mike’s Virtual Garage via YouTube screenshot

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