Dann's Edition 30 - 1170

[Dann]

Hello

This is my thread for my Edition 30 GTi.
I've had a few fast (ish) cars and after a change of circumstances (wife starting to work again and silly 2nd hand prices) I decided to sell my mk3 Leon Cupra 290 and "downgrade" to a cheaper car.

A lot of open searches online with a few key features brought one car to the top every time....a Golf GTi.
So the actual search began.

A knew a friend of mine was into his GTi's so I asked his opinion and he let me know that he was selling his Edition 30 as he'd replaced it with a mk7.5.
So after a quick viewing we struck a deal and the Edition 30 is nearly mine (pending an MOT)

So this was my Cupra. A lovely spec "black edition" in Dynamic Grey.


And now the Golf.
It's a Black Magic 2008 car with 104k miles on, in 5dr and manual.

Overall it's quite messy on the outside and needs a fair bit of work cosmetically but mechanically it is sound. The stack of receipts and invoices I got is quite impressive.

It's come on eibach lowering springs and has had the pre-cat already removed.





Next steps are to get it MOT'd and give it a bloody good clean (wheels off, arches out etc)

[Acekid]

Looks like a good base.....I find the whole cleaning process quite relaxing and gives a massive sense of achievement when you can stand back and admire your handywork,
   The front grills on mine had a similar greyness to them as yours, I managed to save the lower middle one, but have now fitted some aftermarket ones for the rest, fit is virtually perfect and really makes the front end look newer.

[Dann]

Looks like a good base.....I find the whole cleaning process quite relaxing and gives a massive sense of achievement when you can stand back and admire your handywork,
   The front grills on mine had a similar greyness to them as yours, I managed to save the lower middle one, but have now fitted some aftermarket ones for the rest, fit is virtually perfect and really makes the front end look newer.

Yeah it's not bad overall. A little bit of rust here and there (front arch is gone, rear has 2 bubbles and the bootlid is just starting to bubble).
My main thing was get one that's mechanically sound.

Yeah they really let it down, I'll either replace the whole lot, heatgun or paint them.
I'll probably put the vented ones it the fog light sides too.

Sent from my Pixel 5 using Tapatalk

[Dann]

Small Update. Mainly some photos of what it looks like currently and what I've got to work with.







It's just dirty and a bit unloved:









A few rusty bits too







Dull and flat paintwork



Managed to give the interior a decent clean. Cheap scrub pads, some brushes, DR Leather cleaner and APC and it's a whole lot better. Also did the insides of the windows with neat IPA as they were filthy (the cloth was black afterwards)





Also fitted my Ramair Intake the other day



And Finally, I noticed it had a bit of lacquer peel or bad respray on the passenger rear quarter:



Flatted it back gently and gave it a polish with some Menzerna One step polish (I'm planning on a full polish next week)



Milltek exhaust should be here this week, as will some new headlight and LED bulbs

[Golf_is_not_a_sport]

I enjoy a good before and after cleaning gallery, please make sure you give us some photos of those inner arches when done!

How are you finding the Ramair??

[Dann]

I enjoy a good before and after cleaning gallery, please make sure you give us some photos of those inner arches when done!

How are you finding the Ramair??

Oh I will do. I've got a feeling it's going to be minging under them

Also got some rust treatment stuff (remover and converter paint) to attack it all with too.

Ramair is good. Only driven with it once, fairly noisy on WOT but quiet everywhere else.
Annoyingly my Cupra made much better intake and BOV noise, so I'm going to need to have a look at that (the IS38 turbo is bigger though)

[Dann]

Had my first day off on tuesday and with the wife still at work and kids at nursery, it gave me some time to myself.

So off came the wheels and out with the inner arches for a deep clean.



The state of the wheels before


Getting them off was interesting:


After a couple of hits of autowheel and citrus power, they are a lot better but about as good as I can get them. New centre caps will be fitted soon.





Front arch with splash shield still in





Splash shields out:







and after:







Onto a rear:











And after (forgot to get photos of the arch, but you can imagine it's clean)



Took the front grilles off and coated with Gtech C4 and a mixture of cotton buds and pads.
Didn't realise how bad they were. Bought a new main grill as the fixings are broken and it rattles like mad.





Also wanted to fit my spacers and re-paint the calipers, but the extended bolts I have left over from my Cupra are a touch too long so they wouldn't screw in all the way and it was too cold and wet to paint calipers, so I'll do those once i get the wheel bolts sorted.

I've hopefully got two more days off with the kids at nursery, so should be able to get some more done. Main bit now is a quick machine polish.

[LC5F]

Nice work cleaning out the grot inside the arches - any particular product used in there?

[Dann]

Nice work cleaning out the grot inside the arches - any particular product used in there?

Gave it a soak with autofinesse avalanche, then used autofinesse citrus power and bilt hamber surfex.

[pudding]

The peeling lacquer is likely the original paint.  It's very thin on the roof.  A respray generally uses a more generous layer than the factory.  Mine is the same colour and also peeling in places.  MK5s weren't the best made of Golfs unfortunately.

[Dann]

The peeling lacquer is likely the original paint.  It's very thin on the roof.  A respray generally uses a more generous layer than the factory.  Mine is the same colour and also peeling in places.  MK5s weren't the best made of Golfs unfortunately.

It's definitely not original paint. It's from a respray of some sort.
There's a clear blend line and change in paint colour between the two and you can see a couple of areas where they've masked up the shuts (and lacquer coming away from under lights etc)

[Dann]

Had another couple of days without the kids so got through a few more jobs:

Machine Polished
Milltek Non Resonated exhaust fitted
LED bulbs fitted to Front Sidelight, Reverse light and number plate light
Philips Racing Vision Bulbs fitted to Headlights
Grilles Coated with Ceramic Sealant
New front grille bought and Coated with Sealant
Hybrid Racing Gearknob fitted

Started off with the machine polish.
As the car was only driven a handful of miles since the last wash I gave it a quick wipe down with QD prior to polishing.

The paint is generally pretty dull and scratched and the bonnet and roof are a mess with water etching (or failure of the clearcoat)
As I didn't have a lot of time, I opted to go straight in with an Orange hex pad and Menzerna 3in1. I found that took a lot of the defects out and also restored most of the gloss.
Not looking for a full correction, just an enhancement.

Roof Before:









B Pillars:



(that's all I took before)

Afters:

[Dann]

That took me about a day.

So the following day I got some more done.

Started off jacking the car up and removing the old exhaust



"New" Milltek on the right







Then I removed the old "Golf Ball" style gearknob as I hate the way it feels.
The square section around the base doesn't fit my fingers and it ruins the experience

The new gearknob is actually for a Honda and came from Hybrid Racing in the US (on a black friday deal). Because it's threaded and the VW one isn't, I had to get an adaptor off Amazon.

The actual knob is machined from stainless and weighs about 450g. So should help with the shifter feel too.

Old Shifter removed



Gaiter removed and cable tied around the adaptor:



Had to adjust the height of the old lever:



And New one fitted:





And finally, got the new grill polished and coated with C4



Hopefully I will get round to fitting the spacers and painting the brakes before the year is over.

[RBS]

Realy nice work
And a beautiful 5 door Edition 30

[Octoparrot]

That gearknob is going to be fun in summer.