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I just picked up an '02 Jetta 5spd TDI for a work commuter, since I drive 140 miles round trip. She's got 235,320 miles on it and purrs like a kitten. First time ever driving one yesterday and I couldn't believe how peppy it is for 90 flywheel horsepower and 155 flywheel torque.

Going to be doing some MPG mods to it. I'm hoping to see 55mpg as an average. 

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I can't comment on the older models, but today if you want mileage and horsepower VW turbo diesel's are hard to beat. I really don't know why anyone would give electric cars a second look with these around. Turbo's just give everything a little more excitement. Pretty fun to put your foot in it isn't it!

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I had a '92 jetta with the 2.0 + 5spd years ago and this thing is so much more fun to drive. And that '92 was a fun car to drive in itself. This one just offers so much more. Getting it tuned in two weeks for +25hp and +40tq. Supposed to get 3-4mpg better too. 

 

Word is VW TDI's are no longer available and will never be available for sale again the US as new vehicles, because of 'Diesel Gate'. Google it and find the show on Netflix under Dirty Money if you haven't seen it. 

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Hard to believe at some point they won't be back. Takita made shit airbags (safety recall) for millions of vehicles and hardly a whisper, VW plays with emissions just a bit and got hammered.  Completely unrelated but damn funny, the guy in the bay next to mine called me over to look at a scan tool reading on 2017 VW Turbo Gasoline Bug about a month ago. It set a emissions leak detected P0455 code at 145 mph. First, 145 mph in a bug is just crazy, and second, I can't believe it ran the test at that speed but it logged it in freeze frame.

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First fill up today. Going to keep track of each fill up and mileage in a log book. I'm geeking out over it. Did the "fuel tank top off mod" where you vent the tank manually, to squeeze 2 extra gallons of fuel in there.

On 9/2/2018 at 6:52 PM, 6500rpm said:

Hard to believe at some point they won't be back. Takita made shit airbags (safety recall) for millions of vehicles and hardly a whisper, VW plays with emissions just a bit and got hammered.  Completely unrelated but damn funny, the guy in the bay next to mine called me over to look at a scan tool reading on 2017 VW Turbo Gasoline Bug about a month ago. It set a emissions leak detected P0455 code at 145 mph. First, 145 mph in a bug is just crazy, and second, I can't believe it ran the test at that speed but it logged it in freeze frame.

Hard to say for sure, but they fucked up pretty bad. Not too mention it gives the EPA and tree huggers that hate diesels, reason enough to keep them off US soil. That Dirty Money episode about it is great. The part where they (a German company) were wanting to use a gas chamber with live people in it, was almost unbelievable. LMFAO 

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I like them, but post dieselgate, VW has basically said that they can't afford to start making them again.

My grampa had a 98 jetta that someone had worked over. It was fast, fun when it hit turbo, and I got 65mpg flogging it through twisty backwoods roads. Unfortunately, it had a VW transmission, which is the failure mode. I don't know what was done to it, but I am fairly sure that it had upgraded suspension and some engine mods, and probably upsized tires. I've driven gas jettas, and they felt way more understeer prone, even with what must be lighter engine blocks.

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I'd probably pass out if I realized I was getting 65 mpg in anything. My daily gets about 15 mpg and I am glad that I don't have to drive very far on a regular basis. My regular commute is about to go down to 9.2 miles round trip and I'm quite happy about it. A tank of fuel should last a month or more. At 65 mpg I'd be good for months if not deviating much from going to a from the shop.

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On ‎9‎/‎2‎/‎2018 at 6:08 PM, Mullet Man said:

Word is VW TDI's are no longer available and will never be available for sale again the US as new vehicles, because of 'Diesel Gate'. Google it and find the show on Netflix under Dirty Money if you haven't seen it. 

Thanks for the "Dirty Money" Nexflix reference. I watched the VW segment and the two following it. It's a very well thought out and educational show...made me want to punch a few people through the TV on the Payday loan episode. Not a bunch of VW's in the fleet, but my German buddy in the bay on the other side owned a Jetta TDI wagon when all the diesel gate stuff hit. I never knew the half of it. Man, he took me on some rides in that thing like we were on the Autobahn. Being originally East German he now owns a Mercedes C300 that VW helped fund. He loves to beat on U.S. cars so I love to push his buttons that my big ass Taurus SHO has more options and he won't run me. If he ever moves up to a AMG I'm going to up my game with a methanol tune. Then again, my GTDI engine only averages 22mpg.  Enjoy the new ride, if you put a tune on it, that thing should fly.

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Still on the first tank of fuel. 

This thing is just satisfying to drive. 

Check out the trip vs fuel gauge.... 

IMAG0746.jpg

 

Normally driving my truck or jeep, I would have filled up twice going into the third fill-up at that kind of mileage. 

