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you missed this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57AigxAEzDE&NR
I assume that your car has the 1.8 engine, which then would have an exhaust manifold with Part # 051 253 031N. This manifold is common to all Mk3 Golf/jettas with the 1.8 engine. It isn’t syncro specific, and you can get a new one through http://www.worldimpex.com in the US for $213.15 usd.
Mk2 GTI 16V for North America came with 205/50-15 on BBS 15×6.5 alloys. They provided good handling and with good tires, acceptable wet performance. I would not recomend going to 16″ or 17″ unless the roads you travel are in perfect condition. Ride quality is poor on rough roads with 35 or 40 series tires.
An issue that is often overlooked is that the Syncro rear suspension is designed to provide more toe-out as the car is lowered. This is why some have recommemnded using the eccentric bolt adjusters on all 4 bushings using the slotting guidelines I stated earlier.
As soon as I have my eccentric bolts in hand, i’ll be fiddling with my rear beam to see how the alignment is affected. I’ll try to develop some sort of chart or graph to indicate the relation between toe and camber as the car is lowered, with the goal of determining how much adjustment is needed at each bushing to bring the alignment back to spec. (something I’ve wanted to do for a long time [
])Edited to read “toe-out as the car is lowered” – Les
A while back I was told by Todd at http://www.hyperformance.ca/ that he was only able to achieve 0.5 degrees of Camber corection with the offset bushes. Lowered Syncros have over 1 deg of neg camber, so the bushes are useless. I’ll try to dig up his comments to see if he provided any other details.
Mine will arrive in a day or 2. Funny thing is that the part numbers I found were not the same as what you listed, even though the dimensions/descriptions were. It will be interesting to see if the parts are the same.
To use these bolts, you will need to slot the rear arm mounting holes in the rear beam and then weld on some steel plates for the eccentric cam of the new bolts to react against. This can be two parallel bars or a custom machined 1- piece plate. The plate is the better method.
The camber is adjusted at the inner bushing (vertical slots in rear beam) and toe-in is adjusted at the outer bushing (horizontal slot in rear beam)
I have been considering the kits from dutchdub, but have a few ideas of my own that i want to try first. My biggest problem is finding an eccentric head adjuster bolt in M12x110.
There are adjuster kits being made by two different guys.
One of them is http://www.Dutchdub.com in Holland. I have been following an interesting discussion on his adjusters on VWVortex. http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=2849085
The second guy is Todd at http://www.hyperformance.ca/
Todd produced a similar kit for his own Passat Syncro and now offers them on a special order basis.Some people burn them out with a torch.
I use a large deep socket and a threaded rod with nuts and washers. Cut the existing rubber lip from one side of the old bushing to expose the flat surface of the swingarm. Select a deep socket or piece of pipe that will sit firmly on the swingarm and allow the bushing to pass inside. Pull the old bushing out using the threaded rod, washers, and nuts. This may require a substantial amount of force, so use the largest threaded rod that will fit through the bushing. you may still need to heat the swingarm around the bushing should you encounter a very difficult bushing.To install the new bushings, clean the hole to remove all corrosion and lubricate it with petroleum jelly or similar. Use the same tools to pull the new bushing into position.
You will need to use a washer that just passes through the swingarm and place it against the bushing during removal/installation. The bushings can distort/flex enough to damage them if you don’t use the washer or sufficient lubrication.
