Not a lot to see but thought I would start a thread, as you never know what the future may bring

Most of my cares have lapped the 'ring and done trackdays or hillclimbs / sprints but no current plans for "Das Frugal Wagan" but never say never! The BMw 525TDS towcar did a Prescott hillclimb when the racecar was broken.... in 1min and a few hundreths if anybody cares :p

I'm the 3rd owner of the car.

1st owner clocked up lots of motorway miles between various offices.

2nd Owner is my mate - 1st owner living just round the corner, he bought it 3 years ago with 100K on the clock and did 10K in that time.

Over the time he had it it was flawless until the last few months, then it had a new headlight, front and rear pads and disks, new backbox, new front arms, cambelt done, and has some issues with locks/central locking (only passenger side works)

Car is the 3-banger TDi, bought it to do good MPG (The BMW was doing about 32MPG and I no longer needed to tow a racecar with it). 2000miles in and I'm averaging above 50MPG often late so often "pushing on".

I do a fair amount of mountain biking and its a little small for that, but the Thule bike-rack sits well and will take 3 bikes. I've hidden the lighting board plug in the boot.

Since getting the car I have swapped the broken passenger side wing mirror for a new one, and downgraded to a 6N wingmirror - I actually quite like the larger mirror (did I mention I'm not 20-odd like most on here seem to be) and have also bought a drivers side one to match.

The centre section fell apart and fell off, so thats been temp welded up and the car is booked in for a full exhaust in a month, will be 50mm bore pipe, straight through, no boxes till the backbox - should help with freeing up some spool and torque. I'll probably get a remap too (for MPG) having a look round the Jabbasport one is favourite at the moment _ I know they will do a proper job of a remap not just throw some extra fuel in and hope.

The car inst as "chuckable" as I had hoped for a small car, so will be checking the various bushes and replacing as required, as well as looking at the suspension. My favoured brand of BC Racing Coilovers only do kits for the 9N, not the 6N2 so will have to see what my options are.

This will be my second VW in my mainly RWD car history, having previously had a Passat (with 1.9 PD)

And this link here http://igorweb.org/equidec/Default.aspx

From this pinned thread here http://www.clubpolo.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=255889

Says my car came as standard with ...

X2B = National sales program Great Britain

1AC = Anti-lock brake system (ABS)

C8E = Steel wheels 6J x 14 Offset 43 (Must have been swapped at the dealers for alloys)

H2Y = Tires 185/55 R14 H

4KC = Side and rear windows in heat-insulatingglass

4GF = Windshield in heat-insulating glass

3NC = Rear seat bench/backrest, split folding

1MZ = Steering wheel for air bag system

Q1W = Standard front seats with integrated storage trays

J0N = Battery 330 A (61 Ah)

8BF = Halogen headlight for driving on the left

U0L = Instrument insert with tachometer clock and mph speedometer

8RE = 4 speakers (passive) (Well 2 speakers & 2 Tweeters)

8TD = Rear fog light for driving on the left

8AC = Radio "beta"

7R3 = Side turn signal lights (white)

Edited 27 May, 201313 yr by Stupid Monkey

nicely angled cat lol

Well a good friend of mine offered to detail my Polo for me, as he has done a lot of my other cars and helped keep my race car looking good too :)

Car was first cleaned with an array of products before the polishing, it was a full days, 11 hour, non-stop job 9am till 8pm

This Polo is a well used car, i live on the farm so it has to go down a dirt track to get anywhere, and often gets drive into forests so I can ride or build mountain bike tracks :) This means its hard to keep clean.

We plumped for a special finishing coat, its like RainX for the whole car, coating everything in a film that muck wont stick too. So when I jet-wash the MTB after use I can rinse off the car and it should come up all shiny again.

Disadvantages of this coating is the car cant be waxed/polished without first polishing off the opti-coat 2.0

Some info on the coating here - or google - http://www.elitecarcare.co.uk/optimum-opti...int-coating.php

Click for Bigger pics on Photobucket, or go direct to the album - http://photobucket.com/kevsshinypolo

Normality

All panels shown to be original

Worst 2 panels were the panel with the fuel flap & passenger door (dog jumping up at window scratches).

