Table of contents for June/July 2020 in Performance VW

Well, I’d say this is all a bit weird, sat at home in my pants producing the magazine in lockdown, but as I’ve actually been editing the magazine this way for the past three years now, not a lot that has changed (other than I don’t have to get dressed to do the school run). Okay, the fact most of my mates are sat at home getting paid to watch films all day, drink beer and generally have fun while I still slave away on the mag is a bit frustrating, but I guess it could be worse… a lot worse! Some times (and none so more than now) it does feels a bit weird doing a job that you also enjoy and is your hobby, especially when you consider…

Leighton Vans is proud to unveil its all-new ‘LV-S Splitter’ – created especially for the recently-launched T6.1 VW Transporter models. Many thought the new vehicle’s front-end looks fell short of the rest of the design and could have benefitted from a little more aggression out of the box. Proudly designed and manufactured in the UK, the LV-S Splitter is the latest in a line of Leighton Vans’ products that stick to the company’s well-known mantra of being ‘created by van people, for van people’. Featuring angular skirts on each corner surrounding the fog lights, as well as a gloss black lip underneath to offer an even more sporting appearance, this stunning item successfully offers that vital premium vehicle feel to any T6.1 it’s applied to. As well as being available…

Unitronic is pleased to announce its Carbon Fibre Intake System for the B9 Audi A4 and A5 equipped with the 2.0 TSI MLB engine. This carbon fibre intake is a direct bolt-on upgrade which is designed to optimise airflow, improve throttle response, enhance turbo induction sounds, and increase power, gaining +11hp. It also provides seamless integration, perfect fitment and an aggressive carbon fibre presence in the engine compartment. What more do you need to know? Well, head over to www.getunitronic.com if you’d like to find out more nitty gritty. The price is below… PRICE: $1099.00 USD CONTACT: www.getunitronic.com…

Some people say it’s easier to get low using air ride, which I guess it is to a degree, but at the same time you’ve really got no excuse for not achieving the perfect stance. But trust us, you’d be surprised how many people get it wrong still, even with the right equipment. It’s so tempting to simply fit your new kit and air out, even if you do smash your arches in the process, or achieve the sin of all stance sins… reverse rake! Trust us, to pull off the ultimate stance using air suspension you need to look at a whole bunch of other modifications, the basic air ride kit is just the start of the process. Arch mods, chassis notches, relocated exhausts and other parts that can…

If you were presented with the opportunity to buy a rough-running, engine- and manual-swapped Jetta Coupe, what would you do? Would you follow the standard advice of the car community and run away? Or would you accept it’ll need work, roll up your sleeves, and get cracking on building a spectacular machine? Yamada Takeshi, from Niigata on Japan’s west coast, obviously took the latter path, and we have to say, we’re very grateful for that. Because his Mk3 16V-swapped Jetta is one of Japan’s best VWs, and one we’re very glad to feature in these pages. Despite the engine issues, the project started, oddly enough, with Yamada-san getting rid of the suspension and wheels, so he could get his chosen workshop, VW specialist 84Base, to fit Air Lift Performance bags,…

While air suspension may be the most practical way to go low, with adjustment at the flick of a switch or push of a button, for the diehards, there’s only one way to go low and that’s by keeping things static. There’s no denying that air ride is great, but it’s not for everybody. Some people like to set their car at a desired ride height and leave it there. Tackling speed bumps and awkward drop kerbs is just part of the daily routine. But as with the seriously low bagged cars, it’s the same process with static and achieving the ultimate low. Fitting a set of coilovers and winding them right down is only the start of the process. Raised turrets, shallow sumps, modified arches and notched chassis are…

Email us a selection of high-resolution images of your car (exterior, interior, engine, etc), plus answer the questions on the right in as much detail as possible. PLEASE INCLUDE: Name, age, location? Make, model and year of car? Which year did you purchase it? What was your first modification? What is your favourite part? How much have you spent? What are you future plans? DUB DETAILS (PLEASE LIST): Engine, Chassis, Outside, Inside Send to: pvw.ed@kelsey.co.uk (enter 'Readers’ Rides' in subject line) Note: All images must be watermark and copyright free (you need to have permission to use them). We can’t guarantee if/when your car will be included in these pages. Due to a high number of emails we won’t be able to reply to all emails so please be patient. The…

