I think the GK has better use of space, better fuel economy, and an overall more spacious cabin.

The Golf is much faster with better driving dynamics.

This is the fourth black car I've owned. Nothing looks better when they are clean, but nothing worse when dirty. I once had a black car that I showed at HIN events. That was a pain to prep, but the Nissan paint wasn't as bad as you'd think.

Our Golf came with "dealer installed" scratches. They applied a sealant so they could try to upsell a paint protection package. The person that applied the sealant did so with a gravel impregnated dirty rag it appears.

Took Medium compound with my rotary to get the scratches out. Light compound, swirl remover, and wax got it shining, but it's continuing to scratch or mar very easily. Thought I could use my orbital to get out the water spots, but no luck :( I've heard of "soft" paint and I'm thinking this is just one of them. Never really had this before. I'm thinking I need to compound again to get out the water spots, apply a hard sealant and just let it ride for the sake of my sanity.

 

Washed the Golf with vinegar tonight and put it in the garage.

Could hear the Fit protesting giving up it's spot and the 532whp car in the bay next to it wondering what this new black thing was.

Will hit the VW with the rotary again tomorrow and then put a mild sealant on it. Have Finish First on the shelf to use. I'll see if it's hard enough or if I need to go to something like CQuartz. Never had to go there before, but maybe I will on the Golf.

Won't seal the hood just yet though. Have to do the paint touch up method that was suggested by kenchan. Thanks to him for the suggestion of saving some dough!

 

i completely agree on the GK vs Golf. GK has a bit more room than my Golfs.. but then sooooo slow and performance is so lacking. after driving my Golf-R, i hop into the GK and its like literally 1/3 the power. im like wtf is wrong with the engine on this car? no torque! lol

i suppose you can always masking tape the touchup areas and seal the rest of your hood.. heck i recommend you do that so that the rest of the hood is protected by the sealant! why did you use vinegar? to remove calcium?

yah, dealer installed swirls.. i had some on my GTI as well, but since my car is parked outdoors 24/7 and wanted the clear coat to be as thick as possible i decided to only polish it enough to round off the swirls and then fill with glaze + sealant.

 

Ah VW Golf's & Fit's I feel right at home here. The Fit is only down about a 100 HP to a GTI. Yes it's quite a difference. I haven't driven my son's fit yet, but my wife's MINI has even less power than the Fit does. Where I notice the difference in power is passing on 2 lane roads. In the MINI I just don't do it, in the GTI its just downshift & done.

I agree with not polishing too much. There is only so much clear coat & paint. Once through it you are in a world of hurt. I have learned to live with the odd chip here & there.

 

hey there askchuckton- from the read the GTI's make A LOT more power than that 220hp or watever they spec out on paper. with a minor tune, lighter wheels, and completely shutting off traction control using vagcom/OBD11, my GTI is night/day faster than a stock GTI.. i was keeping up with a stock S3 from a roll no problem.. honestly if i had more room my GTI was probably faster. Fiesta ST's and focus dont mess with my GTI.

 

Funny! Just getting back in and I had already decided the same thing as ash and ken suggested.

I ended up using 3M Perfect-it with a foam pad on my rotary instead of compounding the thing. At least it's really shiny and the swirls are gone.

Have the first coat of sealant on now and will do a second tomorrow. Will just live with the scratches for the sake of keeping as much clearcoat as possible. Wife did the first round of touch up as well. I left her a square with no sealant to work with.

So, funny story that I share for others amusement and to show my stupidity...

Was hitting the passenger rear of the car with the rotary this morning and the fuel door popped in and then out. For those unfamiliar with Golf's, the fuel door is a press in to pop out thing. Well, when it popped out, the rotary grabbed the door and removed the outer skin from the assembly and flung it across my garage!

There was a strong OH S>H>I>T moment. Turned off the rotary and, thankfully, found the door skin unharmed by the event. With a little studying I figured out how to re-attach the door and no harm done.

Fast forward to this afternoon when the wife and I are washing it to remove the Perfect-it residue. I push in on the fuel door so I can wash inside and get the residue out of the crevice and....doesn't pop out! Wife and I are panicked. Figured that a tab broke off when it was flung and it's now not hitting the release.

We spent the next 20 minutes prying at the door until we are finally able to slide the skin off without harming the body of the car. Get it off and...nope...still won't pop out.

About this time the wife is cussing and threatening to get out BIG tools when a little itty bitty light bulb went off over my head. Hmm..."I wonder if the fuel door is locked with the car doors." Hit the unlock on the key fob and the fuel door pops open. Literally, pops open as if the car is giving us crap for the whole thing.

We re-installed the fuel door skin for the second time and all is fine once again.

Moral of the story...read the owners manual so you know your car better. Oh, and don't use a rotary on the fuel door.

 

I've read that about stock output being under-rated too. Not sure I buy it or not. I don't drag race or hammer my GTI off the line so having the traction nanny on isn't a detriment to me.

The only mod I have done to my GTI is adding a larger rear swaybar. It has enough power for me as is, plus the fact VW loves to cancel warranties on modded cars keeps me tune free. My use is a daily driver & twisty back road fun car.

There is no way on the street that you can safely determine a car is faster than another. Just because one can keep up with another car means little. You may be racing & the other person isn't. It may look like your car is faster, but it proves little if anything at all plus it is unsafe as all get out to do speed tests on public roads.

My advice is to take the speed runs to the track. It's a real blast, but even there it is hard to tell whose car is fastest. I've passed cars while doing track days that I had no business passing. Porsche's & Corvette's should never get passed by a MINI, even a modified one. Driver trumps all, best mod is seat time. Just my .02 for what that's worth.

