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2019 GTI 6MT Performance Issues I'd Like to Correct

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
On the Corrado for sure I can spin away and understeer through a corner if I so choose, but if you get the power just right (which you can with a N/A engine and is rather more difficult on a turbo engine), it will actually flatten the car down on its haunches and pull it round the corner quite nicely. So, personally, I don't see a significant need for an LSD on the road. On the track or on gravel/mud is a different matter obs.

Caveat obviously I've not driven one, but I'd be surprised if the VAQ can't respond pretty much as fast as the ABS and traction control can, i.e. on barely a fraction of a turn of a slipping wheel.

It won't be out-drawn by ABS, but the actual differential won't beat an ATB, which doesn't have to respond to an analyzed scenario or, to break from proper definition, it doesn't have to "react".

An ATB is always engaged; always functional. There is no delay in operation, and it always does the same thing, every time.

With a good mechanical traction aid, you can flick that ass out just short of steering lock, plant the throttle, and it'll pull you right back in line; every time, in precisely the same manner. No electronic system can match that.

ABS grabbing a wheel to shunt torque is just icing on the cake, and isn't even always desirable.
 

GTIfan99

Autocross Champion
Location
FL
On the Corrado for sure I can spin away and understeer through a corner if I so choose, but if you get the power just right (which you can with a N/A engine and is rather more difficult on a turbo engine), it will actually flatten the car down on its haunches and pull it round the corner quite nicely. So, personally, I don't see a significant need for an LSD on the road. On the track or on gravel/mud is a different matter obs.

Caveat obviously I've not driven one, but I'd be surprised if the VAQ can't respond pretty much as fast as the ABS and traction control can, i.e. on barely a fraction of a turn of a slipping wheel.

My Corrado didn't understeer when driven correctly. In fact, it's the only factory FWD car I've owned that oversteered. It was glorious. I took it to Italy with me and you could blast up the Amalfie coast all day in a perfect rhythm corner after corner. The back end rotating controllably on lift or under braking and you'd rotate until it pointed at the apex, then pull the car out of the slide with the throttle. If a Corrado is understeering, the suspension or alignment is borked or you're it's being driven like a RWD car.

VAQ does not respond as fast and the xds is there to bridge that gap in response. VAQ works well at factory hp levels and on grippy surfaces, but I'm finding it doesn't like old low grip asphalt or even stg 1 power. Next autocross I'll try a run with VAQ off to see if it's doing more than I'm giving it credit for, but I was getting power on understeer on corner exit last weekend. At stock hp levels, never had that issue.
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
My Corrado didn't understeer when driven correctly. In fact, it's the only factory FWD car I've owned that oversteered. It was glorious. I took it to Italy with me and you could blast up the Amalfie coast all day in a perfect rhythm corner after corner. The back end rotating controllably on lift or under braking and you'd rotate until it pointed at the apex, then pull the car out of the slide with the throttle. If a Corrado is understeering, the suspension or alignment is borked or you're it's being driven like a RWD car.

VAQ does not respond as fast and the xds is there to bridge that gap in response. VAQ works well at factory hp levels and on grippy surfaces, but I'm finding it doesn't like old low grip asphalt or even stg 1 power. Next autocross I'll try a run with VAQ off to see if it's doing more than I'm giving it credit for, but I was getting power on understeer on corner exit last weekend. At stock hp levels, never had that issue.

It's funny... Every time I get in this GTI, I think about the 2000 G20T I just sold for a grand. It was a better car. :ROFLMAO:

It also had a mechanical limited slip; wet clutch and assertive, but it worked quite well.

That thing was an absolute monster, especially on switchbacks going down the side of a mountain, which I do not think was an accident, given the pop culture era and the country of origin.

The only real problem was the lack of steering lock... It had the turning circle of the titanic, so the angle limitation was a bit lower.

You could drive it like that slaloming sideways with one hand and have no issues at all; no feeling of being rushed... The revs dropped like a lead balloon and rose like a bottle rocket.

There's really no excuse for how sluggish the GTI feels; turbo or not. I love the wheelbase, but I get the feeling this is going to be twitchy when I start to do what I want to do. Maybe it's the track width, but this car drives shorter than I'd expect for a 103" wheelbase. If the rest of it sucked, I wouldn't be so critical; but it doesn't. This car is a prime example of falling short of potential. If it was better it would be better, and if it was worse it would be better. ;)

When I have to buy tires, I may actually go harder and narrower. Might put a solid anti-sway bar on the rear and some stiffening back there, as well; but leave the front as-is. That should bring the chassis in line with the drive-train.
 

