This is my first review so bear with me here.
Some things to be noted before hand
-My Golf R is fully stock...for the most part.
-No tune
-Installed already is the Unitronic intake system, including turbo inlet pipe.
-and APR intercooler.
I purchased the Unitronic Front Air dam earlier this month from ShopDap.com
and to my surprise the item arrived a bit early and was packed very well and safe to protect the items inside... I'm looking at you ECS Tuning...
Now first impressions of the item are great!!!
The Carbon weave is flawless.
the quality seems great.
I couldn't be happier.
There was a small bit of almost like tissue paper material possibly a small amount of leftover resin within the housing that I just simply removed with my fingers.
Installation. Unitronic rates this install as 1 star...My ass...
I can agree the Intake as 1 star or "wrench" as Uni calls it.
The removal of everything was nice and easy took me 2 minutes...
The first issue that came up was the removal of the Coolant line.
Unitronic states to Perform this while the engine is cold to prevent coolant loss.
Well the car had been sitting in the garage for 4+ hours and was as cold as Florida standards would allow.
As soon as I removed the line a small eruption small enough to make MTN St. Helens look like a turd dropping in a toilet. The coolant got everywhere...
Lovingly unitronic states to "Clamp the hose! to prevent coolant loss"
Doesn't work when you disconnect the line from the flow in end first...
So first piece of advice... Don't listen to the directions. Disconnect the end towards the engine first THEN hose clamp After the bend, very important.
Luckily I had a small glue cap that I was able to block the flow while I read on with the directions.
2nd issue Lack of hardware. Unfortunately it seems Unitronic seems to have forgotten about the actual mounting bolts for the hardware...
Solved quickly with some leftover bolts from working on my 79 super beetle!
I contacted Unitronic and they are sending me some bolts.
Gotta admit they have the BEST customer service.
3rd issue. The Fitment.
Now the bolt holes line up just fine but that's about it...
First issue there is a large pipe of some kind. (unfortunately not sure what it belongs to behind the intercooler above the fans and is held on by 2 brackets)
This caused me a lot of fitment issues I was unable to properly lower the dam at the proper angle without loosening the brackets.
After this was done I moved the hose clamp attached to this pipe twisted it 90 degrees to prevent it from rubbing to much against the carbon fiber.
There would still be rubbing but less of it. I also fixed this with a bit of rubber seal leftover from a previous project.
3rd issue... The intake area itself...
Now I'm not sure if it's due to the bolts being wrong... I can't imagine it is...
The fact that this is a Golf R VS a GTI and perhaps it has a different set for the cooling pipes? I.E. the pipe that was rubbing the bottom, but unfortunately the opening of the front air dam does Not align properly vertically to the opening of the grill section. there is about half an inch of just carbon fiber lip and wall that just doesn't line up...
I'm going through steps currently to see if something can be done about this as I mean it's bad....
Final minor note the new intake seal that they give you for the Uni intake is about 2 inches to short. so I have a small bit of my intake entrance as unprotected as a first time hooker experience.
I stretched and stretched almost to the breaking point... "insert some sort of masturbation joke here" but to no avail.
So things are going so well for me at this point.
After the install and drive review
Now let's be honest here. This should not add much in the terms of performance but definitely adds 10+ cool points in the engine bay.
But the new sound brings me many happy points. Now the intake sounds almost as loud as my Uni Open air intake on my Mk6 GTI
and frankly I LOVE it!
I will keep up to date with the fitment issues and see if Uni will help me out here...
What I believe the issue to be is that the brackets that you use to hold the Dam in place are far to high up and cause it to sit far to low causing this issue.
I might try to remove a bit of the section myself unless Uni helps me out here.
I've never worked with carbon fiber so this would be a bit interesting...
I know how dangerous it is if it is inhaled or gets in your eyes so I would use precaution. I'm just hoping Uni helps me out here!
Some things to be noted before hand
-My Golf R is fully stock...for the most part.
-No tune
-Installed already is the Unitronic intake system, including turbo inlet pipe.
-and APR intercooler.
I purchased the Unitronic Front Air dam earlier this month from ShopDap.com
and to my surprise the item arrived a bit early and was packed very well and safe to protect the items inside... I'm looking at you ECS Tuning...
Now first impressions of the item are great!!!
The Carbon weave is flawless.
the quality seems great.
I couldn't be happier.
There was a small bit of almost like tissue paper material possibly a small amount of leftover resin within the housing that I just simply removed with my fingers.
Installation. Unitronic rates this install as 1 star...My ass...
I can agree the Intake as 1 star or "wrench" as Uni calls it.
The removal of everything was nice and easy took me 2 minutes...
The first issue that came up was the removal of the Coolant line.
Unitronic states to Perform this while the engine is cold to prevent coolant loss.
Well the car had been sitting in the garage for 4+ hours and was as cold as Florida standards would allow.
As soon as I removed the line a small eruption small enough to make MTN St. Helens look like a turd dropping in a toilet. The coolant got everywhere...
Lovingly unitronic states to "Clamp the hose! to prevent coolant loss"
Doesn't work when you disconnect the line from the flow in end first...
So first piece of advice... Don't listen to the directions. Disconnect the end towards the engine first THEN hose clamp After the bend, very important.
Luckily I had a small glue cap that I was able to block the flow while I read on with the directions.
2nd issue Lack of hardware. Unfortunately it seems Unitronic seems to have forgotten about the actual mounting bolts for the hardware...
Solved quickly with some leftover bolts from working on my 79 super beetle!
I contacted Unitronic and they are sending me some bolts.
Gotta admit they have the BEST customer service.
3rd issue. The Fitment.
Now the bolt holes line up just fine but that's about it...
First issue there is a large pipe of some kind. (unfortunately not sure what it belongs to behind the intercooler above the fans and is held on by 2 brackets)
This caused me a lot of fitment issues I was unable to properly lower the dam at the proper angle without loosening the brackets.
After this was done I moved the hose clamp attached to this pipe twisted it 90 degrees to prevent it from rubbing to much against the carbon fiber.
There would still be rubbing but less of it. I also fixed this with a bit of rubber seal leftover from a previous project.
3rd issue... The intake area itself...
Now I'm not sure if it's due to the bolts being wrong... I can't imagine it is...
The fact that this is a Golf R VS a GTI and perhaps it has a different set for the cooling pipes? I.E. the pipe that was rubbing the bottom, but unfortunately the opening of the front air dam does Not align properly vertically to the opening of the grill section. there is about half an inch of just carbon fiber lip and wall that just doesn't line up...
I'm going through steps currently to see if something can be done about this as I mean it's bad....
Final minor note the new intake seal that they give you for the Uni intake is about 2 inches to short. so I have a small bit of my intake entrance as unprotected as a first time hooker experience.
I stretched and stretched almost to the breaking point... "insert some sort of masturbation joke here" but to no avail.
So things are going so well for me at this point.
After the install and drive review
Now let's be honest here. This should not add much in the terms of performance but definitely adds 10+ cool points in the engine bay.
But the new sound brings me many happy points. Now the intake sounds almost as loud as my Uni Open air intake on my Mk6 GTI
and frankly I LOVE it!
I will keep up to date with the fitment issues and see if Uni will help me out here...
What I believe the issue to be is that the brackets that you use to hold the Dam in place are far to high up and cause it to sit far to low causing this issue.
I might try to remove a bit of the section myself unless Uni helps me out here.
I've never worked with carbon fiber so this would be a bit interesting...
I know how dangerous it is if it is inhaled or gets in your eyes so I would use precaution. I'm just hoping Uni helps me out here!
