My Rabbit (WIP)

[TheTalman1]

I bought this Rabbit back in October IIRC and drove it for a time. Had put some time and effort into it but the engine is losing compression and very hard to start (I use 24volts now to get it to fire). So a new job and many moons later I've got the time and funds to do something with it (within reason). Come Saturday I'm going to go pickup a lower mileage motor to swap into it.
Just an FYI It's a 1981 VW Rabbit LS Deluxe (came with AC and is a diesel)
1.6l Diesel with a 5-speed Manual

However in the meantime I've embarked on a paint job and some minor body work, removed the front bumper and straightened out the lip under the front valence. The great thing about painting a car with rustoleum bedliner is if there were paint bubbles/rust spots you can scrape it off with a piece of metal or a knife and wire brush it and you are good to go. Also adjusted the hood abit so it sits flush. It had come open on a previous owner hence the hoodpins and was a touch out of alignment.

Also I have heard it all before about the exhaust routed through the interior. No I didn't put it there. Yes I have some ideas about what to do about it but I'm leaning towards keeping it just because its silly and kinda cool. I may put up an interior "firewall"of sorts so that its not in the passenger compartment.

Before





WIP Just shot the car with spray on bedliner after wirebrushing the rust away. Car is surprisingly solid with only one rust hole located in the passenger side rocker, but it is about 8 inches long.







After adjusting hood and where the car stands now

[GreenHornet]

I love it that is the car I learned to drive on wayyyy back in the day. I have a big soft spot for these cars. If I would not have sold off my 1.4L 3 cylinder TDI a while back I would have tried to convince you to swap that into your ride However I still have a lot of spare 1.4L parts like honed engine block and cylinder head waiting to be ported. I can also get more of these engines on the cheap at anytime. If I didn't have other projects going on this is what I would probably be doing myself. A 150hp 220 ft/lbs 3 cyl TDI rabbit with a CTN transmission would absolutely be the most bad*** combo there is I think. You would have over a 100mpg car with performance in the 6sec 0-60 club It would run circles around my MK3 Jetta TDI and make it look like an overweight fuel guzzler on a twinkie diet lol

Whatever you decide to do with this Rabbit I for one will enjoy the build and look forward to your adventure. Welcome to the wonderful world of ecomodder land. Now there is no going back hahaha

GH

[redneck]

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Love the exhaust. LOL...




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[TheTalman1]

@Green Hornet
Can they be converted to run mechanically? no computer? I'm not ruling out going that way but i am getting an old 1.6l witth 166k miles on the clock this weekend and that will get it reliably mobile in the short term i had planned on rebuilding the engine that is in it now and going all out with it bored over, ceramic coated pistons, stronger con rods, possibly piston oil squirters, metal head gasket, ARP head studs, Turbo, ported head though with a turbo I don't think it matters much. I was also toyin with Anodizing the exterior of the head just for ****s and giggles I have a buddy that does anodizing in his garage. Also as far as the CTN goes my 020 may have a lower final gear ratio anyway I'd have to try to find the code on the tranny and i don't know where to look and if it bolts up I'd like to keep it simple is best as far as i'm concerned.

@Redneck
Everyone loves the exhaust I went into my local autozone when i was driving the thing regularly and he looked outside and asked if it was my car I said yeah why? He responded that he'd seen it on facebook. I got on the highway with it and there were 2-3 cars behind me all recording it.

[GreenHornet]

The 3 cylinder TDI can't run mechanically it is a Pump Deus Engine or PD for short. Due to the small size of the engine it would fit very easily in the Rabbit however not without some fab work. The CTN transmission has the lowest differential of any VW transmission at 3.16. You can also swap in a taller 5th gear on these transmissions for an easy 100mpg Freeway beating ride.

There has been plenty of people who have swapped in 4 cylinder TDI engines into these. A few have put the 3 cylinder engines into the pickups with great success. However nobody has put one into a rabbit that I know of here in North America.

What you have planned would be much simpler and get you up and going much faster. I would probably just stick with that at this point. Besides I want to be the first to do the 3 cylinder swap LOL

[TheTalman1]

Update: Went to the scrap yard saturday and had them pull the motor out of a 91' jetta for me you'll notice the injection pump isn't on the motor i'd pulled it off previously since mine is leaking

The donor car in my favorite parts yard


Our engine hauler




The engine after i stripped off the power steering crap

[TheTalman1]

Quick Update: Got the engine in last weekend and did a compression test and fired it today! Got 500+ PSI on all cylinders with 520psi on the best. Cam was mirror bright damn good junkyard motor. It fired on one cylinder with the lines cracked while we were priming the pump! I did use an electric diesel pump to help with the priming.

[TheTalman1]

Update with Pictures:

Pulled the engine out the top and tranny out the bottom


Pressure washed degreased and painted the engine bay


Had a little bit of trouble swapping some things over between the motors


COMPRESSION!! WE HAVE IT!! unfortunately the bleeder valve on my gauge started sticking so i couldn't get a picture of peak compression but they were all 500 PSI or higher. New motor spec is 493psi.




New engine even has a block heater in it.
Hopefully have some mpg numbers soon then I can do a few aero mods

[TheTalman1]

No pics or video but the engine is in and running it was a bit of a stretch getting the alternator to mount up didn't realize the brackets were different and it was too difficult to swap in car with the pump on so it was a trip to autozone to find a larger belt and a few washers to get the pulley offset right.

Unfortunately the highpressure o_ring on the injection pumps valve body is leaking so i'll be attempting to fix that in the car, oh joy of joys. I've been advise to never attempt this with the pump horizontal but i dont want to pull it so we shall see.