Tweet
I have had this post saved aside for a long time now and so there is going to be some missing photos and holes, but the majority is there.
So another MK3 means another thread. At least this one got finished...
I picked up this MK3 as a running, stock, not a thing to touch daily a little over two years ago now, drove it for a few months, did a trip to Queensland and took it to GAD. Went to put air ride in it, and the kit that I bought, hardly any of the bits worked so, tore it back out until I bought a new compressor, lines, fittings and controller. Not long after I took the air ride out and put the stock suspension in, the control arm bolt snapped inside the subframe whilst driving. Made for a scary steer!
Tried to fix it with easy outs but had no success, so instead of cutting open the subframe and getting he nut out, I decided that it was more logical to replace the subframe, and obviously that required the engine to come out, so I thought I would put something else in. Insert the AMK 1.8t from an Audi S3 and an O2S 6 speed from a MK5 Jetta. Meant to be a bolt in swap with minor mods here and there…
Started sourcing some parts, got a swap loom from LankyVW, a Track slag K04 MK3 down pipe, Forge charge pipe, DV relocation kit, turbosmart Kompact BOV, 80mm TIP and other bits and bobs.
First of all was painting and changing the subframe that I got of Dylan8. Next to the engine mounts. Starting with the rear engine mount, a known modification, I notched a standard mk3 rear engine mount bracket to clear the K04 oil drain hose.
Installed an ECS Stage 1 clutch kit and lightweight flywheel, New Throw out bearing and Pinion Brace, I threw the gearbox on and moved to fitting the front engine mount, that didn’t fit. Bit of cutting and a new nut and it was now sorted, not the most ideal in terms of lateral strength but thus far so good.
Moved to mounting up the trans mount bracket and this is where it all went down hill. The mount was no where near close to fitting. Cut up, plated, welded and new holes drilled it was finally mounted to the O2S.
Next was to fit the accessory belt. This was another mission in itself, as I was removing the A/C. The power steering pump from a MK3 bolts up to the accessory bracket yes (Internet was right for once here) but the offset of the snub was completely wrong to work with the crank & alternator pullies. Bit of research& measuring found that T4 transporter power steering pump has a different offset, suitable to what I needed. BUT, it didn’t come with a pulley and the MK3 pulley offset wouldn’t work. Luckily Gavin had a ECS lightweight kit he no longer needed and scored the crank, alt and power steering pullies cheap. Installed them, and measured up a belt to suit. At the same time I had already sent my ECU to Gav to be immo deleted and a S3 Tune loaded on as the ecu was from a normal 1.8T A3.
After heat wrapping, fitted up the Track slag downpipe upper half to be able to swing the engine and trans into the bay.
However this made it a PITA to fit the second half of the downpipe as the bends are tight and can’t get most tools in there to tighten the nuts and bolts. Fitted up a braided clutch line and master cylinder (all MK3’s have the provision for a master cylinder from factory, VW used a block plate that un bolts if it was a cable clutch car to begin with, same goes with the pedal, they have the provision for both cable and hydro fitment. Next was the shifterbox and cables, using the 6 speed box from a MK5 meant that I had to notch the tunnel for the lever system to move freely and mount the box to the tunnel as well. Easily done with a grinder, drill and a few bolts. The cables however being much longer than normal MK3 cables meant that I had to zig zag them in the tunnel to avoid sagging them onto the exhaust. I also put a fire/heat resistant sleeve over them to protect them.
Moved onto getting the driveshafts in, Passenger side short shaft goes in without an issue. Go to put in the drivers side shaft, about 50mm to short! Quick internet search, “Uses stock mount and driveshafts when swapped into a MK3” I knew to not listen to this after the modifications required to make the stock trans mount bracket work. Knowing that VR6 driveshafts were longer than 4 Cyl shafts, I searched for how much longer exactly. After finding out that the VR6 shaft was approximately 13mm longer, I knew this wasn’t enough and feared I would need custom driveshafts made, There goes all the OEMness of the build I wanted to keep. Remembering that Passat VR6 shafts were longer again, I searched once again for how much longer they are, found the drivers side is a whole 35mm longer than the standard 4 Cyl shaft! Now the trouble of finding a Passat VR6 shaft, luckily there was one pretty local to me! (bet this will never happen again though)
Swapped on the 4 Cyl outer CV as I was intended to just keep the standard brakes and not worry about upgrading them.
Shortly after this my Friends Bora and come up for sale cheap, the person who had bought it, hydrolocked the motor! It had plenty of tasty bits for my MK4 R32 and of course, 312/256mm brakes that I had read were able to be used on a MK3 using some OEM parts….
