Mk2 Golf 8v GTi to 16v ITB Build Thread (Pic Heavy)

A couple more weeks past and it was now July 2015, I'd owned the car just under a year at this point, and this was the day it returned from the paint shop. I'd been told about how good it feels to have your car come back from paint but wasn't prepared for how good it would look. The silver sparkle in paint showed up beautifully in the sun and made the blue look a lot lighter than it really was.




Once off the truck (and I had calmed down) we could inspect the final finish, it was pretty good all round, there was a run in the rear drivers side door and a couple of holes in the paint, which the painter agreed to sort once the car was finished as we were keen to get it on the road before I went to university in September.





Overall though we were pretty happy with the paint job, then came the task of refitting all of these parts in the right order and place, no small feat for someone who had never done it before, but I was excited all the same.



Note the windscreen I foolishly put against the seats at the back. This would result in it cracking and me needing to buy a new one! That was a live and learn moment for sure.

 

By the end of the first day we had a lot of parts refitted, this included;

• The full tailgate assembly with wiring, wiper mechanism, washer mechanism and rear window
• The interior - seats, carpets, trim and dashboard/centre console
• Rear lights
• Refitted the side windows (we had asked the painter to leave these in the doors as we really didn't want to faff about trying to refit the glass, but he took them out. Weirdly, the glass he removed would not go back into the car, try as we might. So we pillaged the donor mk2 for its glass and it slid right in to my car, and my glass fitted into that car without any issues, go figure right?!

By the end of day 1 it was looking pretty good but there was still a lot to do. I refitted the BBS RA's to see how they looked, and they did look good






The above photo also shows the 16v style bee sting aerial we decided to fit. This involved patching the hole in the new wing before paint which we did by gluing a plate behind the hole and filling and smoothing the hole, which worked well until it fell out at the paint shop . As we didn't drill the hole before paint, we had to drill into my freshly painted roof which was a nerve wracking experience but it looks way better than a wing mounted aerial.

 

You and me both!

 

The next day we continued to put the Mk2 back together, the side trims, bumpers, splitter, lights and grille all went back on. We found while fitting the indicator that the holes in the heritage wings were not drilled in straight, so the side repeaters were wonky, this would need rectifying.

The side trims were greyed out from years of being out in the elements so we gave them a couple of coats of paint. I've read the different methods of getting trim back to black time and time again and honestly, painting them has been the best option. Since I did them in 2015, I did them again in 2019, so 4 years use before doing them again is better than any oil/heat gun/peanut butter treatment in my book.





After many months the car finally had its face back!

 

Next up it was time to put on the arch trims, these were also given a spray of black as they were a little grey and less black than the newly painted side strips. It was white drilling holes for the arches in the wings (another thing I didn't check before paint (again, live and learn)) that the drill slipped and scuffed the new paint, nightmare! Luckily this would be hidden by the arch so was given a coat of touch up paint immediately and all was well (I'd honestly forgotten about this until I saw the photo )



With the arch trims on, I found a local windscreen supplier (Jay and Robs Windscreens) in Great Dunmow who had a Mk2 windscreen in stock, so set off to go collect it. One nervous drive later and it was back home. With the help of my dad and my brother we fitted the screen using insulated wire and washing up liquid as lubricant to fit the rubber seal. It was a great relief when the wire was pulled out and the seal made that final pop as it set into place. The car was now water tight, finally!



This car also came with the sill cover sticker which was removed for paint. I had bought another from VW Heritage but after half an house of faffing around trying to fit it, finding that it was slightly too short and it constantly getting stuck in the wrong place, we said sod it and got ready to paint the sills in black for the same effect. This definitely came out better than the transfer and took less time to do than we'd spent faffing around with the sticker.




The car was so close to being ready, so we booked and MOT for a few days time, a deadline was set..

 

MOT day was here and it passed with flying colours, only 2 small advisories for rear wheel bearings which had a small amount of play. We gave each of these half a turn and the car was good to go.




With the car now road legal, I headed out to take some photos for my insurance company, and yes, that was its ride height at the time but did I care? Nope, I was driving a Mk2 so thats better than most!






I was buzzing that my car was finally on the road and headed out to a local meet, where I had to get that customary petrol station shot.




