My MK2 VW GTI 20V 1.8T Projekt

Yeah it is fun to just kick back and watch everybody crowd around the engine bay until that one person looks inside and notices the dash. I love the reaction. Yesterday I took a trip down to LA to see eurocabi from vwvortex for some fender rolling. He does great work at a great price. I finally got my drop done:


It could go lower, but here is my driveway that I need to negotiate every time it goes out:


and just cause I love it, Kelli's MINI doing the same:

 

Took it into an AC shop today and had the system checked for leaks, vacuumed, and then filled. Surprisingly it was all good to go and now I have AC just in time for the hot weather. Since last time I posted, I got my cross hair headlights, red/clear euro taillights, and clear side marker lights so all of the lighting is finished now. I managed to get a hold of all of the interior switches and lights so I will be trying to figure out how to get it all to work with the MKIV harness and try to figure out how to make door panels that will work.

 

I went to a local car show today. The car show was pretty cool. Lot's of good old American iron and muscle and a couple of sweet air- cooled VW's and then me. There were no other foreign cars of any kind there. I was in the "90's and up" and "Under Construction " categories. I got a lot of positive feedback on the car and most people said they had never even seen a modified water-cooled VW. I tightened up a few things since I last checked in. Red striped the bumpers, added dual tips to the exhaust, got the fog lights straightened out, got a hold of a new rear emblem, and got a few small parts painted in Inaris Silber. I think the Eurotrash plate is appropriate and represents the spirit of the build. It sure is what I felt like at the car show. Here is how it is looking all cleaned up with a little bit of new paint:

Look close and you can see the lower valence painted along with the lower grill strip. Gives a small idea of what it will all look like painted. I really like this color:


The Inaris Silber looks hot with the bay color:


When you have a hot rod builder do your paint, you end up with pinstripes:


I also got a sunroof assembly from a VW Quantum which tilts and slides instead of just sliding like the GTI's sunroof. I had it painted and then added a new seal and now I can install it:


Some old Monza exhaust tips:




Some random shots:

 

My 04 Jetta GLI with a KO4-001 turbo swap had to be smogged this year for the first time. With this car and Kelli's MINI needing the "special smog test" I decided to strip it down to look OEM and run it through. I pulled all of the obvious parts off so it would look OEM and took it in for the test and it failed because of the 2.5 inch TT downpipe I have. I have an OEM downpipe on this car and I decided that if I am going to go to all of the trouble to swap downpipes, I might as well swap everything and bring the GLI back to stock so I don't have to worry about smogging it again. So what that means is this car is going to get a Kinetic exhaust manifold, KO4-001 turbo, and a 2.5 inch TT downpipe. Since I can't swap ECUs and I have APR on this car, I will just add APR's KO4 file to the ECU. At least they throw all of the other programs in for $200 total. All the APR requires is a 4bar FPR too so I can ditch the 3 inch MAF that has been a pain in the ass to deal with. I will also ditch the SAI, N249, PCV and Evap to really clean up the bay. Here is a dyno from my Jetta so this should be fun in the lighter car:

 

:blush2: Thanks guys. I started tearing it down today and I go to get the needed parts to swap turbos tomorrow. It is a big risk because it is supposed to go to Vegas on the third and I have never installed a turbo before. I broke on e of the downpipe mounting studs so i will have that to contend with tomorrow. I will be able to tear down the Jetta tomorrow too so I will know what I am getting into soon enough.

 

It should be there. I Pulled the turbo, exhaust manifold, and downpipe today. I also decided to remove some stuff to clean up the engine bay some more:



Hard to believe all of this is in there just for pollution control. Tomorrow I will pull the parts off of the Jetta to swap onto the GTI.

 

I finished getting everything off of both cars today. I only broke one exhaust stud and stripped one bolt. Both were easy to get out and replace though. Unfortunately the Kinetic high flow exhaust manifold has a crack where the turbo mounts. Explains the exhaust leak I had on my Jetta. I am going to see if it can be repaired tomorrow, but if not, I still have the OEM manifold to put on. I also have some oil leaking from the valve cover so I am going to change the gasket. Since I had the intake manifold and valve cover off, I dropped them off at the polisher for a refresh. Hopefully I will have it all reassembled by Wednesday so I can get it ready to go to Vegas.

 

I got everything going today. I just need to have the downpipe welded to the exhaust tomorrow morning. After that I need to do some detailing to get ready for Vegas. There is a lot more room in the bay, but I need to wait for my catch can to get here form 034 Motorsports tomorrow to wrap it all up. I was boosting 18 lbs today without software. I have made arrangements to get the ECU updated in Vegas and can't wait to drive it after that.

 

Ready to go: