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Members' Cars / Pearl Grey with R32 power, Digifiz mini install update
Pearl grey I've had for a while now and looked like this when I picked it up. Already had the Ronals, some cheap coilovers, GTI 8V, power flow exhaust and well maintained inside and out.
Only issue was the central locking stopped working. Removed the door card to reveal this work of art ..
installed a new solenoid and tidied up the wiring
The car quickly got an ABF conversion with a 4.25 final drive 020 gearbox. very quick acceleration but topped out at 120mph, she was a screamer on the motorway even at 70 :sorry, what?:
Trip to the Nurburgring
The ABF is a great engine but no match for modern hot hatches which seem to be as quick as super cars nowadays with their 4wd twin clutch launch control flappy gearbox stuff. Plan was to give the MK2 a little extra power so opted for an R32. I'm big on nasp engines so turbo wasn't really an option for me. Luckily a guy from Westside VW was braking his mk2 R32 so I bought the engine and chucked it in ..
All the heavy stuff was done at my uncles garage during a long weekend when it was closed. Great man my uncle :thumbs:
Next was to remove the Subframe and fit a MK3 unit. I was worried about the dredded subframe bolts but the impact gun made short work of them. Also fitted MK3 power steering lines while the frame was off
years of oil and muck..
Good as new..
And then, hey presto ... the engine is in
I was lucky enough to get hold of a Mk2 R32 6 branch from Dubpower, they don't make this anymore but the fit was perfect
That's it for today, more updates coming soon. Thanks for reading
Next item on the list was to fit the Cable change shifter. For the clutch I used a Seat mechanism so retained a cable operated clutch.
Old gear lever came out and I hacked it up to make a brace for the MK3 item. A small amount of material from one corner had to be removed from the MK3 box and it just slots straight in. The brace I made sandwiches the MK3 box into position. This was the best solution I could think of at the time as I do not know how to weld. It’s been like this for over a year now with no issues.
With the heavy work complete it was time to take the car home so we towed it home and started working on the wiring
I wanted to hide the wiring so Engine loom comes out of a very conveniently placed bung on the bulk. Loom for the Fans, lights and other bits go through the chassis leg.
At the same time I decided to move the battery in the boot as I wanted the air box in the corner of the bay to avoid heat soak as much as possible. Rivnuts were used on the floor of the boot and a MK5 battery box.
Once the battery was secure in the boot it needed wiring. I used 35mm2 welding cable for positive and ground. Battery was grounded on the rear seatbelt floor anchor point. I crimped, blowtorched the ends and fed solder into it until it poured out the bottom then applied a piece of heat shrink. This ensured the cable super secure and going to wiggle off the connector
Power cable routed through the bulk and covered with tubing
8V Fuel pump needed upgrading so sourced a 2nd hand 16V unit. Pump was replaced and I binned the accumulator as the bracket had broken off and this engine doesn't need it anyway. Took a while to locate a 16V housing. can't believe no 3rd party company makes these :|
16V fuel filter was used so had to get an adapter as the 8V fuel line is just an open ended hose instead of a banjo like a 16V. Probably get a banjo end in the near future
I noticed the auxiliary water pump was missing so went about adding it. Had to make up a bracket (any excuse to get the angle grinder out)
Bashed it into shape
Like a glove :thumbs:
At this point the car was turning into a SKIP :problem:
Battery tray was looking a bit sad so cleaned and sprayed it up
Why stop there, Servo was also looking a bit sad so decided to spray that too. very difficult manoeuvring this with the engine in. Had to remove the exhaust heatshield for space
Homemade spray booth with oven
Came out pretty good
Servo vac line had to be shortened. Brass insert and some heat was used to rejoin the tubing
Fitting it all without scratching was a pain in the ass :sorry, what?:
It was worth the effort though
Back to the wiring, because I hid the loom I had to run the wiper motor loom inside the car. I decided to rout through the aerial grommet. This is not easy to get to as the aerial wire goes behind the glovebox and around a vent pipe then up through the bulk. The grove box is stapled to parts behind the dash so impossible to remove without breaking something.
Solution was to tape string to the aerial cable and pull through the dash then tape the wiper loom and new aerial cable to the string and pull it back through the dash again
At the same time I made a loom for my seats
New seats fitted, managed to pick these beauties up for a good price and in A1 condition. Always wanted a set of Recaros. They are soo comfy
Back to the engine, I didn’t like the short intake I got with the engine so decided to extend it. Local machine shop welded a bung for the air temp sensor then I wrapped it carbon vinyl
Firing up the engine coming on the next update
So for a while I didn’t touch the car because of our great British weather. The car stood still for a few months in the rain and cold.