My GTI hasn't been on track yet. That will have to wait until next year although it may not happen at all. At 66 years old I've hung up my helmet & driving gloves. But the urge to hit the track remains strong.

 

Speed is easy to compare on the drag strip. I know that a lot of track guys aren't fond of the drag strip, but I usually find it's because they've never been.

I've done both and, overall, I prefer the dragstrip. I can try for that last little bit out of my car without coming home with damaged paint and chips. Yes, I'm a little finicky about my cars aesthetics. A night at the drag strip is usually a fun family type event with good people. While you get to easily see if any of your mods have paid off.

We haven't run our Golf yet, but we will. I'll add the time to this thread when we get there with it. It feels like a mid 15 second car to me, but we'll see.

Wife piles on the miles (2500) in two weeks, so we'll be out of warranty in no time and then the tuning will begin :D

 

GAFIT - i was reading the post and was like, GAFIT, unlock the doors! :D hahaha

good thing you fixed it though. do you use an actual direct drive rotary or a random orbital? cause if it was a random orbital it wouldve probably just stopped the big rotation before flinging the gas door off the car. i mean ive had a few times on other cars where the gas door opened after making a pass with my orbital but it wouldn't remove any car bits as the pad rotation is more within the rotation of the pad itself.


sounds like you're still having a lot of fun. :D keep young inside.

 

Direct drive rotary. Have that and a random orbital polisher/waxer in my arsenal. Would like to have a DA for stuff that's in between. The straight up rotary is a bit intense and my random orbital is really only good at applying wax/sealant.

Yeah...I'm an idiot. If I would have known about the door flap, I could have had it locked when polishing and then unlocked when I needed to clean inside. Instead it was reverse and caused all sorts of problems.

My Lincoln is a push to release, but it doesn't lock with the car. Free gas for anyone with a siphon I guess.

 

wow direct drives are pretty harsh on the VW's paint. you must be pretty damn certain what you are doing. :D

i think my old GD was like that too? push for free gas. haha

 

If one knows how to use a direct drive no problem. Those scare me & I have no idea to safely use one so I bought a random orbital one from Griots garage. It works well for maintaining the finish & light paint correction & is safe for a novice like me to use. If I find myself needing more it will go to my friend the detailer for expert paint correction.

Man I love a clean car..... :-)

 

yes, direct drives can quickly burn through the clear.

 

Agreed! Straight rotaries are not for the faint of heart.

I used to use air powered rotaries, so my electric one seems tame in comparison. Got tired of hearing the compressor running.

Key with a rotary is to never stop or pause. Have to keep moving. Also, have to choose your pad and product wisely and keep feeling the paint for heat. It gets hot fast. Just have to know when to back off.

Sadly, even with the rotary, the only spot on our Golf that is scratch and defect free is a small section I wet sanded and buffed. Just had to see if I could in fact get the scratches out. The dealer really did a number on this paint. It would clean up with heavy compound, but I just don't want to remove that much clear from a brand new car.

It's partially my fault. I saw it at the dealership, but figured I'd just fix it at home. Didn't realize the depth of the scratches. I violated one of my personal rules which is to only buy a vehicle straight off the truck. Our Fit, for example, was in the back lot still in plastic. I bought it that way and wouldn't let the dealer touch it. They had service check fluids and do the checklist, but it didn't go to detail. I brought it home and removed the plastic myself. Same with my last Ford, Nissan, etc.

Don't get me wrong. From 5 feet away the Golf is now an eye popping black beauty. Maybe even from 2 feet away.

It will be good enough. Going to get plenty of road wear with the wife commuting. Have second coat of Finish First curing on it now. Will do at least three coats and consider it done for this week.

Someday, I'd like to try one of the true hard coat sealants. This might be the car that I try something on.

 

GAFIT don't beat yourself up. That kind of stuff happens. I'm sure to everyone else your car is beautiful. You are your own toughest critic.

When I bought my MINI it was picked up on a cloudy winter day & it looked great. Took it home & parked it in the garage where it sat for a few weeks waiting for nice weather. A couple of weeks later when the sun was shining down I took the car out. There were hologram buffer trails all over it. I went back to the dealer & had them look at it. They told me that they never use buffers & I must have done that with my washing technique. But he tells me we can buff those out for $100. I said #!@* to them & left. My detailer buddy fixed them up for me. Tough lesson I learned from the good folks at the MINI dealer.

 

yah, its just the way it is with dd's and i wouldnt kill myself over it either GAFIT.. plus, the Golfs are cars that are meant to be driven in all sorts of weather, not so much a show car imho. looks good with some daily driver wounds.

askchuckton- if u haven't tried already, take your red Griot's pad (wax pad) and some ScratchX over the hologram with your RO and it should polish away completely.

 

is ur ride lowered? i like the stance. my GTI is running VWR springs + 19x8.5 OZ's.

 

No Ken my GTI is at stock ride height. I drive on back roads with a high crown & the occasional gravel road. I sure don't want it lower than it already is. In fact I'd be OK with it being an inch higher.

I lowered my MINI & regretted it on the first back road drive I did. Hate those scraping sounds.

 

nice. that's a good ride height. yah, there are definitely side effects to lowering cars. might look good but mang the stroke is so much shorter over rougher loads with full load.

i dont plan on lowering my R. thing rides beautifully and ride height is a touch lower than the mk7 GTI from the factory so she looks great out of the box.

 

All done with the Golf. Scratches are still there, but it's definitely reflective!

Here's a pic of the hood...

https://imgur.com/9LzadNv