After some thought and discussion, I realized that if I try to get the Audi swap working correctly with the Tiptronic, I will probably not have the car ready for the $2,000 Challenge in October. Running the car through an autocross and drag race in 4th gear limp mode would not be fun. Someone on the GRM forum mentioned nitrous oxide on the 2.5L. The engine may not survive, but the drag race is after the autocross, so I'm going to give it a try.
Summary of the current plan: The 2001 car is going to the Challenge with the 2.5L engine and a nitrous kit for the drag race. If the engine survives, it just means that I didn't give it "all she's got". Many of the nice parts that I take off the 2001 will go onto the 1999 - head and tail lights, top, Porsche crest heated leather seats after I replace the lower leather, and whatever else looks worthy. The Challenge car will be stripped down for weight loss, cheap aero mods installed and tested, and increased front camber. Additionally, some parts will be removed and replaced with ugly scrappy parts to work the budget as needed -trading fair market value of the parts 'off' for the actual cost of parts 'on'.
I installed the oil cooler from the '98 Boxster (Free with $10 shipping - Thanks Jim) and adapter plate ($169.75 with O-rings, tax, and shipping). The upgrade a lot of people do to a Base model Boxster is to add the S model oil cooler. It's larger and more effective (why didn't Porsche just make it standard?). The '98 oil cooler is smaller than the one from the '97, so it's probably a slight downgrade.
Since the '97 engine has an air purge hose coming from the front of the engine and the newer oil cooler has a purge hose on the top, I merged the two together with a brass T ($3.89) and connected it to the coolant tank.
This car has some issues with the central locking system. The windows don't drop slightly when the doors are opened, sometimes the interior lights stay on after the doors are closed, and the key would not lock or unlock the doors.The Central Locking System Module under the driver's seat looks good and pristine. The driver's door latch mechanism was damaged/worn, so I rebuilt it. The lock mechanism in the door handle had two broken tabs that prevented it from unlocking the door. I fixed it all with parts from my stash, but the door repairs don't directly count on my budget. I will be trading the doors with stripped out doors from another car.
I've been keeping receipts and looking at prices for eBay 'Solds' to track fair market value for trades and budget recoup. It's all scattered across 2 PCs, my phone, and an external drive. I need to consolidate it all and put it in a spreadsheet before it becomes any more of a mess.