This:
is an ’89 GU engine Golf syncro. It already has 280mm Corrado G60 front brakes, 239mm Golf 16v rear disks and a 21mm master cylinder. The standard carb has always been crap and it does the typical syncro thing of refusing to tickover every now and again. Note the special ‘reverse dragster’ stance – suspension is next on the list…
Last week I bought this:
for £60 and drove it home from Scarborough to Hull. It ran ok – bit of a mis / backfire on overrun but tootled along nicely. It’s the perfect doner as 1) it’s an ’89 so wiring etc should be same or similar and plug and playish and 2) it’s already had the interior totally stripped and sold which makes my life easier (I had to take a Corrado seat and seat belt to drive it..). It’s also an 8v digi GTi which is exactly what I wanted. Once the syncro has the digi it is a cheap platform for further enhancements etc. The conversion is going to be on a budget but I don’t mind spending where it’s important. I am reasonably pedantic about things being ‘factory’ and want it to be as close to a ‘proper’ GTI syncro as I can get it.
I’m starting at the back with the lift and inline fuel pumps and their associated wiring and then everything should be A pillar forwards. This is the GTI lift pump and sender top:
And this is the syncro:
The GTi has the three pole connector (earth, fuel level and power to lift pump) and the syncro obviously has no lift pump. The connection for the GTI inline pump is also here which makes it nice and neat. The two senders look a bit like this – the GTI one on the left with the lift pump obviously…
The GTi lift pump is the same part as the rallye item so I’m going to get a rallye sender from VAG (about £45) and fit the GTI pump to it. I don’t want to get a second-hand one (even if I could find one..) with a bent arm and bad fuel reading. The rallye item is four wire so it’ll be interesting to see what the fourth wire does – can anyone shed any light? The loom I’m swapping runs from the fuse box, down the right hand side interior of the car, picks up the tank connections and also runs the rear lights so I set to removing the loom from the syncro, whereas I was greeted with this:
After scratching my head for a min, I realised that the scotchlock nightmare is my tow hitch electrics.
Because I’m an audio geek I hate scotchlock connectors – they are generally wholly inappropriate for audio connections – they are generally used with the wrong sized cables which renders them useless. .. I guess for power connections they are ok… I will re-splice the trailer cable into the new GTI loom so I disconnected it and just took a note of the connections for now. While stripping the loom back I also discovered that the connection to the syncro diff also runs through this loom. I went under the car without jacking it up and disconnected the electrical connector from the diff. Although it was hard to see, there was also a clear tube which appeared to be connected to the side of the electrical connector. This went down the shroud into the loom with the wiring. I guessed that this was the vacuum connection and also disconnected it from the diff. The tube promptly fell out of the loom shroud… It’s just a clear piece of thin tube about 6 inches long which looks like it has been trapped or cut. I wondered if the rest of it ran through the loom but there was no more of it in there so I’m at a bit of a loss until I jack it up tomorrow and have a proper look..
The pipe which carried the water to the rear window jet does, however run through this loom…
Here’s the GTI fuse box as is:
And the syncro:
I’ve never noticed the shorting out link in the syncro top right before now…
Here are the two looms laid out:
From the bottom, the first tap off is for the handbrake switch – just a single core on the GTI (right), with a dedicated ground on the syncro, the next is the tank connections on the GTI and the tank and the rear diff on the syncro, then the right and left taillights. The connections at the fuse box end are very similar – the rear diff connection is on a separate connector and connects to a cable coming from relay 83, there is an extra pole in the main fuse box connector for the power to the fuel pumps.
I stripped the syncro loom down and took the diff connection out to put it with the GTi loom. Whilst I was there I decided to keep the separate ground to the handbrake switch and wrapped it with the diff connection to the GTi loom which now looks like this – much more aesthetically pleasing I think…
Threw the loom back in the syncro without too much problem – does anyone have a spare black carpet for a five door RHD syncro? Both of mine have grey carpets and they are crap… I’ll jack the back up tomorrow and sort out the diff connection and find out what the mystery pipe was all about…
Chris – Grey carpets are both shabby and a bit oil stained..
my syncro currently has a full ‘longlife’ custom stainless system with the stock syncro manifold. The current plan is to use stock parts – i.e. no real performance gains but easier for now but I’m open to suggestions as I go – it wouldn’t harm to come up with a more liberating solution..
