2021 GTI SE in cornflower blue.

Brett_Murphy said:

Some 17" wheels fit the bigger brakes, but not all. I may have to test fit any wheel I plan to buy. 

If I remember, all 17" VW factory car wheels will clear the brakes, the previous gen. Tiguan wheels will not. 

We turned 1,000 miles on this. I've gotten to drive it about five times, total. 

What an awesome color!

I bought snows for the 15 GTI and put them on sparco 15's. If I'm being honest, the car was way more fun on the smaller wheels and crappy tires. I'm sure my brakes are smaller than yours though. 

OZ 17" will fit. I have them on my Golf R which has the same brakes as your's. Sparco's fit as well. That is what my winter tires are on. 

bmw88rider said:

OZ 17" will fit. I have them on my Golf R which has the same brakes as your's. Sparco's fit as well. That is what my winter tires are on. 

Which OZ wheels? The Superturismo? 
 

I have the superturismos on there as you can see. But the ultraleggera will fit as well. 

Really nice car.  Ford calls this color grabber blue.  Looking forward to updates because the GTI is on my list as a potential long commuter car.

Ok- had to find this thread again to vent a little- I have a 2015 GTI, first year of the MK7.  I had the first battery poop the crib at just exactly three years. So, September 2017. Took it to the dealer thinking I would at least get some proration, but no... but their replacement- that the parts desk lady told me was an interstate - was within comfortable range of the autozone price, so I went for it. Now it is June 2021, and I guess we made it almost 4 years, the battery is pooping the bed again. Look under the hood- it's an OEM VW battery date marked 12/2016. Which would have been a 9 month old battery by the time they installed in my car.  I didn't check it after the install, and truthfully just forgot about it (as one should be able to do regarding batteries).

1. I have no idea why this car "eats" batteries. We've never run them down. 

2. My confirmation bias is upheld by the dealer sorta not giving me the whole story/putting in what I deem to be an "old" battery". 

So, take for this what you will- don't know why these eat batteries in my limited experience, and don't know whether this is limited to me or if common in the VW world.  I'll be getting the Napa or whatever with a clearly marked warranty period for the next one. 

And tomorrow is going to be fun- replacing the water pump in hopes that the "coolant transfer valve" check engine light is related to that system. No one online seems to know, but I'll be damned if I spend thousands of dollars at the dealer/indy trying to find out. Awesome!!

New cars are a lot harder on batteries now that everything is electronic.  You have a lot of continuous 5V draws all over the place now to keep various computers alive.  The engineers take it for granted that when you drive it the alternator makes enough juice to recondition and keep the battery topped off.  It's not like you ever drain the battery and do an equalizing charge to refresh each cell like major storage batteries in the power industry.  I think 3-5 years in a new car is probably about all you can expect.  I keep a trickle charger plug on each of my infrequently driven cars which helps.  My new 2013 Mustang ate a new battery in less than a year.  It had 4 miles on it when I bought it.  It was traded off right at two years thanks to a knee injury. 

I've learned that the batteries in the Golf/Beetle typically last 3-4yrs and then die. Had to replace the one in my 2017 Golf when I bought it last year. Once you get the new battery installed, you'll likely see all kinds of warning lights on the dash. You can clear those by starting the car up, and then turning the steering wheel all the way to the left, then all the way to the right, adn then back straight. That resets all the sensors and warning lights. 

~Peter

5 years on a battery is a long time.  How long do you expect them to last?

It's two batteries in six years. Two. I bought the 84month warranty napa battery to replace. And my 2016 Ram Ecodiesel is still on its first battery.

If I get three years out of a battery, before it dies, I'm not surprised, but that's about the minimum life I expect. Anything more than four years is a bonus.

My wife complained of a "tap-tap-tap" noise while driving at low speed.

There was a carriage bolt in the rear driver's tire. Luckily it was right in the middle of the tread and not terribly big, so it got plugged.

Tire prices are kind of nuts, I didn't have to replace one with only 10k miles on it.

My mom's 2017 Jetta is on its 2nd battery. 

Meanwhile my wife's 2014 BMW diesel wagon is still running the factory AGM and probably has 2x the electronics and 4x the load starting that diesel.