The 5 BEST Modifications for the Golf R ~ Do THESE First!

what's up everybody its Charles it has been about six months since I picked up this 20 19 Ginn stir yellow one of 13 in the United States Golf R and it really didn't stay super stock for long we've actually done a handful of modifications to this car and in this video I want to talk about what I think are the five best first modifications that you can make to this generation of car now most of these modifications are going to be about the same for the golf the GTI the all track and the golf are some other part numbers maybe a little bit different but I think that these five or six things really bring out the best in these vehicles without going overboard and truly feeling like you drive a modified car I've also done individual videos on a lot of this stuff and I'll be sure to link that playlist if you guys want to check that out even though this list is really not in any particular order I think the first thing we're gonna talk about really should be very early on in your modifications and that's adding a spare tire kit the Golf R does not come with a spare tire in the United States actually it's super common today that a car doesn't come with a spare tire which i think is absolutely insane yeah I know there's a lot of people that wouldn't change their tire anyway and you can get a service like triple-a all good all cool however for me it is just one less thing to worry about I did the full kit which includes the spare tire the jack the lug wrench the foam insert to house all the tools and then one piece of trim that allows the spare tire to fit all the way down you can modify your factory trim on the Golf R to make it fit but it looks a little bit nicer when we just use the right trim and it really wasn't that much more expensive the good thing is is it'll fit over the brakes in the front it'll fit over the brakes in the rear and your subwoofer if you have the fender audio which in a Golf R you would you can still drop the subwoofer inside of that tire it's all factory stuff so it fits perfectly next up on that list is going to be an ECM - now it doesn't matter if it's a Golf R GTI all track whatever doing the ECM tune really brings the car alive I feel like with stage one especially Golf R and GTI that's how it should have came from the fact it improves just about every aspect of being behind the wheel of the car and that's whether you have a DSG or whether you have a manual transmission if you have a manual transmission you get to save a little bit of money the high torque files on most tuning companies ECM software does require that you do a DC DSG tune so that's something that plays into the cost of doing this modification but it brings the entire car lot faster ships better throttle response overall more boost it's just makes the car feel so much more fun to drive now there is a couple of questions that always come up whenever I talk about ECM tunes who makes the best tune and will it void my warranty from me who makes the best tune standpoint there's about five major players in the VW Audi tuning world that to me you're probably gonna be happy with no matter which one you pick I have integrated engineering software on my car and it's fantastic I think for most people if you choose ie like I have if you go APR if you go unit Roenick if you go from reflect tuning if you go to cabo to United Motorsports you're gonna be pretty happy with whatever tune that you go at sticking with one of the major players it also kind of depends on which piece of equipment we're trying to tune when it comes to something like the Haldex the all-wheel drive system most of those tuning companies don't have a holodecks tune in fact before too long maybe even a twiki's in the woods I'll probably be doing a Haldex tune from United Motorsports on my Golf R I have their tune ECM tune Haldex tuna on the r32 and it's pretty good but the tuning capability of these cars versus the older stuff night-and-day difference next up will it void my warranty well that is not a black-and-white yes-or-no answer to a great question will it flat-out void every bit of warranty on your car the answer to that in 99% of cases is no it will not blanket void everything if you tune your ECM software and you have a headlight go out like an HID or something and it would normally be covered under warranty it should still be covered under warranty however there always is the possibility that if you have some type of and you related failure whether it's a sensor whether it's a component or something like that a tune could impact whether something is covered or not so you really before you make the jump to stage one or any ECM software tune whether it's transmission Haldex or actual engine computer you need to be prepared that a failure may not be covered under warranty whether it's something expensive like a turbocharger or whether it's something simple like a fan going out I have seen both of those things get declined on a car that was tuned and both of those things get approved on a car that was tuned it's really case-by-case now a piece of advice if you are tuned and you do have an issue the whole goal for you as a customer is to want them to help you not to feel like they have to you want them on your side you want them to be your advocate so be nice be polite be professional and if you're going in there guns a-blazing screaming and yelling you're probably not as likely to get that extra bit of help from the dealership as if you were being cool about it and understanding and you know it's not their policy they don't make up the rules they're just trying to do their best to follow them but I don't think that you're