VW GTI - Heavy modding done - what next?

[ncwa]

I would study the underside of your car and look into a belly pan. I only did a partial under the engine bay back to the transmission. Of all my mods, aside from a tune up and air in the tires, it was easily the best per dollar spent. Just keep an eye out on engine and electronic temps as you can overdo it. Good luck!

[Frankencar]

Originally Posted by ncwa

I would study the underside of your car and look into a belly pan. I only did a partial under the engine bay back to the transmission. Of all my mods, aside from a tune up and air in the tires, it was easily the best per dollar spent. Just keep an eye out on engine and electronic temps as you can overdo it. Good luck!

Finally have one installed as of 3 weeks ago...

Originally Posted by Frankencar

...
And I finally installed this:



It's a Seat Toledo Belly pan - needs some trimming up front to fit behind the bumper, but makes for a nice underside! And I can't believe how much quieter the car is now! Now it's just the sweet TDI 2.5" straight pipe exhaust note.





And finally the small plastic air channels that go in front of each wheel:




I'm hoping this improves FE a bit.

Filled up 8 times since then as we were on a bit of a road-trip. It along with the LRR tires are definitely doing their job! The car would never get MPG this good on longer highway trips before these mods. Here is the basic rundown of out 2-week road-trip:

There is one thing to mention about the Odometer. It's fairly accurate, but not 100%. We counted miles using the mile-markers on the freeway in 100 mile stretches and on 3 seperate occasions confirmed that the Odometer reads 1% less miles than actually traveled.

Odometer at the beginning of our trip: 234650
Odometer at the end of our trip: 239791
Miles per Odometer: 5141
Corrected miles (Actual miles driven): 5192

We made 7 fuel stops on the trip, and I include the last fill from yesterday in order to see how the MPG was for the whole trip.

They went as follows:

Odo Mi Gal $/Gal MPG Where Filled
234747 810 13.010 3.739 62.26 Stockton, CA
235353 606 11.629 3.649 52.11 Wendover, UT
236106 473 11.769 3.489 63.98 Castle Rock, CO
236867 761 11.682 3.409 65.14 Jackson Hole, WY
237711 844 12.773 3.799 66.08 Kalispell, MT
238514 803 13.166 4.917 60.99 Revelstoke, BC Canada
239168 654 10.525 3.739 62.14 Vancouver, WA
239841 673 11.161 3.999 60.29 Vacaville, CA

with a trip average MPG of 61.618 US MPG. If we correct for odometer error this becomes 62.234 US MPG.

We burned 83.434 Gallons of diesel at a cost of $323.08

(Calculated my only using the portion of the first and last tank that were actually driven on the trip. This was assuming consisten MPG through those tanks.)

We drove through:

2 Countries:
USA
Canada

9 states:

California
Nevada
Utah
Colorado
Wyoming
Montana
Idaho
Washington
Oregon

2 Provinces in Canada:
Alberta
Britich Columbia

4 US National Parks
Grand Teton
Yellowstone
glacier
Crater Lake

5 Canadian National Parks:
Waterton Lakes
Banff
Yoho
Glacier
Mt. Revelstoke

Abd we had 1 vehicle mechanical failure:
Passenger mirror adhesive failed and it fell off. Replacement was sourced at Pick-N-Pull in Kelowna Canada.

EcoModding rules! This trip would have been crazy expensive without the mods.

[JethroBodine]

Awesome numbers!

That's about the same distance as my trip to the Salt. I'll keep track and compare.

[wyatta4]

This is FRAKIN AWESOME!! Nice work!

[Frankencar]

Originally Posted by wyatta4

This is FRAKIN AWESOME!! Nice work!

Thanks!

Today marks one year since I registered the the GTI as a Diesel (yesterday was one year since engine swap completion) and I already put 26,122 miles on it! It has only been involuntarily down once due to a failing manual steering rack. Looking back, I would never even entertain the option of another engine for a swap. This thing has averaged 60.1 mpg, run 14.658 @ 95mph on the 1/4 mile, driven the Bonneville slat flats, been to the top of Pike's Peak, and reliably taken me to work every day for the last year. The engine swap has already paid for itself, and the MPG keeps getting better. It's consistently getting over 60mpg now. I think with the right combination of parts and proper install a home-built project can be a very good daily driver.

Thanks to everyone on this forum for helping to fuel my Ecomodding sickness sickness, I'm not sure I would have done all this if it weren't for all the cyber high-5's.

Here is a YouTube playlist of some of the better videos taken of the car over the past year, starting with the original of course :

1991 VW GTI TDI Conversion YouTube Playlist

[JethroBodine]

I'm following in your footsteps and agree that the TDI would be the only other engine I'd use besides the 1.6na that I have.

See ya on the Salt.

[JethroBodine]

Frank- If you are still going to Bonneville and happen to have a 14" steel rim, could I buy it off you? I have a tire, but couldn't find a rim. I have a compressor with me, but it would be a bit slow on the road.

[Frankencar]

Originally Posted by JethroBodine

Frank- If you are still going to Bonneville and happen to have a 14" steel rim, could I buy it off you? I have a tire, but couldn't find a rim. I have a compressor with me, but it would be a bit slow on the road.

I really wish I could make it - but my TDI has made the poor little VR6 clutch cry & it's starting to slip quite badly. I am also trying to finish p closing on a house - so I'm buried in paperwork etc... The extra garage space will be nice though!

In other news, I went to a big VW/Audi/Euro car show locally over the weekend and took home some trophies. I was the only TDI conversion there and the highest MPG car by at least 15mpg. Nobody quite understood the whole TDI/LRR tires/Belly pan/High temp thermostat thing... Many also didn't believe the MPG.

Took the opportunity to get some shots on the way too.





And here was the car at the show:

[Sven7]

Pretty Mk2. Don't know how I missed this thread, but it's all the more reason to TDI the Cabby. I've been debating diesel or rebuild the 8V. One more vote for diesel.

Keep it up!

(If you're doing the 5 lug swap why not run aero-friendly D90's?)

[Frankencar]

Originally Posted by Sven7

Pretty Mk2. Don't know how I missed this thread, but it's all the more reason to TDI the Cabby. I've been debating diesel or rebuild the 8V. One more vote for diesel.

Keep it up!

(If you're doing the 5 lug swap why not run aero-friendly D90's?)

Thanks! Don't even think about keeping the 8V... Diesel is far better.

These are the only wheels that will fit over my brakes and still fit under the fenders. they are also very light and strong. This car isn't built specifically for MPG, though that's about 50% of the focus, it's also quite fast.