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fairwell to the cummer

J

JSmith

CEG'er
Joined
Jun 28, 2001
Messages
205
Location
Wethersfield CT
I'm having serious thoughts on selling or trading in my truck. I bought it thinking it would be getting plenty of use for work and therefore earning a living for itself to help pay its outrageous monthly payment. Two years and that hasn't happened yet except for in the winter when I run it to plow snow. With the weak winter we just had I was really feeling the pinch having to dip into my savings to make a few payments. Not to mention the fuel prices now. Granted it does about 20 - 21 in town if I drive civilly and don't have any weight in it or towing a trailer and about 19.5 - 20 on the highway as long as i keep it under 75mph. (if I go 60mph it will get about 25mpg, shocking for a 3/4 ton pickup)

I'm thinking about a car. I'm leaning towrds a VW. My friend has one, a Jetta GL with TDI. I've driven it, its a fun car to drive and its comfortable. I'm thinking either a GLS with 1.8T and 5spd or a GLI with the fancy wheels, sportier suspension and and a 6spd. The TDI would be nice with the 30mpg in town and over 40 on the highway. (my friend gets about mid 30s around town and close to 50 on the highway and he drives it like an animal) But 90 hp you kinda have to drive it like an animal to keep up.
 
Just stay in the taller gears of the TDI, the torque will compensate. My brother inlaw had one and the thing pulled really well on the highway.
 
My friend has the TDI. Its got alot of guts in the low end. In fact I believe that it has more torque than the 1.8T. On the highway its a good ride. Its not going to keep up with an SVT of course but it will go double the distance on a tank of fuel.

My friend and I took his car to my parents place on Laconia two summers ago and we drove the 4 hours there and about half way home the gas guage finally moved from being past full.
 
get the GLI...such a fun car and so easy to modify, handling isnt as good as the svt but with a 6 speed, factory 18's and a factory turbo...you cant go wrong, my gf's GLI gets waaaaaaaaaaaaay more compliments than my SVT does and her car is much faster on the highway and even faster in the 1/4 mile, but the SVT takes off/on ramps faster
 
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You should have kept the truck for work only, and gotten a beater to drive to Lira's house every weekend. ;) :p

but it's too late for me to say that isn't it?
Enjoy the VW, Jaybob. :)
 
yeah, Jay already has the VW.
and if i remember coreectly, he did get the GLI
i didnt get the chance to look at it on friday, i was too busy cooking weiners and s'mores on the bonfire.
plus there was lotsa girl on girl stuff going on.....
 
my car is the GLI. It has the 1.8 turbo, the 18" wheels but doesn't have the GLI body kit or the 6 speed.

You're right, the handling is a way's off from what the SVT offers. I'm sure that the handling can be fixed for the most part with a set of sportier struts and sticky tires.

The only thing the GLI doesn't have that the SVT had lots of is low end torque. Below 2K RPM the GLI can't touch the SVT. I'm still learning what gear to get in for a specific speed after slowing down for a corner. With the SVT it didn't really matter. It had so much balls in the low end you could drive it like a truck. Come out of a turn at 20mph, leave it in third taching a little over 1K, hit the gas and pull away decently. With the GLI doing the same thing, hitting the gas gives just about no feeling of acceleration.

Pulling off from a stop the GLI is picky too. You see I'm used to trucks with MTX where you can let the clutch out with the engine idling and get rolling. The SVT could do it with just 1 little gurp of the throttle. The GLI needs a little more finesse between the gas, the rpm and the clutch.

I think about doing a few mods to the GLI. But before I make any decisions I want to do some research. So far I want to find out how much response in perfoprmance I could expect from a few simple things like a K&N drop in filter and a cat back exhaust. But I'm in no hurry. I bought the car to same money and buying speed parts for the car defeats that purpose. Thoughts for thing to do in the future.

#1 on my list is to get the carpet cleaner and the upholstery attachment for it and clean the carpets and the headliner becasue the inside is a little stinky. Who ever owned it before me smoked in the car and I hate that smell.

#2 is to get some black steel wheels and put snow tires on them. There's no hurry for that.
 
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