Had my MK4 Golf for just over two years now which is the longest I've ever owned a car, odd as its been the most problematic, I bought it as standard and have done a few changes
I found the car at a VX dealer nearby in Blackburn and after test driving left a deposit collecting it a few days later driving home with a big grin spinning up the cheap sh*t linglong tyre's that was on while enjoying the low down grunt of a turbo having only previously driven N/A cars. Well spec'd with 180bhp, 6 speed box, 312mm & 256mm brakes, winter pack and lovely fake wooden trim
Took only 3 weeks for the modding to start with a set of 18" OZ Superleggera's with decent tyres from a member on another forum.
Shortly followed by a stupidly overpriced pipe for sucking up water and making noise along with the essential 007p DV.
Just after XMAS the clutch and dual mass flywheel decided to sh!t itself which I was surprised at since car was only on a stage 1 remap and had only covered 36k however had already looking at upgrades considering the plans I had. 3 weeks later thanks to Mastercard back on the road with a sachs clutch and lightened single mass flywheel.
Recovering from the clutch and coming into spring the handling needed a bit of work as was under steering all over along with loads of bodyroll - Eibach RARB and 40mm Weitec suspension was fitted making a big difference and still practical. RARBs are a must for the MK4!
With that sorted attention was then on the wheels that had taken a battering over winter being only painted and 2x tyres needed replacing. Got them powder coated locally in gloss black along with a full set of Goodyear Eagle F1s
Oct 2010 was getting the car ready for stage II / custom mapping and fitted an oil catch can, TIP before driving down to R-Tech for a full turbo-back milltek tech exhaust and custom map which resulted in 233bhp and 240 lb-ft along with launch control. A world of difference from the generic map that was previously on and good to have a half decent noise coming from the back.
A few weeks later the FMIC turned up almost 2 months after first ordering which was annoying having already had the mapping done but couldn't get time off work in November. Took a good few hours to fit and required quite a bit of the bumper cutting, had problems with boost leaking due to the poor AUM/AUQ charge pipe design using a c-clip connection that is poor and easily breakable which remained unfixed till the weather cleared up.
And pretty much as it stands now
Plans for the future are changing the suspension setup for probably Bilstein/Eibach, poly bushes all around, bodywork tidied up, LSD and either a K04-001 or possibly hybrid depending on options - aim is for around 260-270bhp and a decent torque figure which will be more than enough IMO