I knew the car had to return to the paint shop to have a couple of small niggles sorted out as well as the side stripes put on it. This car came with a silver stripe in the swage line and a red stripe above the side trims so these had to be applies by someone more skilled than myself. I could only find the side stripe kit for a 3dr car and the seller would not make a 5dr set, but luckily the bodyshop were able to make the 3dr set fit and the join can't be seen. It was handy the car had to go back there, as despite my best efforts to socially distance (heh, topical joke) from every car in Tesco car park, someone parked next to me and did this.. Bastards!



I was fuming that my fresh paint was already damaged but at least it could be fixed.

 

The paintwork was soon fixed and the side stripes applied. The next couple of months involved just enjoying the car, heading to local meets and tidying a few things up that still needed attention, like any rebuilt car.




Come mid September it was parked up and SORN'd where it could sit till Christmas while I was away at university. While I would have loved to have taken the car with me to carry on doing bits to it, a nearly 30 year old car with no central locking and on street parking in a city didn't make any sense, so this is where it sat, dry storage is such a blessing.

 

I'd been thinking of making some changes to the car over my first term at uni. The ride height needed some attention as it was so high with so much body roll it did not give any confidence when approaching corners, so some lowering springs were acquired thanks to Santa. These were 40mm drop springs which would lower the ride height and provide some additional stiffness.

Thanks to assembling the car properly the first time, removing the shock was a piece of cake and the springs were swapped over, still in race car red to ensure maximum power was added.



This is a comparison of how the car sat before and after changing the springs.





This was all that happened for these weeks, as being a broke student is hard, and being a broke student with a VW addiction is harder. With that done, I went back to uni and the car was put away, or so I thought, as I would occasionally get a photo message like the one below from my dad just letting me know he was keeping the wheels turning for me while I was away..

 

I wasn't sure initially, but after the car got back from paint it looked fairly bland and I felt like I needed the stripe. I haven't seen many with a stripe like this which I think makes me like it all the more.

 

Next up we fitted a silicone hose kit to the engine as the temperature was sometimes getting a little high and it couldn't hurt to have nicer hoses. This kit fitted really nicely but a fair amount of skin was lost trying to get the old hoses off the engine and fighting with those horrible hose clips. All old clips were replaced with new jubilee clips so if they needed to come off again it wouldn't be too hard to do.



Along with the hoses, a manual fan switch was also fitted, so I could turn the fan on whenever I wanted if I thought it was getting hot or I was in traffic. This was not essential as the car had not over heated but a bit of preventative maintenance never hurt. I used a spare dash switch so it doesn't look out of place on the dash, its the switch on the right hand side.




Next up was to take it on the first London Cartel Mk2 Cruise, I didn't know what to expect from this event but it was fantastic, so well run and so many Mk2's in attendance.

 

The car went away until the summer when I was home from uni, and almost immediately I smashed the splitter driving the Mk2 onto a field helping out at a charity event.. damn



The dash cluster that came with the car started playing up so another one was sourced, the speedo would randomly stop working and sometimes it would not power up at all. At around the same time, the indicator stalk that came with the car stopped working, so I tried to find another one. This car is an 87 - 89 model, and they have 90 spec style wiper and indicator stalks, but use the CE1 electrics, so can be a little tricky to find. I couldn't find one that wasn't in the triple figures so I fitted a Mk1 stalk, not the prettiest but it worked.



I also found one morning that the car had a serious water leak from under the dash, I did some searching on the forums and found that the drainage channel in the scuttle was packed full of crap. I removed it and luckily it hadn't leaked since.



I saw from Facebook that VW Heritage were having their 30th anniversary event at Brands Hatch and they were offering track time, well that was a no brainer. We have the car a quick service of oil, filters and plugs as well as a new rocker cover gasket, as the old one was leaking oil and making the engine bay look crap. We also gave the rocker cover a fresh coat of black before hitting the road.




I had never been to Ace Cafe before and while it wasn't exactly on the way to Brands hatch, a detour was made to have a breakfast at Ace before heading to Brands.



The track time was a good way of learning about the car, including getting it on 3 wheels on paddock hill bend which made my brother in the passenger seat squirm a little! I also got schooled by 2 20vt swapped t4 vans, they were properly fast.

