Royal Blue MK2 GTI, 16v KR then ABF, now abf management+widetrack

I'm pretty certain tyhey're re-trimmed, I've never seen this fabric before. never know could be obscure euro trim, but arnt all jetta benches fitted with the centre armrest?

Am loving the ABF, it pulls so well and k-jet is nice and snappy responce wise compared to the old Digi2
I hope I wont be disapointed with the ABF managment once fitted, but I did have a go in my mate James' after I finished doing it and it seemed pretty nippy. Back to back comparison against k-jet from same base lump will be interesting

 

Ta, I never think to call anyone I just get stuck in

Yeah duff sensors and crispy looms shouldnt be a problem, I'll be purchasing all the usual suspects and stripping the mk3 loom completly for a checkover and adjustment for MK2 usage before it goes in

 

right its about time I updated once again! Some of you may know I finished my cabby last March, so for a year the MK2 was off the road. shortly after I took it off the road I ripped out all the k-jet management, leaving it with a completely bare engine. This was due to me picking up ABF management bits in exchange
A combination of lack of parts, laziness + winter meant I did bugger all to the car till the beginning of March this year, where I got cracking again!

Step 1 was to remove the engine, since the PAS lines were badly corroded plus I decided to go wide track. Leaving it like this:


I then decided to strip the end off the KR gearbox so I could fit a 2.0 8v 5th gear. The gearbox felt pretty good, and was very happy with how it looked once the end came off:


Unfortunately I realised then I had been a complete idiot and had leant out the tool I needed to remove the 5th gear retaining bolt, so I had to put it back together again
After much swearing I put it back how I found it and moved on. Car put up on stands, and subframe removed:


This is where the real fun started. the track rod ends completly welded themselves on, even though they were less than 3 years old. I got them off eventually then noticed the boots wern't looking too great, bit of cracking in the folds. So I got on the phone to mattneck and ordered new ends and boots. I got the track rods off no drama thankfully.
I then hung up my PAS pipework and masked off, gave em a damn good clean and a coat of por15. Chucked the subframe back on the car with the MK3 wishbones, then put the car back on 4 wheels


I had removed the lighting loom earlier, so i set about stripping off all the old plastic sleeving, and removed a few un-needed wires. Then wrapped it back up with my nice loom tape, and repaired some of the ends with fresh terminals


Next day I got the new track rod ends and went to fit them to the track rods. Unfortunately they turned out to be around 10mm too long for some reason (ebay specials!) so out came the grinder and we lopped a bit off the ends. cleaned up the ends of the threads and the rods fitted fine. chucked em on the rack and did up the new boots, all was well with the world again. I started to clean the bay then got carried away with the marine clean and metal ready, eventually I ended up de-rusting the whole thing as well as the subframe, then I gave it some por-15 touch ups to seal it. Looks a bit messy as I didn't bother giving it a top coat of royal blue, and I couldn't be arsed to scrape off all the wax. way I see it, the wax has stopped the rust since 1990, so it can stay! I really should have done the brake servo, but though bugger it, cant see it when engine is put together anyway


Next day and we dropped the engine back in, looking almost like a car again. After that I put the exhaust system back on. I used a jetex system, G60 downpipe, ABF manifold and miltek MK3 GTI cat bypass. You can just squeeze a MK3 manifold and cat downpipe with the engine fitted, but next time I'll fit it to the engine first
It all bolted straight up with no fuss, I was well chuffed
Then I had a thought. 'Crap, did I remove the tissue paper I blocked the zaust ports with?' So I had to unbolt it all again to check. To answer my question, no I hadn't left the tissue paper in the zaust ports
I bolted it back up again, then the last stud shears off flush with the manifold (I had used new copper nuts) which was totally awesome. So it had to come off AGAIN and I spent the next 3 hours with mole grips, stud extractors and harsh language. Nothing was working and I thought engine was gonna have to come out again! Then I found a random 7mm socket, which I hammered over the stud, and joyously it came out. New stud and zaust was refitted.

After that laid out the engine loom so I could finalise the layout and get it wrapped. Taped it where I was happy and called it a day, went inside and drunk some beer. You can see beer #1 in the piccy


The next day was spent refitting all the management and finalising everything. Once it was in I turn the key to prime the pump, couldn't get engine to fire. Rechecked my fusebox wiring and thought it was almost like ECU wasn't getting power, I checks the ECU relay and it clicks so thats fine. Then I remember I hadn't actually fitted the ECU yet
So I puts one in and it fires and dies, which is to be expected as I hadn't matched up the immobiliser yet. But then I smells fuel, and look at the back and i see it dripping under the car
After a look I see one of the new lines made by pirtek just over 2 year ago is ****ing fuel out of one end
Once I get the line off I see the rubber pipe had totally perished, also noted they had also used this PTFE tape stuff on the threads. However had managed to pretty much totally block the pipe with some of it, which was pure genius. I have no idea how the car even ran like that

