Golf MK3 16V - The Bottomless Moneypit

[Benjaholic]

love that you kept your car. i have never lasted this long in keeping a car lol. youve had quite a few good looking cars man. so is OEM+ like a really big thing in the UK? i follow candyshowroom and alot of the cars they post are oem+, its interesting and a very clean look.

Cheers mate! Yeah OEM+ is pretty big in the UK, I think we're just not very adventurous to be honest haha!

That GTI has such a '2009 era stance look'. I dig it man

Thanks dude, I appreciate that! Just gotta dial in my fitment and then I'll be happy with it

def keep the roof racks

My thoughts entirely

[darth_thanos]

def keep the roof racks

[darth_thanos]

That GTI has such a '2009 era stance look'. I dig it man

[scweet14]

love that you kept your car. i have never lasted this long in keeping a car lol. youve had quite a few good looking cars man. so is OEM+ like a really big thing in the UK? i follow candyshowroom and alot of the cars they post are oem+, its interesting and a very clean look.

[Benjaholic]

Great read as always. Keep us informed!

Thanks bud, appreciate that!

Nothing much in the way of updates at the moment other than I sold my daily and bought a newer (still ancient), more comfortable daily. Not got many plans for this, probably just going to tidy it up and give it a little bit of OEM+ treatment, (factory tints, facelift parts, genuine S6 grill potentially...). It's an S-Line 3.0 TDI Quattro, it's got above average mileage but there's nothing majorly wrong with it at all. Goes rather well for it's size too .



Also, did a few other bits to the GTI, its currently back in storage now as the day the MOT ran out, the clutch went on the way to work too. lol (it was also my first day back at my old job so the stress was real haha!

I bought some Blue, Hella Magic Colour rear lights, then decided that I didn't really like them on it so I sold them. Kinda regretting it now though haha. Ooops!







The car is currently sat on a set of staggered Porsche 928 wheels that I borrowed off my mate, ran it through the summer like that and that's pretty much it, gonna fit all new brake lines in the coming months hopefully, and replace the clutch. Most likely will end up popping a G60 flywheel in too as they are much lighter than standard and they're a good, cheap little upgrade. I also bought some new control arms, but I'm waiting until I buy new coilovers so I can do all the jobs at once really.











LASTLY, I got some original Votex roof bars for an absolute steal. Debating whether I should run them or not? I really like them, what do you guys think?





Cheers for reading .

[Firstcarlife]

Great read as always. Keep us informed!

[Benjaholic]

We picked up pip in January, we spent a couple months saving up some money to start the build though…

A couple months ago work started and we made some real progress, I’m just gonna do a photo dump so you can see …

First on the list was sorting out that awful red badge on the front. I also sourced some original tail lights and front indicators in favour of the blacked out smoked ones that the previous owner had fitted.

Much better!



Then there was a bit of welding that needed sorting on the floor in the back, for some unbeknownst reason there was a big figure 8 hole that somebody had cut out. A friend of mine sorted that for us (as I still can’t weld ) and then we started lining the van with insulation and building our framework .















The idea is that we’ll have a little bulkhead with a door to separate our living area from the cab, the worktop is going to continue almost all the way to the back of the van, but there’s going to be a big full height cupboard there too.

Round about this point we had a huge scare, I was reaching up behind the dashboard to try and sort a small issue with the heater vents, basically they were stuck on hot constantly (not great in the summer )…

Anyways, as I reached up something fell, I looked and it turned out to be a cigarette lighter that somebody had previously wired in and then just tucked behind the dash. Literally as I touched it, it sparked on something and smoke started billowing out from behind the dashboard. I was proper scared. Cut a long story short, the thing set on fire and I managed to save it by running to the back and disconnecting the battery live.

After investigating it a bit further I found that the live wires had just been twisted together and left bare behind the METAL dashboard. Yes, the van has a metal dashboard. Even worse was the fact that the absolute idiot that wired it in had earthed it to said dashboard.

If it had rattled around and short circuited itself whilst I was out and about driving, and not at my unit, it genuinely would have burnt to the ground.

I ended up removing the dash and going through all of the rats nest of dodgy wiring to make it safe, I had a general tidy up too.

Bad!



Anyway, once that was done, we started work on the conversion side…

I carried on making the bed frame, this needed to be on two pivots; one, to allow the back to lift, so that we can access the engine bay still, and two, because the front needed to lift up as I was planning on putting chest storage underneath it .





I got it to this stage about a month ago and then broke my ankle skateboarding like an idiot .

After a few weeks of sitting on my arse feeling sorry for myself I decided it was time to get outside, so I hobbled outside and started on the van again from where I left off… I’m off work for a little while yet as I’m still in a pot on my foot.

This was yesterday .









Bed frame is basically done, I’m gonna do some more today so not sure what that’ll be.

Also a couple weeks ago, my mate brought his MX5 over and took me for a spin, he bought it in January too, crashed it two days later and has basically rebuilt it and in the meantime put coil overs and wheels on too. Proper proud of him haha!

As you can see, it’s pretty dirt nasty low .





That just about finishes it.

A side note, sometime a couple months ago I hit my daily MK3 estate with the lowering stick even more and fitted some 80mm drop plates to the rear, anyone who knows these cars will know it’s pretty difficult to get the back end down so these are a good solution. A lad local to me makes them so if anyone wants some get in touch and I’ll put you in touch .

