1987 mk2 vw passat estate 20v :)

[pologaz]

Retro ride #1 of 2 in my stable

Sort of bought it on a whim. Think I needed a summer project. Because reasons 😂

Someone decided to call it Pat the Passat. (It was me, I just don't like to admit it)

She's the runout topic model, equipped with fairly basic spec, but she comes with the somewhat rare sports seats and, most importantly, the 2.0 5 cylinder engine.

This is how Pat Passat was when purchased, nearly 4 years ago now. Some things have happened since. More to follow

[NobbyClark]

Looks epic on the Porker wheels!!

[pologaz]

Thanks, I thought so too! I have sadly had to let them go but it was a tough call. I think partly because I didn't fit them, I needed to put my own spin on it, but also I'm not a massive fan of using adaptors, especially when lacking a Porsche spare wheel! I toyed with getting some 928 alloys but I found some wheels more in keeping with vw styling at the time, and as an added bonus, are the correct fitment (4x100)

[pologaz]

Got quite a good deal on this car. Came with a wealth of spare parts and the original (and minuscule) alloy wheels

I did have cause to use them once. I needed some extra ground clearance to make a towing job a bit easier on the polo. Here it is about to get cracking.



Think I nearly cooked the old engine doing this job. It just needed to make it 150 miles down to my friends with the polo on the trailer


Oh, and it had to bring one back as well

[pologaz]

Unfortunately what it didn't come with was any kind of suspension. After dissassembling the front, then the rear, I found it had been fitted with mk2 golf coilovers on the back and polo lowering springs at the front. 5 stars for inginuity, the car was super low, if that's what you're looking for but what it wasn't was driveable at any speed above 45mph. I drove the 240 miles home, bouncing all the way. I ended up stopping half way back overnight at a friend's for a rest.

So once, I got it home it was time to buy some proper suspension for it



Sorry, not many pics from this time period. But, a shot after the suspension was fixed




Increased ride height, but now it was properly driveable.

[pologaz]

Here you will see the original engine. Now the audi boys are quite complimentary about the 2.0 5 cylinder. On paper it is nothing to write home about; 115hp and it didn't feel quick, I wasn't expecting it to.

Unfortunately this one had a top end rattle. It was there when I bought it and all my attempts to sort it just made it worse. So after spending £100 on a cambelt, waterpump and a set of tappets, plus driving twice over to leeds to borrow the tool to take the crank pulley off, I decided there was no choice;



Out with the old, and in with the new...

[ChasR]

I am looking forward to seeing how this goes .

[pologaz]

Small backtrack as I found some more pictures.

Late 2013. Id offered to Chauffeur my friend to her wedding in the passat. Engine was sounding pretty sick by now, so it made quite an entrance. I'd bought the new engine that July, but hadn't had the time to do the swap yet.








I did over 600 miles in her that weekend (Manchester-portsmouth and back plus driving around) and although the engine sounded like a bag of nails it didn't put a foot wrong. So with that the life of the 2.0 engine ended on a high.

[arsonist]

Lovely looking car. I'm a sucker for boxy looking passats. Looking forward to updates on this!

[pologaz]

Jan 10, 2017 0:20:39 GMT arsonist said:

Lovely looking car. I'm a sucker for boxy looking passats. Looking forward to updates on this!

Thanks. Think I've seen you over on ukpassats!

More updates to come. Bedtime now though 😴

[07lilredwagon]

what a great looking car!....really looking forward to the mods.....

JP

[65mustang]

Those are rare over here, you don't see those often and they are great looking cars.

We also have one we build for doing the Carbagerun over here (converted from a 1.6 d to a tuned 1.9TDI

[pologaz]

Great Stuff! They are pretty rare over here too. Most people bought sierras and cavaliers instead when these were being built.

So engine out. This was supposed to be a fairly quick and easy swap. Just as a precaution, I put the car through an MOT just before I took the engine out. I figured that gave me the time I needed to do the swap and get a custom made exhaust for it without worrying about needing it to be presentable for an MOT.

