Love/Hate relationship

[tudor@tvo.org (Michael Helms)]

Hi guys,

I can't let a love/hate Scirocco rant go by without fuel injecting my
$0.02.

Gripes.  I have plenty.  The sunroof on my car is a fickle, sensitive
mechanism that needs as much maintenance as my engine.  Whenever I
change my oil, I religiously go in and lubricate and adjust my
sunroof.  It's a pain in the ass, but it's better than $300 for a new
mechanism.  The valve cover seems to consistantly piss my
six-dollars-per-litre synthetic oil all over the place.  I learned to
be liberal with gasket sealant.  As much as I love the engine, there
are little things (idle stabalizer valve, for instance) that I just
can't stand.  The air filter is ridiculously hard to get to.  The
windshield wiper bottle is too small (considering that there's a
bloody lot of space on that side of the engine bay).  The air
conditioning on Volkswagens sucks in general.  Intake and exhaust
manifolds are on the wrong side of the head (why can't they sprout
out of the front of the head to make it easier for tuners to get at
them?), and the electrical system can be finnicky at times.  And
anyone who has replaced a Bosch fuel pump knows that it's a real pain
in the chequebook ...

... now, for the things I love.  The engine (with all due respect to
the positioning of the intake and exhaust, which actually is a good
design, all thigns considered) is marvellous to work on.  Everything
is where it should be.  With no more than a few hand tools, I can do
an oil change, spark plugs and distributor cap and rotor.  The engine
doesn't have silly shrouds and covers to make it look "sleek" - it's
a model of mechanical beauty and simplicity.  And it's grossly
understressed in its stock form, so there's plenty of room in that
engine to wring more power out of it.

I have grown to love the interior, as it reminds me a bit of a
Porsche.  The antithesis of the Scirocco interior is something like
an Eagle Talon ... a cramped, cluttered interior in comparison. 
Switches are few and the major controls are exactly where I need
them.  It would be nice to have the oil pressure and temperature
gauges a bit closer to the main dashboard cluster ... but a bigger
dashboard would probably be tough to see through the spokes of my
Momo wheel.  The shift lever is a bit of a reach, but again - I've
grown used to it over time.  Back seats are useless, and I simply
refuse to take more than one passenger now because I know it's a
pretty miserable ride back there.  With the back seat folded down,
the trunk holds about as much as the average station wagon.  I
haven't found a good use for the stupid little spare-tire well yet.

Driving the Scirocco can be unforgiving - sort of like a Porsche 911
in reverse.  The ride is noisy and harsh (partly due to my H&R race
springs) and the steering is really sensitive (and heavy - very
reminiscent of early model Testarossas).  The pedal cluster is
perfect - the only thing that made it more perfect was the Momo
aluminum pedal cluster.  I can heel-toe like nobody's business.  Sun
visers are nearly useless.  Interior light is completely useless. 
And I want to figure out a way to make my dashboard light up red.  I
think that would be cool.

Overall, I would say that I don't hate this car any more than the
other cars I've grown to love.  All it takes is a quick ride in a
Civic or a Mustang to remind me why I lvoe my German car so much.

Cheers,
-- Michael Helms

'81 Scirocco - the fixer-upper
'86 Scirocco - the daily driver

Web Site:  http://www.continuum.org/helms

"If you don't believe your country should come before yourself, you
can better serve your country by living somewhere else."  - Dr.
Stompin' Tom Connors


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