RYAN SINCLAIR IG: @mountune52_ryan AGE: 24 OCCUPATION: Customer service JOB TITLE: Front of house at mountune52 LOCATION: Essex Favourite issue of PVW? It has to be the issue in August 2019. This was the issue where mountune52 were really put in the spotlight. The article on our demo Golf R gave a real insight into what we do here at mountune and where we are heading in the VAG scene. I also loved the cover Caddy van. I’ve always been a fan of cars that are a little different from the rest and the custom Caddy typifies that perfectly! The build was really carried out with no stone left unturned and it shows! Favourite PVW feature car? That would be the wide-arched Golf GTI we built for Tanner Foust in…

At some point, the question will inevitably be asked of any enthusiast, usually posed by an innocent bystander of the hobby. What’s your dream car? It’s not long after the punctuation’s been placed at the end of the asker’s inquiry that the respondent’s eyeballs start twitching. Suddenly, every decision they’ve ever made becomes suspect. Luckily for 29-year-old Clay McFarren, his answer was firmer than an unripe avocado: the Mk4 R32. For the fortunate folks, Volkswagen enthusiasm stems from childhood, either through familial or environmental osmosis. The Charles Town, West Virginia resident’s family had a 1979 Super Beetle back in the day when he was a teenager, helping to stoke the fire that would eventually turn into a five-alarm blaze. “The [Super Beetle had the] ’four on the floor, guess what…

Did you know the new Mk8 Golf can actually help drivers to prevent accidents, thanks to its innovative Car2X technology, which allows it to wirelessly connect with other vehicles and the traffic infrastructure. The Euro NCAP consortium gave special recognition to the traffic hazard alert function with the Advanced Award for ground-breaking safety features. The German automotive association ADAC tested the new technology and declared it a “technical milestone”. It’s great to see VW pushing boundaries once again. PRICE: From £23,875.00 CONTACT: www.volkswagen.co.uk…

The car wash can be a surprisingly pivotal and influential venue. While most of us prefer to get busy with the snow foam lance at home these days, there’s still a place for those timeworn rollers in the modern world; a soapy going-over in the supermarket car park may do the trick, but it doesn’t match the theatrical drama of driving through the old-school machine. Just ask the person we once saw in a car wash in Portsmouth who exited the vehicle after driving in, to see why the programme hadn’t started – only to then observe the rollers ripping off her driver door and filling the car with water… To get a handle on just how life-changing a car wash can be, have a chat with Walt and Skyler…

We’re an educated lot here on the modified VW scene so, contra to the online ramblings of the more unenlightened, you’ll already know that air suspension has been around for nearly as long as cars have. Initially developed to enable carrying heavy or uneven loads in relative comfort, there are custom-built examples as far back as the early 1900s. Various aftermarket kits have been on sale since the 1920s and the idea became extremely popular with bootleggers and whiskey-trippers in the ‘30s and ‘40s. How else were they going to maintain a stock ride height with a ‘trunk’ full of moonshine, right? Nowadays you’ll also find OEM applications on everything from busses and HGVs to expensive SUVs and saloons so, in short, air ride is far more common than many…

When car manufacturers decide to say farewell to a particular model by releasing a limited-run ‘last-hurrah’ version, it’s often quite a special moment. Acting as a way for not only car fans, but also the dedicated teams that’ve poured their hearts and souls into the platform, to pay tribute, it’s unsurprising that these unique machines are usually the ones that stick in people’s memories the most (and retain their values the best) a few years down the line. Volkswagen has always had a particularly close relationship with its hordes of fans around the globe, helping to explain why it’s one firm that’s well-known for bringing out such variants before the production line is switched off for good. When it came to the car that would send-off the Mk7 and Mk7.5-generation…

The Venom Hybrid Turbos brand was founded three years ago by Paul Booth and Benjamin Gray, the talented duo also behind Turbo Clinic UK – a company that itself has been leading the way with turbocharger manufacturing and reconditioning for over 12 years. With an increasing demand for performance focused hybrid turbochargers recently, Paul and Ben decided to create a dedicated arm of Turbo Clinic UK solely focusing on these modified high-performance units, leading to the conception of Venom Hybrid Turbos back in 2017. Hybrid turbos normally feature the same housings as their OE counterparts, but with thoroughly re-worked internals that are much more efficient at their job to make for a far more effective turbocharger. Combined with the fact that they can usually be installed in a ‘bolt-off, bolt-on’…

