tony_ack

I get a bit of this in the Corrado - usually in town so there isn't really much point rising to it. But the MK2 Golf is far worse - it seems like every single car on the road wants to race it because of the 'kudos' of 'beating' a GTI. It's pretty funny watching them shoot off from the lights under full acceleration, while I follow behind normally minding my own business, only to draw level with them at the next set of lights.

Insured it. Taxed it. Drove it. Grinned.

Got mine yesterday Alex, cheers :-)

Slow down on it. A lot of work done in 2011, and a lot of money spent, so now it's time to enjoy it. Only plans are: New front discs/pads at some point Re-bleed brakes Some interior bits to replace Adjust rear wheel bearings Replace leaky PAS pipe and new fluid MOT due next July Service due next October. Aircon is a pipe-dream at the moment (actually finding the pipes and other bits and getting them to fit is a nightmare!) so I may put that on hold.

Yep, anything that affects the intake, ignition (inc timing) or exhaust should be fixed before setting the CO. Because once you fix something else in those areas, it will be out again. If you can't get an FPR from VW, see if anyone on the forums has one spare. It's only a small piece of plastic irrc? I managed to get 48mpg when driving from Reading to Oxford on the M4/A404/M1 in my old 8v, and that was in fairly heavy traffic, but keeping at about 60-65mph. I miss that car.

55-60mph following a lorry should return you 40mpg-ish - get the CO set - it will pay for itself in a month!! Alternatively the warm-up phase in traffic won't be doing the MPG any favours but 35 is still realistic. 8v's are pretty hardy creatures in the winter. I remember starting up my old 8v when it was covered in 5-6 inches of frozen snow a couple of years ago and it didn't complain - started with the first touch of the key.

I wouldn't worry about manifolds just yet - popping, especially on overrun is a sign of too much fuel. Makes sense that it is now running rich to me... If you had vac leaks before, more air would have been entering the engine than that which was metered by the MAF, so to compensate for the extra air, someone may have increased the fuelling in the past (and at that point it may still have been running lean). Now the airleaks have gone but the engine is still getting extra fuel. You have done pretty much everything you need to do to get the injection and intake system up to scratch, and now it needs the CO and timing setting up. Don't underestimate the effect of getting the CO right. Any garage should be able to do the CO/timing but just make sure they know to set timing to 6 deg BTDC @ 2-2.5k rpm - most garages won't know this and will attempt to set the timing at idle. Might be worth going back to the garage where you had your cambelt done if one of the guys has a Rallye

Here's a pic, but it is quite hard to see down there with a camera I don't think it's from the rocker cover gasket - it just doesn't seem to be coming from there and it was replaced with a VW item about 6 months ago. The only other thing could be the water pump, but it was done about 8 months ago. Perhaps (wishful thinking) it is old leakage from before the rocker gasket was changed? There are absolutely no other signs of HGF, though looking at the invoice for the chains that were done about 30k miles ago, there is no mention of replacing the head gasket which is ominous. That said, I don't think it'll be on its original head gasket at 222000 miles

One of *those* days today. I started off trying to paint the areas of the battery tray I'd ground the rust out of, but the weather was far too cold for painting, and my usual trick of warming up the engine to warm and dry the paint wouldn't work because the battery was flat and I couldn't start the car. I finally found another set of jump leads, so I could jump start from the Audi ( I was using the first set of jump leads to connect the battery to the car while keeping the battery tray clear). After running the car for about 10 minutes I noticed a patch of wetness (wasn't sure if it was oil or water) on the airbox side of the block, just under the headgasket. It looks pretty ominous like it may be seeping from the headgasket? It could be the start of a head gasket failure? Or possibly from the water pump? I decided to check for other signs of headgasket issues. Coolant is clean, and it doesn't use any. No mayo on the oil cap, and when I did the oil change a couple of months ago, the oil seemed pretty normal. I've never known the car to smoke. I took off the Schrick to check the plugs (the plugs need changing anyway).The plugs were all a little sooty (possibly as it's not been driven for a while but has been started a few times), but dry - no oily plugs at all, and 1 and 6 looked probably the best of the lot. So that was a relief at least. But now I need to replace the Schrick gaskets, and one of the HT leads fell apart so the car is now further away from being on the road than ever. Add the plugs onto that and we're already over £100 of parts. I also spent a little time today mulling over the aircon. I think that the pipes connecting to the expansion valve coming out of the bulkhead are going to be obstructed by the ABS pump, so that is a worry. I did however start connecting the wiring to the fan controller, so a little progress there. I was hoping to get the Corrado back on the road next week on a classic policy as a weekend car, but looks like that's on hold now.

Got a quote from Footman James which included quite a few mods, so they do cater.

That's doubled in price in the last 6 months!!!

You didn't say which type of Golf 16v! MK2 Golf is k-jet as opposed to KE-jet in the 9a - but to be honest calling the MK2 ECU an 'ECU' is stretching it a bit, as it only really controls igniton timings and doesn't respond to many sensor inputs (temperature control and idle control is handled off-ECU). Don't really know much about KE-jet on the 9a but it has has lambda and knock control which I believe is on the ke-jet ECU, the MK2 16v ECU doesn't have this. The 9a ECU is also designed to work with a cat, which the MK2 16v one is not. MK3 Golf 16v is Digifant 3 and completely incompatible.

