Marticus' Red GTI

[Marticus]

Hi Guys, I figured I would start a little thread for my new project.

The plan for this is for it to be a good all-rounder, that will let me ferry the kids to school a couple of times a week and do some track days on the weekend.

Nothing too extreme is on the cards, a general tidy up, some exterior mods, maybe some weight reduction where possible without sacrificing the livability, some handling upgrades, and a little bump in power eventually. But for now, i'm starting with the basics.

A few pictures of the starting point:

[Marticus]

[Marticus]

ive made the first of many changes to come, whilst not a mod this an upgrade for me, its time to de-chrome.

Look at this nastyness, what was the last owner thinking! 



So the first thing i did was order some low profile number plate holders, i found some with a red pinstripe which i though would fit ok without being too obnoxious.

Old v new



And fitted to the car








Only a small change, but a big difference to my eyes.

Next in relation to this im going to try and find a red GTI badge for the front. Im not sure what to do about the VW badges yet, the back needs to be replaced because the previous owner painted it black with a brush by the looks of it.. but im undecided where to go with that, i saw a nice example where someone colored behind the badge to match the body and then had dark badges, maybe ill try that, either way TBC..

[Marticus]

Whew what a rollercoaster of a day. Took the car out to collect the kids and the check engine oil light came on.  level was still above minimum on the dipstick, but when i got back and checked the garage floor sure enough somethings been leaking fml.

So now i need to pick up some oil, top it up a bit and keep a close eye on things untill i can get to VW next week. Ill try and see if i can find the source of the leak in the meantime.

I swear ive got absolute crap luck buying cars, but im in this for the long haul so whatever she needs she will get.

On the other end of the rollercoaster these arrived today 



Theyre pretty light so eventually they will be my trackday wheels i guess, but they conveniently came with a set of winter tyres on them, so they may be getting put on sooner..

[Marticus]

No updates on the car today, but a funny anecdote.

Before I bought this car, I had been keeping my nose to the ground for something interesting to buy and one of the cars that kept catching my eye was the last gen celica, I was always a fan of jap cars, but what put me off is that they're very expensive over here in LHD land.

So anyhow I'm driving home with my daughter and what do we roll up behing at the lights, but a nice looking last gen celica with the TRD body kit and spoiler and huge exhaust, all the rest.

Of course my daughter is immediately smitten, and when I told her that was the other car I was thinking of buying she was very disappointed that I hadn't bought the sleek sports car with the big wing on the back.

To add fuel to the fire, the other driver had obviously noticed us looking at the car and given us a few revs as well.

So feeling suitably challenged by my daughters lack of faith and the other driver, when we moved off the celica promptly realised what a difference the extra few hp and huge amount of extra torque makes in the golf.

And so my ego is soothed and purchasing decision justified, only problem is now my daughter want to put a big spoiler on the back of the golf  I did explain to her that they don't really work on hatchbacks, but she remains adament.

[Marticus]

New wheels fitted 




Unfortunately after the swap there seems to be a lot if noise, not sure if its just tyre noise or something else. No vibration, and i double checked that everything is torqued to spec. So will see

[LC5F]

Nice looking Golf.
Are the new wheels much bigger than original ones?
Bigger wheels are really good for highlighting bush wear - try to work out what direction the noise is coming from will help locate the wear

[Marticus]

Nice looking Golf.
Are the new wheels much bigger than original ones?
Bigger wheels are really good for highlighting bush wear - try to work out what direction the noise is coming from will help locate the wear

Thanks for the suggestion, yeah they've gone from a 17 x 7.5 to 18 x 8 with a lower offset, it seems like the worst of the noise if front right, but did have a suspension refresh with new wishbones at the beginning of the year

Just another thing for VW to check next week when it goes in.

Out of interest I weighed the old and new wheels with tyres on my bathroom scales, old came in at 19.8kg and the new 19.4, not bad considering the size difference I think.

[LC5F]

Most likely it is the control arm console bush.
Yes - not much difference in weight, but that weight is pushed further out

[Marticus]

Most likely it is the control arm console bush.
Yes - not much difference in weight, but that weight is pushed further out

Yep for sure, it's on the list to get checked. Thanks!

