My Corrado (a little bit different)
Discussion
Hi PH,
I've been here ages but haven't posted a right lot as yet. I've been debating with myself as to whether to put a thread up of my current motor and have decided to fly in the face of the inevitable abuse and go for it
A bit of background - I like Corrado's. My first was a lowly 2.0 8V that I bought in 2008, it was the only one I could afford to insure at the time as I was only 24 and money was tight. It was great, full leather, heated seats and a modern drive compared to the Polo GT I had before! Here's a pic:
Did some work on it (brake upgrades, wheels etc) took it to the 'RIng, had fun:
Then I decided that I wanted more power, so the natural progression was a VR6. Sold the 8V and found myself in this:
Again, decided to do some work on it - so after an engine rebuild (OBD2 conversion, chains, tensioners etc), brake upgrades and suspension work, I ended up with this:
But then, the inevitable happened and I moved out of the parents house into my own place. Almost immediately I couldn't afford to run the VR6 anymore. I was forced to sell both the VR6 and my Vauxhall-engined Mini
However, on the day the VR6 was picked up I was contacted by the chap who bought the 8V from me who said it was up for sale. I snapped it up for a third of the amount that I got for the VR6 and I was back in a Corrado.
I ran the 8V for a bit, bought some winter tyres and subjected it to the ravages of 'that' winter of 2010:
Then things got silly, I'll let a few pictures do the talking. Basically, I really NEEDED a project, something to do. Plus, I wanted something economical that still looked good, and I was fed up with the crap 2.0 8V engine which while being reliable wasn't much fun.
So.....feel free to abuse! I built it myself over the course of about 4 weeks and if you're interested the full build thread is here (i've been told it makes a good way to waste half an hour!):
Corrado TDi Build Thread
To summarise, its a 1995 Corrado fitted with a 1.9 TDi from a B4 Passat. It's been finished for almost a year and while it's currently producing 90bhp/155lbft I'm in the process of modifying with an aim of 150bhp/280lbft. Nothing special but it should make it a reasonably brisk practical daily driver
Thanks for reading!
Tom
I've been here ages but haven't posted a right lot as yet. I've been debating with myself as to whether to put a thread up of my current motor and have decided to fly in the face of the inevitable abuse and go for it
A bit of background - I like Corrado's. My first was a lowly 2.0 8V that I bought in 2008, it was the only one I could afford to insure at the time as I was only 24 and money was tight. It was great, full leather, heated seats and a modern drive compared to the Polo GT I had before! Here's a pic:
Did some work on it (brake upgrades, wheels etc) took it to the 'RIng, had fun:
Then I decided that I wanted more power, so the natural progression was a VR6. Sold the 8V and found myself in this:
Again, decided to do some work on it - so after an engine rebuild (OBD2 conversion, chains, tensioners etc), brake upgrades and suspension work, I ended up with this:
But then, the inevitable happened and I moved out of the parents house into my own place. Almost immediately I couldn't afford to run the VR6 anymore. I was forced to sell both the VR6 and my Vauxhall-engined Mini
However, on the day the VR6 was picked up I was contacted by the chap who bought the 8V from me who said it was up for sale. I snapped it up for a third of the amount that I got for the VR6 and I was back in a Corrado.I ran the 8V for a bit, bought some winter tyres and subjected it to the ravages of 'that' winter of 2010:
Then things got silly, I'll let a few pictures do the talking. Basically, I really NEEDED a project, something to do. Plus, I wanted something economical that still looked good, and I was fed up with the crap 2.0 8V engine which while being reliable wasn't much fun.
So.....feel free to abuse! I built it myself over the course of about 4 weeks and if you're interested the full build thread is here (i've been told it makes a good way to waste half an hour!):
Corrado TDi Build Thread
To summarise, its a 1995 Corrado fitted with a 1.9 TDi from a B4 Passat. It's been finished for almost a year and while it's currently producing 90bhp/155lbft I'm in the process of modifying with an aim of 150bhp/280lbft. Nothing special but it should make it a reasonably brisk practical daily driver
Thanks for reading!
Tom
Wow, wasn't expecting so many replies
There're quite a lot of questions so I'll try to cover them all.
MPG wise, it varies depending on how I drive but it seems to be averaging about 57-60mpg. On a long run I can get 65mpg and blatting it around the country lanes I generally return 50ish.