Edited by Mullet Man
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On 9/7/2018 at 5:56 PM, 6500rpm said:

Thanks for the "Dirty Money" Nexflix reference. I watched the VW segment and the two following it. It's a very well thought out and educational show...made me want to punch a few people through the TV on the Payday loan episode. Not a bunch of VW's in the fleet, but my German buddy in the bay on the other side owned a Jetta TDI wagon when all the diesel gate stuff hit. I never knew the half of it. Man, he took me on some rides in that thing like we were on the Autobahn. Being originally East German he now owns a Mercedes C300 that VW helped fund. He loves to beat on U.S. cars so I love to push his buttons that my big ass Taurus SHO has more options and he won't run me. If he ever moves up to a AMG I'm going to up my game with a methanol tune. Then again, my GTDI engine only averages 22mpg.  Enjoy the new ride, if you put a tune on it, that thing should fly.

I hope they continue to make new episodes.

That Payday loan episode was infuriating, to say the least. 

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First tank went 717 miles. When i filled up, it took 15.6x gallons. Averaged out to 45.1mpg, thats triple what i was getting before. I didn't change my driving habits at all, still drive 78-80mph for 85-90% of my commute. Plus my rear brakes were garbage metal on metal and dragging, and all 4 tires had excessively different pressures, for about half of that tank. When the fun of driving it slows down some, i will try harder to get a better average by driving slower, coasting more, shifting at a lower rpm etc. etc. 

 

Cant complain about that

Edited by Mullet Man
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22 hours ago, evlblkwpnz said:

That thing would be awesome for a cross country trip. I can see it now, "We are only stopping for pee breaks when we need fuel... " he says with a maniacal laugh.

If i was by myself, that's exactly what i would do.

Straight interstate driving at a steady 72-73mph, i bet this thing would do well over 800 miles to a tank, easy.

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reliable economy is a very freeing feature. Most of my friends got 4wd suvs for the feeling of being down for adventure. I always had econo boxes. My first car was even a ford festiva which was a better car than you would think. 55/45 mpg in a car you could afford that lasts for 450k miles and isn't made of lithium. then a crappy saturn, and then a protege 5 speed which I still have and like. It is more like 30-32 MPG most of the time, but if I am going over mountian roads at about 60, even if the car is working hard, my mpg goes closer to 42. It's getting pretty shabby due to the interfaces with antler bearing quadropeds screwing up the looks and the rear dampers are gone from having some very fat people in the back going too fast down Forrest service roads. At this point it would be dumb to dump a lot of cash into it, but it has been a great car for me.

My friends always wanted to do road trips, then debated about pooling money for gas for their explorer or trailblazer or whatever. "We can go to X for the weekend, if we get another person to cram in, the gas will be $35 each..." I'd say, "let's just go. We'll take my car, and the gas will be under $35 round trip. Jump in and don't worry about chipping in on gas." economy is freedom to do what you want as often as you want. So is having a car that you don't mind getting a scratch on.

I think my next car is likely to be a subaru hatch, or wagon, so I won't be as economical, but most of the miles go on two wheels the last few years anyway.

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Gunfun, you must be the greatest driver in the world. 65mpg out of a TDI VW, and 55mpg out of a Festy. I owned an '89 Festy 4spd manual, that i swapped a 5spd into. It was the carb 4cyl, pre stupid door attached sliding seatbelts. The best i ever mustered out of that Festy was literally tailgating a semi for 110 miles, of a 170 mile trip. I used up 3.5 gallons. When i say tailgate, i mean i was literally 8-10ft off the trailer of that semi, doing 55mph on Interstate 39. Fun car tho, i only paid $550 for it and it came with the 5spd i swapped into it. It's been 10yrs since i had that Festy, and if memory serves me right, i averaged ~42mpg. I actually shopped those again, before i picked up this TDI. 

 

I agree. The econo box has an aire of freedom about it. In more ways than just being able to travel farther, for less. It's about not being 'AS' enslaved to the oil industry to. It's a double "FUCK YOU". so to speak. 

Edited by Mullet Man
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I'm nothing special. I don't know much about the TDI, but I was impressed. feel free to be skeptical, I'm just reporting what I found on the trips I used it on. I enjoyed the car and was sad to see it die.

As for the festiva, they came in with several different engines, and I had whichever the good one was with a 5 speed. We had a couple others in the family which were not as good, and one which was the same. The autos were garbage.

I did a test driving for about a month and a half using 87 gas from arco, and ditto from the chevron which was at the time 10 cents more a gallon even. My cost per mile was identical, but the car ran way better on the chevron. I tried to not change my driving habits. So I do think fuel makes a big difference with some cars. I was a more economical driver then  than I am now, but it really was a good car for me. Most of my cars since have been around 30-32 mpg most of the time. 

The car that really surprised me was driving a late model very borrowed loaded outback and getting 36+ mpg per the display while going over mountain passes and being kinda aggressive. I had noted mileage, and when I did the math for the trip it came out exactly what the display claimed. Older versions of the same car with less refined transmissions were much cruder and get rather dismal economy. I still don't see how they managed to get that much mpg out of such a heavy rig.

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Oh, the other thing about the festiva, was it was night and day in feel and performance, and economy at some undefined weight threshold. I could have a passenger or two, and it was the same as always. If I had my dad in there, who is a big guy, the thing was just struggling, and it was like a completely different car. 

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