Anyone who has spoken with a Momentum employee for any amount of time will understand that the knowledge that oozes from there is beyond anyone’s comprehension. So when we sat down to talk with Momentum co-owner Shawn van Neer about this month’s cover car, we knew we were about to be hit with more VW techno-jargon than even MAX could handle.
The cover car, in case you failed to notice, is a 2001 1.8T Passat wagon, and the initial idea of the project was to build a 1.8T engine without upgrading the factory computer. Foolish, you may be saying, but you forget Momentum is comprised of people who stop at nothing to prove their point. Did they? Well, since the tuning industry relies upon dyno numbers, Momentum took the Passat to a dyno for a few runs.
Although there are so many variables that can affect each dyno and the numbers it produces on any particular day, Shawn said the Passat is definitely a “300-plus” horsepower car (350-plus on nitrous.—MAX) with daily driving reliability. For the sake of racing, the power could be pushed to a more aggressive 400- or 450-plus horsepower, but Shawn assured us that he could hit almost any number we wanted when “on the giggle.” Just with a ballpark figure of 300-plus though, it seems pretty obvious the project was a success.
“How on Earth can you get 300-plus horses out of a 1.8T with a stock computer?” we asked. The answer was an hour long. The simplest way to describe what Momentum did is to say they “fooled” the stock computer. By manufacturing custom voltage blocks, Momentum was able to make the computer think the engine was stock so it would continue its business like it wasn’t a 300-plus horsepower monster. Every time something was modified, another “block” was put into place so the stock computer wouldn’t sense what was going on, panic, and shut down.
The major components of the engine upgrade came from HKS. An HKS GT-2835 ball-bearing turbo and an HKS intercooler core were used to power the car. As there was no Passat turbo-upgrade kit available, Momentum custom-made the air plumbing and smoothed out the pipe diameter changes with custom conical transfer cones on both the intake and exhaust. The cones provide a smooth air transfer without the air entropy that creates power-robbing back pressure. Other HKS components were utilized, such as the EVC-IV boost controller, 550cc injectors, blow-off valve, 14.2-psi wastegate, and air filter, but the magic started when all the components reached Momentum’s Canadian office.
Using the knowledge Momentum has gained in the last three years of existence, the crew set to work on the Passat. The trick was that nearly everything had to be customized in some way or another. Most of what was produced were one-offs, as gaining massive power from the 1.8T without the aid of a chip upgrade had never been attempted before, but these one-offs will never be sold. “I don’t sell a lot of what I do,” Shawn explained. The reason is that each person at Momentum knows how to tune engines, but they also know that the same tools that made such a wonderful car in their hands could turn tragic in the hands of an amateur.
Although Momentum used some pretty ingenious devices to create power, while blocking the stock computer from sensing it was producing more than twice its normal power, Momentum still kept things simple. Since Momentum is composed of several VW nuts, the knowledge that the 1.8T engine was pretty stout is a given. Knowing the 1.8T could handle a lot of power meant when the option of replacing the pistons and crank came, Momentum opted to keep the stock components. This decision alone shows that although it may seem Momentum is crazy for attempting a 300-plus horsepower car with a stock ECU, the simplest route was still taken when it came to the rest of the engine. Engine parts were only replaced when deemed necessary.
Now you probably understand a little better the engine work that went into this project. It wasn’t merely a plug-and-play kind of project (As most chip upgrades are.—MAX), but it was a nearly-everything-must-be-modified-before-this-will-work kind of project—all in the course of two weeks.
Momentum did it, and Momentum is fully capable of doing it again, but probably not anytime soon, as both Shawns, Daniel, Duane, Bron, and a few female counterparts are all pretty tired of a project that demands 17-hour days. During those 17-hour days, however, the Momentum crew was kind enough to play journalist and snap a few shots for us. The photos don’t even begin to tell the story as to how much work went into the engine, but it does show several of the components as they were installed.