In early 2004 my wife Tosha and I bought our first car as a couple: a 2002 Jetta 1.8T in Reflex Silver. We loved that car to death, and it started our passion with watercooled VW's. After a couple years of modifying and enjoying the Jetta the MkV GTI was released. We couldn't resist the call of the 2.0T and traded the Jetta in on the red MkV listed below in this folder.

Tosha has felt remorse for trading the Jetta in since that day, and I gotta be honest - the MkIV Jetta is probably my favorite-shaped water pumper. This car came up for sale and it was a no-brainer. We drove to Wichita and picked her up days later.

This 2001 Jetta GL 2.0 is an "OG" Team Foolie car - one of the early WetDub club cars from the days when the club was much smaller. The Jetta was a one-owner, bought new in England when the previous owner was stationed there with military orders. In 2004 he returned to the states and brought the car with him. Once the P.O. got hooked up with WetDub he was bitten by the mod bug. It did not take long for him to add suspension parts, an EIP turbo kit, Peloquin LSD, "Getta" front clip and many other goodies!

The car and it's owner vanished from the forums and club meets for a couple years as the previous owner became busy with other things in his life. Suddenly the car reappeared, this time for sale and toting a broken motor. Despite the broken motor (first though to be a broken valve or spring - turned out piston #3 had vaporized), the mileage on this 2001 car is just 34k! The asking price was more than fair and we knew the car well so we picked it up as Tosha's first major build project!

The turbo is gone, so we decided to tear the engine down and build a 16v hybrid using the stock 2.0L block and crank. This engine was chosen as much for it's aesthetic shock value as it's added power. After all, a 16v intake manifold is the last thing you expect to see in a MkIV bay!

Mrs.Shifty has owned and modified some neat VAG products, but I was typically the one doing the mods. This time she's fully hands-on, helping with every step of the build and choosing all the modifications on her own! We're both very excited about this build, and so far I think we're on track for a very unique car. Stay tuned, we're moving quickly on this one.

UPDATE:

After about 9 months of hard work, the "Wetta 2" came to life with a roar! As you can see from the pics, the 16v engine was painted a custom hue of pink mixed to contrast perfectly with the VW Vapor Blue. All other components under hood were coated in gloss black aircraft paint for durability. A Bahn Brenner fuel rail and FPR adapter, along with BBM and custom-fabbed flanges adapt the MkIV parts to the older-style head. The exterior got a basic shave job, including the door strips, trunk emblem and hood notch. Initially we custom shaved an ABD badgeless grille to fit with the Dubtechnik Votex replica bumper, but that has since been changed to a more "conventional-looking" Kamei piece. The head and taillamps were tinted very lightly for a clean and classy look, and Raceland coilovers went on to create an inexpensive stance.

We've put about 10,000 miles on the car over the past year and I'm happy to report we have had no major issues! We did have a few small SNAFU's - namely a timing belt tensioner issue, head gasket problem, and bad MAF sensor, but these were more like "bugs" to be worked out, and the car hasn't left us afoot. She's now running better than ever and we're having a lot of fun with it. Our next focal point will be to recover the 20th AE Recaros and clean up the interior & engine bay a bit more to make her truly show-worthy.