If you ask 20 enthusiasts to name the ultimate VW, you'll get a range of answers. A few might mention the Corrado SLC with its VR6 engine, while others may choose the R32 with it's all-wheel drive, but the most popular car would likely be the Golf Rallye.
The venerable Golf Rallye was a classic. It had a high-tech and powerful (for the time) G60 engine with an aggressive yet restrained widebody and, of course, the Syncro all-wheel drive system. As far as Golf's go, it had a much higher level of handling, performance and refinement than anything else at the time. Its reinforced chassis was made for racing, and because it was never imported into the USA we could only dream about this ultimate VW.
A few enterprising souls, however, have gone through the somewhat complicated and frustrating process of importing a Golf Rallye Stateside. You may recall Ed Sheets (former co-owner of NGP Racing) had his Rallye featured in et 2/06. It was an extreme project, with a VR6 turbo making over 600 horsepower.
One of NGP's oldest customers, Steve Brown, happened to stop by the shop one day and went for a ride in the Rallye with Ed. That quick blast was all he needed to get on the phone to his bank manager. Luckily for Steve, a recently imported Rallye turned up at the shop, and he was happy to scoop it up and set his dream in motion.
"I always wanted a Rallye. Who doesn't? It's one of the rarest cars, so when Ed showed me his, I knew I had to get one," Steve said. "It was stock and had about 70k miles on it."
The engine may have had relatively low miles, but after owning a series of highly modified cars, ranging from a Mk1 16v to a built-motor Mk3 8v turbo, the standard 160hp G60 wouldn't satisfy Steve for long. So a round of upgrades were installed at NGP to get the power to an acceptable level, including a Kompressor Kanada rebuilt stage 3 supercharger, cam, chip and a smaller pulley. Yet the power of the VR6 lingered in the back of Steve's mind, and the G60 lacked the punch he had been hoping for.
"We re-did the G60 engine and made it look real nice, but it wasn't enough power and the car didn't have the prestige of the VR6 sound. So that's why we swapped it," he mentioned. After discussing the details with Dave Graf (NGP's service manager and co-owner), a 2.9 VR6 was sourced from eCodeparts.com and the little G60 was removed.
"It was just going to be the VR6 2.9 striaght from Europe, but as the project progressed we wanted a turbo, then a bigger turbo and intercooler, and it snowballed," Steve relayed.
The bottom end was checked and the head freshened before being reinstalled with a set of Techtonics 264/260 cams and a C2 Motorsports 8.5:1 head gasket spacer. An Innovative Turbo T04E hybrid turbo was bolted into place with a Kinetic Motorsport exhaust manifold and a Tial wastegate to regulate boost.
NGP's head technician and fabricator, Ron Weaver, handled the tuning on Steve's car. Having worked his magic on Ed's Rallye, he was familiar with the challenges and able to complete Steve's.