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Pete has a special torch for showing up scratches, and all the car was inspected and a few paint chips filled with some touch-up paint. With the torch you can see the felects of blue and silver within the paint

Polishing started ~10am after a REALLY good clean

Pic to show the before/after

After the polish, but before the coating.

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Then the coating was applied, by this time it was dark!

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The WORST bit was by the fuel flap, look at it now!

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There are more picture on facebook .....

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1...mp;l=394557a68e

As a side note, this car is supposed to be my eco-frugal-wagen and is doing that job nicely.

MPG STATS

2369 miles covered in 43 days (55 mile/day)

7 fill ups

245.9L Total

£335.43 Total

Best MPG 54.85, worst 47.2, average 52.05

Average 12p/mile

The Daily Driver I had before this was BMW E39 525TDS before was running about 32MPG, so I've saving about 7.5p/mile

Although the BM was of course much more refined, felt like a newer car even though its 4 years older and done double the milage, also much less road noise, the Polo whistles on the motorway and feels like a tin can.

Engine is great though, very impressed with its 3 cylinder boostings looking forward to having it remapped :)

Suspension is still boat-like on the Polo, bit crashy too, will need looking at before next years trip to Slovenia calling at the 'ring on the way back.

Thought I'd do some tidying up of the interior too, the gear gaitor was the only part showing wear, so has been replaced.

Well .. MPG on that tank was low ....

coming to work this morning the fuel gauge seemed very low to what I was expecting, and it had taken more than the usual half-a-second to start.

I filled up and carried on to work, when I got to the car park I thought I would look for a fuel leak, at this point maybe with the extra pressure the pipe must have split some more as it started pouring out from under the car.

Replaced the hose, 2 min job, must have lost 10L of fuel on the way too work, would have been a fair old fire in a petrol car (and I'm glad I didn't have to go through that AGAIN!)

Some of the other pipes seem brittle too, so thats a job on the list to replace the lot with new hose, I have a roll of 8mm braided fuel hose at home somewhere.

The Pipe

The puddle of fuel

Last fuel leak I had ...

Vid - http://youtu.be/hzZZoTbf7Cc

Aftermath - with mate looking at the damage

Thought I'd do some tidying up of the interior too, the gear gaitor was the only part showing wear, so has been replaced.

where did you get your gaiter from mate and how much? :)

cheers

eBay, cheap ~£6~£7

From these people

http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/topgaiters/m.htm...p;_trksid=p3686

Like the touches man!

What a difference to the paint after that polishing and treatment! Makes me want to get my bodywork sorted lol.

Also bet you shit yourself with that fire Lucky though!

Well, long winter, Polo did OK I live out in the sticks on top of the Pennines so had some winter tyres fitted.

Now fitted 4 brand new summer tyres and have been enjoying the extra grip of those :) Also did a full service using some spanky VW specific Motul oil

The window switch failed, but on the other polo forum found some good info with a part number

http://www.tigerstyle.co.uk/phpBB3/viewtop...f=7&t=50134

Drivers Side Electric Window Switch 6X0959855B 01C - in stock at my local dealers for £18.94 all in, so picking that up soon.

The car is not as shiny as it was, but the whole point of the detail was to get the special coating on, and its going back to my mate for a proper wash/refresh ready for summer, I can then just give it the occasional jet-wash.

Me and the Polo have a big 3000 mile European trip planned for July

First to Brugge, then somewhere in Holland, then to Spa for the 25 Fun Cup :)

Then onto Nurburgring, closed for tourist days but we'll do a lap of the MTB track on the bikes.

Onwards to Slovenia via Austrian Alps for a weeks Downhill MTB'ing

Then to Florence, well Mugello circuit for the Moto GP - will be cheering on James Ellison :)

From there to Chamonix / A'lpe Duez for the final week of MTBing - racing down the mountain - have a Google of "megavalanche"

Now for sale!

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/271213631560?ssP...984.m1555.l2649