Having well and truly sorted out the suspension on the Golf by bolting on a winning, and totally affordable combination of Raceland airbags and AirLift Performance management, the next logical step was to dump the yawn worthy stock steel wheels, horrendous hubcaps and granny spec tyres and upgrade the rolling stock. Prodigious peer pressure and Internet chatter steered the conversation to the usual suspects; three piece hoops that cost three months wages and track ready rubber that had more tech specs than the space shuttle. Style Svengalis deemed eighteen inch to be the ideal diameter, with a “recommended” tyre size… because I care about optimal everything and I don't want the speedometer reading to be out …apparently. After carefully listening to all the “professional” advice and ignoring it I decided…

A bit of a special one for you this month. Okay, so all our Reloaded culprits are hand-selected, so they’re all special in one way or another, but this month is different. Why? Well, this particular Mk4 is one of the editor’s all-time favourite feature cars. Sure, it might look like a just another Mk4 R32 on BBS wheels on first impressions, but that couldn’t actually be further from the truth. The car actually began life as a humble front-wheel-drive 1.8T GTI before it’s creator, Roy Koenen and his best mate, none other than Dutch tuning God, Jeroen Dik, shoe-horned a twin-charged Audi S3 motor under the hood. That’s right, as if the turbo wasn’t enough, the guys found a way to bolt on a G-Lader supercharger to eradicate any…

BC Racing recently dropped us an email to announce their Street and Circuit Coilover kit for the Mk5 platform. The BR series coilovers use a large 46mm diameter piston in a 53mm diameter damper body to maximise oil capacity. BC Racing only use a very high quality oil with their coilovers and the larger capacity of their units increase the volume of oil contained within them. This, in turn, reduces the peak temperature and so significantly improves damper performance. The dampers are also designed to help the car be set up for corner weight adjustment and feature ride height and damping adjustability, too. The icing on the cake, though, are those stunning pillowball camber adjustable top mounts which don’t just look the part, but allow you to dial in (or…

You may remember we test drove m52’s Stage 2+ Mk7.5 GTI last month. Well, we may have been blown away with what the package had to offer, but at the time of going to press the price hadn’t been released for the Stage 2+ kit. Centred around a Golf R turbo upgrade, the Stage 2+ kit also includes an mTune handset (with software installed) so you can switch through tune settings, a gauge display, adjustable shift-light, performance measurements, date logger, fault code reader, plus a zip-up case with mTune mount, relevant cables and the all important m52 badge. And the price… how does £2099 grab you? For more details about he kit and 12-month/12k-mile warranty, head over to www.mountune52.com PRICE: £2099.00 CONTACT: www.mountune52.com…

I’m sure by now you guys know all too well how important wheel choice has become. Choosing the right set of wheels is just as important as dialling in the perfect fitment. That being said, since Rotiform released its classic BLQ design a decade ago (and we slapped a set on G-Werks Mk4 cover car), it’s since become perfectly acceptable to fit off-the-shelf wheels, providing some thought goes into the fitment. Over the next five pages we take a look at the latest cast wheel designs to drop from a number of the well-known brands and we’ve also thrown in a few split-rim options for good measure. Enjoy! ROTIFORM We take a look at the latest cast wheels released by the cool kids at Californian’s finest wheel producer, Rotiform. If…

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Fifteen years. For most of us it seems a crushingly short lifespan for a car, but that’s how long manufacturers expect their latest models to trudge up and down motorways, haul luggage and crawl through commuter traffic before retiring as scrap. So when you picture a single owner spending almost twice as long perfecting their project, changes-of-plan feel like an expected part of the process. And sometimes the biggest U turns arrive with a whimper, instead of a bang. “I blew a hole in the top of the supercharger coming back from Stanford Hall eight years ago,” says John Mitchell, recalling what had already been 20 years of hard work taking an unexpected dive south. “I wasn’t even going full chat at the time, just pulling up to some traffic…

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