Wheels, Gauges, Oh My....

It's About Time...

 As I've mentioned before , the "Helmet" gets no love.  My previous attempt to show it some love resulted in a road trip to Kansas City to buy some wheels that didn't actually fit.

Wait, What?

Yup.  It turns out the Borbet Type C wheels I drove 4 hours for and got such a "great deal" on?

Yeah, they don't freaking fit my car.

Turns out the guy didn't know what he had and either intentionally or accidentally misrepresented the wheels in his Craigslist ad.

The wheels were for a car with a 5x120 bolt pattern, and not for a 5x100.  Great for a older BMW, but not for a Mk4 Volkswagen.

This is partially on me, as I never bothered to validate the bolt pattern.

You know,  before I had one of the wheels repaired, bought new tires and took them to the tire shop to have them mounted.

 You know, before I did all that and looked like a huge jackass.

*SIGH*

Craigslist Crawl, Part Deux

So, I still wanted to make the Golf look better, so back to Craigslist I went for a deal on some nice wheels to polish my turd.

Found a set of Black 17x7 in Konig "Day Lite" wheels in Tulsa, with tires installed for a decent price.  Neat!  Off to Tulsa!

Managed to snag the wheels and tires and also verified offset and bolt pattern before I loaded them into the Raider for the trip home. Check these out.  They look great and are supposed to be pretty light.  A great addition to the TDI.

I hope these improve the looks of the car without hurting the fuel economy too much.

17X7 5X100

Konig DayLite Wheels With 235/45/17 Tires

The tires installed were 235/45/17 and were pretty much the same size installed from the factory for OEM 17 in wheels.  The offset was perfect for the most part.  I'm not a fan of too much poke from the wheels on my cars, so I didn't see a need to use spacers.

The only thing I wanted was for a small drop in ride height.  My only worry was the fact that the car already sat rather low from the factory, and was more concerned with everyday driving than looks.

The wheels and tires really helped dress up the looks of the car.  Handling was improved, but mileage did suffer slightly.  MPG dropped from 41mpg to 38-39mpg.

Can't win them all.

Information High

A lack of information from the factory gauges was also a consideration that needed to be addressed for my Diesel Daily Driver.

I wanted a way to monitor Boost, Voltage, Water Temperature and Boost Pressure.

Unfortunately, due to limited space for gauges there wasn't going to be an easy way to install enough gauges to monitor everything.

P3 Gauges offered a multifunction gauge that monitored most of the parameters needed, and fit into the space occupied by the Driver's Side air vent in the dash. The gauge read parameters directly from the OBD2 port under the dash.  While this was a simple and convenient solution to my issue, it was fairly pricey.

Some research revealed several other multifunction OBD2 displays, that were far cheaper than the P3 Gauges offering, but didn't offer the same drop in mounting integration.  Some custom work would be needed to mount the chosen unit.

I chose to use the UltraGauge OBDII Scanner/Gauge for the "Helmet".  It offered far more features including, MPG Readings and the ability to read and clear OBDII errors and codes.  Mounting the unit was kind of a challenge due to the shape of the gauge and the shape of the dash.  I eventually decided to remove the useless factor pop out cup holders located above the head unit, and use a plastic blanking plate in its place.

The plate was notched slightly to allow the cable for the UltraGauge to be routed into the dash.  A special multidirectional mount for the gauge was secured to the blanking plate with 3M double faced tape.

It Actually Works Pretty Well Here

Once installed, configured and properly calibrated, the UltraGaugeII is a very useful tool.  I used it mostly to monitor Water Temperature, Voltage and Boost.  There are several other parameters that can be monitored depending on the ECU Protocol used.  For $69.97 this gauge is a bargain, and I will probably use it on other OBDII equipped vehicles.

One More Gauge

While the UltraGauge took care of the majority of the engine parameter monitoring issues, I still needed something to monitor oil pressure.

  The gauge was a little over $100 and the tee was about $12.  The steering column pod was around $39 or so.  It's been awhile, so I might be completely off.

I picked up a 52mm Electrical New South Performance Oil Pressure Gauge along with their L/H side steering column pod.  The gauge included pretty much everything needed to install the gauge except for a "tee fitting" from VDO to use with the oil pressure sending port on the engine.

I used the info in this guide for information on locating the proper port on the engine, routing the signal wire past the firewall and the part number for the VDO tee unit (M10x1k thread T-fitting VDO 240-850).  Everything else is outlined in the instructions for whatever gauge you wind up using.

One thing to consider is how close the factory steering wheel comes to the front of the gauge when installed with the NSP Steering Column Pod.  The 52mm AEM digital gauge I intended to use originally wound up hitting the back of the factory steering wheel due to how far the AEM gauge bezel stuck out.  It kept hitting the steering wheel.

I know for a fact that the NSP and VDO 52mm Analog Gauges will fit using the NSP Steering Column Gauge Pod.

Almost Looks Factory

 Once installed the gauge supplied a lot of peace of mind, as good oil pressure is MANDATORY for reliable operation of any engine.

Information Overload

The addition of these two gauges provide plenty of information for the driver of a TDI to monitor and diagnose their vehicle.

Hopefully this will help someone out in the future.

Alpha, Mike, Foxtrot....