going to get a better bang for buck in overall driving experience improvement as you will with a stage one tune now number three does not give you any improvement in driving unlike the ECM tune but what it does give you is an incredible peace of mind and that's doing one of two things I'm cool with both of these installing an all track belly pan or some other type of reinforced belly pan if you drive an all track you don't need to do this or doing a metal pan upgrade either one of these is cool I like the all track pan because it's OE and you guys know me I'm kind of snobby about that kind of stuff but there are other solutions as well and there are also metal oil pans that you can install to cover up the composite oil pan that these cars have this is a oil pan that all the mark sevens have and the Alltrack is the only one that has a pan that covers it up in any kind of way that's a pretty legit pan reinforced and whatnot but none of the rest of them have it they all have a pan that stops right really at where the oil pan is and while I'm not taking the golf cart off-road or anything like that you never know what can pop up and hit that oil pan and cause damage so it unfortunately does not give you any cool-guy points or any scene points or pops and bangs or you know 200 horsepower but it may be it may help prevent having a catastrophic oil loss resulting in catastrophic engine failure number four is a rear sway bar upgrade I am convinced that now going forward on every car that I own that it's not rear-wheel drive like the Miata it will get a rear sway bar upgrade it is that good of an upgrade the best part it's about 250 to 300 bucks depending on if you get end links or not that'll add well quite a bit on this one because we went with the high test end links you just get regular metal replacement and links then it's gonna save you quite a bit of money the end links on these cars are composite or plastic so it's good to get those out get some metal ones on there but you know I touted the benefit of the software tune as being the best overall upgrade in overall vehicle performance and I still I believe that I really really do however when it comes to handling and in like spirited driving twisties in the mountains or autocross or whatever the rear sway bar is such an amazing upgrade reducing that understeer giving you a little bit more control being able to drive with the throttle and having it give you more of a result than without it is such a huge benefit if you've never driven a car like this we go one of these you've never driven a car with a rear sway bar upgrade find someone with one and drive it or honestly just pull the trigger and buy it cuz I think you're gonna be happy with it typically they're pretty easy DIY typically they're not very expensive especially when talking about suspension upgrades and components for me the best part of having that rear sway bar upgrade is that when you're in that spirited driving situation autocross twisty mountain roads you really feel it it's active you you know you've made an upgrade the flipside is when you're cruising to work in the morning at you know 6:30 in the morning and you're half asleep there is no difference in the way the car behaves you don't have to be worried when you have to take a co-worker somewhere and your car rides so stiff that the fillings in their teeth are rattling out or your car has basically no shock absorption it's just bounce and down the road it doesn't change any of that at all it's only when you're in sort of that performance driving spirited driving situation that it makes an improvement it's one of the very few things that you get an improvement with really no downside other than well you have to spend the money to put it on so number five is going to be a collection of things but they're all gonna be centered around coding and adaptation changes this is my VCDs cable doesn't matter whether using VCDs or obd 11 I'm a VCDs user but I know a lot of you guys are obedient users and that's perfectly fine with me to this car and these mark seven seven and a half can do so many more things than they are programmed to do in the United States from the factory really cool things like rolling the windows up and down with the remote coding so that the power fold mirrors actually power fold when you lock and unlock the car doing things like turning the sound actor all the way down which is the very first thing I ever did on this car so we didn't get those fake engine noises pumped in there is almost an unlimited amount of things you can do with software adaptation and coding changes so here's a couple that I've done turn the sound actor all the way down coated a power fold mirrors which the powerful mirrors aren't add-on in an awesome one at that added and then coated our touch handles for the rear doors one of my favorite coatings that I've changed is when I put it in reverse you used to have to hit the button for the little overlay of the car to pop up and show you like where objects were around the car with a simple coating change it pops up automatically so I don't have to hit yet another button I know that seems silly and I know that seems lazy but it's one of those niceties that the car has the capability to do so why not go ahead and have it done now a couple of the next coding changes I have planned are windows up and down with the remote I don't take the key out of my pocket ever so it's not something that I was really like jumping at the bit to do the other one I have planned as coding start/stop off I've tried a couple of different things you can just unplug the battery maintenance module and the car won't shut off but you get warnings in the dash changing