Because I had new control arm bushings for the shorter 4 Cyl control arms and I couldn’t afford to increase the track width due to the drive shaft debacle. This created a plethora of issues in trying to fit the front 312mm brakes. Caliper mounts have a different offset on the 4 Cyl to the 6 Cyl MK3’s. So I had to modify the carriers. To save redrilling discs, I swapped the car to 5x100, so new hubs and VR6 outer CV’s swapped on. Got the brakes to fit square and as they should be.
Moving to the rear, I didn’t want to get the adapter brackets that exist to fit 256mm vented rears because of being a stance queen on air ride. So I found the pretty uncommon 6N polo gti stub axles that used a MK4 style rear hub but have a MK3 beam pcd. After tonnes of modications to these to get them to work, including elongating the carrier mount holes and machining the disc down to 248mm~ they still couldn’t fit! GGRRRR. Got frustrated and just put on all new VR6 226mm discs and hubs.
With the air ride installed with a new compressor, new fittings, all new lines and a new control switch/box (AVS-9) the suspension and brakes were sorted! (not)
Moving onto finishing up the engine, I got an intercooler off TrickySimon (dog) that was good for 300kw on his 2nd Fastest in Australia turbo Bora, making it perfect for my relatively standard 1.8T. Mounted behind the MK3 bumper with only a few small cuts to the bumper required.
It was time to get the turbo connected to the throttle body, using some 180deg bends and silicon joiners I cut the bends to suit, marked them and took them to my mates shop so he could weld them up for me, Myles is a legend! Brought them home, fit a treat. Move to fitting the intake, I had just got a S3 80MM TIP, thinking it was in the same orientation as the motor is in 8L chassis. Well, sure enough it fouled on everything, the accessory(DV, evap recirc etc)joining hoses were in all weird and wrong places as well.
So I chopped it up, and just used the first initial bend out of the turbo and facing the bonnet, from here I cut up some more pipe and pieced together the intake pipe, sourced a 3” alloy MAF housing as the housing that come with the motor was for a standard 1.8T??, back to Myles, welded up, painted and fitted. Including a BOV return port and a N75 bleed off port. At this time I also scored a valve cover with the IE catch can kit. This was a great replacement for my plastic T-pieced, heater hose PCV system.
Next was mounting the DBW pedal, I had purchased a “bolt in” conversion pedal from an overseas company that had assured me it would work with RHD, as with everything, this was not true. Made up a suitable bracket out of cardboard to utilise a stud from the brake booster, taken to Myles once again, cut, folded and welded to the modified DBW conversion bracket. At this time we also folded up and welded the alloy battery box/holder.

So another MK3 means another thread. At least this one got finished...
I picked up this MK3 as a running, stock, not a thing to touch daily a little over two years ago now, drove it for a few months, did a trip to Queensland and took it to GAD. Went to put air ride in it, and the kit that I bought, hardly any of the bits worked so, tore it back out until I bought a new compressor, lines, fittings and controller. Not long after I took the air ride out and put the stock suspension in, the control arm bolt snapped inside the subframe whilst driving. Made for a scary steer!
Tried to fix it with easy outs but had no success, so instead of cutting open the subframe and getting he nut out, I decided that it was more logical to replace the subframe, and obviously that required the engine to come out, so I thought I would put something else in. Insert the AMK 1.8t from an Audi S3 and an O2S 6 speed from a MK5 Jetta. Meant to be a bolt in swap with minor mods here and there…
Started sourcing some parts, got a swap loom from LankyVW, a Track slag K04 MK3 down pipe, Forge charge pipe, DV relocation kit, turbosmart Kompact BOV, 80mm TIP and other bits and bobs.
First of all was painting and changing the subframe that I got of Dylan8. Next to the engine mounts. Starting with the rear engine mount, a known modification, I notched a standard mk3 rear engine mount bracket to clear the K04 oil drain hose.
Installed an ECS Stage 1 clutch kit and lightweight flywheel, New Throw out bearing and Pinion Brace, I threw the gearbox on and moved to fitting the front engine mount, that didn’t fit. Bit of cutting and a new nut and it was now sorted, not the most ideal in terms of lateral strength but thus far so good.
Moved to mounting up the trans mount bracket and this is where it all went down hill. The mount was no where near close to fitting. Cut up, plated, welded and new holes drilled it was finally mounted to the O2S.
Next was to fit the accessory belt. This was another mission in itself, as I was removing the A/C. The power steering pump from a MK3 bolts up to the accessory bracket yes (Internet was right for once here) but the offset of the snub was completely wrong to work with the crank & alternator pullies. Bit of research& measuring found that T4 transporter power steering pump has a different offset, suitable to what I needed. BUT, it didn’t come with a pulley and the MK3 pulley offset wouldn’t work. Luckily Gavin had a ECS lightweight kit he no longer needed and scored the crank, alt and power steering pullies cheap. Installed them, and measured up a belt to suit. At the same time I had already sent my ECU to Gav to be immo deleted and a S3 Tune loaded on as the ecu was from a normal 1.8T A3.
