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Something Different... Pro-Touring VW??

As you can see in my other posts, I am a fan of Pro-Touring Muscle cars, however, for something different I thought I would share my buildup of my 380whp 1991 VW Gti with you all. There are a TON of pics, so be patient.

I purchased the car as a nearly mint unmolested 2 owner 91 GTI 16v in July 2002. It has all original metal, paint and has no DECs on it. It is one of the cleanest MK2 I have ever seen.

Here is how it started:

Picked up car July 20th, 2002. Here are a few shots to show you how clean it was. This was before having it detailed.

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI1.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI2.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI3.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI4.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI5.jpg

I drove it for the summer as a MK2 VR6 with Coilovers and stock wheels and tires. It was really fun just as a NA MK2 VR6. After selling off some excess toys, I purchased a T3/T4 turbo setup from a friend. This also came with the trick and very limited VSR intake.

September 23, 2002

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI16.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI17.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI18.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI19.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI20.jpg

Here is how it looked after being detailed and cleaned up for a Eurotuner Magazine Photoshoot in Feb 2003. I also put the Bolt in Cage, Kodiak 2" Lips on the RM's, as well a full custom setero install between September and Feb. I was running 2 Xtant 2200i AMP's with a Pioneer ODR 10" Sub in a custom built enclosure, Audiophile Mids and Tweeters with a Pioneer Head unit.

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI28.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI29.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI24.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI25.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI26.jpg

With this setup, we strapped it to the dyno and it put down 288hp to the wheels at 9lbs of boost. Not bad.

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI27.jpg

That is it for now... more to come!!

So I got married in August of 2003 and moved away to Ottawa for 18 months while my wife went to school. I left my car in the hands of my good friend Shawn "Mr. Miagi" Lang. He took care of her until I got back in April of 2005. Once I got back, I drove the car again for the summer and then stored it in October for the winter. The car has never been winter driven since I have owned it. I was told by the previous owner that it was never driven in the winter when he had it either. If you see the undercarriage of the car you would agree as it is that clean!

I knew at the time when I stored it, I needed to do some work on it because the chains were getting noisy (the engine had around 150k on it), the headliner was sagging, and there was a leak somewhere in the interior (which turned out to be the sunroof drains). I decided to tear out the interior to source the leak and then in sat... Until April 2006. I took it to MMP with the intention of getting the chains done and putting in a Peloquin diff that I bought from Kompressor Kanada while I was living in Ottawa. For those that know me, you know that I can never do ANYTHING half ass and it is either go big or go home. Well this went a lot bigger than I had originally planned... silly me for thinking!

I will let the pictures do the rest of the talking.

August 2006 - I decided that since I had the interior out that I wanted to redo all of the sound dampening using RAAMmat and their closed cell foam called Ensolite. Although I do not have pictures of everything, I did every square inch in the car with the exception of the door panels which I still plan on doing. I also decided that I couldn't live with the wiring mess that the stereo installer left me. I also decided to install a Compustar Paging Alarm and a few other goodies.

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI30.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI31.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI32.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI33.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI34.jpg

I then took the headliner out to Pacific Autotrim and had them redo it in Black Alcantara. I love the way it looks. They did a wicked job. They are pricey, but they do fantastic work. They do all the interior retrimming for Burrard Autostrasse and other high end shops.

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI36.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI37.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI38.jpg

After we took out the engine, we discovered another secret present from the stereo installer. Apparently it is common practice to use drywall screws to hold the fuse block to the battery and let the battery acid leak out into the tray!

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI39.jpg

I decided that I was going to clean up the engine bay before putting the engine back in. After all the work I went through detailing the engine, I didn't want it to go back into a dirty bay! I had a couple holes filled in and had the body shop do some minor smoothing and then had them repaint it. The goal was to have a relatively clean look without going nuts with the filler to make it smooth. I dont want to have to work about cracks later.

Before:

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI40.jpg

After:

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI41.jpg

While this was going on, I began the tear down of the engine. We took the head off and I decided to have it rebuilt with new lifters, guides, valves, seats, springs etc. After the head was removed we inspected the bottom end and were very surprised to find that it was in awesome shape. Cross hatching was perfect and everything else other than the chain guides looked like it had 50,000ks on it! A note to all, regular oil changes and maintenace will take these engines a LONG way!

Even though it wasn't necessary, we replaced almost every part with brand new parts. Water pump, billet crack pipe, thermostat and housing, all new seals, gaskets, plugs etc. Other than the bottom end, we replaced every thing.

I also prepped the block and painted it with high temp paint. I sandblasted every piece and every bracket and had it powder coated. Any components that were hot (ie. Hot side of the turbo, exhaust manifolds, downpipe, etc.) were all blasted and coated and baked with a Thermal Barrier coating to keep the heat from radiating off. All cool components (intake manifold, compressor housing, intercooler etc.) were blasted and coated and baked with a 'Thermal Disperssant' coating that helps cool the component. It took a while to do all this and was a pretty messy job, but in the end I think it turned out very good. The sad thing about this is, once it is all back together, you cant see all the work that went into it, however, just me knowing that all that work went into it allows me to sleep at night ;)

I don't have any pictures of the tear down, but here is what it looks like all together minus the intake manifold...

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI42.jpg

http://nuttall.doesntexist.com/GTI43.jpg