This didn’t do anyone any favours as when I got back in the car I noticed the passenger side door was jammed. It wouldn’t open from inside or out.
I tried hot water, WD40 soak, plus gas soak, pushing kicking and swearing. Nothing would open it. I didn’t want to damage the door card so I got my tools together and attempted to remove the Door card with the door still closed :confused:
Precision screwdriver and a mole grip did the trick. Was very pleased with myself :clapping:
I was able to pry the door card from the corner and use my small girly hands to push/pull something on the back of the door latch.
I also managed to slice my hand when the latch let go and my hand hit the inside of the door, blood everywhere :silent:
At least the door was now open. And yes, that’s a heater in the car … it was that cold
The door latch mechanism had been chromed in the past but didn't look like any grease was applied to the moving parts. Luckily I had a spare in my hoard of parts. Greased and fitted. all good now :thumbs:
It was time to start it up. I jumped the starter to get the engine turning as it hadn’t been started for over a year. Then I primed the pump a few times, turned the key and to my surprise … it fired straight up.
Rad and Front end went back on and it started looking like a car again
It was time to give it a hot run to ensure cooling system was working ok. Started it up again and ran for about 5 minutes until I turned it off because of a very strong smell of fuel. First place I looked and the most likely cause was the dredded fuel pump housing. I was right, the 2nd hand unit I bought was leaking by the fuel return line
Again the car stood still until I sourced a replacement housing but as these are obsolete and most 2nd units have seen better days I knew it would take a while to find one.
After searching and searching for weeks an almost brand new unit popped up on ebay. I contacted the seller and made a deal. Pump was collected and fitted the next day with brand new brackets and fittings.
With the fuel leak sorted it was time again for a hot run again. Fired it up and left it running while I topped up the cooling system. All seemed to be going well but the fans were not kicking in. Water temp gauge went passed halfway and still no fans. Wiring to fans were fine so I changed the fan switch, still no fans.
Did some digging around online and came across a post on ClubGTI forum where another member had the same sort of issue after a 1.8T conversion. Turned out to be the water temp sensor for the clocks was a MK4 golf item so calibrated for MK4 clocks.
To confirm, I plugged in my laptop to the Emerald ECU and checked the water temp. It was barely 70 degrees. I let the engine run for longer this time while monitoring the ECU. Fans finally kicked in and did their job.
With everything pieced together it was time to take it for a spin up the road.
DAMN it felt scary and dangerous! Tracking was out so was all over the place but it picked up rpm seriously fast! I didn’t drive it too much as it wasn’t insured and no road tax.
Insured the car and booked it in for tracking and a custom exhaust from Style Dynamics in Hayes. Driving to and from getting this work done it was evident something was not right with the engine.
At around 2.5K it hopped around like crazy then cleared after 3K and water temp was not moving past 1/4 . It was freezing the day I drove it but the engine shouldn’t be that cool. Oil temp was only at 52 degrees and wouldn’t move.
I knew the engine heated up fine when not in motion so I had a hunch that there was something wrong with the thermostat.
I had to make some changes to the Rad bracket so removed the rad again
Then started removing the thermostat housing. On the V6 engine you have to remove the whole unit from the head. I also realised whoever put this engine in the previous MK2 replaced the standard R32 housing with a VR6 housing, probably to retain VR6 coolant hoses.
There's the Thermostat, so I thought ..
A Matrix moment .. There is no thermostat ! It's been hacked off
Bought a new housing with fittings and thermostat
Pieced it all together and fitted to the engine.
Once it was all back together I ran the engine again, bled the cooling system and took it for a spin. Success, the engine was heating and cooling as it should and water temp gauge was now ok. At this point I didn’t want to drive it took much as I wanted someone to look at the mapping. A nice chap goes by the name Toyotec on ClubGTI offered to have a look.
He popped over to mine one evening, hooked up his laptop to the ECU and bolted a stethoscope to the block to listen out for knock. We drove around until the early hours of the morning adjusting the map. There was so much improvement after every adjustment and the ‘hopping’ around had virtually gone.
During mapping, we were getting loads of top end power but seemed to be lacking in low end torque, it almost drove like a Turbo car. Had a quick look under the bonnet and realised the Variable intake system was not working. This we left alone as it was most likely down to a wiring issue. which I'd have a look at later on.
We tried to make more adjustments but Cylinder 3 developed a misfire. Eddie swapped a coil over from another cylinder but the misfire remained on number 3. This cut our mapping session short and we called it a night. Big thanks to Eddie!