Friend of mine is looking to buy one of these monsters. The car is a 91 H reg 45 k , has a larger turbo, dump valve, trust exhaust, superchipped has 315 bhp and is priced at 4.500. Anyone on here who can offer some advice on what to look out for etc it would b greatly apreciated. He only wants it for a runaround but i dont want 2 see him flush 4.500 down the cazee!! Cheers Graham.

Graham,

Try http://www.kudosevolution.com/testgtirocindex.htm

With one modded to that level I'd want it looked at by someone who knows a lot about them. If the clutch has not been uprated it won't last long, and if the brakes haven't been done it would have to be owned by someone with a death wish as they are not up to the job of stopping a std Gti-R. Top this off with the fact that most have had a hard life, and I'd recommend a very close look.

Not the sort of car I'd recommend as a runabout as running costs are at Scooby levels, but a very good car if you can find one of the few good ones.

My old man's just bought one, and everything Robertio said is correct. The brakes are crap, and the clutch wont last the distance.

Also, I'd be wary of 315 brake on a Superchip. The conrods and pistons are notorious for going on anything more than a bar of boost - in fact NME recommend you don't take the car above that without a full rebuild and uprated internals.... major money!

My dad's runs a bar of boost on the standard engine, and that is really at its limit.... fuel supply is pretty inadequate for anymore.

Rich.

Check out the Sept/Oct edition of "Japanese Performance" magazine...there's a feature on a seriously tuned GTi-R, including a nitrous kit. As mentioned above, to handle 300+bhp some serious mods become necessary. In the car featured this meant soucing a Nismo gearbox from Japan, for an eye-watering £3200! www.Norrisdesigns.com might be able to help. There was another feature on buying these cars in "EVO" magazine about a year ago - it looked at the Celica, the Legacy Turbo and the GTi-R together. Some good tips in there if you can get hold of a back issue. Also, tell your mate to be wary of claimed power figures. Unless he's had it dyno'ed the reality could be quite different.

Hope that's some help

I had one for 2 years before the Scoob - fantastic car but it cost me a fortune. Maybe I was unlucky? Power was standard, but it had to have 2 gearbox rebuilds while I had it - the standard box struggles with 220bhp, let alone 300bhp (mine had the front diff bearings replaced first time, then the main/layshaft bearings failed).

Also had the cam chain tensioner fail which damaged the chain, sprockets, cams and cam followers, though I don't think that's a particularly common fault.

But if you can live with the bills it was great fun - much more raw than the Scooby!

Dave

My advice is;

Buy one from an GTIROC member, that way you can check the history of the car by trawling through any emails sent by that person on our discussion lists. Comments like 'it seems to smoke abit after I've hit the limiter for 3 minutes' may help you find a good...or bad car.

Check out www.gtiroc.com and the buying guide, also check cars for sale there too.

The brakes are OK if you change to braided hoses and change to DOT 5.1, also uprated discs aren't too much.

The clutch will not handle more than 1 bar of boost unless the mileage is low.

Find one with most things sorted and your OK, I use mine as a daily runner and it does require some care, seals will go etc.

I get about 15,000 miles plus a year and I've had it for more than 3 years. It's done 50,000 in my hands and has not allowed me to travel about 5 times in that time but one time required a full rebuild!

If you get one you'll love it and forget about the odd problems but you have to really be an enthusiast and love cars to handle the ownership issues.

Try www.gti-r.co.uk for 'Rs for sale, Martin runs the company and is one of our key members of the club.

An 'R will handle about 320bhp with standard internals, maybe more but you gotta let a pro touch it.

Hope this helps,

Caleb
www.gtir.co.uk
www.gtiroc.com

[Edited by GTiR - 10/30/2001 10:32:50 AM]

Graham,

Listen to Caleb (above) as he is Mr GTiR. His advice isn't bad either ;)

Mind you, never did understand how Caleb can do over 15k miles a year on a little island :D

Cheers

Ian

HI Ian,

Cheers for the comments, I just drive the sucker as much as I can, it's pleasurable all the way to the max 35mph speed limit here......

Caleb,

LOL, it may be 35mph, but I bet you get there quick ;)

Cheers

Ian

Graham

One of the guys at Power Station in Cheltenham has one of these. He also knows his mods. and may be able to offer some advice, though you probably can't go wrong with Mr GTiR

TONY

Thanks lads very helpfull advice , i've talked him out of it and i think he will look elsewhere. cheers Graham.

Caleb would get to 35mph quick if...
A) He didn't drive like a poof
B) His car didn't break all the time!!
We both work at the same place, there's also a P1, sport estate, turbo 2000 saloon, turbo 2000 estate and jap WRX estate, and Forester GLS owned by guys that work here. We could form our own club!
Toerag

my girlfriend has just sold her evo6(to a scoobynetter) and bought a pulsar from someone on the japuk meets board.
its a fantastic little car, we have dyno figures for 291bhp and thats without an fmic. goes like a rocket! better built on the inside than a scooby too.
basically, she sold her evo, bought a pulsar, put a huge wedge in the bank, and is having a ball! cant be bad eh? :)

I own a GtiR dyno'd on standard boost at 248bhp with jap spec de-cat and induction mods(on a hot day (23c) without octaine booster running on other SUL at the time, not Optimax that I now use).

The car is great fun, raw and quick, but I wouldn't own it without my warranty (through work), just in case, they are fragile like an integrale. I also get it checked regularly every 3 months by someone who has rebuilt a few in the past and change the oil each time.

I run standard boost because it delivers enough thrills as it is, with just GAB's and uprated springs. At this low level of boost the braking is fine with the slightly uprated Tarox discs and Mintex pads.

Biggest problem is insurance and petrol costs, but then so are scoobys!