Jetta 2.0 vs. 1.8T

Someone on forums.vwvortex.com put a WRX motor in their Vanagon. Sounds like it kicks butt!

Yea, the "Vanagon S", there's an article about it on the site. Nice to have a Vanagon with real-world power, but no Subie-powered VW's for me. I'd probably replace the 2.5 litre Audi-sourced engine the Vanagons ran with Audi's 2.2 litre turbo-5. Either that, or see if I can fit a 24-valve VR6 in there. Do it up with Schrick cams and intake manifold, a custom exhaust and a GIAC chip and you'll be making around 230Hp with a flat powerband and no turbo lag.

Hey, if you feel bad about dropping a Subaru engine in a VW, you should know that the basic design for the Subaru flat 4 was a copy of the engine from a Lloyd, which was a German car company in the 40's and 50's. I also recall reading that some of the tooling for the early Subaru engines was bought from NSU, another German car company. All of these German car companies had produced air-cooled engines similar to the VW's.

So...a Subaru engine is really not that far removed from a VW. I had a few older Subaru's, and while they were watercooled, the similarities between them and the aircooled flat 4 VW engines is striking.

Not to mention...that WRX powered VW looks like FUN!!!

Yea...I've heard most of that stuff. There's just something about Subarus that continually dissapoints me. I test drove the WRX before I bought my GTi, and despite being quicker 0-60 and having AWD, I couldn't get into it. Same with the Forester XT I recently drove, which is ridiculously fast for a vehicle of that size and type, but I just came away feeling indifferent. The Turbo version of the Baja looks interesting though. I'm amazed that they aren't selling more of them to compact-truck buyers. As indifferent as I am about Subies, I can't believe anyone would buy a 6-cylinder Ford Ranger or Chevrolet S10 for about the same money as a Baja Turbo. In any case, I'd love a 90' or 91' Vanagon Synchro to rebuild (I want it to be CLEAN, I'm really anal about the smallest imperfections) with a 24-valve VR6 or an Audi 2.2 Turbo 5. I wonder how hard it'd be to get a Carrera 3.6 motor back there....

Interesting. Honda was saying that the Insight was the most fuel efficient vehicle in the world, 70MPG. However the Lupo TDI is really the most efficient with 77MPG. I think that's because they only think NA is the whole world in their minds. :)

Maybe there was an asterix you didn't notice ;-).