VR6 engine swap info / help / advice.

Hi, can anyone offer some help / information.

I'm by no means desprate to swap my engine, so if this is a none starter, i wont be swapping for anything else.

long story short, I have the chance of a VR6 at a very good price with rusty rear arches, I'm interested in buying it to fit the engine into my 1988 1.8 AUTOMATIC clipper.

Can anyone tell me, If i have a full VR6 donor car, running and complete, what other parts will I have to buy.

I've seen the kits you can get which cost $1100 usd

but I've also seen loads of UK build cars which havent used this "fitting kit"

what major parts will I need to buy bacause i cant source them from either car?

what major fabrication will be needed?

any information would be brilliant

Thanks
dan

basically, its either spend out on the conversion kit, or you have lots of chopping and welding to do.

couple options, weld the vr subframe mounts to your chassis, or chop the shell up till the vr6 subframe bolts on. the 2nd option would be my preference, it adds strength and rigidity to the shell, allows you to use std vw driveshafts and makes big break upgrades very easy

Thanks for the reply rubjonny.

so, to go into a bit more detail, if I chop up my shell, i'm guessing it will be the rail sections where they meet the bulkhead?

Can i just then bolt on the VR6 cross member, and the engine and everything else will just fit?

and apart from the simple things like wiring and exhaust/fuel pump the rest of the conversion is just bolts, with no welding or chopping of inner wings or anything else, my drive shafts will fit the vr6 box  and the vr6 will mount to the rest of my existing mounts and so on?

if you bolt on the vr crossmember you would use mk2 or mk3 driveshafts, depending if you go mk2 narrow or mk3 widetrack. probably mk2 as i think you would see some serious poke with mk3 stuff!

but yeah its a case of chop away at the shell till you can get it where you need, then lots of metal and captive nuts welded in to mount the old wishbone mounts will have to go and a fair bit of the metal up above, there are a couple builds out there for this one but as you can imagine its not common!

you may have to finess the chassis legs a bit depending where the lump ends up sitting. even in a mk2 golf you need to hammer the leg a bit for pulley clearance.  The front mount will also need work, if you can make something that triangulates between the 2 front bumper mounts that will add a bit of stiffness to the shell which will always help. this bit should be easy once you get the subframe finished

then its a case of convert the wiring, same as a mk1 abf loom lots of info there. adda decent fuel system again lots of infos

Thanks again Rubjonny.

wiring, exhaust, fuel lines and so on dont really worry me, but I'm reluctant to take a grinder and welder to the shell. I wasnt to worried about fabbing up parts, but dont really want to get into the chopping and then trying to make sure it's all straight, i can see me ending up with a car that drives horrable and is all over the road.

looks like a VR6 conversion is a none starter, for me anyway.

I've just done a vr6 in mine mate used the eurowise kit makes it fitt easy check my thread in members ride.

I cant really justify £700 for the mounts and drive shafts, then another £400 - £500 for the engine, box and new bits needed to do the swap.

i've done less than 2000 miles in the car in over 2 years, it spends it's time sat in the garage collecting dust, it would be just to expensive and in reality, more than the car will ever be worth.

put an ABF in it