GTIfan99

Autocross Champion
Location
FL
It's funny... Every time I get in this GTI, I think about the 2000 G20T I just sold for a grand. It was a better car. :ROFLMAO:

It also had a mechanical limited slip; wet clutch and assertive, but it worked quite well.

That thing was an absolute monster, especially on switchbacks going down the side of a mountain, which I do not think was an accident, given the pop culture era and the country of origin.

The only real problem was the lack of steering lock... It had the turning circle of the titanic, so the angle limitation was a bit lower.

You could drive it like that slaloming sideways with one hand and have no issues at all; no feeling of being rushed... The revs dropped like a lead balloon and rose like a bottle rocket.

There's really no excuse for how sluggish the GTI feels; turbo or not. I love the wheelbase, but I get the feeling this is going to be twitchy when I start to do what I want to do. Maybe it's the track width, but this car drives shorter than I'd expect for a 103" wheelbase. If the rest of it sucked, I wouldn't be so critical; but it doesn't. This car is a prime example of falling short of potential. If it was better it would be better, and if it was worse it would be better. ;)

When I have to buy tires, I may actually go harder and narrower. Might put a solid anti-sway bar on the rear and some stiffening back there, as well; but leave the front as-is. That should bring the chassis in line with the drive-train.

The GTI doesn't get twitchy with mods, it's actually amazing once you get it dialed. Mine rotates predictably and progressively. The GTI would be such a better car if VW removed alot the the electronic interventions and just trusted us to drive, but I think that's a bygone era and requires significant effort and expertise to get a modern VW to feel natural.
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
The GTI doesn't get twitchy with mods, it's actually amazing once you get it dialed. Mine rotates predictably and progressively. The GTI would be such a better car if VW removed alot the the electronic interventions and just trusted us to drive, but I think that's a bygone era and requires significant effort and expertise to get a modern VW to feel natural.

Oh, it's a brilliant platform. I'm just not willing to go into too much detail with mods, so I'll probably loosen it up a little bit.

If I can't get the engine and transmission to adapt to the chassis, I'll just adapt the chassis to the engine and transmission.
 

GTIfan99

Autocross Champion
Location
FL
Oh, it's a brilliant platform. I'm just not willing to go into too much detail with mods, so I'll probably loosen it up a little bit.

If I can't get the engine and transmission to adapt to the chassis, I'll just adapt the chassis to the engine and transmission.

A couple tweaks with OBD11, decent tires, some negative camber up front, a rear sway bar, and an alignment are all you need to transform the cars handling.
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
A couple tweaks with OBD11, decent tires, some negative camber up front, a rear sway bar, and an alignment are all you need to transform the cars handling.

That's kind of the effect I'd be going for. Just keep the front like velcro and loosen up the tail end. I have "preferences", which I'm sure over time will become clear. :)

Obviously there is a delay in effect while the perfume smell issue is dealt with.
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
Location
Phoenix
Car(s)
2018 SE DSG
The GTI doesn't get twitchy with mods, it's actually amazing once you get it dialed. Mine rotates predictably and progressively. The GTI would be such a better car if VW removed alot the the electronic interventions and just trusted us to drive, but I think that's a bygone era and requires significant effort and expertise to get a modern VW to feel natural.

I agree but unfortunately VW tunes it for the average person who doesn't know how to drive.
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
I agree but unfortunately VW tunes it for the average person who doesn't know how to drive.

I feel like if I wasn't under warranty, I'd be able to dial this thing in to perfection. I'm sure some of you already have.

I've become more used to driving around the issues rather than fighting with them. It's an outstanding car under all that computerized nonsense. Some of that is regulation, I know.

Still, it hurts my soul on some level to imagine what the chassis engineers felt like when they saw what legal and marketing made the actual production designers do to their dream car; and it was a dream car to someone.

The thing is too close to perfection not to have been.
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
Location
Phoenix
Car(s)
2018 SE DSG
I feel like if I wasn't under warranty, I'd be able to dial this thing in to perfection. I'm sure some of you already have.

I've become more used to driving around the issues rather than fighting with them. It's an outstanding car under all that computerized nonsense. Some of that is regulation, I know.

Still, it hurts my soul on some level to imagine what the chassis engineers felt like when they saw what legal and marketing made the actual production designers do to their dream car; and it was a dream car to someone.

