mindless ramblings » Cars http://soowei.com There's only music so that there's new ringtones Thu, 27 Nov 2008 07:40:25 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 GTI: Oil woes… (Update) http://soowei.com/2008/10/31/gti-oil-woes%e2%80%a6-update/ http://soowei.com/2008/10/31/gti-oil-woes%e2%80%a6-update/#comments Fri, 31 Oct 2008 19:29:59 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/?p=198 Got 3 quarts of Castrol Syntec ($8.99 * 3), ended up adding 2 quarts in…

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/10/31/gti-oil-woes%e2%80%a6-update/feed/ 0 GTI: Oil woes… http://soowei.com/2008/10/21/gti-oil-woes/ http://soowei.com/2008/10/21/gti-oil-woes/#comments Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:23:51 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/?p=197 Oil pressure warning light came on while driving just now. Dipstick indicated no oil! Added 1/2 qt and still no results. Will go to Canadian Tire and grab more oil later.

Odometer is at 13200km or so.

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/10/21/gti-oil-woes/feed/ 0 GTI: First service http://soowei.com/2008/07/09/gti-first-service/ http://soowei.com/2008/07/09/gti-first-service/#comments Wed, 09 Jul 2008 15:02:45 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/?p=195 First service was done at roughly 7800km. Got booked in for a Saturday morning appt at Capilano VW, was out in just over an hour. Complained about the oil burning but they maintain it is normal. Cost was quite high, $152 for basically what was an oil change.

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/07/09/gti-first-service/feed/ 0 GTI: Oil update http://soowei.com/2008/05/15/gti-oil-update/ http://soowei.com/2008/05/15/gti-oil-update/#comments Fri, 16 May 2008 05:10:55 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/?p=193 5555km, half a quart of oil burnt. No additional oil was added, will monitor in another 1000km or so.

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/05/15/gti-oil-update/feed/ 0 GTI: Burning oil http://soowei.com/2008/04/30/gti-burning-oil/ http://soowei.com/2008/04/30/gti-burning-oil/#comments Thu, 01 May 2008 06:22:21 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/2008/04/30/gti-burning-oil/ The GTI seems to be burning oil at an alarming rate. 2 qts have been added in just over 4000km.

I have 2 theories:

  1. The oil was at the minimum level during delivery and wasn’t topped up during PDI.
  2. The engine is burning oil.

Anyway, the oil is topped up, and I’ll continue to check the level over the next 2000km to see if it goes away.

On a slightly brighter note, the fuel economy is improving and I’m getting roughly 50km more per tank now. Not too bad for city driving I guess… boost is addictive!

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/04/30/gti-burning-oil/feed/ 0 GTI: Break-in period over http://soowei.com/2008/02/17/gti-break-in-period-over/ http://soowei.com/2008/02/17/gti-break-in-period-over/#comments Sun, 17 Feb 2008 23:49:18 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/2008/02/17/gti-break-in-period-over/ Alright, finally past 1500km and stepped on it for the first time. Coming from the P5, the amount of torque is just ridiculous! I can’t imagine it chipped. Aside from that, fuel economy is staying fairly constant at about 400km per fill up. I’m not driving much anyways, commuting by bus is actually not too bad!

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/02/17/gti-break-in-period-over/feed/ 0 GTI: The beginning http://soowei.com/2008/01/23/gti-the-beginning/ http://soowei.com/2008/01/23/gti-the-beginning/#comments Thu, 24 Jan 2008 04:23:08 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/2008/01/23/gti-the-beginning/ In the spirit of the name of this blog, I’ll just randomly blabber on about the GTI. I think I’m going to use the blog to just keep a running journal of the car, kinda like TrueDelta but with less statistics. :)

It’s been 20 days since we got the car and it’s been completely problem free. 2 tanks of gas (Shell 91 and Husky 92) have gone into the car. With just over 800km on the odometer, that works out to roughly 400km/tank  without really stepping on it at all. This appears to be expected though, and mileage will improve after 8000km.

One thing to look out for is topping up engine oil. The 2.0T seems to burn oil relatively fast, so a check will probably be done at 1000km in case any top up (VW 502.00 approved only!) is needed.

Besides that, everything is great. Seat warmers warm up quick, Climatronic keeps things cool (or warm) and the Gorilla Gear trunk liner is just awesome.

]]> http://soowei.com/2008/01/23/gti-the-beginning/feed/ 0 Tirerack rocks http://soowei.com/2006/09/11/tirerack-rocks/ http://soowei.com/2006/09/11/tirerack-rocks/#comments Tue, 12 Sep 2006 04:11:03 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/2006/09/11/tirerack-rocks/ With the Canadian dollar as strong as it is now, buying things from the US has suddenly become much more affordable. When I got a flat tire a couple of weeks ago, I looked to The Tire Rack to get my next set of tires. It was a shootout between the budget-conscious Kumho ASX and the more performance-oriented Pirelli PZero Nero. In the end the Pirellis won out despite being $30 more expensive per tire. Sounds like a lot, but the actual cost per tire for 215/40R17 was only USD$114! Including UPS shipping to my doorstep (USD$68) which only took 3 days to arrive, my total bill from Tire Rack was only USD$524. Including the standard UPS ripoff brokerage fee, taxes and duties (a total of $167 payable to UPS), my total bill in Canadian dollars came to be just $750! That is about $100 cheaper than what I would pay in Canada.

Shopping online this time was a suprisingly pleasant experience, I’d definitely recommend going through The Tire Rack for your next set of tires!

]]> http://soowei.com/2006/09/11/tirerack-rocks/feed/ 3 Suzuki enters WRC! http://soowei.com/2006/06/25/suzuki-in-wrc/ http://soowei.com/2006/06/25/suzuki-in-wrc/#comments Sun, 25 Jun 2006 07:53:39 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/2006/06/25/suzuki-in-wrc/ Suzuki WRCI’m about 4 months late with the news but I just noticed it! The WRC has been suffering from a couple of withdrawals recently. Citroën, Peugeot, Mitsubishi and Skoda are not competing for 2006, although Citroën is returning next year. No worries, Suzuki is making a full fledged entry into the WRC! Not satisfied with just competing in the JWRC, they have decided to enter the Suzuki SX4 (which is a mini-SUV, strangely enough) to compete against the Xsaras, Imprezas and Foci. The car doesn’t look half bad too! I just hope they put their extensive knowledge from JWRC to use and don’t end up regretting the decision and dropping out at the end of the season.

]]> http://soowei.com/2006/06/25/suzuki-in-wrc/feed/ 0 37,000 workers take up GM’s offer to quit http://soowei.com/2006/06/24/37000-workers-take-up-gms-offer-to-quit/ http://soowei.com/2006/06/24/37000-workers-take-up-gms-offer-to-quit/#comments Sat, 24 Jun 2006 19:16:33 +0000 Soo Wei http://soowei.com/2006/06/23/37000-workers-take-up-gms-offer-to-quit/ When you want to reduce your workforce by 30,000, a good way of doing it is to offer a buyout to your 113,000 employees. However, is it a bad sign when 37,000 people take up your offer? Looks like almost a third of the people who work at GM can’t wait to leave! The buyouts aren’t cheap too, they range from $35,000 to $140,000 (!). Well I guess you gotta do what you have to remain afloat.

Read the whole CBC article here.

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