The Workhorse ... aka "Eurovan TDI".

[Marlow]

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I recently aquired this little baby.

It's a '92 T4 with a kick: there's over 200 horsies under the bonnet.

Basically, the only thing that's left of the original '92 van is the shell. Everything else is pretty much a recent T4 from at least '02. There's a TD red I engine under the bonnet, custom exhaust, EGR delete, de-cat, etc.

The van got bought in by a lad in Portlaoise in 2007 in Germany, brought to Ireland and was his pride and joy for the last 7 years. Time came to move on and I got the chance to aquire this. It being a very early production (T4 Production started in 1990) made it even more interesting.

All I've done to the van so far is: take the decals off it, clean it and replace the headlights with angel eyes. There's very few things I will change, as it's perfect the way it is in reality.

/M

[Marlow]

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New turbo arrived from Germany yesterday. Fitted today.

/M

[Dirty1]

I always loved this van. Have you tried the new blower?

[Marlow]

We tried to rebuild the old one without success. The new one works perfectly, but there are still some fueling niggles, I need to fix. They could be latent issues, but it should be running right again soon.

Gonna stick the van on the dyno, once it's running right.

/M

[Marlow]

Went at ripping the dash apart the other day to install the Boost gauge.
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You'd think that it gets easier, when you've done it a few times, but no.

Anyhow:
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Result. And I'm quite happy with it. It gets tidier though, the more often you do it.

Today then:
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Converted the front grille back to OEM with VW logo and TDI bagde. I also replaced the indicator lenses with US spec ones and that actually looks better than I would have thought.

So the plan is now to add Golf Mk4 or Volvo S40/V40 sidelights in the bumpers and add the bagdes on the rear again. It'll be "Eurovan TDI" though .. Just to throw people off even more.

/M

[Marlow]

When fitting the boost gauge, I had the issue, that on the AXG engine there is no place, where I easily could attach the sensor from my boost gauge.

On the ACV engine .. at least the older ones, there was a pickup on the intercooler. And if you had the performance EGR Delete manifold from egrvalve.co.uk, then you had a pickup there, too.

Now .. I had a spare set of hoses flying about for the AXG, so I got a pickup, that just gets stuck into a silicone or pvc hose.
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All good and plumbed up.

And the best thing, because I used a spare: If I don't like it, I can always go back.

Both good news and bad news today then.

I got a set of Toyo Proxes for the back of the van, which was badly needed. Also fitted the sump guard.

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It's not new, but was something I still had pottering around from my Syncro.

2mm steel sumpguard made in Russia ... beats the original flimsy one, which wouldn't have fit anyhow because of the oilcooler.

The bad news is good news at the same time: I got about half a mile out of the tyre garage, when my van was making noises like the CV joint had fully collapsed. Then no drive at all.

We took it apart and it had stripped the teeth of the center driveshaft, where it joins the gearbox. Somebody has at some point assembled this driveshaft the wrong way, so it only was pushing less than half way into the gearbox. The teeth in the gearbox are mostly ok with very little wear, but the teeth on the driveshaft are utterly stripped.

The issue with this is, that the TD red I and V6 had uprated driveshafts, so none of the bits from my breakers will fit. Ordered one from Germany, but that'll take a few days to arrive. We assembled the center shaft correctly, put it back in, but the second I put a bit of load on the drivetrain, it'll knock over, so I don't really want to drive the van until it's fixed.

The good thing about this is, that it also explains, why the front right camber is off by nearly 2 degrees and can't be adjusted further.

/M