Project Dadmobile: an Alltrack story

I was originally going to tie this into my Audi thread, but this car is cool enough for its own. At least in my opinion. 
Yesterday, I picked up this 2017 Alltrack SEL after trading in my Passat TDI. The Passat was great, but as a father of two now, the extra space was a must. Double strollers are huge! 

I knew I wanted an Alltrack after driving my friend's 2017 6MT, but since SWMBO can't drive stick, I was down to DSG cars. Not really a problem, the DQ250 is great. After missing out on several, I came across this one at a Toyota dealership in Indianapolis and decided to give it a look. 
 

No mention of any aftermarket parts in the ad, but after popping the hood, I noticed this. That's an IE catted downpipe. Definitely overkill for a stock IS12 car, and after a quick google search of the part numbers I could see on the turbo, I realized this was an IS38. Further inspection of the car revealed Bilsteins on all 4 corners and Euro headlights. I was a little wary about buying something so highly modified from a dealership, but after a flawless test drive, I gave in, signed the paperwork, and started the 2+ hour drive home. 
 

After I got home, I threw on some Motorsport Hardware lug studs and wheel spacers and took some pictures. 

And then took it on a quick drive with the fam for some ice cream 

A good day 

I love these cars! Nice find with this set of mods as well.

So obviously it's got aftermarket parts and it's not throwing fault codes, so it must have an appropriate ECU tune. But which one? The dealership couldn't give me any details, so after some digging, I found this

Neat. 

Makes almost double the stock power if the APR marketing department can be believed. Regardless, my right foot confirms that this thing hauls! 
 

So what's next? A few things. 

1) Basic maintenance. Probably overkill, but I'm planning on an oil change, DSG service, and Haldex service just so I know for a fact that everything's up to date. Probably check the spark plugs too. This car uses some special iridium plug that costs $155 for a set of 4. Ouch. Quite a bit more than the $5/plug sets that my Audi runs. 

2) 'Stage 3' cars (I hate the stage nomenclature, but it's what I've got to deal with) need a turbo inlet pipe and an intake and this car has neither. I'm guessing PO took it off to sell separately before trading the car in. I'll need one of those. In the meantime, I'll have to be gentle with it. 

3) A rear sway bar. Even with the upgraded dampers, this thing wallows like a boat. An upgraded rear sway really livened up my TDI, and I'm sure it'll do the same here. 

4) about those upgraded dampers...

old habits die hard, and before I'd even bought the car, I had purchased some parts for it 

These are Koni special active struts for a mk7 golf R and stock MQB Audi S3 springs. Should give me the low I want without completely getting rid of the Alltrack's extra ride height. I usually run Bilsteins on my VWs, but I've been curious about these Konis, and with the 20% off sale they're running, I couldn't resist 

In reply to trumant :

Thanks! Yeah I'm pretty excited about it! My oldest is obsessed with the giant sunroof lol

I commend your choice of rowdy Dadmobile sir.  I built a nasth gen 1 CTSV for the same duty and loved the practicality.

Turbo inlet pipe really doesn't do too much.  I wouldn't bother unless you really want to, it won't impact the tune.  Sorta the same thing with the intake, although both are easy installs and the intake will make some cool choo choo noises

In reply to docwyte :

Interesting! HumbleMechanic and a few of the other YouTubers I follow made it sound pretty important. 
Either way, extra turbo noise is fun. I've got an IE inlet and intake on the way. Didn't shell out for the carbon cover. Yet. 

Meh.  You won't notice any difference with it at all.  Even on the dyno it barely registers beyond the dyno error between runs.  The IE intake sounds super cool, watch the fitment of it, there are several rub points.

I got some wrenching time for Father's Day so I knocked out the DSG and Haldex service and an oil change 

DSG filter looked a little old, but everything looked good otherwise. 
 

Also took a second to install my IE intake and turbo inlet pipe. Then took it on a test drive to pick up some lumber at Lowe's for a project for SWMBO. 
Results? Better shifts and much more turbo noise! The power onset feels smoother too, although that's probably just placebo. Still stupid fast for what it is. 

I love this car. 

Bonus post. If you've seen my Audi thread (I don't blame you if not, it's pretty boring) you might've seen that I found some 17" OZ Ultraleggeras. I was dead set on running these on the Audi, until I saw this today and now I'm thinking the Alltrack needs them instead. Maybe the Audi gets some Apex wheels instead. 

Ultraleggeras + Wildpeaks= winning traction in all conditions!

Its crazy that the little 1.8 gets basically the same power curve as a stock Golf R with the turbo swap.

In reply to Parker with too many Projects :

It's pretty crazy! I'm used to old school turbo lag from my Audi, but despite doubling the factory horsepower rating, this thing is perfectly daily driveable. 