I fitted some 16” Renault Megane steels too at the same time to complete the look. I’ve also made my own USDM style front indicators.









Now THAT is pretty much it haha.

PS. I sold my mountain bike last year and was planning on buying another this year. Anyway, Dee asked me if I’d rather buy that, or we both go halves on putting the Camper on Hydro so we can get it decked… You already know what my answer was . So once the conversion is complete in the back, that’s the next thing we’ll be saving for!

See you sooooon

[Benjaholic]

Wow there’s a lot of stuff I need to put on here!

Number one:

Wedding pics, (only the relevant ones tho right? )

My wife and her bridesmaids arrived in a gorgeous bay window camper that’s owned by a friend of ours, and I arrived with my best man and my ushers in my GTI

Me and Dee went to our reception in the camper tho.













So! After having a go in our friends bay window van on our wedding day, then honeymooning in Cornwall. We then became inspired because of seeing all the VW day vans and surf buses down there. Literally as soon as we got back, we decided to start our little camper adventure.

Meet Pip.



He’s a 1982 Type 25. He started life as a 1.6D panel van and had some windows put in in the 90’s I think. Sometime around four years ago the 1.6D was removed in favour of an AEF 1.9D lump out of a Skoda Felicia, and then some 80mm lowering springs found there way there too and here we are!

It’s getting late but I’m going to continue this story tomorrow ….

[Benjaholic]

So many plot twists but so many sick cars.
Congrats on the wedding.

Hope the wedding went great, both golfs look very nice

Cheers guys! Wedding went great thank youuuu 😁😁

[Aasan]

So many plot twists but so many sick cars.
Congrats on the wedding.

[Firstcarlife]

Hope the wedding went great, both golfs look very nice

[Benjaholic]

Taxed, MOT'd and Insured.

Ready to be my wedding car next weekend!

Still a couple jobs to do before then, but it's almost there

[Benjaholic]

I've been doing bits!

Here's a teaser...











LOWERING STICK INCOMING!

This also happened to the daily:

[Benjaholic]

Got my camera out the other day...

[Benjaholic]

Any updates on either car? Love the golf but havent seen much of it on here

Cheers man! As it happens yes I do finally have some updates ��.

So. First and foremost, the Lupo is no longer ��. I got bored one night during lockdown and put it up for sale. A lad from Bedfordshire came and picked it up and that’s that. I kinda miss it to be honest but I wanted a big diesel again, and to be honest, it was proper shagged ��.

Here’s a little pic dump of the Lupo.






This was it about 5 mins before it went. The guys dad brought it back because it was too low and I had to lift it for him. I also killed the tyres hence why it was sat on those awful Orange things. 1/10 probably the worst most stressful morning of my life ��.



So, in the meantime, me and my pal Rory moved up to an even bigger unit for just the two of us. This is housing our projects, furniture and a few breakers that we’ve both been doing to keep a bit of cash flow going. It’s so good having a dedicated space for car stuff. Unit wise, our plan is to get a two poster installed pretty soon, and tidy up the walls as they’re minging, but apart from that, we love it. It’s 90ft deep and we still pay the same rent as we did in our old unit which was half the size.





Anyway, now I can finally access my GTI, I’ve been putting together a plan of exactly what I want to do with it, and where I want to take the build.

My first job I did was removing the GTI arches, I’m going for a cleaner look so I bought MK3.5 Cabby rubstrips to replace them.



I then had to tackle my fuel tank straps, I won’t lie, I’ve had these laying around in a box for about two years and never got round to doing them.





Much Better!

I’ve bought a couple of other bits maintenance wise that I’m going to do this week I.e. ignition switch, and heater resistor. I kinda got sick of having to Hotwire it every time I moved it ��.

Next on the list is finding a set of track/race inspired wheels, good tyres, a brake upgrade, new coilovers, sway bar, rear anti roll bar, half cage. Then I’ll probably go down the route of cams and throttle bodies. I really REALLY want to turbo it though as well, so I still need to make my mind up performance wise.

That being said, I could change my mind at any point and go stancy again. I really like this look atm...



I’ll have to keep you all posted on this, but I WILL be putting updates on a bit more regularly now.

Finally, I bought a new daily. As a MK3 lover it only made sense to get another, so here’s my 1998 MK3 Golf GL Estate.




It’s a 1.9TDI AHU. The lad I bought it off had had it for about a year and as far as mods went, he’s just put a set of Passat Steels (**** it when people call them G60s because they aren’t ��) and a set of budget coilovers.

Before him, it was owned by an old bloke called Harry, who owned it for 17 years. It’s been serviced at the same garage two maybe three times a year all it’s life, so it’s pretty healthy to say the least.

So far all I’ve done is serviced it, whacked a set of Teledials on, tinted my lights red, dewipered, put a big sub and amp in the boot, and replaced all the speakers. I also resprayed my bumper as when I bought it, the bumper was in primer. Being an idiot, I assumed that my car was dragon green, but found out after I fitted the bumper that my car is actually Bright Green Pearl. ����*♂️����*♂️. (Always check your paint code haha! To be honest, it’s not bad at ten yards so I can live with it, for now.













As far as plans go with this, I’m just going to keep it as a useable daily, and sort some of the little niggles. I'm winding my coilovers down a bit further and changing my wheels on Wednesday for these:



Thinking of painting the faces either body colour matched Green or maybe Gold... What do you guys think?

Anyways, until next time, and thanks for reading ��✌��✌��.