I turn my garage upside down looking for a suitable pipe, and got nothing. I couldn't even find any fittings that could be used. Since there is a metal collar which is crimped over the pipe I couldn't easily remove it, its 6 o'clock, I have no transport and no dremel cutting discs. So I had to hammer the feck out of the thing till I could rip off the sleeves and get the fittings out. Eventually I gets the ends out and push em into some new fuel injection pipe i have, secured with fuel line clips. Pump back on, and car now leak free.
So next step, get vag-com plugged in and get it immob fixed. spent hours messing about with that, cable stopped working half way thru and couldn't get car to run. Swapped about several ecus and transponder units, no dice. Pitch black by now so I give up and go inside.

Next morning I begged a lift off a mate to get some fresh petrol, just in case it was that, and no nothing. swapped the ISV, no, nothing. Give it another go with vag-com, still nothing! Then I notice the car will run if throttle is open a bit, so I swapped on another ISV, and success! So immob was fixed ages ago, just wasted most of my day due to 2 faulty ISV. So next I bleed the coolant and PAS, then swap the wheels off the cab onto it. Front one was a little flat, but thought i could drive it to garage & pump it up. as soon as I move the car 2 foot <pop> tyre totally flat, blowout

So I dig thru the garage and swap over another pair of wheels, and get it to MOT station just in time. I'm sitting there while its getting tested, noting how awesome the exhaust sounds when it stops. then you hear it cranking, nothing. cranking, vroom, cough chug. repeat x6.
So I had to push it out of the station, I sit there twiddling my thumbs for a bit, looking at engine all over. eventually it fires up, so I jump in quick smart and drive home. I get half way there and it cuts out on a roundabout. So I floor it and crank it over, after 3 goes at that I get car off the roundabout and into a side road, pop bonnet and check again. After 5mins or so it fires up again, so off i go and it cuts out yet again round the next bend, so i leave it another 5mins and it runs long enough to get me home

A quick check on vag-com and it flagged up the crank sensor, which though new it was a cheapy one off ebay. I orders one from mattneck and walk to work. turns up the next day and I swap it over the next weekend, problem solved. Tip for you, if you want a new crank sensor, spend more than 25, apparently the saving isn't worth it
So I books another MOT and it fails on the rear callipers, so I pop home and strip them right down, and find the sliders are rusted where the pads move. Gave em a good buff up n copper greasing, and flies thru the MOT test.

Over the next few days I tidy it up some more and fit the corrado PAS reservoir setup, and clean up my washer tank. Happy with how the bay looks now

 

paul: along with the reservoir there is a T piece sat where the mk2 reservoir was and a single pipe from there to the corrado reservoir. the pipe from the front of the mk2 reservoir to the pas pump isnt quite long enough, so either need to add an extension piece or pinch the one from the donour.

rip-mk3: SEAT ABF

richard-MK2: I'm running a corrado 1-touch window loom. MIMs are gone, I'm now getting the TSWs refurbed

 

they're air guides I think, seem to be fitted as std on all the 4 stud MK3s. the ones with 239mm brakes also have air guides bolted on the callipers. Think I'm going to take them off the one on the passenger side is a bit bent and catches the shaft

 

not done much since, changed the top mounts for MK3 GTI ones as mine were worn, can see how bad in the engine pic above! Got the tracking checked and found it was 1 degree out, which isnt bad since I set it all up by eye

No problems to report, except I forgot to do up the front wishbone bolts which resulted in some interesting handling

Here's a piccy of it taken shortly after it got washed by shaz. obviously it had to rain! Shows it on the Estorils which I've been rolling on (no pics of the mismatched setup of 2x TSW omegas on the front, and 1x 13" steel and 1x 14" steel on the back I was running for a while unfortunately )


and heres the results from a rolling road I went to just the other day down at dyno dynamics:

 

well it would have been be dirty if i had, plus this pic ive had 'on file' for ages just not got around to posting it up

 

as above really, it got 136torques tho a typo on the sheet. best to compare the curves too, couple of the k-jet abf/9a ones in particular are interesting, can see how the k-jet delivers the power differently to the abf stuff.

its the only abf mk2 I have driven really except my mate James_S one which was the first ABF swap I did, but that was several years ago so cant really comment in comparison to mine. plus mine is loaded up with all the options so its a fair bit heavier than most mk2s
However I have run this car with the same abf lump on k-jet in the past so I can say that k-jet feels a little more 'lively' whereas abf power sneaks up on you. with k-jet you know you're going fast but with abf you dont. then look at speedo 'oh dear!'

down to abftorque being very smooth and linear, k-jet not so much. hope that makes some sence easier for you to come have a go yourself if you're local

 

better tough love than artificially high I'd say! Storms rollers are bad for this, I got 142bhp from a completely std 1.8 8v with 2.0 bottom end there