You've got a great foundation there, and glad you got the DSG service out of the way! I agree with your research that turbo inlet is necessary for stage 2 and above, it's the intake manifold and filter that doesn't necessarily need to be replaced. Looking forward to following along with your experience. I only wish they made an Alltrack with the 2.0T. 

~Peter

CaprockFabShop said:

You've got a great foundation there, and glad you got the DSG service out of the way! I agree with your research that turbo inlet is necessary for stage 2 and above, it's the intake manifold and filter that doesn't necessarily need to be replaced. Looking forward to following along with your experience. I only wish they made an Alltrack with the 2.0T. 

~Peter

I wish they made an Alltrack with the TDI! Wife drives 6MT 2015 TDI Sportwagen and if was AWD, I don't suspect we'd be discussing a new car for her for long, long time. A diesel, manual, AWD wagon? What more could you want?!

But this thread is making me think some of my goofy VAG specific tools might not go to waste the next time she gets stuck in the driveway after our once every 3-year snow events and declares "I need AWD!". I'll just have to find the 6MT version of OP's car and tell her "careful, you have to use the "normal" pumps at the gas station now!"

I drove one of these (totally stock) about 6 months back.  Really impressive package.

When my daughter goes off to college and takes our e-Golf I could see us grabbing one.

I bought a B7 Quattro wagon from Dan0 on here, and I have to say I'm smitten with this platform and package... I really wanna do the IS38 upgrade, but part of me is scared I'll love it TOO much. 

In reply to Spearfishin :

Right? Lol I would've bought one in a heartbeat. They made one for foreign markets, so it probably wouldn't be too difficult to DIY one over here. My friend sees 32ish MPG with his stock 6mt Alltrack though, so it probably wouldn't make much sense financially. It'd be cool though. 

In reply to golfduke :

Do it! If you're ever around central Ohio I'll let you give mine a spin. 

Turbine said:

In reply to golfduke :

Do it! If you're ever around central Ohio I'll let you give mine a spin. 

Will do, although admittedly, fly and driving used cars from OH is sorta my thing.  Already have done it 3x, haha.  

That's awesome. I also wouldn't be too crazy about buying a modified car, but it certainly looks like it has worked out in your favor so far.

3ish week ownership update: 

This thing rules. I've put about 1000 miles on it so far and the power still puts a smile on my face. More so now, with the extra intake noise. I guess im not completely out of my boy racer phase lol

A few minor gripes though:

1) The DSG shift points in both modes are kinda annoying, even with the tune. D mode has the transmission shifting no later than 3k RPM and it tries to get to 6th as soon as it can. It's possible to be in 6th while going 40mph. Annoying. Meanwhile, S mode is great, until you get into 5th and it won't upshift to 6th until 75mph. No amount of feathering the pedal will make it upshift, so you're stuck accelerating, then coasting down to the speed you want. It gets old on longer drives. I could just use the paddles, but this brings me to issue 2

2) The exhaust is too quiet! Trying to drive in manual mode means watching the tach constantly to catch the shift points because it's so hard to hear anything inside. Definitely takes the fun out of it. I'm on the fence about finding a sportier exhaust since this is my commuter and family car. Seems like any performance catback is $1k+ anyway, so if it does eventually happen, it won't be anytime soon. 
 

Finally, I got a solid deal on an upgraded stock location intercooler. These are usually $900, but I got this for $350. 

Hopefully I'll have a chance to install this next weekend. 

Careful with the exhaust, it's really easy to get one that's too loud.  What I found on my Golf R is that the factory downpipe really makes the exhaust quiet, so if that's in place, really any resonated exhaust will be fine.  If you go to an aftermarket downpipe, then anything other than the stock exhaust will be way too loud

Oh yeah, when you install that intercooler, buy two of the large white plastic clips.  They like to break a lot when you pop them out during the install.  Use a heat gun to soften them up first.  I found it much easier to pull the nose off the car and pull the intercooler out the front vs pulling the radiator and then having to fill and burp it

In reply to docwyte :

Good to know! I'm already running an IE downpipe, so I guess I'll stick with what I've got now. $1400 I can put towards other things lol

Yeah, with the downpipe already there, any aftermarket exhaust, even a resonated one, was way too loud

I was hoping to install the intercooler this weekend, but the new intercooler clips won't be here until middle of next week, so I decided to tackle the suspension instead. Immediately ran into an issue trying to assemble the new struts. As y'all may remember, these are MQB Audi S3 springs that I was trying to run with mk7 Golf R dampers. I was looking for Golf R springs, but found these and figured that they'd do fine. Unfortunately it looks like I made a bad assumption. With the strut nut fully tightened, I have to compress the strut nearly an inch before the spring comes in contact with the bottom of the bearing. Some of the guys in the mk7 groups on Facebook said to send it, but it's a little too sketchy to me. Maybe if this were a beater, but not for my DD. If I'm wrong, let me know, but I've never installed a strut where I didn't have to compress the springs at least a little.