Nah I’m good. I got a shit ton of aliexpress garbage parts coming. I’m gonna run out of VHB tape putting them all over the car

Replaced the leaking water pump/thermostat on my MK7 Sportwagen a couple of weeks ago.

Pain in the ass. Book time is supposed to be 4-5 hours. The videos make it look so easy:
Took me two days, including removal of the intake manifold. Had to buy a crows foot wrench set to re-tighten the high pressure fuel line that I had to remove. Fuel leaked everywhere when I started the car initially and my garage smelled for a few days.

I have way more appreciation for BMW engineering after working on a VW/Audi product.

I hope you replaced it with a metal one !!! Lousy German plastic crap

I wonder if they fixed this on the mk8. I sincerely doubt it.

What are you replacing it with?

My neighbour just did this too, waterpump leaked and fouled his CPS, only figured it out when he went to replace the CPS and discovered the leak... he replaced it with an aluminum one. I have no idea why German manufacturers insist on making parts of their cooling systems out of plastic.

does porsche have this problem? arent their water pumps all plastic too?

edit: i just saw this on rennlist

"... sold my 17 Porsche 991.2 S,,,3 waterpumps in 50K,,,come on...each under warranty,,,NO loaner and 1 hour away..I had the service dept. on speed dial.....what a POS car and the dealer could care less..."

Pretty sure Porsche historically uses metal water pumps, but with plastic/composite impellers. They usually die from bearing failure.

Just when I was thinking I should go test drive a GTI lol

Suffer together with Badhobz :lol

i like the way the GTI drives. its pretty good for me as an old man.

Its very refined for such a small platform and it rotates/pivots quite easily with driver input.

Maybe a bit too refined as it feels more like an audi nowadays than a hot hatch.

you should still go try it underscore! honestly for 500 bucks a month, its the best bargain performance buy on the new car market

I still might, there's a nice looking 2019 for sale nearby in the exact spec I like. The dealer has a couple new ones but that front bumper makes me feel like I have trypophobia lol. I got the call that Toyota is getting in a GRC in the spec I want but I'm still on the fence about that.

I also got to test drive a slightly clapped out Altezza too and I really enjoyed it. It felt really agile and just fun where the GRC felt really serious. I'm just not sure if putting the kids in a 20+ year old tin can sometimes is a good idea lol. I imagine the GTI would be similarly fun while being more modern.

And then ultimately I cycle back around to whether I can let go of the Celica yet. It's such a problem child but I know if I regret the sale it'd be hard to find another.

I cant get over how brutal the GRC interior is.

They Type R interior is like 20x nicer.

The Altezza/IS300 isn't terrible. No different from putting your kids in a E46 imo. Of the few cars I am super interested in owning, a IS300 in manual is pretty high up there.

In Battle Gear you can swap a 2GR-FSE in it, and it's stupid fun.

I wonder how good the beams is for our roads. I just heard prices went up since they are us legal now

Obviously they're not fast with only 210hp but even thought the one I drove wasn't running quite right it didn't feel underpowered either, if that makes sense.

I drove an auto one many years ago from velocity and honestly I remember it drove like a civic with no low end torque at all. I want to try if manual makes it any better

It's a very peaky engine, an automatic is a very poor match for it

My son just turned 16 recently and he's gonna learn to drive in a 2000 Civic sedan (EK). Now THAT is a tin can...

IS300/Altezza is hardly a tin can, my buddy who owns a bodyshop always bitches at me whenever I brought mine in for anything because he said it's like a double redundancy Corolla on wheels... everything he'd have to do to take apart a Corolla he has to do twice on the IS300 and with twice as many bolts/screws/whatever built in.

That said it's a pretty damn small car compared to today's behemoths. It's parked next to my Supra and my Supra is almost longer than it.

But then their pricing is pretty much in the same league as is350 so I dunno that is just a better choice

IS350's are less than $10k?

IS250's maybe.

Classics are always going to start spiking in value... give it another 5 years when all the Surrey jacks have destroyed most of them and all the earlier IS350's will be 50% more than they are right now too.

The IS350 is going to be the better car around town 90% of the time, but you don't get that fancy chronograph gauge faces. And I'd imagine the Altezza would drive better. The also hasn't aged as much as the gen2 IS has

It’s ok the IS350 RWDs will all snap oversteer into a tree after they pulled the ABS fuse to do a burnout

I thought that's only Ecoboost mustangs and V6 challengers. They upgraded from g35 g37

Honestly I think you will find vastly difference experiences that you will most defn keep your Celica GT-Four if you went with the GTI route.

I agree with BadHobz, its such a bargain for $500 taxed in for 36 months

But when he dropped by so I could have a go at it... the GTI felt... flat... its good at everything, but great at nothing, it doesn't feel performance-y at all, and I gave it a good go! A very German thing, the thing is fast, but doesnt feel fast. Opposite of Hyundai, feels very fast but not all that fast lol.

Nothing wrong with the car, but you can tell it wasn't built like the Type R, GRC or your Celica per say.

After I drove it, I took BadHobz out in our Kona N, total different experience, good fun for shits and giggles. Wheel hop all day long, pops and bangs (with a warranty), very loud for a stock vehicle, and can all be turned off and go into ECO mode~ The GTI gets no where near the visceral experience that the Kona N offers~