I've been planning for a while to do a pd transplant in my mk2, but having just secured the job offer of a lifetime which comes with company car (a4 avant s-line) I no longer need the mk2 as a daily driver and so the idea of going through with the ball ache (and expense) of the pd transplant kind of seems pointless. So question is, what route do I take from here? ABF or VR? What are the pros and cons of each? Cheers
ABF would be the easiest, but you may as well go VR. Find a rear ended VR6 swap over the axles (so your mk2 is now 5 stud and has 288mm brake set up) and then drop the engine in. Some modification/fabrication will be needed for the gearbox but you can do a search that. Failing that you could go for a 20vt conversion.
I have an ABF in my Corrado and its pretty sweet. Its running on K-Jet (for now) and since being set up properly hasn't skipped a beat! Great power and the torque is awesome compared to the 16v KR that I did have. It was an easy swap to do really. I did everything in 5 weeks - including sourcing and engine, sorting some bodywork, getting it in and getting it running. What is your golf at the moment 8v - 16v?
Yeah I'm leaning more towards the abf at the minute, looks a lot easier. Just found an engine for 250, and can either do the work in my mates barn or pay 500 to have it done properly. Compared to the 2500-3000 I had set aside for the pd seems well cheap. Currently running an 8v, had quite a lot of work done and puts out about 145bhp, just find it really boring to drive.... I think it needs an extra 50 ish. Lets face it, more than that is a waste!! So if I'm aiming for ballpark figure of 200bhp which engine should I be looking at? I'm guessing the 20vt would involve quite a lot of work, and prob more expensive than the abf?
You can get 200BHP out of an ABF fairly easy with some light work from what I've heard. Plus it's a much easier swap all round.
From what I've read it isnt that easy to get 200hp out of an ABF, ask EssThree, hes spent a fair bit and is only banging on the the 190s. If your current engine is touching on 145 you wont get a whole lot more out of an ABF, certainly not 50hp without some work.
2.0 16 valve is a great conversion cheap to do and good power / torque,ideal for a daily driver as the MPG is still good, that said its still not a quick car IMHO if i had another car for daily use and i could take my time on the conversion i'd go 20VT, a solid 280bhp and a few choice chassis / gearbox mods would make a really special 2nd car
for hp i would say ABF. VR6 engine's are great but as i'm finding out when things need fixing or replacing its hard to get parts and they tend to cost a fair bit. I would love to go down the 24v VR6 route, with 204hp stock you can up the power fairly well on these and then if you feel like more power, throw a supercharger onto it. Just a thought but you considered a G60? They can be got for cheap and with a stage 3 chip, pulley and cam can see 200hp'ish and sound great!
ABF at 190bhp needs some serious time and money spending on it. Ess Three's engine has had some top work on it and I believe he has tinkered about with alot of things to get it up at that kind of power. Theres a thread somewhere about running an ABF on megasquirt instead of stock management and by tweaking the fueling it was putting out 160bhp but massively increased torque (I seem to recall it was up at over 150lbs which is high for a 16v!) If you want an easy 200bhp and fuel costs are not an issue then throw the VR6 lump in tbh. Will sound awesome and go really well. If you get bored you can always throw a supercharger on it to take it up to 250+bhp If you want something really tunable then go for the 1.8 20vt conversion. Mines up at 400bhp and most seem to be able to get 250bhp out of them by remapping and adding a bigger turbo. You can keep uprating the turbo every time you get bored of the car.
Based on VW_Singh's results on a standard-ish ABF, you could expect to get close to peak power of 190-200 bhp, but probably not over it, with: ABF bottom end Flowed Head Mild-ish cams (260 or 268?) Megasquirt, or other mappable management Tubular Exh Manifold and Decent System and some proper calibration. With a VR, you'll get more torque from low down. Personally I'd go 4 pot for better weight distribution, but it's down to your preference.
Cool, cheers guys! Some great advice there.... I think I'm ruling out the vr. My mate has just picked up a real sweet ABF, so I'll go for a spin in that and see what I think. I've read through a few builld threads and it all makes sense. 20vt is definately worth looking more into....are there any good threads about? hmmmm....g60 oooohhh I love that sound...makes me feel all warm and fuzzy..... Anyway.....yeah I've got plenty of time to do the build properly, and while moneys not too much of an issue I'm still a tight fecker....the way I see it, if I spend a lot on this project then I may as well stick with the original plan of a PD... Whats the overall cost of the 20vt/g60 routes, both for the actual builds and then running costs? Really appreciate the advice, keep it coming!
I’m not sure if its gone or not but Switch off here was dismantling his 20vt and only wanted 650 for the engine which is running the larger turbo and looks lovely and nicely painted up. I think he wants a further 500 for the qpeng management to make it all work. You wouldn’t need much on top of that other than your own time and uprating the front brakes to G60 or better to make it all run. I’m half tempted to buy the engine myself and throw it in the garage to dump into my ABF’d mk3 whilst I re-con the ABF to go into a future mk2 as my ABF engine is sweet as a nut and pulls like an absolute train. My 400+bhp 20vt did 29mpg on the 100 mile trip back from buying it and that included a bit of cruising and a bit of fun driving too. So far I reckon I’ve done 175 miles in it and its used less than half a tank! 20vt is pretty economical unless you sit on boost and then I’ve been told on my set up it can run as low as 9mpg!!
Just got off the phone with my mechanic mate, who will probably get roped into doing most of the work, and he's trying to convince me to go down the vr route with then poss charging it further down the line. So at the mo its either the 20vt or the vr.....
