Hello, I'm Anton. I have have had several Volkswagens and Audis in the past. That includes (but not limited to) the following:

'91 jetta (VR6 turbo swapped)
'86 audi 4000 quattro (Audi 3.6 v8 swapped)
'87 jetta coupe (1.9 turbodiesel swapped)

Why am I in the RX7 forums? Well, I've been curious about rotaries for quite some time, and do like the concept behind how the work. When over at a friend's house I noticed an FC RX7 sitting in his back yard, and jokingly mentioned trading for the diesel jetta coupe. Surprisingly, he was keen to the idea of trading, since the Mazda had been sitting in that yard since he blew it up 5 years ago. I was somewhat excited about the opportunity of getting my hands dirty in the rotary world. After finding a $200 '93 90 quattro (nice to have a "newer" unmodified car for a change) to replace the VW for DD duties, we agreed on a trade.

If this doesn't seem that good of a trade for me yet, let me tell you a little about the car. It's an '86 with a '91 turbo swap, and he blew it up only 200 or so miles after building it. That means that a LOT of parts like the tires, suspension, brakes, etc were practically new. Mods include (but again, not limited to) Eibachs on KYB AGX's, FD intake manifold and throttle body, FMIC, 3" turbo back exhaust with apexi dual N1's, and some BRUTAL OS Giken clutch. What's more is that the car wasn't actually "blown up", but just lost an oil cooler line while driving, and was smoking afterwords.

Anyways, we were drinking beers late some night before the trade happened, and figured why not try and start it? We grabbed a battery out of another car, and went to start it. After 20-30 second of cranking, the car fired up for the first time in 5 years on the 5-year old gas! I was convinced.

I brought the car home this past Friday, and went for a quick little rip down my road. To my surprise, it runs great, no extraneous noises (although I have no idea of the noises rotaries would make if seals or bearing go bad). The only issue really was quite a bit of smoke at idle and decel. So I started tearing into it. First thing I found (and was hoping to find, honestly) was oil in the charge piping. Pulling the intake pipe off revealed BAD shaft play in the turbo. What this meant was that most of that smoke was coming from the blown turbo and hopefully the motor was still OK. Pulling the turbo off and apart showed that the compressor wheel had been rubbing on the housing, and therefore may as well get another turbo instead of rebuilding this one.

So that is where I stand now. I just want to get this thing driving and autocrossing quick!

Thanks for reading.

-Anton

 

Nice find there...welcome aboard, Anton! Here's hoping you found the problem and will have that car running again soon!

Mario III

 

vw man huh, me too. have a 80 rabbit, 83 rabbit, 91 jetta vr6 wolfy, and a 02 TDI beetle. all moded. and just a few post down from you I posted as a noob here as well. got me a gen one 12a auto. its fun even with he auto. I must look a little odd driveing it down the road with Volkswagen tattooed down my arm. lol were abouts in NY are you upstate? vermonts putting ona huge vw show this year. hit me up for info.

 

Thanks, Mario!

I'm only a little ways upstate. You're talking about Wolfsgart, correct? I'd love to make it up to that, but I'm not sure I'll be around then. Besides, I think I am getting a little tired of the show"scene" and would like to start making it out to more autox's, track days, etc instead. This is especially after seeing Cyrus (I'm sure you know the Cyrus I'm talking about) bring his car down to Rally NY. But I probably wouldn't miss this If I'm around, as I know plenty of people up there anyways.

 

ya Cyrus is in my club and a good freind, his car is great, well was till he lost oil press and smoked the bearings.

I to don't like the scene eaither, but i still like to go look at nice metal. just disregard the morons that might have funded the car, (note I said funded not built)

my cars might not be super PVW cars but I built them my self and I still have fun.

 

good luck with your build

 

I ended up rebuilding the turbo myself, and now it runs and boost very well, with MUCH less smoke. After driving it up and down my road, it was overheating, but a simple bleed of the cooling system solved that.

Moving on, I noticed a tag on the firewall that was stamped "Vertigo Motorsport" with some identification numbers. What is the meaning of this? Is it factory (sure looks factory), or some tuning shop put that in?

 

Got some pictures:

 

o wow, i knew the guy that had that car. great score. he put alot of work into it and glad to see the motor wasnt actually blown. if i knew then what i do now about rotaries...

 

nice! I come from the vw world myself too. '82 diesel rabbit, '79 rabbit, '87 jetta, '98 Jetta vr6. I did a project car with the vr6 from new and have missed it ever since i sold it 3 years ago.