As far as wiring goes, I like things to be FAF and will also be incorporating the syncro reverse switch wiring into the GTI engine bay loom but possibly not with multi-coloured tape as it will be on show…[
] Because my conversion isn’t as full on as yours (i.e. it’s much more of a straight swap) there are a lot less issues..
Siemens and Bosch are the same company BTW (well, sort of – Siemens own Bosch)(and Skil and Atco and Qualcast and Blaupunkt and thousands of other companies…)
Chris.
I’m up in Hull – a long way from you I think…
Took the inline fuel pump from the GTI today – as the fuel sender on the syncro is located further toward the rear of the car (as the tank is further back), I will have to extend the fuel lines from the inline pump to the sender top – the fuel lines are fairly stiff standard items with flexible ends to allow for connections etc – I’m going to use the GTI lines from the pump to the tank and just extend the flexible parts. It appears that I can do this without removing the tank as I had a go at that today and it did not want to happen…
Ordered the rallye fuel sender today – about £65 including a new strainer.
Bought 2m of fuel hose and some clips so total spend so far = £77 (car plus fuel hose etc – I’ll add the fuel sender when I get the correct price). One of the reasons to catalogue the conversion is to track the costs and to explore any ways to save money etc…
One interesting point to note is that the fuel return hose on the syncro is a smaller diameter than the fuel supply hose (5mm vs 7mm I believe), whereas the GTI are both 7mm. The lines from the pump to the tank will be GTI so that’s fine but I was planning to keep the syncro hoses from the pump to the engine bay – does anyone think the smaller return hose will cause problems??
Had a good look at the syncro exhaust around the bulkhead today – you are dead right Mr. Hell – that ain’t going to flow much, especially where it goes square… [V]
I now understand the bulkhead cutting and shutting – there isn’t much room at all between the steering knuckle shroud and the prop CV – the exhaust would appear to be the big question as you correctly stated.. Could always whack a 1.8t in there – there’s enough room for a 3″ single downpipe….[
]
Spoken to VAG technicians – they don’t see the 5mm return line as a problem – it is only to vent pressure from the manifold etc, it’s not as if there is a constant flow under normal operating conditions so the 5mm stays which makes my life just that bit easier.
This:
on the left is my new rallye tank sender with the lift pump from the GTI fitted and a new filter on the bottom. The middle is the old syncro sender and the right is the old GTi sender minus it’s lift pump. All good. The Rallye sender has a four terminal connector, instead of the GTI three and as Chris rightly pointed out, the extra connector is just a dedicated earth to the lift pump (rather than one signal from sender, one power to lift pump and a combined earth on the three terminal GTI). The four pole connector is listed for digifizz models so maybe the electronic dash needs a seperate earth??
Brand new spanking rallye sender comes in at £59.20 including the strainer.
Because I am anal I have ordered the VAG four pin connector and terminals for the new unit (£5.21) and I will join the cables (soldered and heat-shrink sleeved) and just split the one cable earth to both terminals.
Tomorrow should see the inline pump installed and all wiring connected and done, then it’s all about getting the GTi loom out and fitting it into the syncro. I think I’m going to rip the carb gubbins from the syncro first and it looks like I may have to remove (or maybe just loosen) the brake servo to get the looms out and back in – we’ll see..
Total conversion cost so far = £145.94 including all above. If I stick with the rod change box and syncro exhaust (for now, which will restrict things I appreciate) I’m hoping to come in under £500 for a full digifant GTI installation. That’s just for the conversion up and running and doesn’t include niceties like chipped ECU’s..
Chris.