Caff's Bora 4Motion

[Caffeine]

Hey guys and girls!

I loitered the site for a few weeks leading up to the purchase of my white 2001 VW Bora V6 4Motion.

*Warning: Long story about how i came to own the car*

Admittedly, i was in the market for an Alfa 156 V6 but i randomly searched "V6" on evilbay and spotted a really nice black 4Motion that had a video included in the description(you know the one).
After watching the video, i had changed my mind on the Alfa lol.
I put the car on my watch list to see what price it sold for for future reference and it sold for $6750ish and was relisted a day later due to the seller "not getting enough money for it"?! I know better than to deal with ebayers like that so i went on the hunt for another example without to idiot seller.

I watched 3 or 4 of them for a few more weeks to guage the amount of interest their was in such a car.
I really wanted to buy a metalic blue with beige leather example in Adelaide but the seller would not answer my text message, emails or phone calls

I ended up striking a deal for a silver with black leather model in Parramatta and went about booking a flight for my brother and myself, taking the day off work and gathering the cashola.
We both went flew to Sydney and caught a $75 taxi to the seller in Parramatta on the proviso that the car drove as well as it looked from the extra photo's i had the seller send me.
Upon arrival, i found the seller had already warmed up the engine and it it was also wet. Knowing a lot of the tricks of the trade, alarms immediately went off in my head. There was an oil leak from the rear of the gearbox when i looked under the car and when he lifted the bonnet, i noticed some DIY electrical work. On startup, it almost did not want to idle and was rather lumpy. I decided to take the car for a drive anyway...
The car would not engage 1st gear and when it finally did, it then refused to go into reverse. He tried showing me the "trick" to getting it into gear but it need a lot of force to do so. So yeah, i basically flew 1000km on his word that the car was faultless. Needless to say, i walked away from it after being insulted by the Lebanese guy trying to sell it to me.

I called in a favor from an old friend in Canberra as i used to live there a few years ago. He picked us up that evening and while i waited, i hit the evilbays and Gumtree in a mad scramble to buy a car. At that point, Alfas were back on the cards and were actually priority. I spotted a newly listed white 2001 Bora V6 4Motion in Murranbateman which is about 20km outside of Canberra so i gave the guy a call and organized to view the car in the morning.
The car was owned by a 21 year old who wanted to "upgrade" to a Commodore. The car looked ok so i took it for a drive. Other than some slightly sloppy suspension, a cracked windscreen and an odd rattle in the rear(suspected exhaust rattle of some sort), the car was good. There was a huge difference in shifter feel between this car and the silver one i had seen the day before. I could actually feel the gates and when it engaged a gear instead of just slopping around in there.

Dealt with the guys father as the guy was recovering from his 21st birthday party the night before. The advertised price was $6500 but i organized to view the car based on me only being able to offer the same $5k that the Parramatta guy was asking. His father told me that he was hoping that i actually had more money and that after seeing and driving the car, i would be willing to offer more than the $5k i had on me. I was not... Not that i did not want to, i did not have anymore money available to me.
I flashed the $5k and told his father that i was headed back into Canberra with plans to have lunch with my father who traveled in for the day from Goulburn. After that, i was booking my train/plain ride back up north.
We got 1 km away before i received the phone call from his son telling me to turn around and pick my new car up

*End long story*

So there ya have it!

I drove it home to the Ballina Byron region which gave me a fair indication of the condition of the car. We figured out that it needed all suspension looked at and the crack in the windscreen meant that i would have to replace that before i could blue slip the car.
On the drive home, i went over the log books. The car was purchased in Parramatta in October 2001 and the log book had been maintained till late 2011. Everything post 2011 was handed to me in a paper folder. I found out that the car has had receipts for $11,500 spent on driveline replacement since 2011 including diff, gearbox, flywheel, clutch, drive shafts, tail shaft and a bunch of other stuff so that made me happy to know that i should not have to spend any large amounts of money in those areas any time soon(touch wood).

I priced a windscreen from the local VW reseller. The price was $425 for the glass alone!?!??!
Had a local glass guy replace it and the gel pack(?) for $330 in the end just to get it done. Apparently the gel pack has something to do with the automatic wipers but i don't even know how to enable that function lol. Have to look it up.

I have posted a few question regarding wheels and suspension in the forums and i had initially intended to place an ECS order from the US of A but with the help of you guys, i realized that i had been loking at parts from the Jetta VR6 list and not the R32 list. It was then it became apparent that my ECS order was about to double in price
I dropped into the local Super el Cheapo, i ordered front and rear "sports" suspension, rack ends, control arms and strut tops. The total was around the $800 region but they told me that the parts would be available for pickup on Monday or Tuesday.

