My 1998 VW Jetta TDI

[91LTDProject]

So, as many of you know, I was driving a 1990 Ford Festiva for almost a year and a half. The car was getting to the point where it was costing more than it was worth to keep it going, and there was always the nagging thought in the back of my head about what would happen if I got hit in the thing.

Anyways, I was not really planning on getting a new car at the time, I was going to drive the Festiva until it puked its guts all over the road one day, but the opportunity came up to purchase the Jetta. The car was owned by one of the mechanics sisters since new, and he had been the only one who had worked on it. It had maintenance records and a relativly low for a diesel170xxxkm on the odometer. I'd had a hankering for a diesel for a while, so I went for it.

So far, the car has been amazing. I regularily get 45mpg, 900-1000km a tank, and only have to fill it once every two weeks. I've put 13xxxkm on it in 5 months and its not complained once, besides oil changes and re-packing a rear wheelbearing.

Heres how it sat when I bought it...







And after a quick wash and engine bay cleanup...








Edit: Pictures are not supposed to be this big, sorry...

[91LTDProject]

Now, being the person I am, I can't leave anything alone, I was buying parts for the car before I even owned it...

The first thing to go was the stock tail lights, replaced with factory tinted Hella ones from a Jetta GT






After that, it was rims. I threw out the hubcaps that were on it, and started looking around for some cheap alloys. I opted for a set of old Passat wheels, I liked how they looked and they were cheap...



Come springtime, I was looking for something else to do. I found a set of lowering springs on kijiji and figured why not. A couple hours of work and they were in. Not the greatest ride, but it corners so much better. Planning on switching to coilovers sometime in the future....




I've also done an interior swap (seats, doorpanels, e-brake boot and steering wheel) with a K2 edition Jetta. Black/dark grey factory Recaro buckets with red stitching, 60/40 rear split, leather wrapped steering wheel with red stitching, leather e-brake boot with red stitching, and all black doorpanels with material on the inserts that matches the seats. The old seats were very un-supportive and were a kinda minty greeny grey, along with the doorpanel inserts. They sucked. I dont have any pictures though, so I will put some up as soon as I do...

[91LTDProject]

Spent a few hours cleaning/waxing/vacuuming on Saturday...







And on the interior swap, these are my old seats. Old doorcards had matching colour carpet inserts...






And these are the new seats and door panels, along with matching steering wheel and e-brake boot, still searching for a shiftboot. They are much darker than they look in the pictures, couldnt get the camera to take a picture of their actual colour...










Bought a set of K2 sideskirts a couple weeks ago, they should be going on this week. Also picket up a set of motoform aluminum wheels, they look alot like Bugatti Type 35 rims, I'm in the process of painting them and finding rubber. Before I put them on, I have to clean up the drums and calipers and give them a coat of paint, probably going to be doing a rear disc conversion using MK4 aluminum calipers, I hate looking at drums through wheels...

[P72Ford]

It looks like its in awesome shape, Zach.

Whatever happened with the plan for bright green wheels?

Did you ever do any performance mods to this car?

[Lincolnmania]

drums on that generation jetta?
took brakes from a 95 jetta and put em on a 85 cabriolet a few yrs ago

i'd be looney if i had to see that many nazi cars in one place and have to work on that many lol

[RugerP97DC]

MMMMmmmm

Manual

"I can shift my own fucking gears thank you very much!"

[Caporegime2]

I never noticed it but Jetta's got small wheels.

[91LTDProject]

These are actually an inch bigger thant factory, and I have a set of 16" rims that I'm re-finishing. I'm going to be painting my winter rims lime green, i tried it on a couple steel rims, and its just too over the top for the summer.


Right now, I've mainly been working on making it handle better. This car handled terribly stock. I have a set of H&R coilovers coming this weekend, made in germany, pretty nice stuff. The lowering springs and the lower profile tires on the passat wheels made a drastic difference, but theres still much room for improvement, and with the springs theres way too much of a rake. After I get the suspension the way I like it, I'm going to be upgrading the brakes all around. The rear drums work well, but theyare ugly as sin, so I'm going to be doing a rear disc swap using MK4 aluminum calipers, the MK3 rear calipers are prone to seizing. I've yet to decide what to do with the fronts, you can do a OEM upgrade using Corrado parts, but its not really that big of an upgrade, rotors are like .5" bigger, still uses a single piston caliper, but its larger. I've been considering a Porsche Boxster front brake kit from ECS tuning. Its like $1299 american, but after pricing out all the Corrado stuff new, its only around $300 more.

