MK6 GTI - Rattle upon acceleration - Resolved via TPI: 2021062/7

[REXman]

But a top spec corolla is $30K and a pulsar is less than that by far. A fully optioned golf gti is $60k.. That's double the price, more in the cases of a car lesser than a fully specced corolla..

I have a few friends who have heated garages so there paint won't ruin? Who cares. A golf is a premium hatch here in aus and compared to the competition.

You should be proud to own and enjoy the car as being one that is of a higher position from an engineering standpoint, and you have every right to be upset if the car is behaving like a hyundai excel, even in just "some" aspects, particularly when so many people who have experience with much cheaper cars, have not experienced this.

And i might add, Regardless of other things being done well.

[rs73]

true, golfs are definitely ahead if you cross compare against japanese or european scale, in terms of finish etc.
but if you compare within the european scale itself, they're not the most super duper thing ever.

that said it's not about not being proud to have a golf to drive around, but it's about managing my expectations so if things do fall apart, i know where it stands in a scale...

there was a case study at work in regards to managing expectation, a reputable road assist company had taken approach to quote time of technician to arrive at customer's broken down car in 1 hour blocks, say if their nearest car is 15 mins away they will say they'll have someone be there in 1 hour, if it's 1:05 away, they'll say 2 hours. what happened is they've set the expectation baseline to those and in most cases the mechs managed to get to the customer in LESS than the quoted time and majority of customers are happy...

had they done differently, promising mechanics to arrive in 15mins but constantly late even by 1 minute customers experience may not be as great.
Our team have applied this approach at work, setting a baseline of completing peer requests by 2 days for minor and 5 working days for larger piece of work, and at 99% of the time we managed to exceed their expectations, as well as allowing ourselves ample of time to juggle and prioritise between work.

ok, enough management course.
that said - my way of setting the scale, if my gti don't rattle like a rattle snake after 3 years, I will be a happy customer, kept my sanity, kept my blood pressure low, and remove stress. if my gti does end up rattle like a snake, I can tell myself, it's an entry level euro car anyway, as I expected when I bought it. no harm done to my sanity

[mfl]

as being one that is of a higher position from an engineering standpoint,

When I bought the GTI I did actually expect a slightly higher build quality than the cheaper Australian and Japanese cars I have owned, especially when the interior trim of the car gives the feel that puts it a class above everything else I owned. In fact it was the quality of the interior which in the end, meant I bought the GTI instead of the XR5, which was cheaper and had more options for the price (leather and blue-tooth).

so far on my 9 month old GTI, the ac compressor and water pump have had to be replaced. The water pump took 2 days and the dealer didn't offer a loan car. the dealer hasn't fixed the squeaks in the front doors yet and after our disagreement over oil 'sweat' on the turbo, it probably means I will have to see another dealer for another opinion. - but I still actually really enjoy driving the GTI. - as for the exhaust rattle, maybe if VW tuned a few more pops and crackle into the engine note, you wouldn't hear it.

[G-rig]

Raspier? It's downright insane! I took a Stage2 for a short spin on the weekend thanks to a very nice bloke who had the exhaust fitted here in Perth. Up-changing at 4000rpm almost broke the windows on a few houses in my suburb. It's very aggressive, in my opinion and I don't think it's for me. It is still sedate-ish while crawling around, but it's louder than stock for sure. It's very easy to make it sing and I'm not sure I'm after that much attention.

You may be better off just going for the downpipe setup for stage 2 (and get most of the power). However i think you need some extra burble/exhaust note to get your mind of the 'rattle'. I don't even think it's nearly as bad as people make out or don't notice it much myself. The door rubbers make more noise J.

Depends how much people want to worry about trivial nonsense things I guess.

[ddre78]

b) Buyer beware in my case as this sound was present on all GTIs I had driven.

Certainly if someone had driven a car minus this sound and it then turned up on their delivery and/or developed over time then I'd probably be asking questions too.

Neither of the two cars I test drove had the rattle! Mine does. Not acceptable.

[cameronp]

it may be like $50k with options here and there in A$ but unfortunately that was a byproduct of economy, import duty, and our location being so far off with the rest of european/american continents (and buying power). but IMHO in a euro car sense of scale, golfs are just like corolla/pulsar/lancer/civic/323/swift and similar level if compared to a japanese scale. (and perhaps only as level as Lanos/Elantra in a korean scale).

Going off on a tangent here: Agreed that VWs are common as muck in Europe, but I don't think we're being ripped off.

The Golf is actually cheaper here in Australia than it is in England, if you compare like-for-like specs; it's just that we only get the higher-end models with more features and more powerful engines. I noticed lots of 1.6L Golfs last time I went to the UK, lots of TDIs, but relatively few GTIs and TSIs which are popular here. (The VW UK website now lists the 1.2 TSI engine found in the new Polo here as the base-model Golf engine there. But how many Australians do you think would be interested in buying a 1.2 TSI Golf for the price of of a 1.8L Corolla?)

The UK Ford web site lists the Focus as being almost the same price as the Golf (about £1000 price difference in similar-spec base models), despite the Focus being several grand cheaper here in Australia. Ouch.