I used Paisley Freight to carry an exhaust... they used CityLink as the 3rd party to courier the package. The CityLink driver didn't come on the scheduled day of collection (apparently he couldn't find our house but didn't think to ring the contact number...) so we had to reschedule the collection for another day - which meant another day off work. Then on the day of the rescheduled collection for some unknown reason they cancelled the collection before the driver went out. At this point we were prepared to go to the delivery office ourselves and drop it off, as the buyer needed the exhaust ASAP. However once we kicked up a fuss, City Link sorted themselves out and contacted the driver to make the pick-up. To be fair to Paisley Freight, they responded quickly when I told them about the missed collection (e-mail as it was out of hours), and they put me in contact with CityLink directly to get it sorted when the rescheduled collection was cancelled. Luckily there was no issue at all with the delivery.

The guy I bought the Corrado off had moved to a MK4 TDI from the Corrado as he couldn't afford the Corrado insurance.... he hated the MK4 in terms of driver enjoyment. I take the other view on a daily - it doesn't have to be fun, it has to be frugal, and reliable, as long as you have a nice weekend car tucked into the garage! God I miss driving the Corrado as a daily (I took the missus' MK2 to work on Monday just to get my fun 'fix'), but I am glad it's dry and clean in the garage at the moment. I think MK2s still make decent dailys if you don't mind the lack of comfort or safety features. The 8v GTI is quite economical, generally reliable if maintained properly and cheap and easy to fix when it goes wrong. It's fun to drive and reasonably spacious. It's a shame they're all so old now and things like rust are taking hold of most examples. My main issue with a MK2 is that if I had one as a daily I would be tempted to get it all fixed up and tidy, and it would become bottomless money pit #3.

N-reg Mystic Blue Storm in Morrisons car park in Bramley, Rotherham (J1 of M18) this lunchtime. Car was standard, looked solid but dirty - looked like an oldish driver so probably not on here? That's 3 in a week now!

Main issue with the pattern sensors is that they fail prematurely. I would still expect it to work and be within tolerance if brand new - if not then it's a pretty shoddy replacement!

Though you are planning to sell it soon! With the knock sensor - remember that an invalid or non-existent reading from any of the sensors will cause the ECU to pull back the timing.

Try your local community forum (Leeds forum?) - there's usually some classifieds on that. Not so good when looking for a specific car, but useful if you don't really care what you're after. If you're looking for something more specific then stick with eBay and Autotrader - yes the fake Autotrader prices are annoying, but work around those and ignore any that look way to good to be true. Also set yourself some reasonable expectations - if you spend £150 on a car you may need to spend more on it just to get it through the winter. Of course you risk issues with any used car. To be honest it's hard to fault the Audi A4 I got so far. £725 for the car (with 12 months MOT), £120 for tax, £70 for service items and about £40 to fix some leaky boost pipes, and it's needed nothing since. So less than a grand spent, saved £500 in insurance and tax costs on the Corrado (appreciate that this will need insuring again), and have saved about £150 in fuel costs so far. Since it's a TDI I can probably sell it on again for more or less the same as what I paid for it. And all the while the Corrado is tucked up nice and cosy in the garage, avoiding the damp and salty roads. ---------- Post added at 01:30 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:27 PM ---------- Just to add - if you do buy another car just for winter you really need to resist spending any money on it! The Audi has niggles and a few things that could be upgraded, but as soon as you start throwing money at it (and it's easier than you think) then you're taking funds away from the Corrado.

Never realised it was a pattern part... definitely beware then!!

MPG depends on how you drive and what you use the car for. As a daily I was getting about 27mpg on a tank (included urban, traffic and motroway). Tax will be the same as the valver Insurance may be your biggest cost increase. Chains are the biggie on the VR6, so check for evidence they've been done. If not, then be vary wary of any rattles coming from that area of the engine. Also check for oil smoke - could be something like valve seals but they can ovalise cylinders 1 and 6 when they start to go. Mileage isn't a massive issue if it's been looked after - mine is approaching 225k and is smooth, quiet and uses no oil and water, but it had FVWSH until 175k.

The number of motorbike deaths on rural A and B roads is scary... Checked the Snake Pass between Manchester and Sheffield and almost every one involved a motorbike. Not suggesting that bikers are to blame for all the accidents, but certainly a lot more dangerous place to be.

You should be able to pick up a 1.9TDi B5 Passat wagon for around that price and a similar age.

Nice one, I remember Netto selling ones like these a while ago before they closed down. Kind of makes a mockery of the 'original' and 'rare' ones on eBay that are 10 years out of date and going for £35+

Jealous.

rubjohnny is a legend and I'm pretty sure he has all the equipment you need to set it up properly - you should be able to contact him via ClubGTI, GolfGTIforum or VWGolfMK2 forum. He pretty much wrote the book on Digifant, and almost everything I know has come from reading his guides and following his advice when setting up my old 8v a few years ago. If you have a new BTS then I would fit it anyway - obviously checking the resistance will confirm whether the old one is working or not (and tell you whether you've found the problem, or need to keep looking), but it seems a shame to have a new part sitting in a bag which, when it goes wrong, can cause running problems.