The new engine is a 2.3 litre "7A" out of the B3-shape Audi 90 and was also fitted to the B3-shape Audi Coupe. Same basic configuration as the original 2 litre; an inline 5, mounted longitudinally. But Moar Powahhhh.

the engine had been fettled a bit before i got it:







I'd done a fair amount of research on the differences between the two engines. The 20v engine runs on a different gearbox, same bolt patterns, but the input shaft is a different length with a different type of pilot bearing. The clutch and flywheel are also quite different, but it can all be swapped with off-the-shelf parts. I would just need to find them. I wanted to keep the original gearbox, as there are some problems using a newer gearbox, they lack a mechanical speedo drive for one, but for another, they are designed to run bigger wheels and tyres, plus the newer cars are heavier so the ratios are a lot shorter to compensate.

Once the old engine was out, it was time to compare apples with apples, and flywheels with flywheels

[pologaz]

On the left we have the 20v flywheel, on the right we have the original 2.0 one.

There are too many differences between the clutch design and the flywheel thickness to use the 2.3 flywheel. So attention was focused on whether the 2.0 flywheel would work.

Eagle eyed viewers may note the 20v flywheel has a bearing in the centre of it. On the 2.0, this bearing is mounted directly into a recess in the end of the crank. The 20v has this recess but is empty. appropriate bearing duly purchased.

Next, note the timing dowel on the 20v flywheel in the bottom left of the pic. This is part of the 20v engine's engine management. Its a reference pin for top dead centre. Not only is it missing from the 2.0 flywheel but there is no gap to install it. - the flywheel could be modified to make a gap, but perhaps there is a third option?

[pologaz]

Another problem with the 2.0 flyhweel is it's designed to take a 215mm clutch. The 7A uses a 240mm clutch. I expect that's important.




Here's a UR quattro flywheel. Got the timing pin. Designed to fit the B2-style bellhousing. 240mm clutch. Great!

Can't find one. Farce.

Ok, what else is there?

2.2 flywheel is the same as the quattro one, but doesn't have the pin. Ok. At least I don't have to have the flywheel trimmed. Not sure if I can use a 240mm clutch on this flywheel, so will play it safe and use the 2.2 clutch which is 228mm. I'm sure it's not that important...

[stonio]

Ooooooooohhhh a B2 hmmmmmmm lovely...

[pologaz]

I got a machine shop to do the flywheel timing dowel because I realised I didn't know what I was doing. The reference markers on the flywheel are no better than useless once you remove the gearbox, and i had a funny feeling the reference markers were in different places on the different flywheels. So the location needed measuring accurately. the only useable reference being the eccentric bolt pattern to mount the flywheel onto the crankshaft.

While it was away for that I cracked on with some other stuff.

renewed all the engine and subframe mountings. New suspesion bushings, arb and droplinks. It was all off anyway, seemed rude not to.

Bushes were definitely past it

I might have some pics of this. But I might not. I'll have to see if I can find them later. EDIT - I had the one above and that was it!

[scene missing]

Then this happened

[dandam]

I like this - my parents had three B2 passats, all hatches and the prefacelift versions. The final one was a GL5 and I can still remember the warble of the engine.

Looking forward to the updates 

[pologaz]

Biggest problem fitting this engine was it had to go in from underneath. The front of the car is welded on. On later Audis the front just comes away and you can pull the engine forwards. On these, you just need to get the car as high as you can.

I'd made a rudimentary engine trolley out of a piece of wood and some castors and i just about got the beggar under the front valance. The inlet and exhaust manifolds had to come off to reduce clearance problems. Or at least that's how I remember it.

Next big headache:

[pologaz]

Not sure exactly when, but I decided I should probably do something about the brakes. The car came standard with 13" wheels so the brakes are tiny, the same diameter as fitted to the polos and golfs of the era, albeit with vented discs.

Since it shares the brakes with the mk1 golf, there are many tuning options for them. I'd spent a great deal of money on the engine so funds were tight (well, I was tight). And i decided I wanted to keep it OEM, so I opted for the maximum size of brakes I could get from the parts bin, the resulting upgrade is equivalent to what's fitted to the mk2 golf GTI 16v, which most people upgrade away from because they aren't good enough for that, but hey-ho. It was the best I could do.

So now it has 256x20mm front discs instead of 239x20mm. At least 17mm betterer. The rear brakes are still drums for now, but I have a rear disc conversion and golf GTI rear axle to go on when I get around to it.

While I was doing the brakes, I trial fitted the new wheels. Funds were definitely tight after their purchase!