The Story
The Story
My first and only other VW
2003 GTI 1.8t
The W8
2003 W8 Sport
6 speed manual
Bought it with 113k miles, currently (2/27/14) has 145k miles and probably one of the best running Passats out there.
January 2012
Had a coworker been bugging me about buying my GTI for months, but didn't know what I'd replace it with, so I didn't want to sell it. I had so much blood, tears, love, hate (the usual stuff) poured into the GTI, whatever I got had to be pretty significant. Now, from this point to the end of the paragraph, everything happened in one night. I looked at a new A4, thought maybe I should look at an older S4. The only one I could afford would be a B5. I liked them, but they just seemed so dated, and the 2.7t seemed like too much of a head ache. I had really wanted a B6 Passat also, but knew I couldn't quite afford those, and I didn't really like their interior. So I thought, what about a B5.5 Passat. Honestly I only thought about the 1.8ts and V6s. The W8 seemed too intimidating. Plus I needed a manual, I was not going to buy an early 2000s Auto VW. But the 1.8t just seemed too small, and the V6 just seemed too boring. So I figured, well, I'll see what W8s are out there, just for kicks and giggles. Came across a manual one and figured it much be a euro car. Figured I'd look into manuals a bit more and found out they sold them here. Then found out they were pretty rare. Then decided that's what I need to replace the GTI. I started searching Craigslist. I found one 8 hours away in Duluth, MN. At that point, it was decided, I'm buying that car.
The next day I contacted the seller and told my coworker to put the wheels in motion to buy my car. It took a month worth of working with my bank and the owners bank to get the car paid for. And was taking weeks for my coworker to sell his car in order to buy mine. Eventually I posted it for sale to the public, saying someone was planning to buy it but just in case he cant, it's for sale. Someone offered $1k more than I was asking, so like any money driven American, I sold it to this other guy. After more bank drama and 2 weeks of not having a car, I made the trip to Duluth to bring home my new love.
The drive back was fun, discovering all the little trinkets I didn't even think about it having. And was incredible how smooth and solid the car felt. The car looked so much like the GTI, just in it's styling and interior, many shared parts, but the W8 just felt so much more quality.
Week 1, bought coilovers
Did a couple or repairs. Headlight ballast was acting up so I replaced them with some aftermarket HIDs ballasts and bulbs. Replaced the front axles due to torn boots and one bad CV, and 2 weeks later one of the replacement ones blew apart going through an intersection. Motor mounts split open and leaked out, replaced the with 034 motorsports solid rubber mounts (deleted the stock W8 vacuum lines). And all seemed well after that.
Motor mount top nut tool
I ordered wheels, but thanks to the HP2 calipers, I couldn't just slap them on. So did some work.
Plenty of room...
Day one with wheels on
The rest of the story is little things here and there. So I'll just post pics for now.
Garage door lip
Brakes
Black headliner
Interior trim, went from factory wood to brushed aluminum vinyl to black wood.
Refinished the factory BBS Madras for winter
Electric exhaust cut outs cold start
2014 Updates to come
Will post back as things are updated.
