Let the tinkering begin...

[Greg Roles]

Fraid you'll never completely sell me on a "sports van", although I do remember with great joy my brothers Ford transit van he dropped the Nissan VN V6 into. The van cost like $500 and the engine / tranny about $4k. It couldn't HELP but wheelspin in most gears, and nothing could touch it in a straight line. It was an absolute monster, and I had many a fun time borrowing that weapon, till it eventually ripped the diff out of itself! So I understand the stunned look concept!

Now to rip the diff out of the Golf.....

[gregozedobe]

I don't claim my transporter is really a "sports van". I wanted something just big enough for one person to do weekend camping in reasonable comfort that was also a good highway cruiser . Once I started test driving vans at highway speeds the VW came up best, and naturally after I test drove one with the torquiest engine (400Nm with good torque from 1,500rpm) I had to have one in the van I bought

Mind you if they ever put the VAG 3.0 V6 TDI (IIRC 176Kw, 550Nm) in a transporter with 4motion AWD that would definitely qualify as a "sports van" in my eyes. It's like seeing an elephant dancing, it isn't how well it dances, but the sheer fact it can do it at all that impresses.

[Greg Roles]

OK I've changed my view of sports vans after this e-mail from my Bro.
Ingham car show apparently!

[Greg Roles]

I can't for the life of me understand how these two diffs can work like this.....

[DaveMack]

Remove the central driveshafts should do it.

Dave

[gregozedobe]

OK I've changed my view of sports vans after this e-mail from my Bro.

Well, it does have a few things going for it.....................

Mid-engined
Light
Simple
Unique
Great power to weight ratio
Cheap
ABSOLUTELY BONKERS CRAZY !!!!!!!!!!

I would never have the balls to really nail the accelerator in something as scary as that (I like to remain alive and uninjured).

[DaveMack]

Would indeed be a scary beast ... specially as the vehicle 'crumple-zone' is basically your knees.

Dave

[Greg Roles]

OK, back to the real stuff....

Put my stock airbox back on for my 15k service, without the MAF grid and it's been running fine. Still, even gridless, the responsiveness has dropped, especially off boost. The lag is definately longer, and you spend more time in the "dead zone". Once on boost it feels pretty much the same, which you'd expect with a turbo on boost.

It's not really any quieter per say, just that now the typical diesel rattle ( without engine covers ) is very obvious, whereas before with the pod the induction hiss kinda drowned that out when you're up it.

So for anyone considering a pod upgrade, it's an easy 10 min swap back to stock, so long as you don't modify the factory fit points too drastically.

I AM looking forward to getting my pod back on though!

[comfortline]

So Greg, how's the tinkering going?

Loved the thred so far, sorta thinking about whether my 2.0 comfortline needs a new intercooler, and inlet syste,

Cheers

David

[Greg Roles]

Mate she's stalled, thanks to the last few months of work being dead, and my income dropping to survival. Fraid it's been bills, food and repayments, and not much left over for fun! I'm sure I'm not alone, so I hardly feel hard done by...

Nah it's been OK, but certainly tighter than usual. I'm sniffing around jobwise, and suprisingly there's a lot on offer currently in my industry, and some nice pay advances out there, so 2009 is looking up.

Scored a smoking hot girlie since the start of this thread too, so that's definately been a distraction. I apologize for being tempted by the awesome tidy flesh at my disposal.....what were we talking about?

I've chatted to Plazmaman, whom alongside PWR seem to be right up there and on the ball with W2A intercoolers. All I need is a core and I'm ready to go.
I've been asking around about the idea of using the stock Air intercooler as the water radiator for a W2A core, and from what I can find, it may be a great way to go. I'm keen to get on with it, but doing my research too, for as relatively safe a more efficient intercooler would be, I'm sure if something goes bang, my warranty will be very much affected with such an obvious mod.

Over Christmas I plan to get a few things finished up, so will have some more to post.

Actually come to think of it, I have tinkered here and there, but it's been stereo stuff I'm afraid. Certainly sounds nice!