 

great work, well worth the effort put in! enjoy it

 

The day at Brands Hatch had proved too much for the eBay exhaust mounts causing the exhaust to knock on the rear beam, a cable tie proved to be a temporary solution.




The motor for the washer bottle also stopped working and I was not able to find another one for a reasonable price (some were like £75!) so Martin at AEDR who did some wiring on the car before came over and wired an external wiper motor for me, again not the prettiest but it was a daily driver and not a show car so no drama, just good to have it working.



I'd been looking for a new set of wheels for the Mk2 for a while as I was tired of the RA's. I wanted something dishy and of the split rim variety, but did not have a grand to cough up for wheels. There was nothing nice on the second hand market so I took the plunge and bought a set of Japan Racing JR10's in 16x8 et20. I know these are 'reps' but the quality was genuinely very good.




I wanted 16's as I wanted to fill the arches out more as well as give the car a wider stance which I think I achieved. I really liked these wheels and how the car sat on them. (note the still wonky indicator that I hadn't got round to sorting (in my defence, I only noticed it when I was either getting in or out the car ))



However the shock and spring setup was causing some rubbing on the body when cornering (as the arches were not rolled) so I bought a set of coilovers and set about fitting them to the car.



This meant I could dial in the ride height of the car to stop any rubbing as well as stiffen up the suspension, with that, the car was sorted for the summer.

 

Lovely stuff - dedication to the Mk2 GTI (nothing like it), kudos to you for keeping with it.
Granted it's not a VW but I can't help but notice that nice red Alfa 75 in the photos, a rare beast and nice to see one still kicking around.

 

Ah good eye sir, yeah its a 75 v6 America (so it has the orange rear strip rather than the red the UK cars got), theres very few left in the UK. It's my dads since new and soon to be mine (hopefully). Its a really nice one too, never welded and always garaged. We took it to Le Mans in 2018, nearly 1000 miles and it never missed a beat
https://imgur.com/Akkk7v1

 

Beauty!! I have a soft spot for Alfa's as well (I owned two - 33 & 155) Terrific engines but sadly it was what was around them that caused problems (wiring, rust, trim, the list was pretty long) Anyways keep up that great work on the GTI and mind that 75.....

 

I took the car for its second MOT soon after this, where it was found that the bushes for the rear beam were in a pretty poor state, a front brake hose was needed and an anti roll bar bush was needed. I bought a set of polybushes for the rear beam and for the anti roll bar. I'm a big advocate of poly bushes, set and forget modifications are all good in my book. The rear bushes took some force to get out but eventually came free and the new poly bushes slid right in and the rear beam could be put back in. The anti roll bar bushes were a lot easier to change, simply unbolt them, replace the bush and put it back on. Couldn't be easier.





Myself and a few mates headed up to the VW Whitenoise show up in Norfolk on a whim, it is a pretty good chilled out show with good variety.



Couple of weeks later we headed down to London again for the London Cartel Mk2 Cruise, along with a few other guys in their Mk2's.





I'd actually been on holiday in Cornwall the week beforehand, and got a train home Saturday morning to go to the event that evening, we crashed in a hotel around 4am and were back down in Cornwall by mid afternoon on Sunday, serious commitment to car events! The car was faultless all weekend and I got to enjoy the Cornish roads in the Mk2 which was a good experience.

 

I was heading into town one morning when I came across a frog eye sprite that had broken down on quite a fast corner. Honouring the classic car owners code of help each other out I rigged a tow rope out of a some spare cord I had in the car and towed him back home to try and we tried to fix his car. Turned out that it was just a bad earth but the Mk2 earned it stripes as a recovery car that day.



I'd been surfing ebay one night after a few drinks with the flat at uni and found a set of Rover Recaro's on Mk2 bases for quite a good price, around £150 from memory. I bought them and a fellow Mk2 owner collected them for me and brought them down when he came down my way. I was really impressed with them for the price and set about fitting them to the Mk2.




They were really comfy seats and suited the style of the MK2 well. This was pretty much it for the car for 2016 as it was time to head back to uni. I was a little tired of using it as a daily so we started looking for a cheap run around. My dad found an ultra cheap Mk4 tdi on ebay which relieved the Mk2 of its daily duties come winter when I was home. This car met an unfortunate end but thats another story...