[Marticus]

Got the car back from VW this morning and am £400 lighter in the wallet.

Good bews is that the gearbox is fine, after the service and adaptations reset it seems to be running smoother and according to the mechanic theres nothing to worry about there, so happy days!

And the additional road noise i was hearing was just down to the winter tyres that came on the wheels, they will be going once spring comes around, so no worries there either, bushing and bearings are all good.

On the flip side, the diagnostics checks bought up a few other issues,

The timing is noisy, and will need replacing according to them, which is odd to me as according to the logbook it was changed at 140k (30k km ago), but i may get it done to be safe as im not certain the history is kosher.

The DMF is rattling when cold, nothing to worry about yet.

They couldnt find the source if the leak (im not sure how hard they looked) but i need to get that checked again, they cleaned the underside and asked me to go back after a few hundred miles to see..

Lastly a couple of errors appeared relating to the intake flaps again nothing urgent from my understanding..

So now im looking forwards and i need some advise from you guys on future mods.

Firstly regarding the things above, if im going to be doing work in relation to thise problems are there any upgrades to consider? For example i know there are flap delete kits, which i guess i can do if im going to be there anyway. But in relation to the dmf for example?

For the more fun stuff my plan is to put maybe £1500 towards some mods in the next year with the focus on doing some track time next year, but im unsure where best to focus my efforts. Can anyone with track time experience chime in with the major weakpoints to consider? I hear the brakes will need some work and there are a few s3/r32 upgrades for sale, but im seeing mixed reviews on that.

Im also thinking about suspension, but with an eye on handling as opposed to looks, so would a decent set of shocks / springs be a better option than budget coilover? Im guessing yes..

Thanks in advance!

[LC5F]

Probably the timing belt was changed before and they are suggesting the camshaft chain on the gearbox side that is needing replacement.

Suspension is really subjective - you need to realistically look at how you will be using the Golf - if you go too much track bias it will make road driving miserable - Bilstein B6 seem to be the sweet spot for most

[Marticus]

Probably the timing belt was changed before and they are suggesting the camshaft chain on the gearbox side that is needing replacement.

Suspension is really subjective - you need to realistically look at how you will be using the Golf - if you go too much track bias it will make road driving miserable - Bilstein B6 seem to be the sweet spot for most

Good point! I'll need to double check, it's painful because I'm an English man dealing with Polish mechanics and a German logbook, so theres room for error in translation 

I was looking at bilstein b12, but at about £900 over here it's a hard sell considering some respected coil overs aren't much more expensive, and some 'adequate' brands like St, and AP are much cheaper.

The cars does need to be road use able and the roads here aren't that great, just want to see where I can give myself a bit of a helping hand on track days.

Thanks for the help.

[Marticus]

Not an exciting update today, but a funny story in a fml kinda way.

So today I'm another £600 lighter in the wallet after getting the timing chain tensioner etc replaced. Good news is that the cars running a lot quieter and seems to have found a bit of power.

Bad news is that on the test drive I noticed that the tempurature gauge (which always sat steady just below 90) dipped down to 80 during the drive before going back up.

I didn't think much of it at the time, but about half an hour ago I went to fill up on fuel, and the tempurature sat on 0 for ages, then all of a sudden when I stopped at some lights it climbed to 90, and then dropped down to 80, and after filling with fuel its now firmly stuck back on. 0.

 

So it's back to the mechanic to see if he's missed something when he was doing his work, otherwise I guess a new thermostat is next on the list.. Eyy

[Marticus]

To celebrate having a fresh timing chain, or to console meself for having a broken thermostat (not sure which) i decided to spend some more money on the golf and the first frw bits arrived today.

First a new keyring, because why not i guess



Next new bulbs and lamp switch which was worn out completely.



Old switch was wrecked



New one is so much better, made a huge difference to the interior.



Ill be replacing the bulbs later, the previous owner had swapped one out when it died i guess and now they dont match.