Well, its been a pretty uneventful few months, which is no bad thing! The Mark2 has been the daily work-horse whilst I get a few bits tidied up on the Mark3.

As a few of you will recall at Polo Show this year I had a slight downpipe/manifold issue, in that they had parted company. aA quick trip over to Vic's (who was a complete and utter legend for not only having the part needed to fix the problem, but kindly let us use his garage and tools to fix things), saw things remedied, or so I thought!

On the way back from BVF I got less than a mile from my house to hear the same thunderous sound of manifold and downpipe going their seperate ways. By this point I'd had enough and decided I'd take the sledgehammer to crack a nut approach and buy a replacement exhaust that I'd conveniently spied on ebay that same week.

The result after fitting my newly acquired exhaust was this:

Which, whilst the fitment was good and the sound was nice enough, did my head in as the tailpipe not only rattled on the rear valance, but was massively too long for a Mark2.

A quick trip to my local Powerflow place managed to doctor up this:

Which wasn't quite the tailpipe I was after, but looked better, and hey, the exhaust was cheap enough!

Next on the list of bug-bears was my cars appetite for clutch cables (1 every 1500 miles). My suspicion after speaking to 86C was there was too much friction on the relese bearing, putting more strain on the clutch cable than it could stand.

Rather than take the 4 speed box off to regrease the release bearing and fit the 4 speed box again, I decided to gather all my conversion parts and switch to 5 speed. I had intended to do the conversion since getting the car back on the road, but had struggled with finding a gearbox, until one was discovered recently in my local scrapyard.

So, being a gluton for punishment, the weekend after fitting a full exhaust system, we decided to comvert my car to 5 speed.

Goodbye GX:

Hello 8P:

I've since fitted some poly exhaust mounts, but other than that, thats about where things are at the moment.

Love the GX goodbye gesture

I think Homebrew Crew with Pirate Modding Skills has reformed as a duo.

Actually poss a trio if we include Gio. If he's well behaved.

Triiiiio! Giiiiiooo!....

(too much Tesco Cola)

Hahaha! I think we're fueled by that stuff these days. With any luck we'll become caffeine dependant soon .

Maybe the gearbox didn't quite deserve that send off, but hey, looking back at it retrospectively, I hold it partially responsible for my £80 recovery charge!

I just swapped my gx for an 8p too. Yeah boyyy haha.

Looks nice this!!!

Make much difference eric?

Car looks great karl! Saw your mk3 in flesh the other week

It does indeed, the rev drop in third isnt too bad due to where the power is on the 8v, i think the valver struggled because most of the grunt was at the top end.

So nice having 5th gear though.

Tell me about it, especially having to do 2 thirds of my journey to work on A roads. New wheels are in the pipe-line. I don't think Eric will like me for them though .

You've been down the workshop then Max? You'll have seen the other projects I've got a hand in too.

Yeah, me and steve had to pick up a dizzy from one of the units near yours after i blew my dizzy up at the track day!

Looked awesome insde the unit by the way, so gelous

What wheels??? Gaylord!

Yeah, me and steve had to pick up a dizzy from one of the units near yours after i blew my dizzy up at the track day!

Looked awesome insde the unit by the way, so gelous

Its better in there since having at least 2 major clean-outs since we moved in some 2 years or more ago. Also got more space to play with now for getting rid of a long term project non of us had the time or motivation to fix.

Currently got my attentions on sorting out a long-term Derby project with Charlie, with a mind to sorting out the Audi next.

What wheels??? Gaylord!

They might be 13 x 7 and steel .

My GX got me from Carlisle to MK at full chat in the fast lane all the way - but then, i could only use 4th gear because the other three made a horrible racket, so i didn't have much choice.

Looked great at poloshow this, just needs some more fitting wheels imo.

What wheels??? Gaylord!

They might be 13 x 7 and steel .

i hate you. theyl look crap on a red mk2 they wont suit it atall honest!

All I can say is I was bidding on 2 sets of wheels on German ebay. One was some 13x6 ATS Pepperpots and the other some Mattigs. The ATS went well over the £200 mark, whilst I actually won the Mattigs for quite decent money with 2 useable tyres. Just got to wait for them to arrive, refurb and sort tyres. By the time all thats happened it will probably be having a break whilst the Mark3 sees the light of day . I'm not sure what to do with the valver wheels next, and I've still got my 13x6 RAs and Ronals to find homes for!

So after a little wait, and what was actually a trouble free transaction thanks to the German seller, these turned up Thursday and Friday of last week.

And then I decided to try something as I had my beauty rings lying about in the unit. I think it could work!

They're now off the car, reardy to have a much needed refurb, as the pressure washer saw off most of the previous owners attempt to paint them black . I've also tried on a few spacers, so I can look at buying the correct stub-axle spacers. 10mm seems to be the magic number.

Next on the list is audio.

looks great on those wheels karl. I've just snapped a clutcg cable due to it being so stiff(release bearing) .not entirely sure what box to mate with the 1. 6 16v yet though. . with the 8p, what sort of rpm does it sit at 70mph?

Thank you. Just checked it tonight. On standard wheels and tyres I was at 3,250rpm in 5th at 70.

loved it with the beauty rings as well.

Thank you. Just checked it tonight. On standard wheels and tyres I was at 3,250rpm in 5th at 70.

How far is your speedo out etc.. Sounds about same as mine but in reality I'm most prob doing 60 ish

I can't remember exactly which point the speed difference increases, but on standard 165/65/13 tyres its 5mph out below (I think) 65mph, then it starts to increase to as much as 9mph when you get closer to an indicated 100mph. Around 70mph I think its 7mph out on what the speedo is showing, so an actual 63mph.

The 'tigs are currently being refurbished at a place up the road from my work. He reckoned he could turn them around in a day (seen as I gave him bare wheels with no tyres, weights or valves), so I'm gonna pop there during dinner to see how close he is to keeping that promise.

Well i've worked mine out to be roughly 10% out through the range .. 195 45 14s .

You work in a bodyshop do you not K? Why are you paying someone to do work you can do Too much money :p

I like the beauty rings!

I do indeed, however, you ask a painter to paint something for you and you end up waiting 2 months (like my mirrors and bumpers for the Mark3)!

So I took matters into my own hands and sub-contracted the wheels . Sure enough They've been done in less than 24 hours. I'm made up. Hopefully get chance to put 2 tyres on today. The other 2 were fit for the bin, and I need to start selling off a few bits and pieces from the loon before I can look at purchasing the remaining 2. Oh the joys of having bills to pay .

Tonights task is fit my replacement parcel shelf support speakers and look at some more painting on the Derby. Maybe take some bits off one of the loons. I think we have too many Polos .

I do indeed, however, you ask a painter to paint something for you and you end up waiting 2 months (like my mirrors and bumpers for the Mark3)!

Just been round my mates in lunch... said i want my wheels painting, we are doing them this weekend.... You just ask the lazy sprayers

Did you do them silver??