Skip to main content

Forum Fridays: A Wagon Lover’s Dream

When the history of cars is written, it will remember the golden age as a time before practical, engaging wagons were replaced by the Milli Vanilli of cars: the crossover. Today’s pick revisits that time in the early 2000s when modern technology graced these elongated estates with all the amenities you really need and finding one to buy didn’t require a blood sacrifice.

User D Nasty discovered not just any Jetta wagon, but a cherished diesel-powered TDI in a lovely shade of blue outside of Knoxville, Georgia. It wasn’t long before D had the car in the shop, en route to becoming the successor to — what else? — another blue Jetta Wagon, Nasty’s previous car.

Can You Say TLI?

Mention the name Volkswagen to any gearhead on the planet and the first three letters that come to mind will be GTI. It’s easy to forget that Volkswagen also offers the Jetta in a more sporting trim level. GLI versions of the car have been around for years now, delivering upgraded performance and aggressive styling, but never for wagon body style.

Nasty felt the newly acquired TDI was the perfect prospect for a GLI wagon conversion. It only takes a quick look at the pictures from the multipage build thread to see this is an enthusiast with some serious bodywork skills. If the ones of the new car in the shop don’t convince you, there are some of his first custom wagon, which isn’t half-bad itself.

Prime Time

At what appears to be his personal, private garage — and a very well-appointed one at that — Nasty set to work stripping everything out of the blue Jetta. The car is also slated to receive an upgraded interior pilfered from the GLI to give it a little more sporting feel on the inside, but pictures of it stripped down to bare metal are enough to make you bite your nails.

An electric sanding wheel can be spotted in multiple shots, and the transformation from painted to bare metal comes together in photographs as this owner puts on a clinic about how to sand down the paint on your car. Finally, with bare metal showing, it’s time for a coat of gray primer.

The matte-finish primer makes the chunky early ‘naughts wagon look angry in the best way. However, the car was finished in true-to-VW candy blue that displays incredible depth even in the photos. We imagine that seen in person, the car would be eye-popping.

The Finishing Touches

Nasty fitted a set of chrome split-spokes to the car, which does a convincing factory GLI wagon impression wearing its painted ground effects. The shiny wheels continue the theme set by the paint, catching the light from all points on the car.

We’re impressed by the amount of labor the owner put into returning this car to a color very close to the one it was wearing when purchased. One look at the photos, however, is all it takes to understand how far it has come. Nice job, D Nasty. Now, about that other wagon — is it still for sale?

Check out the entire build thread here.

The post Forum Fridays: A Wagon Lover’s Dream appeared first on VWVortex.



from VWVortex http://ift.tt/2Ex0Woy
via IFTTT
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Waterfest Moves to Atco Dragway

Waterfest 24 will be held at Atco Dragway, in Atco, New Jersey. The summer event will take place at its new venue on July 21 and 22. Long held in Englishtown, New Jersey, the festival has been such a large part of the VW scene that the latest iteration of the Golf even comes with optional “Englishtown” wheels . The new venue, however, is an NHRA drag track a scant 52 miles southwest of Englishtown. The ¼ mile drag track opened in 1960, which makes it the oldest drag strip in New Jersey. The announcement came today on a social media post that announced the new location. Waterfest is North America’s largest VW/Audi show. As many 20,000 people show up for the annual show, making the second largest show in the world—with Worthersee being number one. 2018 will be Waterfest’s 24 th year in existence. The post Waterfest Moves to Atco Dragway appeared first on VWVortex . from VWVortex http://ift.tt/2GQjkuc via IFTTT
Post a Comment
Read more

Macau Gets Messy with 16-Car Pileup

The Macau Grand Prix is always good for an accident or two or 16— you may remember Audi’s race ending crash last year —and this year’s event didn’t disappoint. It didn’t take long for things to get messy on the tight road circuit. On the opening lap of the qualifying race a 16-car pileup caused the race to be suspended. Things kicked off when Daniel Juncadella hit a wall on the exit of Police bend, one of the tightest parts of the already tight circuit. The following car of Raffaele Marciello was able to avoid the carnage, but Laurens Vanthoor, who was in the upside-down Audi that ended the race last year, could not avoid Juncadella and together they blocked up the road pretty much completely. “I couldn’t see him [Juncadella] at first. Then I saw the car standing still,” Vanthoor told Motorsport. “I tried to brake but it was just understeering and I couldn’t do anything. There’s room for one car there and you’re blind.” Fourteen more cars would eventually crash into the corner c
Post a Comment
Read more

The First of its Kind: Integrated Engineering Releases Highly-Anticipated IE450T MK6 Golf R Turbo Kit

After two long years of development, the team at Integrated Engineering has finally announced the release of their IE450T kit for the MK6 Golf R. With their turbo kit bolted on right out of the box, the sport AWD hatch is transformed into a 450bhp monster, with hardly any noticeable increase in spool time. In fact, 435 ft-lbs of torque are achieved at all four wheels, at a mere 3300rpm! By now you are probably asking yourself how this is even possible on a 2.0L engine that made nearly half that power from the factory. By employing true twin-scroll technology into the cast turbo manifold and pairing it with a state-of-the-art BorgWarner EFR turbocharger, IE was able to keep spool time at a minimum and bring the fastest-spooling big turbo setup to the market. “We wanted to offer a kit that would dramatically increase the power output without making the car lose its amazing street-friendly drivability,” mentioned one of the IE engineers. We are told the IE450T leaves the car driving jus
Post a Comment
Read more