My Mk3 Golf: An OEM inspired daily driver

[20V'er]

Bought this 4 door Golf GL from my buddy’s wife a few weeks ago. She bought it new in 97 from Westside and it has been sitting in their garage since December with a bad coil. It isn’t the Mk4 1.8T GLI that I wanted, but with the downturn of the stock market it was something I could buy out right verses getting a car loan.

So my plan is to turn this fairly clean and completely stock GL Golf with only 100,314 on the ODO into a bit of an OEM plus whore. I’m not sure how long I will keep it or how far I will get on it, but as I find parts, time and money I will make it cooler then it is now.

When I drove it home:






Some of the parts waiting to go on it:


Work done already:

• Washed
• Installed relay 99 to make the wipers programmable
• Got the parts to fix the rear washer nozzle
• Replaced a couple burnt out bulbs
• Installed GTI tails and hella tinted sidemarkers

Parts waiting to go on:

• Keyless entry
• Short shifter
• Driver’s side rub strips
• Painted mirror caps
• Tilt column with leather wrapped OEM steering wheel

I also have a complete power window setup, with leather cards and seats, but not sure I want to do that much work.

Parts I am looking for:

• Clean Jetta headlights and clean OEM fogs
• Clean black Jetta grill
• Euro VR lip (I think)
• OEM lower moldings from a GLX/GTI
• Complete OEM cruise control.

I don’t plan to do much to it performance wise as I like its reliability and good gas mileage.

Up next will be fixing the AC, fixing the minor exhaust leak and getting it aligned. I’ll try and take pictures along the way and maybe even do some how to write up’s if I get into anything interesting.

[duluthmkII]

Absolutely nothing wrong with a relatively low mileage mkIII golf as a daily. As a matter of fact that would be my ideal daily over anything I had to take out a loan for...
Plus I am sure you are aware of how much cheaper maintenance is on mkIII vs later models.

[silver saloon]

i think theres a euro vr lip for sale in the classifieds, iirc...

[20V'er]

Spent the night working on the Golf.

• AC fixed
• Keyless entry installed and programmed
• Shift boot replaced with a non ripped GL one (looking for an oem leather one)
• Short shift installed, but I need a new ball on the relay shaft
• Exhaust, T belt, tensioner, serp belt, roller, and breather tube ordered
• Leak in radiator discovered
• Oil changed
• Checked suspension for worn parts and everything looks great

Hoping I will get time this weekend to install the tilt col. and leather steering wheel. I really hate the plastic steering wheels on these base model cars.

[vweezly]

Pics of it washed please

[20V'er]

Pics of it washed please

No way

Thanks to Jack I now have rub strips on the driver's side doors and a working rear washer nozzle. He also rubbing compounded most of the huge scratch on the rear bumper out.

I also replaced the defroster switch as the light bulb was burned out and cleaned up some stickers on the windows tonight. Pretty sure I will drop it off to get the windows tinted at some point soon. As a black car with black interior sucks to get into after it has baked all day in the sun.

[20V'er]

Exhaust is brand spanking new from the cat back. It was a nice quiet cold ride home tonight.

Once the heat breaks it will be T belt time.

[20V'er]

Paid a buddies kid to wash the car last Thursday. He did a decent job, but I spent about 3 hours on it on Saturday and finally almost got the interior clean. Previous owner had a yellow lab, so there was and still is dog hair everywhere. I still need to wax and buff it to get it shined up a bit, but I think one more interior cleaning and it will finally be clean.

Today I had a meeting in Coon Rapids and was able to sneak out at lunch and go to John's Auto Parts. Only one mk3 cabrio there, but I picked up the leather ebrake cover from it. My cover was MIA since I bought the car (PO's dog had eaten it).

I also have been working on joey modding a set of jetta headlights. I got them painted on Saturday and now I just need to glue them back together. Then the Jetta front end can go on it! I'm just trying to decide if I should source a black GTI/GLX fender without the antenna hole while I am in the process of swapping front end sheetmetal.

Still need to find seats, fogs, decent oem shift knob/boot and maybe oem side skirts.

[Digital K]

sweet! cool to see something brought back. AC is king. first thing I fixed on the new mkII I got as well

[dubswede]

i hope the headlights are working out okay.

[20V'er]

i hope the headlights are working out okay.

I was able to parlay your headlights into some OEM ones with no broken tabs. I split those headlights and joey modded them last weekend. Tonight I bought some black silicon and glued them back together. I will give them 24 hours plus to dry before I put them on. I think they look decent for how little cash I have invested in them.

Tonight:

• Replace the T belt
• Backdated to the older style t belt tensioner
• Put on a new serp and v belt
• Installed a tilt steering col.
• Installed an oem leather steering wheel

I just tossed the steering wheel back on it to make it driveable, tomorrow I will have to set it straight and put the airbag back in.

I also picked up the vac pieces to make the gas flap a locking one. I'll see if I can sneak that in tomorrow as well.

[20V'er]

Today:

• Steering wheel installed correctly
• OEM painted mirror caps installed
• Rear section of center console swapped with one with a good cup holder
• Quick wash
• Went to the junkyard looking for seats, but struck out

[20V'er]

Last Week:

• 37% tint installed

Last Night:

• Installed Jetta front end
• Installed Hella tinted front bumper blinkers (sweet junkyard score)

Today:

• Ordered Radiator, T stat and T stat elbow

I have to get a decent day to wash it and snap some pictures. It already looks drives and smells (thanks to a new strawberry pine tree air freshener) then it did when I bought it.



P.S. Still looking for some clean fogs and blanks.

[John2.0T]

Nice progress!

We needs pics soon

[20V'er]

This is the way it has looked for a few weeks, just got time to wash it today. I still have not waxed it.






Mad 3 wheel action!

Still need to put in radiator and t stat before it gets cold out.