The thing is too close to perfection not to have been.

Just a rear sway bar does wonders for the handling and it won't void your warranty.
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
Just a rear sway bar does wonders for the handling and it won't void your warranty.

You know, there's something I hadn't addressed here, because I honestly didn't notice it:

Torque steer. At least in stock tune, it's incredibly minimized; and some of that is coming down to the very differential and management technology I've criticized. Even given the sacrifices this mandates in the responsiveness of the car, that's a tangible benefit of the technology. With that on the table, this makes a little more sense. The power this is capable of putting to the ground if unleashed entirely, right off the shelf, is a lot for a transverse FWD car.

I was expecting more, but it's pulling that away, some by robbing power, but some simply by function. So, there's that.
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
You can rip off the VAQ unit, fit the non VAQ parts to the gearbox case & swap out the open diff & fit an LSD.....then spend ages coding out the VAQ unit from the Canbus….then tell modules like the engine & ABS that the VAQ is NOT fitted.. ..

The are way too many electronics in these cars....some good some bad....even on my lowly 1.4lt I had to leave it in spirt the whole time & slacken off the nannies...to get it to drive input to output...

Right about now I really wish it was easy to do that.

Had one of my little outings earlier, and visited my usual nearby fool-driving locations. This time, I pushed it. I've been on good behavior the past week or so, and I wanted to burn that energy I'd saved up. Every time I can take it out, I inch a little closer to the line, and this was where it ended up being crossed.

I was deep into the throttle coming on boost to simulate a sudden avoidance maneuver, and I felt the grip begin to loosen, so I gave it a notch of lock and modulated the throttle to kick a wheel free and drag it back in line; same thing most would do, I suspect; but that's not what happened. The car immediately cut torque to the wrong wheel, and I had to compensate. The power I needed to smoothly execute the maneuver wasn't provided to me. It was sent somewhere useless, all the lights yelled at me, and basically told me to piss off. ?

Wanted wheelspin to use the road as a clutch, and instead got a rather surprising slap on the wrist; this was with all the tricks turned off through the driver-accessible options (no VCDS alterations minus throttle response).

There's that unpredictability we've discussed here and there.
 

golfdave

Autocross Champion
Location
Scotland (U.K.)
Car(s)
Mk7 Golf GT Estate
I was deep into the throttle coming on boost to simulate a sudden avoidance maneuver, and I felt the grip begin to loosen, so I gave it a notch of lock and modulated the throttle to kick a wheel free and drag it back in line; same thing most would do, I suspect; but that's not what happened. The car immediately cut torque to the wrong wheel, and I had to compensate. The power I needed to smoothly execute the maneuver wasn't provided to me. It was sent somewhere useless, all the lights yelled at me, and basically told me to piss off. ?

Wanted wheelspin to use the road as a clutch, and instead got a rather surprising slap on the wrist; this was with all the tricks turned off through the driver-accessible options (no VCDS alterations minus throttle response).

There's that unpredictability we've discussed here and there.


next time drive throught the rode & keep the power down....

Mate had a Mk4 R32 & couldn't get it to work right & asked me to drive it for him...I'm a better driver than him anyway which is also why he asked me....

So after warming the car up we set off down the twisty back roads we both know......as each bend comes & goes I start driving the car through as I would in the correct low gear, but with more & more throttle applied....

the result is that the well known "laggy" Haldex unit starts locking up & transferring more power to the rear...

Basically to get the most out of it you have to start driving like a muppet at some silly speeds.....& these bends a very sharp, on narrow twisty roads, with a run off into trees...& I can scare much more powerful cars in my lower powered car!

I think you need to just drive the car differently with a VAQ....fast in fast out.......counter intuitive...
 

dosjockey

Go Kart Champion
Location
South
next time drive throught the rode & keep the power down....

Mate had a Mk4 R32 & couldn't get it to work right & asked me to drive it for him...I'm a better driver than him anyway which is also why he asked me....

So after warming the car up we set off down the twisty back roads we both know......as each bend comes & goes I start driving the car through as I would in the correct low gear, but with more & more throttle applied....

the result is that the well known "laggy" Haldex unit starts locking up & transferring more power to the rear...

Basically to get the most out of it you have to start driving like a muppet at some silly speeds.....& these bends a very sharp, on narrow twisty roads, with a run off into trees...& I can scare much more powerful cars in my lower powered car!