As for performance,I have a few things planned/in the works. Theres not a whole lot of aftermarket for Diesels, at least not on this continent. I found a guy on VW vortex that makes custom ground camshafts for older diesels, but has not tried one in a TDI yet. He lives just down the escarpment from me, so we are going to put one in this weekend and check the clearances and see if it works. Other future plans include a 2.5" exhaust with no cat or mufflers Its still pretty quiet, I've heard one with this setup), a 2.5" downpipe, Bozzio injector nozzles, chipping the ECM, and a VR6 clutch to prevent slippage. I've not looked into injector pump modifications yet, I dont know much about them, and its not a cheap part to screw up. I also have to getout to dyno and get some baselines, just because I'm curious.

[91waggin]

i'd be looney if i had to see that many nazi cars in one place and have to work on that many lol

I'm with you there. Fuckin Nazi sleds.

Also, these cars have the most ANNOYING key-in-ignition chime in the whole fucking world. It's three ascending tones. So fucking obnoxious.

And have fun doing any kind of repairs. Nothing is straightforward.

[91LTDProject]

I'm with you there. Fuckin Nazi sleds.

Also, these cars have the most ANNOYING key-in-ignition chime in the whole fucking world. It's three ascending tones. So fucking obnoxious.

And have fun doing any kind of repairs. Nothing is straightforward.

I've been fixing nothing but Nazi sleds for the last year and a half. Now the way domestics do things looks pretty stupid compared to what I used to think, but thats a whole nother conversation. I can figure out and fix a VW most of the time with just an explanation of the symptoms in most cases. But I do know where your coming from, they are shitty to work on when you dont work on them all day every day....

I like my key chime by the way, I've not gone out of my way to remove it yet, unlike the one in my '85 Ranger...


Anyways, since the last post, I've installed the rear H&R coilovers, added a set of Votex roof racks and recently picked up a set of widened Corrado steel wheels (staggered front/rear, stupid I know, but these are what I wanted since I bought the car, and these were alot cheaper than the $1000-$1500 I would have had to spend to have a set made, so I'll settle for staggered). The rears were rubbing against the fenders quite bad, so I'm renting a fender roller next week, and possibly switching to a lower profile tire for next summer when I order new tires over the winter. Front coilovers are going in next week in time for my roadtrip to Thunder Bay....

[torquelover]

Looking good!

[91LTDProject]

Went up to a friends cottage this weekend, ended up getting lost on some single lane dirt road by Tweed, Ontario. Spent 20 minutes on this road only to come to a hill that the Jetta definatly was not going up, so had to backtrack to Tweed again. Mind the goofy looking rear suspension, I didnt have time to swap my tires back on the the Estorils, so to avoid rubbing I had to jack my rear coils. Looks stupid, and rides even worse, but the clearance issues should be taken care of this weekend.... Oh ya, pulled 1000km/tank on the highway this weekend....







^ the road my GPS led me down, at this point I had to stop, behind me while taking the picture, the "road" was full of 3-6" deep grooves cut by rain water and offroaders. The only time my GPS has done anything like this to me in 3 years...

[91LTDProject]

So, I've been finding alot of bargains for some reason lately. Picked up a set of of factory foglights and a european VR6 front lip. The foglights are installed, had to change the headlight harness, but it wasnt that terrible. I dont have any pictures of them on my car, so I just used a photo off the net. Very large improvement at night. Have not installed the lip yet, just picked it up tonight. Rented a fener roller last week to do my rear fenders, and the tool didnt fit. I ended up "rolling" them with a heat gun and a hammer. Turned out ok, but it is noticeable, so I have to find a set of fender gaurds to install to cover up the parts that are noticeable. Even when I try to do things properly, it still dosent work....And I sepia'd and messed around with one of my car photos, really just posting it up here so I can set is as a desktop on my work laptop....

[gabegt90]

nice zach I like the wheels you have on it. I still see your rocking your same ontario plates you had on since your first 91 vic lol

[91LTDProject]

nice zach I like the wheels you have on it. I still see your rocking your same ontario plates you had on since your first 91 vic lol

Yup, had those plates on every car I've had on the road, from my first to the present...