There was also a cracked side mirror housing which played with my OCD so i went about finding a replacement. I ended up buying a pair of carbon fiber full replacement housings(not snap on covers) for $125 off evilbay(sorry if i outbid any of you guys for those lol).

I also picked up a second hand grill from Gumtree as the standard grill had been hit with a matt black pressure pack at some stage and was starting to flake. It looks like an Oettinger replica to me but it has a "Kamei" badge attached to the mesh. I fitted it today but im not sure how i feel about it to be honest. I will wait and decide if i will paint the grill, wrap it with a carbon fiber resin kit or leave it black in hope that it suits the car when i finally fit some wheels which i had planned to be gloss black.

Planned modifications:
Headlight lens fix/replacement
18" black centered, dished wheels with a polished rim
Suspension mods to suit the wheels(springs initially and coilovers if the springs don't cut it)
Replace the interior wood grain trim with wither carbon examples or brushed aluminum
Cat back exhaust
Possibly a carbon fiber boot lid spoiler(if i retain the carbon theme)
Paint(needs some spots repaired along with some front bar re-aligning)
New chrome exterior trim
Front seat retrim

Not looking to reinvent the wheel with my build, just looking for something that is nice and rewarding to drive and does not attract too much attention for all the wrong reasons.
On that note, please PLEASE tell me if i am making my ride too ricey. I went down the Euro track to space myself from my Japanese automotive past so forgive me if i revert to that momentarily, i will try not to though

Thats it for now. If i am not too busy with work or my sim racing, i will try to keep my thread up to date when i do anything with the car.

Any and all comments or advise is appreciated

Pic dump!

[Bernoulli]

I was in the same situation as you, looking at Alfas until I stumbled across a 4motion Bora on eBay... I'd never heard of them!

Yours looks nice mate, will be keen to see your progress with it.

[Caffeine]

Thanks Bernoulli,

I would have got an Alfa if every second search result was not about the lack of reliablity.
Even though black leather or white paint were my least preferred options, i don't regret buying the car

Can anyone comment on my ride height and headlights appearing to be factory spec?

[Bernoulli]

Both look ok to me? Here's mine... Don't have a better pic on my phone of the ride hight.

[blake_]

Can anyone comment on my ride height and headlights appearing to be factory spec?

On headlights, looks like a half joey mod on stock 4mo headlights?

[dylan8]

yep headlights have been half done. this car rings a bell for some reason...

[Caffeine]

Thanks Bournoulli.
Thats a real clean 4Mo you have there mate. Your car also helped me see that my new grill is not a Oettinger copy but something different.
Still not sure i like it black. I will probably end up painting it white.

@ dylan8
Joey modding is just painting certain parts of the inner light right?
I figured they had been painted but though i should ask the people in the know in case VW did something i had not seen yet.

Quick update.

The shocks ordered from Supercheap were not the right part

I was trying to diagnose an odd rubber sounding squeak coming the front left wheel when i found that the bolt that goes through the bottom of the strut had all but fallen out!?
It was not even finger tight. It was about 5 threads from completely exiting the car. I had a wheel alignment and suspension check done about 3 weeks ago. That is something i though they would have picked up on? Or maybe they cause it somehow?

Anyway, thats when i pulled out the replacement strut to make sure they had given me the right part as somehow, i knew they would not deliver. I'm pretty sure it is the wrong part as there was no way of connecting that rod from the sway bar(?) to the shock tower.

That gave me a bad taste in my mouth as i had just spent $800ish dollars at Supercheap so i could have all the parts for the weekend so i can start getting the car ready for a Blue slip. I am taking all the parts back in attempt of getting all my money back tomorrow after work.
If that works out, i think i will do what i should have done in the first place and just order from ECS or this Seb guy i keep hearing about.

I noticed an add in the for sale forums regarding an EOI on wrecking an A3. I'm guess that none of the suspension would be any good to me?

[dylan8]

Sounds like you have none 4mo/r32/s3/tt 4mo struts. All other fwd cars have sway bar connection to the control arm.
Yeah someone has just painted them aftermarket, although I do believe some late gli boras came with the lights have painted (doubt yours would be those as your beam pattern would be way off)

[Caffeine]

I spent an hour arguing with the manager from Supercheap this afternoon getting my refund.
The guy was fine with refunding the parts till he looked at the price. Then he became a Fu*king looser!
Got the money after a whole lot of him calling all sorts of people in an attempt to have them tell me that they were the right parts. All the while, i kept offering to take him out to the carpark and show him the difference. Anyway, done now

Now i need to speak to this Seb guy before i order from ECS. I did see his mobile number on the forums somewhere recently but can not find it for the life of me now? Can anyone give me his number or pass mine onto him for me?

[dylan8]

Iv had a blank on his forum name. Euro something?, trickysimon might know.
Otherwise check out Tim at dub addiction, although he is in Vic