After heat wrapping, fitted up the Track slag downpipe upper half to be able to swing the engine and trans into the bay.
However this made it a PITA to fit the second half of the downpipe as the bends are tight and can’t get most tools in there to tighten the nuts and bolts. Fitted up a braided clutch line and master cylinder (all MK3’s have the provision for a master cylinder from factory, VW used a block plate that un bolts if it was a cable clutch car to begin with, same goes with the pedal, they have the provision for both cable and hydro fitment. Next was the shifterbox and cables, using the 6 speed box from a MK5 meant that I had to notch the tunnel for the lever system to move freely and mount the box to the tunnel as well. Easily done with a grinder, drill and a few bolts. The cables however being much longer than normal MK3 cables meant that I had to zig zag them in the tunnel to avoid sagging them onto the exhaust. I also put a fire/heat resistant sleeve over them to protect them.
Moved onto getting the driveshafts in, Passenger side short shaft goes in without an issue. Go to put in the drivers side shaft, about 50mm to short! Quick internet search, “Uses stock mount and driveshafts when swapped into a MK3” I knew to not listen to this after the modifications required to make the stock trans mount bracket work. Knowing that VR6 driveshafts were longer than 4 Cyl shafts, I searched for how much longer exactly. After finding out that the VR6 shaft was approximately 13mm longer, I knew this wasn’t enough and feared I would need custom driveshafts made, There goes all the OEMness of the build I wanted to keep. Remembering that Passat VR6 shafts were longer again, I searched once again for how much longer they are, found the drivers side is a whole 35mm longer than the standard 4 Cyl shaft! Now the trouble of finding a Passat VR6 shaft, luckily there was one pretty local to me! (bet this will never happen again though)
Swapped on the 4 Cyl outer CV as I was intended to just keep the standard brakes and not worry about upgrading them.
Shortly after this my Friends Bora and come up for sale cheap, the person who had bought it, hydrolocked the motor! It had plenty of tasty bits for my MK4 R32 and of course, 312/256mm brakes that I had read were able to be used on a MK3 using some OEM parts….
Because I had new control arm bushings for the shorter 4 Cyl control arms and I couldn’t afford to increase the track width due to the drive shaft debacle. This created a plethora of issues in trying to fit the front 312mm brakes. Caliper mounts have a different offset on the 4 Cyl to the 6 Cyl MK3’s. So I had to modify the carriers. To save redrilling discs, I swapped the car to 5x100, so new hubs and VR6 outer CV’s swapped on. Got the brakes to fit square and as they should be.
Moving to the rear, I didn’t want to get the adapter brackets that exist to fit 256mm vented rears because of being a stance queen on air ride. So I found the pretty uncommon 6N polo gti stub axles that used a MK4 style rear hub but have a MK3 beam pcd. After tonnes of modications to these to get them to work, including elongating the carrier mount holes and machining the disc down to 248mm~ they still couldn’t fit! GGRRRR. Got frustrated and just put on all new VR6 226mm discs and hubs.
With the air ride installed with a new compressor, new fittings, all new lines and a new control switch/box (AVS-9) the suspension and brakes were sorted! (not)
Moving onto finishing up the engine, I got an intercooler off TrickySimon (dog) that was good for 300kw on his 2nd Fastest in Australia turbo Bora, making it perfect for my relatively standard 1.8T. Mounted behind the MK3 bumper with only a few small cuts to the bumper required.
It was time to get the turbo connected to the throttle body, using some 180deg bends and silicon joiners I cut the bends to suit, marked them and took them to my mates shop so he could weld them up for me, Myles is a legend! Brought them home, fit a treat. Move to fitting the intake, I had just got a S3 80MM TIP, thinking it was in the same orientation as the motor is in 8L chassis. Well, sure enough it fouled on everything, the accessory(DV, evap recirc etc)joining hoses were in all weird and wrong places as well.
So I chopped it up, and just used the first initial bend out of the turbo and facing the bonnet, from here I cut up some more pipe and pieced together the intake pipe, sourced a 3” alloy MAF housing as the housing that come with the motor was for a standard 1.8T??, back to Myles, welded up, painted and fitted. Including a BOV return port and a N75 bleed off port. At this time I also scored a valve cover with the IE catch can kit. This was a great replacement for my plastic T-pieced, heater hose PCV system.
Next was mounting the DBW pedal, I had purchased a “bolt in” conversion pedal from an overseas company that had assured me it would work with RHD, as with everything, this was not true. Made up a suitable bracket out of cardboard to utilise a stud from the brake booster, taken to Myles once again, cut, folded and welded to the modified DBW conversion bracket. At this time we also folded up and welded the alloy battery box/holder.

Comment