Hello to everyone

[lawrencea]

Hi guys.

I am fron Durban in South Africa and drive a 2002 Polo playa (6n). I have only recently got into the whole modding thing (and even more recently, found that there were such things on the net as forums :embarrest.

So there are details of my current ride

Anyway, that's my intro...

I am hoping to 'meet' new people here and to continue learning, getting new ideas and having a good time!

I got the car about 2 years ago and it was a stock standard 1.4.

The first mod was a set of 17" Malas Racing Wheels (I am from Durban and this how we roll)

Next was some obligatory window tinting and then she looked like this

Then it was time for some ICE.
JVC front loader
1 x 12" 1000w Sony Explod sub (the car is still a daily drive and we need boot space for the SO's shopping and what not)
350w XTC 6x9's
Mids
Tweeters
500w AT Audio amp

A couple of months later summer rolled around and using the aircon combined with a set of 17's made it quicker to walk, so none the wiser, and knowing next to nothing about how to upgrade the performance, I was referred to SAC for the following mods:

Wildcat 4-2-1 branch
50mm wildcat free flow pipe
sportflow airfilter
UnichipQ

A big dent in the wallet and a whopping 33% increase in performance on their magic dyno later ....let's just say - school fees paid

So I drove around like that for a while until some chop side swiped me

This lead to an insurance claim and the perfect opportunity to replace the rims with a nice set of 17" Fusion Alloys (I wasn't too happy with the MRW's anyway, and then one of them got damaged in the accident). I got the car back from the panel beater and a few days later and on the way to work, the car shot a spark plug out the head. It was the ideal opportunity to ditch the 1.4 and replace the motor with a 2.0l ADY motor.

So the car was sent to Dubworx in Durban who did the following.

2.0l ADY
276 Estas Cam
Gotech Mini-x
Replaced front discs and drilled them
Painted the calipers
Fitted Sachs clutch and 210mm flywheel
De-trumpeted the airbox and fitted K&N flatbed filter
Wildcat 4-2-1 branch and 57mm free flow

Then it was off to V-Tec (who are Koni's agents in Durban) for the fitment of a set of Koni Springs and STR-T dampers

Now she looks like this

She was then sent to Imraan at Speed shop for tuning - it now makes 135.5hp (101kw) and 171.2nm

Future plans include

Spray the front badge black (DIY this weekend)
Replace front bumper with this

Fit these side skirts

Fit this rear boot spoiler

Replace the front seats with some nice bucket seats (suggestions welcome)


So any comments you guys have would be most welcome!

 

[obi_waynne]

Hello there and may I extend to you a very warm welcome to TorqueCars forums.
It is great to meet you and I hope you enjoy the forums as much as we all do and that you get totally addicted to this site.

It sounds like you have a great project on your hands, with an impressive mod list already.

Tell us a bit about yourself and where you're from? What is the tuning scene like over there.

What cars have you owned in the past then?

Do feel free to get involved in our other threads too, the more the merrier as they say and we are friendly (being friendly is actually a forum rule!)

 

[turbonutter69]

Hello and Welcome to Torquecars.:bigsmile:
Hope you enjoy your time with us.

 

[lawrencea]

Thanks so much for the warm welcome!

So just before I get started, I would like to know if I did something wrong when trying to post a link to a website?

Anyway, so a little about myself...

Well I don't know how much detail to go into, but I am divorced and have 3 kids from my previous mariage. I have been with my current fiance for 8 years and am planning on getting married next year. My fiance has 2 kids, so all in all, 5 kids between the 2 of us.... so modding the car is unfortunately the last thing on my wallet's priority list

As I said in my intro I live in Durban South Africa, and have never left the country, so I really have no point of reference from which to compare our modding scene to the rest of the world.

All I do know is that over here most of the guys are into fast cars, hot chicks (women), braais (a barbecue is what I think it is called in the rest of the world) and we are all passiontate about our sports.

I suppose though that the above are common traits amongst all men?

As I said earlier, I am still fairly new to the whole modding scene. It started about when I got the polo (about 2 years back) with the obligatory rims and window tint. Then it was exhaust, branches and chip... I would say almost the first mod that anyone here does.

I then happened to snap the cambelt and instead of pouring money into the 1.4 motor, did a 2l 8v conversion. Over here it works out to be a relatively cheap mod, and a reliable one at that.

The modding scene here is quite big.... well in my opinion anyway. We have a lot of really decent cars roaming the streets (running 9 and 10 sec 1/4 miles etc) and I would like to think that we can compete with the rest of the world.

Exterior styling is varied, with anything from a Euro look (big over here in the VAG scene), rat (also a VaG thing), OEM+ and our own unique flavor:bigsmile:



I would guess that in general we are a very brand loyal bunch, and therefore there is fierce competion between say VW and Opel for example. We each have our own 'club and forum' and regularly meet for what we call 'meet and greets' (all the guys meet, perv over each other's ride and talk about cars, or go on what we call 'breakfast runs' - a drive to a certain destination, have breakfast, snap some pix of our rides etc.

So if there is anything else you wanna know about me, feel free to ask.

 

[pgarner]

Hello and welcome to the site mate

we dont allow links from new members due to the amount of spam we get. waynne copied you post from the other site

how hard was the 2.0 to fit ?

 

[T9 man]

Greetings and Welcome!

 

[lawrencea]

Oh ok...

As for the fitment of the 2.0l it wasn't that difficult (not that I did the work myself as I am not a mechanic), but from what I could ascertain, all the engine mountings are in the same place, so the motor literally dropped straight in.

I left the original gearbox in and it was then just a matter of wiring up the after market fuel management system and sending it to the tuner to be set up properly.

 

[pgarner]

hows the original clutch handling the extra power ?

 

[lawrencea]

Sorry - I forgot to mention in my earlier post that the clutch and flywheel were replaced with a 210mm Sachs kit, and this seems to be holding up very well.