R32 MK5 Rattle + Upgrade advice?? Supercharger?

[tuffpro]

Guy, i have two questions

What is that rattle type noise that comes from the underneath exhaust area of the R32, sort of midway through the rev band? Took my R32 back to the dealer who told me that its a trait with all R32s. Went in two other cars and they did the same thing. Does anyone know what I'm talking about???

Also I'm already thinking about a power upgrade, fed up of saying bye bye to S3s. I'm not greedy; just want enough to give a S3 a decent challenge. Reading through the forum the VF supercharger sounds like it will do the trick

Are these superchargers reliable?

Is the V6 capable of handling the extra power without any problems?

General advice of what to do welcome

[tuffpro]

Any MK5 owners, please tell me what you did to your car? Where you got it done? Any problems

AMD advised me to go for "remap, full Milltek exhaust, cold air intake, and Schrick cams to take it over 300bhp without compromising reliability"

Sounds like a good option for me, anyone done this???

[mlhj83]

The rattle is most likely coming from your heat shields caused by resonance from your exhaust, although I didn't experience this when my exhaust was stock. Force you dealer to fix it if it's annoying you. I know it might sound silly, but I hope the rattle you are referring to is actually a rattle (i.e. something touching something) rather than the exhaust rasp which you get above 3000rpm.

With regards to power upgrades, best to speak to Ed Jackson of APS or Ray West of West Tuning. Both of whom have the most experience in tuning the Mk5 R32 in my opinion.

The recommended list of power upgrades are:

milltek cat back

high flow air filter or air intake

Schrick cams (268/264 for manual, 264/260 for DSG)

custom remap

These should bring you close to 300bhp. I would be cautious about installing milltek manifolds and sports cats as there have a been a number of owners including myself, who have experienced significant low down torque losses and problems with the cells of the sports cats. However, there are a few who have had no problems with a full milltek system. It's really up to you, but it would be advisable to stick to oem manifolds and cats if you are not going down the forced induction route.

Also, milltek have withdrawn the manifolds and cats for the Mk5 R32 from their inventory and have given different people different reasons as to why they have done so.

[mlhj83]

Also if you are planning to go down the forced induction route, I would suggest selling your R32 and buying an S3 and remapping it as the total cost of a full milltek, air intake, remap and forced induction would very nearly cover the cost to change to an S3. Unless of course, you love the R32 enough and don't mind going down the forced induction route, in which case, HPA turbo kit would be a better choice than a supercharger for the Mk5 in terms of reliability and the fact that the HPA turbo kit has undergone more development, testing and adoption. Also, HPA are about to release their CVP intake manifold which is supposed to make the progression from NA to forced induction much easier and cleaner, in addition to liberating more power at the top end.

[tuffpro]

Thanks for the advice, I do think that i'll go for the Cam & remap option, 300bhp is around the power figure i'm looking for.

Also just noticed that your in Wimbledon, not to far from me in Croydon. Who did you get to mod your car and are you happy with the power of the car?

Edited July 8, 2008 by tuffpro
Typo

[mlhj83]

My car has been taken care of by APS and they have been absolutely brilliant, customer service is top class and their opinions are honest and not financially biased. APS is also very well known amongst Audi/VW tyresmokers. I will eventually be getting 264/260 schrick cams and a CVP manifold in a few months, but my current engine related mods have made a significant improvement in throttle response and top end power delivery. Obviously, it's no S3 killer, but I would say I'm on par with regards to acceleration.

[mlhj83]

AFAIK, APS is also the only tuner that is still actively tuning their Mk5 R32. You should get in contact with them and go for a test drive in their Mk5 and see what you think. They have got the 268/264 cams with a 7200 rev limiter on their R32. They are currently waiting delivery of the HPA CVP manifold.

[Bogdan]

From my short experience on this site, it seems that APS is indeed the way to go. I would go that route too if it was my case. Only one small problem though: I also have the rev limiter set to 7000. I know for a fact that going above 6500 rpm often will end up with a damaged DMFW, and that is even on a stock engine with the rev limiter set higher, not to speak about an engine with more hp on it.

[tuffpro]

My car has been taken care of by APS and they have been absolutely brilliant, customer service is top class and their opinions are honest and not financially biased. APS is also very well known amongst Audi/VW tyresmokers. I will eventually be getting 264/260 schrick cams and a CVP manifold in a few months, but my current engine related mods have made a significant improvement in throttle response and top end power delivery. Obviously, it's no S3 killer, but I would say I'm on par with regards to acceleration.

Did you end up going back to APS for the cam work? I'm ready for more bhp so if you did have the work done what the car like now? Any regrets?

Cheers

[mlhj83]

Yes, I have got the 264/260 cams now. They make a significant difference to the way the car accelerates. There is just so much more torque in the upper region of the rev range without any loss low down. It now pulls relentlessly all the way up to an indicated 170mph, whereas before, full throttle acceleration from 4th to 6th gear would be a little asthmatic. I wouldn't say that my engine mods have completely changed the car, but rather improved what was already there. IMHO, APS Stage 3 is well worth the cost, and most definitely a must have.

However, the single biggest mod you can give your car is some really serious mileage to loosen up the engine! Next mod for me would be a custom 200-cell cats.

Edited July 8, 2008 by mlhj83

[jimmyp]

APS no longer have there MK5 .:R32, and iirc if you fit the cams along with the manifold and cats you shouldn't experience any loss of low down torque.