Performance wise, it's not 'quick' but it's not slow either. I've measured the 0-60 time as being about 10.5 seconds, which as someone said is pretty much the same as the 2.0 8V that I removed from the car. The engine is really nice, plenty of torque but doesn't have much to give above about 3000rpm, particularly with it currently being a non-VNT turbo. It does however deliver a fairly nice shove in the back at lower rpm and it can still be 'fun' to stir the gears and eeek the best in terms of performance. I have owned high-revving petrol engined cars (including a Corrado VR6 as I previously said) so I feel fairly well qualified to comment on the old 'petrol vs diesel' debate. I would sum it up by saying that while the driving experience lacks the high-intensity drama of a revvy petrol car, it still provides a good amount 'smiles per mile'. I find it quite satisfying to only have 90bhp and still be able to play with more powerful cars on the twisties, as I'm sure a lot of you know that the Corrado benefits from a superb chassis. I also know it'll never really be quick enough to kill myself so it sort of encourages me to drive it quickly everywhere
To settle the weight argument that someone was having - it weighs 1155kg with not much fuel in the tank. Somewhere halfway between a 4-pot and a VR basically. When you were talking about Furby's I thought you meant those annoying little penguin things that all the kids wanted for Christmas about 10 years ago so I'm glad Kerrly clarified that it was a Fabia because I'd never have got it
You won't believe the amount of times I've been told that "that VE engine is a waste of time, you should have just shoved a PD in there and be done with it". Well this is my opinion on the matter.......there isn't really any benefit - the PD is more complicated, expensive to buy, suffers if incorrectly maintained and require lots of electronics to get it to work, including the use of the donor vehicles clocks. Not to mention the inherent difficulty of the engine mounts which require a fair bit of modification to the chassis legs or hefty subframe modifications coupled with turbo changes etc. Admittedly, they're *slightly* more refined, but offer no other benefit. They're even less economical. The VE TDi literally drops straight in, is good for big power (200bhp on standard internals is achievable with relatively good reliability, they will give 170bhp all day long with no bother), allows one to easily run the standard Corrado clocks, standard wiring, etc. It is relatively cheap (sub £1k) to modify the engine to give 150bhp/260lbft, so once you've factored in the purchase price of a PD engine and all the ancillaries etc I believe a VE is the way to go.
I built the car to look as close as possible to how it would have done if VW had ever built a Corrado TDi. It uses an engine of the same vintage (90bhp 1Z for someone who asked), which is a *relatively* straightforward physical swap. I say relatively because there were still a few challenges to overcome, and I did chose to rebuild the rest of it at the same time
To the person who asked if I was at the 'Ring last year, I was indeed. I remember you guys arriving and I spent a bit of time admiring the cars when you weren't looking I think. Someone even got a picture of the Corrado which made me happy:
Think that's everything, thanks for reading
There're quite a lot of questions so I'll try to cover them all.
MPG wise, it varies depending on how I drive but it seems to be averaging about 57-60mpg. On a long run I can get 65mpg and blatting it around the country lanes I generally return 50ish.
Performance wise, it's not 'quick' but it's not slow either. I've measured the 0-60 time as being about 10.5 seconds, which as someone said is pretty much the same as the 2.0 8V that I removed from the car. The engine is really nice, plenty of torque but doesn't have much to give above about 3000rpm, particularly with it currently being a non-VNT turbo. It does however deliver a fairly nice shove in the back at lower rpm and it can still be 'fun' to stir the gears and eeek the best in terms of performance. I have owned high-revving petrol engined cars (including a Corrado VR6 as I previously said) so I feel fairly well qualified to comment on the old 'petrol vs diesel' debate. I would sum it up by saying that while the driving experience lacks the high-intensity drama of a revvy petrol car, it still provides a good amount 'smiles per mile'. I find it quite satisfying to only have 90bhp and still be able to play with more powerful cars on the twisties, as I'm sure a lot of you know that the Corrado benefits from a superb chassis. I also know it'll never really be quick enough to kill myself so it sort of encourages me to drive it quickly everywhere
To settle the weight argument that someone was having - it weighs 1155kg with not much fuel in the tank. Somewhere halfway between a 4-pot and a VR basically. When you were talking about Furby's I thought you meant those annoying little penguin things that all the kids wanted for Christmas about 10 years ago so I'm glad Kerrly clarified that it was a Fabia because I'd never have got it
You won't believe the amount of times I've been told that "that VE engine is a waste of time, you should have just shoved a PD in there and be done with it". Well this is my opinion on the matter.......there isn't really any benefit - the PD is more complicated, expensive to buy, suffers if incorrectly maintained and require lots of electronics to get it to work, including the use of the donor vehicles clocks. Not to mention the inherent difficulty of the engine mounts which require a fair bit of modification to the chassis legs or hefty subframe modifications coupled with turbo changes etc. Admittedly, they're *slightly* more refined, but offer no other benefit. They're even less economical. The VE TDi literally drops straight in, is good for big power (200bhp on standard internals is achievable with relatively good reliability, they will give 170bhp all day long with no bother), allows one to easily run the standard Corrado clocks, standard wiring, etc. It is relatively cheap (sub £1k) to modify the engine to give 150bhp/260lbft, so once you've factored in the purchase price of a PD engine and all the ancillaries etc I believe a VE is the way to go.
I built the car to look as close as possible to how it would have done if VW had ever built a Corrado TDi. It uses an engine of the same vintage (90bhp 1Z for someone who asked), which is a *relatively* straightforward physical swap. I say relatively because there were still a few challenges to overcome, and I did chose to rebuild the rest of it at the same time
To the person who asked if I was at the 'Ring last year, I was indeed. I remember you guys arriving and I spent a bit of time admiring the cars when you weren't looking I think. Someone even got a picture of the Corrado which made me happy:
Think that's everything, thanks for reading
MJK 24 - sounds awesome, you should start a thread
Just to let you know, I've recently acquired another Corrado and I'm getting the itch to build another TDi. Its ripe for it as its a VR6 without the engine/box so the TDi would slot in there perfectly. I'd be building it to sell so if you're seriously interested then let me know
Just to let you know, I've recently acquired another Corrado and I'm getting the itch to build another TDi. Its ripe for it as its a VR6 without the engine/box so the TDi would slot in there perfectly. I'd be building it to sell so if you're seriously interested then let me know
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