I think you need to just drive the car differently with a VAQ....fast in fast out.......counter intuitive...

That seems to be the case, and I'm also coming to the conclusion that I'm supposed to "trust" this car to make the right decisions. There's not really a way to get along with it unless I hand it the reins at 9/10ths.

I'd have preferred to break traction in that scenario, and in the process modulate the wheel-spin to more smoothly pull the vehicle where I wanted it to go. I wanted it to break free progressively and to pull it in line as I progressively rebuilt traction; this is happening in very small amounts of time, mind you; but that's where the bleeding edge of performance truly lives: Right between the ticks of a clock; fractions of a second. That's where feel, response, linearity, progressiveness... All the fancy words. That's where they all live.

One thing I've noticed is that the driving style it prefers is a bit odd... To get the most out of it, a contrasting combination of laziness and aggressiveness seems to be called for. When I do what the thing wants me to do, it's an absolute rocket after second; and it wants me to take full advantage of that and come in hotter than predictability allows.

It kind of reminds me of a Saab, in that respect. Star Trek analogy: I get to use warp 9.5 in the interstellar medium, but it won't let me use full impulse in a star system.

If I fire up that warp drive to get everything nice and juicy on a quick trip around Mars, I'm now asking the chassis to do things it can't really do as configured, and I'm in the hands of those computers again. Not a good feeling, to me. Even so, I've become used to what it likes just poodling around town. The torque limitations are still irritating as hell, as they don't really go away when you turn the stuff off, but once I just slowed down every single thing I've spent decades speeding up... Well, once I did that, the car was happy.

This seems to have been built to make the average driver feel like a great driver and, as a result, the rest of us have to drive it in a counter-intuitive manner. I think that will be my main GTI experience takeaway down the road.

It's designed to make one feel as if he can handle a performance vehicle, without actually being any good at it; because if one tried that crap in a more analog car, he'd wrap it around a tree very, very quickly. ?

I'm imagining a... I don't know, a really fast motorcycle. What's a good one? I'll just invent my own. I'm imagining a Shakasuta 9001 R200 GR Black... Only, they knew people couldn't handle it, so they made it a trike. ?
 

golfdave

Autocross Champion
Location
Scotland (U.K.)
Car(s)
Mk7 Golf GT Estate
That seems to be the case, and I'm also coming to the conclusion that I'm supposed to "trust" this car to make the right decisions. There's not really a way to get along with it unless I hand it the reins at 9/10ths.

I'd have preferred to break traction in that scenario, and in the process modulate the wheel-spin to more smoothly pull the vehicle where I wanted it to go. I wanted it to break free progressively and to pull it in line as I progressively rebuilt traction; this is happening in very small amounts of time, mind you; but that's where the bleeding edge of performance truly lives: Right between the ticks of a clock; fractions of a second. That's where feel, response, linearity, progressiveness... All the fancy words. That's where they all live.

One thing I've noticed is that the driving style it prefers is a bit odd... To get the most out of it, a contrasting combination of laziness and aggressiveness seems to be called for. When I do what the thing wants me to do, it's an absolute rocket after second; and it wants me to take full advantage of that and come in hotter than predictability allows.


This seems to have been built to make the average driver feel like a great driver and, as a result, the rest of us have to drive it in a counter-intuitive manner. I think that will be my main GTI experience takeaway down the road.

It's designed to make one feel as if he can handle a performance vehicle, without actually being any good at it; because if one tried that crap in a more analog car, he'd wrap it around a tree very, very quickly. ?

I'm imagining a... I don't know, a really fast motorcycle. What's a good one? I'll just invent my own. I'm imagining a Shakasuta 9001 R200 GR Black... Only, they knew people couldn't handle it, so they made it a trike. ?

You've hit the nail on the head....

Over the past couple of decades they have added more "aids", & encouraged the driver to NOT drive...so they have to add even more aids...to pander to those drivers who can't drive to pander to their poor egos..so that everybody is "a driving god"......much like BMWs ad strap line of "the ultimate driving machine"...which is of no use when 90% of them are driven in 30mph stop start traffic...might as well have a flipping 1lt Nissan Micra..& that in reality is ALL that the idiot behind the wheel is capable of handling...

Basically this is another reason why I have a lower powered car...less aids as less power to then reel in....result is more fun....& you can then have fun as a DRIVER......even then I've still had to whip out VCDS & programme some stuff out/off/etc..

Performance Pack = marketing bullsh1t...
 
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