HTH+++

[mlhj83]

APS no longer have there MK5 .:R32, and iirc if you fit the cams along with the manifold and cats you shouldn't experience any loss of low down torque.

HTH+++

It's a fact that in most cases a larger bore full exhaust system will cause you to loose low down the rev range but gain higher up. The power band is effectively shifted higher up the rev range and peak power and torque are both increased. Question is whether that loss in low down torque is perceptible and if it is, then it's up to individual preference on whether the benefit of a higher peak power and torque higher up the rev range, outweighs low down loss. Cams can go some way to compensate for any loss low down, but the longer the duration of the cams, the higher up the the rev range peak power and torque will be. That said, both the 264/260 and 268/264 cams are relatively mild, so I guess they do compensate for low down losses; 264/260 being the one that compensates more.

Supersprint is pretty much the only other manufacturer offering a full exhaust system. Milltek have discontinued the manifold and sports cats for the Mk5 R32.

[BrakeSnake]

With regards to the 300 bhp figure, it's all abit open to conjecture. The APS 300 they quote as 297 bhp is including a magical 7% percentage difference that someone has comeup with as the 297bhp figure is based on 277bhp on the Superchips RR which is suposedly 7% down on most other dyno's. When mine was done, Ed was very impressed and said it broke the 300bhp mark at 303 bhp (factored for this 7%). Numerous RR's since then has had my car at around the 285 bhp mark, and to be honest, it's acceleration feels about this level. It certainly feels no faster than my Mk1 S3 that was lighter and produced 290bhp.

The 300bhp mark is a very expensive figure to obtain in the Mk V and as has been said, you'd be better going for the lighter more tuneable S3 or Gti Ed30 unless you specifically want the heavier R32 just for the 6pot. As for the HPA CVP, be careful about this... I spoke to HPA over in the states on numerous occasions last year, and there is a lot of information that can be found on the vortex site. If you got concerned over the low down torque loss of the cats and manifolds, then the CVP inlet will be even worse. Their RR tests showed good gains over 4500rpm, but significant torque losses below. They acknowledged it's benefits would suit those who spend more of their time above 5k in the rev range, very much street racer orientated.

[mlhj83]

With regards to the 300 bhp figure, it's all abit open to conjecture. The APS 300 they quote as 297 bhp is including a magical 7% percentage difference that someone has comeup with as the 297bhp figure is based on 277bhp on the Superchips RR which is suposedly 7% down on most other dyno's. When mine was done, Ed was very impressed and said it broke the 300bhp mark at 303 bhp (factored for this 7%). Numerous RR's since then has had my car at around the 285 bhp mark, and to be honest, it's acceleration feels about this level. It certainly feels no faster than my Mk1 S3 that was lighter and produced 290bhp.

The 300bhp mark is a very expensive figure to obtain in the Mk V and as has been said, you'd be better going for the lighter more tuneable S3 or Gti Ed30 unless you specifically want the heavier R32 just for the 6pot. As for the HPA CVP, be careful about this... I spoke to HPA over in the states on numerous occasions last year, and there is a lot of information that can be found on the vortex site. If you got concerned over the low down torque loss of the cats and manifolds, then the CVP inlet will be even worse. Their RR tests showed good gains over 4500rpm, but significant torque losses below. They acknowledged it's benefits would suit those who spend more of their time above 5k in the rev range, very much street racer orientated.

Agreed about the CVP, that's why I didn't get it in the end. Will have my oem cats literally chopped off eventually to make way for a 200-cell, whilst maintaining oem pipes.

With regards to rolling road power figures, when you said yours achieved 285 horse power, do you mean 285 effective horse power or brake horse power. I would like to clarify this as a rolling road dynamometer can only measure effective horse power, which will always be less than the actual brake horse power. That said, I'm puzzled as to why many tuners say that the stock R32 is down on power when they have it on a RR, which measures approx 220-230 effective horsepower. Isn't 220-230 effective horsepower normal and perfectly inline with manufacturer specification of 247 brake horse power? So if the RR measured 285 effective horsepower then your engine is genuinely producing over 300 bhp. I'm going to bug Ed about this incorrect use of terminology.

[cjallaway83]

I had the rattle prob on my mk5... Could hear it when revving it slowly and when just cruising along at 10-15 mph.

They sorted it under the warranty tho.

Was the heat shield for the exhaust.

Take it to them and tell them to jack up and wobble all the bits around.

[BrakeSnake]

Do you mean at the flywheel corrected for drivetrain losses or at the wheels number? The 285 was a 4wd corrected figure, came out on a few dynos. Uncorrected at the wheels running in 4WD on a 4wd dyno, the numbers where 230 to 235 bhp, which was then corrected for around a 20 to 25 % drivetrain loss due to running in 4wd...

[mlhj83]

Do you mean at the flywheel corrected for drivetrain losses or at the wheels number? The 285 was a 4wd corrected figure, came out on a few dynos. Uncorrected at the wheels running in 4WD on a 4wd dyno, the numbers where 230 to 235 bhp, which was then corrected for around a 20 to 25 % drivetrain loss due to running in 4wd...

Yes, I meant flywheel. Forgive me, I'm quite anal when it comes to terminology, as bhp refers to hp at the flywheel.