The old saying goes third time’s the charm. Well, we’ll see if that saying holds water. I was doing my usual nightly Craigslist searching last week & stumbled upon this “gem”. It’s a 97 VW Jetta GLX VR6. Has 178k & well it needs some TLC. Guy was only asking 1200 obo so I ran up from Glenville to Granville late last Tuesday night to grab it. He said he only needed 900 dollars for some Ranger he wanted so we agreed on that price.
Here’s what the car has going for it:
-VR6 still runs strong
-Clutch & Timing chain have been done
-Everything’s all there (trim wise)
-Body’s straight with just a few rust spots
The not so good about it:
-The rust spots haha
-Needs a wheel bearing
-Needs tires
-Needs a good detail
-Needs a throttle position sensor
-Needs a headlight lens
I have some pretty simple plans for it right now but if it’s a good ride, I think I’ll do a VRT build with it.
Here’s my plans for the time being:
-Retrofit the stock headlights
-Borla Muffler (Resonator has already been deleted)
-Clean it up inside & out
-Badge-less grill
-Lower it on coilovers
-Give it a good tune up
Here’s some pics. Let me know what you guys think!
1st Jetta for those who don’t remember, 04 GLI 1.8T aka the Junky Dub:
2nd Jetta was my 2010 TDI which was just recently traded in last month for a new Silverado:
With the APR stage 1 tune it ran pretty well. Comfortable, nice features. Overall good car. Like the Silverado more though aside from the mileage difference lol.
Well, started making some progress on the green turd today. My buddy Dan is always willing to help so he came over to help me out. Between the 2 of us this is what we got done today. I worked on the intake, the K&N filter that was on the car was dirty & zip tied on to a coupler on the MAF. Pulled all that out, found a disconnected vacuum hose from the intake to the head so fixed all that, cleaned the MAF, threw the new filter on & new filter on the breather hose. Cleared the codes & fired it up. Was running running a lot better but still spitting here & there. Pulled the plugs to change them out & ran into more crap. Wires were a PITA to remove off the plugs, 4 of the 6 plugs fought us coming out & obviously haven’t been changed in a long time & 2 of the plugs are completely rounded off. Couldn’t get those off with the tools I got so that’s on hold. Gonna need new wires & a valve gasket. Dan spent the time while I was doing all this detailing the interior & it came out great. We also discovered this has the window key control mod done to it which I love. Ordered a badgeless grill & euro front lip for it. Pics of the work today:
Front’s not the greatest, hopefully I’ll find a new driver’s seat
Making some progress on the green turd. FINALLY got the 2 rounded spark plugs out & all my new NGK plugs in. Now just waiting on my gaskets from ECS so I can do the valve gasket & my new wires so I can finish my tune up. I’ve been slowly working on the retrofit project & now just have to figure out what to do for lenses & wire it all up. Tires were ordered last night so once they come I’ll bring them up to Tony after I refinish the stock wheels. Still waiting on my euro lip & badgeless grill to show up, should be here in a day or 2. Hopefully week it’ll go up to B&H to get the wheel bearings done & get inspected. Hoping to have it on the road soon. Few pics:
More progress made on the GLX. All the trim is now back on the car, my euro lip came a day early which is awesome so that was put on. Had to trim the bumper up a little but can’t complain. Torn right now between refinishing the stock wheels or getting some bbs lm reps. Got a lot to think about there. Jordan80 was nice enough to give me a spare set of headlights which will come in handy for inspection in a few weeks since as stated a few posts earlier, my retrofit setup I won’t have high beams. Housings for the headlights are all painted & cleared, projectors have been JB welded in, now to just figure out the whole lens issue. Few pics for now, hoping to have this on the road some time next week.
I say leave the wheels alone for now and lower it. Save the money for other odds and ends little things that may pop up. Once it’s all squared away then look into wheels.
Haven’t posted much about the old GLX in a while so here’s what Shift has missed. Went to do the valve cover gasket & noticed puddles of oil in the top of the head which was a nice red flag. Had my buddy take a look at it & well it appears we have a head problem. Rather than mess with it, I decided to pick up a spare low mile motor to just swap in. Ordering new mounts, headers, test pipe, G12, clean coolant tank & a few other odds & ends & then having Gurn from Rofl do the swap for me. Hopefully then it’ll be ready to be on the road. Also got a set of coilovers & I’m currently deciding what wheels to put on it. I also got a euro center console & installed the trunk popper in the console. Retrofit is done & they’re on the car all hooked up. Hopefully by September she’ll be on the road.
um. since when is a little pooled oil in the head a sign of a motor problem, certainly not one that requires a swap lol.
worst case ontario, there’s some sludge gumming up the returns…put some fresh cheap oil in it with some kerosene or something, run for a short while, change and go
yeah you think it is. had one of these for parts that looked better off than that and you could stick a screw driver through most of the “solid rust spots” and you bought an OBD2 Mk3… good luck.
Gave it a quick bath
