So after over a year of ownership and a year on this site I thought it might be a good idea to do some sort of thread on my car as I have actually done quite a lot, maybe not in some of the obvious performance enhancing ways that a lot of people have but in adding OEM kit and extra toys!
So back in Jan 2010 I picked this up from VW, a 2005 MY06 DBP 5 door GTI with 27k on it and with standard kit plus Xenons and Leather seats, I think it is one of the earliest MY06 cars which had some of the spec changes bee sting aerial on the roof black leather wheel instead of grey and paddle shift as standard but still had the blue tint glass the extra lights and metal handles trim inside.
As you can see the original owner forgot to tick some very important boxes, having spent £1500 on DSG £1000 on xenons and £1000 on leather they didnt bother to spend £200 on the armrest £50 on the highline cluster and £200 on cruise control!
As part of the purchase I got the supplying dealer to agree to fitting the cruise control and arm-rest retro-fit, although they were to stupid to find the right part number for a leather arm rest and fitted a very odd cloth version which made it nearly impossible to swop the top for a leather piece. They also replaced all the VW emblems that were white wormed which resulted in me getting a MK6 style 3D badge
At this stage I got them to fit mud flaps and carpet mats.
For the next 2 to 3 months I just got on with enjoying the car, the standard stereo was pants so it stayed switched off and I enjoyed listening to the engine exhaust and the quiet ride (compared to the focus 1.6 I had come from) however spending too much time on this forum as we all know is dangerous so the first mod came when I got myself an RNS510 a nice simple first mod since I have always played around with car electronics.
Once I started I had to fit one or two more items, next up was a ipod insert for the arm rest (which the dealer had ordered me a unit with a big whole rather than the cubby hole type
while I was fitting the cable for this I decided I wanted my rear vents to work so I stuck in the additional pipping between the lower dash and the arm rest pipe (this is not an easy job) a roll top cup holder as well as fitting a factory 729B bluetooth kit at the same time!
After a full day of ripping the car to pieces grazed and scrapped fingers it all finally went back together and more importantly it all worked! The day after this I then replaced my front brake pads myself which is the first time I have ever done anything like this myself so I was rather pleased the first time I stepped on the pedal and actually stopped!
As well as spending lots of time upgrading my standard kit I have been getting into detailing and had slowly started amasing bits and pieces the first time I did what I consider to be a proper detail I spent 7 hours washing claying polishing cleansing and waxing the car this was all done by hand as I still havent invested in a machine polisher, the results were a massive improvement but you just cant get a good level of correction with just your arms unless your names Arnie!
I was rather happy with the results the car was wearing some HD wax at this point and the beading and protection has been great!
Next on my list was to get myself some buttons to add to the DSG wheel a simple mod as long as your comfortable removing the airbag due to my plans to eventually fit a highline cluster I went for the newer style single phone buttons with the raised plastic design, unfortunately without a highline cluster the functionality is rather limited but volume control and trip computer control from the wheel is a lot better than reaching over to the stereo or on the wiper stalk, and the additional lights on the wheel at night give the car an improved look.
The next step for me was to get hold of some Monza II's as the 17" looked lost in the arches luckily someone posted up on here that they were looking to do a swop for some Monza, so I jumped in the car and drove up to Derby swithced the wheels and drove back again.
Taking the car from this
to this
Much better
After that things went a little quiet for awhile I was enjoying the car and thinking about what to do next while always keeping an eye out for parts I wanted, while looking on ebay at work I spotted a German seller who was selling a batch of electric fold and puddle light mirrors for right hand drive car for good money so I swooped and before I knew it I had an electric folding mirror, then the saga of control modules right hand drive folding mirrors and mirrors switches began its literally a mind-field I eventually gave up on finding the right part for the driver side second hand and handed over my sole and credit card to the stealer as no where could I find a right hand folding door mirror, and two door controllers later I eventually had the right part
At the same time I had also spotted a speaker upgrade kit on ebay for not a lot of money and thought while I have the door cards off why dont I upgrade the speakers as well
yet more painful nights trying to fit parts which are rivetted to the car with a torch in my mouth and a hand drill needless to say I got quite good at removing the door cards. I did the dirver side door in the day light on a weekend so took some pictures
original and upgrade side by side
This is a video I took of the two sides, left is upgrade speakers right is the originals
https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/qny8RsRXkQZ2Ov0oasj4og?feat=directlinkThat pretty much brings it up to date, the only other bits have been to replace the DV for the Rev D piston type and to have new spark plugs fitted along with the coil pack recall I went for iridium plugs which are a grade cooler and the combination of new coils and plugs certainly bought the car alive and increased its wish to rev
Current plans are to get highline fitted, (I have one somewhere in the post between the USA and UK at the moment) also about to fit a sharkfin for GPS signal and to get rid of the roof aerial, the car also needs the wheels refurbing from white worm and a proper machine polish which will be done once funds allow. I also plan on adding the under-body aero mods mainly to improve fuel economy at motorway speeds (I hope) and have recently started thinking about handling mods along the lines of WALK new arbs and possibly 20-25mm lowering on springs but that sounds like the start of a slippery slope