the voltage gives you warnings in the dash so I'm trying to find a good way to stop the start/stop system without having warnings pop up in the dash and its plays into so many modules so it's proving a little bit more challenging than I expected but the thing didn't bother me at first but as I've driven the car and owned it longer it's kind of driving me nuts very distracting find it distracting when other cars do it as well so that one will be coated up but all those things and more are things that you can do by changing coding or adaptations all done with VCDs or obd 11 and a quick warning always be careful when you change stuff make sure you document what you changed it from what you change it to that way if you have to go back and put it back it's not gonna be that big of a problem and only change one thing at a time and make sure it doesn't impact anything else all right a handful of honorable mentions that I'm gonna burn through super duper quick window tint and paint protection this car is coated in expell it makes washing the car insanely easy I absolutely love it there's a couple of little Nick's that I've gotten on the front bumper and I'm gonna do a video on that for you guys so I haven't fixed them yet but little heat and they'll self heal it's really really cool also window tint I have ceramic window tint on this car I'm a huge window tint guy I like the privacy I like how much cooler the inside of the car is with the window tint versus without so big fan of both of those my whole car is covered if you don't do the whole car in some kind of paint protection film like expel consider just doing maybe the front and then the b-pillar appliques or anywhere you have piano black that piano black around the car gets scratched up so so easy and putting a layer of protection on it will help preserve that so that it looks good well like six months from now because that stuff does like you can't even look at it without it feeling like it's getting scratched next up power fold mirrors not necessary in the United States but a very cool factor type thing also they have puddle lights in them which I really like how it illuminates the door we got the p3 gauge in there so if you want a boost gauge or something like that or it does way more than boost it's a pretty cool little upgrade and it looks sort of factory ish because it sits right in the vent now for this one I've gone back and forth and changed it a few times but you can actually have where your twelve volt outlets will work on thirty power rather than just fifteen power so the way the twelve volt outlets work in this cars you have to have the key on in order for them to do anything keys off nothing's powered you can move this fuse down one location and it will change that to now being thirty powered not fifteen power what I like about that is I can leave my GoPro in the back underneath all the stuff in the trunk and it can charge it for me rather than having to leave the key on or something like that or bring a little jump pack to keep the GoPro charged now you do have to be careful the car should be smart enough and cut power if the battery voltage is too low to power up whatever you have plugged in but personally I'm not gonna rely on that I have a jump pack in the car anyway so it wouldn't be a problem and I recommend that you do as well but it's something you do want to consider this is probably why it's 15 powered which means ignition on power rather than 30 power from the factory also if you guys want to step-by-step video on how to do that let me know and I'll make a really short easy to follow video for that one more honorable mention if you buy this car used tires put new tires on it high-performance tires some performance summer tires whatever fits the driving situation you're in that'll make such a huge difference in the car not cheap to get good tires but it is almost always worth it in every case so a couple of things I'm working on coming up mods for this car suspension I didn't add it to this list to do it what I feel is right which is to retain dynamic chassis control like lift oil herbs or something can be very very expensive two to three thousand dollars so I don't think that makes a list of first mods I think the suspension is fine not perfect but fine from the factory that's gonna be coming down the road I'm gonna be working on see if we can add a power liftgate like the Atlas has I'm looking to add remote start factory remote start which I'm told can't be done but we'll see if we can prove the powers-that-be wrong or maybe we'll approve the powers-that-be right wheel entire upgrade of course a big brake kit is another one that a lot of people do personally I think the brakes on the stock golf car are fantastic I think they're really really good they produce a lot of dust but I think overall they stopped wonderfully now in a track situation that may be a little different but for street driving they're really really good alright so there's my top five or six or so first upgrades for the mark 7 platform Golf R GTI all track unless you do in the belly pan and golf what do you guys think what did I miss what else is on that list of very first modifications you should make to your mark 7 alright so with that I'm out thank you guys for watching and I'll talk to you next time

Channel: HumbleMechanic

Views: 286,953

Rating: 4.9255853 out of 5

Keywords: humblemechanic, humble mechanic, The humble mechanic, thehumblemechanic, vw, golf R, Golf R mods, mk7.5 golf r, shopdap, power fold mirrors, mk7.5 Gti, VW MQB, 2019 golf r, Keyless entry, vw keyless entry

Id: PET5-dhl7l0

Length: 15min 21sec (921 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 22 2020