For an example of a German car where we're being ripped off - in the UK, a BMW 325i (£27,845) costs a little bit more than a Golf GTI (£24,880 for a 5-door manual), but in Australia the BMW is almost twice the price!

[ddre78]

Depends how much people want to worry about trivial nonsense things I guess.

Im thinking your post is the only thing thats "trivial nonsense" around here.

Just because your standards are different/better/worse, don't insult others who think this is an issue.

[G-rig]

Im thinking your post is the only thing thats "trivial nonsense" around here.

Just because your standards are different/better/worse, don't insult others who think this is an issue.

I'll sign the petition but it's hardly as bad as people make out. The forums and internet make you worry about stuff a lot more than you need to. Under full load i can't hear it at all, it's only on light throttle around 2k.

[Corey_R]

Raspier? It's downright insane! I took a Stage2 for a short spin on the weekend thanks to a very nice bloke who had the exhaust fitted here in Perth. Up-changing at 4000rpm almost broke the windows on a few houses in my suburb. It's very aggressive, in my opinion and I don't think it's for me. It is still sedate-ish while crawling around, but it's louder than stock for sure. It's very easy to make it sing and I'm not sure I'm after that much attention.

For the record, I can't be 100% sure that the rattle sound has gone from that car. Since it had a new exhaust and the Carbonio intake, all I could hear at the required conditions was the intake sucking and the exhaust burbling. Now, it's a great car if that's what you want, but I like my vehicles to sound a bit more sedate. Diagnosis: inconclusive! Damn it!

Yeah sorry mate. I didn't realise it was a Stage 2 car. If I had, I probably would've given you the heads up not to bother (well, not to bother for this issue). Stage 2 is massively underrated by many. Although they don't have much higher peak figures than a Stage 1 car, they're a VERY different beast. Even if you just had the downpipe and still had the stock exhaust, they sound COMPLETELY different to stock/Stage I because the turbo's spin up so much quicker and they have a lot more induction etc!

[Corey_R]

To everyone posting in this thread, can we please leave the discussion about the cost of the Golf, it's placement in the chain of Euro cars, and comparisons to Hyundais and Corollas out of this. The thread is up to 42 pages, and it's all been covered at least 100 times before. Lets leave the discussion to those who are trying to collect information in the aim to find a resolution to the issue.

Cheers

[rs73]

possible solution - dump pipe group buy maybe? how's that for an idea?

[REXman]

Coreying,

Must you always be so quick to stop ANY descent discussion. :p I dont think anyones going way off topic.

I think there should be some leniency in topic discussion considering we are all bored as **** and waiting, without any cars to drive (and get us back on topic!).

[Corey_R]

possible solution - dump pipe group buy maybe? how's that for an idea?

Well as Murphy and I have been discussing, I think that before everyone goes and spends a few $k on a downpipe, more investigations needs to occur to ensure that the reports of "downpipe resolving it" isn't just a case of someone not having the "same rattle" in the first place, or they've gone straight to stage 2 and the noise is simply being masked by induction noise.

Plus, there'll be many people who have no interest in pursing that option.
Finally, whilst I'm sure Guy_H may be receptive to a group buy on the downpipes if you're able to secure enough committed purchasers, the complication comes that you'd also need the APR ECU update. Since that must be installed by your local APR dealer, it means a group buy for the software is not possible due to all the different independent businesses involved.

[ddre78]

I'm having a Milltek cat-back exhaust fitted at some stage next week. Ill ask the techs if they can try the wheel weight to see if it works before I have the exhaust fitted. Will report back.

[Corey_R]

Yeah sorry mate. I didn't realise it was a Stage 2 car. If I had, I probably would've given you the heads up not to bother (well, not to bother for this issue). Stage 2 is massively underrated by many. Although they don't have much higher peak figures than a Stage 1 car, they're a VERY different beast. Even if you just had the downpipe and still had the stock exhaust, they sound COMPLETELY different to stock/Stage I because the turbo's spin up so much quicker and they have a lot more induction etc!

So I really shouldn't post when half asleep! Brain fade
Anyway, by definition, all that is required for a Stage 2 car from APR is the Stage 1 ECU update, and then the APR downpipe. When they put the downpipe inplace, you then get the Stage 2 ECU software for free. Although the APR Carbonio intake, APR Intercooler and full APR RSC TBE are recommended, they are not "requirements" for Stage 2.

This means that, simply replacing the downpipe will require the Stage 2 software, and cause a big change to the turbo spool and induction noise etc.

This makes me wonder. Is the problem the downpipe, or still the wastegate actuator rod?. The stage 2 software might actually be what is fixing the issue, by changing the turbo operation and whatever else it does so that the wastegate rattle is either covered by other noise, or at a lower RPM which doesn't cause the same resonance etc. (Does this make sense?).

So I guess the resolution really needs to be in the following order:
1) On a car which definitely has "the rattle", do the American diagnosis steps with the wheel weight on the actuator rod
2) If step 1 doesn't work or has no effect, change the downpipe but not the ECU software (I'm not sure if this is "advisable" with the APR downpipe... maybe another brand will which doesn't require a software update may have to be used... someone should check with Guy).