Quick Mods.

The 31 inches tires were rubbing on the bottom of the front fenders. A quick fix was to use the grinder, cut the bottom of the fender. Then use a pop-top seal to finish it, that would also protect the paint. As the van should be repainted this winter I don't have to worry too much about the rust.

The New Syncro Story

7000km is a long test ride but I know it's all good now. We are ready for the summer. The picture were taken in the same spot, Mount 7 in Golden BC. We still miss our first Syncro...

At least we have some good photos.

Almost Done

Here is a few pictures of the conversion before I take it for a road test. Everything should be all right... but we never know.

TDI Conversion

The converted oil pan is a combo of an 1.8T oil pan and the bottom part was fabricated and welded by a machine shop in Calgary. Even if it look really good on the photo, this is the only thing that I would do differently. As soon as I have installed it on the engine on my first conversion it started leaking, the problem is that the welds are porous and so the oil slowly make it's way thru the aluminum. Hard to believe but true, so I removed the pan and used some gasket maker from Permatex that is specific for oil pans. It did help a lot but it's still leaking a bit, and that really bugs me...


To suport the engine and transmission I'm using the 2 transmission mount at one end and the Jetta mount at the other but that is not enough to secure the transmission and the engine together and stop some of the vibrations/movement while driving the van. I'm not trying to "Fast-Foward" this part of the conversion. To solve the problem I have made these 2 motor mounts that are bolted to the bell housing, engine and tranny. I'm using the WBX rubber mounts and also the modified WBX bar that used to be at the back of the engine. The bar will be put in place at the same time as the skid plate.

TDI Conversion

I have installed the ECU and the TDI fuse box inside the van on the left side, that way they will be away from the elements. To make sure the van doesn't become too noisy because of the hole I made these 2 plates of Richlite to seal the compartment, the top one is bolted to the bottom one that is threaded. A piece of under mat is sandwiched between to seal the whole thing.

TDI Conversion

There will be 2 oil switches, one for the ECU and the other one for the instrument cluster. The adapter can be found at California Imports in Vancouver.

TDI Conversion

What a mess... Soldering the wires to the cluster, the electronic gas pedal, brake light/ cruise control switch.

Here is the TDI harness, in fact this is what the ECU needs to run the engine.

Finally done with the front wiring, these 2 gray cables have 12 wires each and they do the connection between the ECU/engine and the front of the van.

TDI Conversion

This is the big Jetta motor mount bolted to the 1/4" steel angle.

Once installed to the back of the van and bolted to the frame this will support the engine at one end and the transmission mount will support the other end.

I'm using a Jetta/Golf clucth kit, this is made possible by buying this shaft from Winkler in Germany. No more WBX parts in this Diesel bell housing.

Here is the link.

http://www.vw-winkler.de/product_info.php/info/p118_Clutch-shaft.html

TDI Conversion

I made this bracket to hold the the Jetta main fuse box, and installed the glow plug relay next to it.

You can see the fuse box that will be used for the starter, glow plug and more.

Vacum reservoir and control valve.

I have used a Eurovan expansion tank because of it's bigger size and the bracket that hold it is also available. That help the installation to look clean and saved me some precious time.

Cleaning up.

With the engine out it's time for a good clean-up, repositioning the fuel hoses and installing the new TDI wiring harness.

TDI Conversion

While there is no engine it's time to make some room for the intercooler right behind the left tail light. With an angle grinder I cut an opening and than spray it with some spray-on bed-liner, that give a good rust protection while doing a bit of sound-proofing. I also have to cut an opening for the wiring harness, because the ECU/ Jetta fuse box will be inside the van under the back cabinet.

You can see the GoWesty springs and OME shox on the 2nd and 3rd picture. As the TDI is heavier than the WBX I will need to add some spacers to the springs to level the van, about 1 1/4" once I have removed the GW 1/2" spacers that came with the lift kit.

TDI Conversion

There is no time to loose so along with my very good friend Serge we started the conversion, the 2 vans are parked side by side and we will see how long it will take but we are hopping to be done in a few weeks.

On the first photo you can see the 1.9 Turbo Diesel engine that will be removed from the van and on the other one you can see the TDI on a pallet on it's way to it's new home or mobile home I should say.

We are doing more than just the engine conversion because I'm keeping my freshly rebuilt tranny, VC, differential, drive shaft and more.

Differences-Lights

Our new van is equipped with European H4 headlights that give better lighting, I did not see much difference as I'm use to the high power offroad bulbs that give 400 watts instead of 240 with regular bulbs, but it will be interesting to see how they perform with 4 x 100 watts. Even if the fog lights look like aftermarket ones they are OEM Hella and the bracket was factory-installed by VW back in 1988 and so was the wiring.

Differences-Parking Lights

As you can see there is no parking lights on the back of the van, I'm ok with that since I always tought they looked cheap. Now I understand why, that this was a North -America only thing. In order to pass the "Out of Province inspection" I had to install some temporary parking lights in the plastic bumper corners, after the inspection I took them off as I like how it look without them.

Differences-ABS

This van came with factory ABS brakes, the ABS unit has the same serial number as the unit in my 2003 T4 and it does an excellent job on snow/ice and muddy roads. It is located under the driver's seat where we usually put the auxiliary battery.

Differences-Antenna

As the van was built for the European market there are many things that are different between an american Vanagon and the ones we had here. For example the antenna is built in the windshield and there is an antenna booster, all this from VW.

First Trip.

After 6 months without camper it was time to go in the rockies and enjoy the mountains. Here are some pictures of our first camping trip just after I installed the Go Westy lift kit. The awning is a new thing for us and we were quite exited to see the possibilities it opens according to the weather.

It was a cold week-end in Banff and we did not open the pop-top, that is one big advantage of this roof you don't have to open it to stand so you can keep the heat inside.

Home

5000 kms later I am home, it was a long and boring drive that I did in 6 days. It's now time to get the van ready for the "out of province inspection".

Halifax

Once in Halifax I took the taxi from the airport to Autoport where our new van was waiting for me. The fuel tank was totally empty as they empty it before the van gets on the vessel, I only had enough fuel to make it to the next gas station. Then I realized the van was not as nice as I expected... The paint looked perfect on the pictures I had but in reality it was far from being perfect. The battery was disconnected from the starter ( and the alternator) for no apparent reason, the battery was of course not charging. After fixing those little problems It was time to hit the road. I was 5136 kms from home.

What To Do to Import

Once you have bought a car and have the Bill of Sale signed by you and the seller with a copy of the car's paper, you can contact a shipping company that will provide you with a Bill of Ladden. The next step is to contact a Custom Broker in you country that will take care of you paper work. In my case I used the service of Merchant Custom Broker in Montreal.

Once the vehicle has arrived in Canada You will need to pay the GST and importation fees to your custom broker. Then you show up were you car is with ID and a copy of your Bill of Ladden and your good to go.

It's that simple if you car is 15 years old or older.

Nice But Not perfect

We don't know who is the maker of the cabinets, it looks a lot like a Reimo but it's apparently not. On the nice side, it feature a Truma propane heater with what what seem to be a double size LP tank, a built-in portable toilet, a Westfalia like fridge but this one is external burning, 2 removable water tank and storage over the engine lid. This van can also sit 6 passenger via a second double seat. On the not so nice a miss matched grey/brown interior and i'm not a big fan of the way the pop top was cut.

I'm a woodworker/cabinet maker and quite picky on finishing so I will wait until the van arrives here, but I'm already thinking about redoing the interior. That would be 3rd custom camper interior on a T3 base.