learn me 91 jetta, and tdi swapping

My wife has pretty much monopolized our 09 Corolla, and i drive 600+ miles a week for work, so i decided to pick up something more fuel efficient than the Previa or the Supra. I'm in the process of buying a minty 91 Jetta GL, 8v 5speed. It has the interior out of a GLI with the power recaros, gti single round grill/headlight combo, coilovers, and polished bmw bottlecaps.

This is my first VW, what else should i be looking at? any common problems i should be weary of? Cool mods or build threads for these?

So it should already be a pretty nice DD. I've searched around a fair amount and i'm intrigued by doing a TDI swap, probably an ALH but i'm open to other options. I've read everything on project sipster over at motoiq.com, but they basically just say that cws did everything. There's not a pretty low signal to noise ratio over at the vortex. Does anyone have any better info?

GREG

Few suggestions:

First: tdiclub.com is THE place to go for TDI info.

Second: Yes, IMHO, the ALH is the best TDI engine (of course, I own one, so I'm biased).

Third: check your local registration requirements. 99% of the time, a car is emission-checked based on its VIN. If you try to inspect a gas car with a TDI engine, it will fail quickly. The only option is to re-VIN the chassis, which can be potentially troublesome from a legal aspect.

Lastly: You are much better off finding a TDI Jetta and upgrading it to GLI suspension and interior than trying to convert a GLI into a TDI. This would still be the case if you want to upgrade to the better ALH engine: start with a car already VIN'ed as a diesel.

I wouldn't worry about the swap really. A well tuned 8v Mk2 is a pretty simple, reliable car if it's maintained. Mine can get +35 mpg (CDN gallon, so about 30 mpg US) on highway trips.

Not sure what your motivation or end goal is. If it's saving money I think you're better off to rock the 8v or buy a MKIV TDI (which you'll actually have to do for the swap anyway). Seems like the TDI motors are hard (read: expensive) to come by and the swap requires a lot from the donor car (seems like some dash board parts and pieces and maybe the pedals?).

If you're dead set on a MKII TDI I think it's a cool swap. I had a 1990 Jetta GLI 16v that I daily drove for about four years. I finally grew tired of its non-appliance nature and sold it. The age of the car was starting to show with all the little things that didn't work.

TDIs cost $2k-$5k for a engine trans and wiring harness. A stock one in a MK2 could get 50 mpg, but you could easily put $4-5k into a swap even if you get an excellent deal on the engine. You do have to change the pedals, shifter box, gauge cluster, etc. It could be done and work well, but I wouldnt do it just to save on fuel cost. The stock engines are fine if they run right, but most of them dont. The body shell and suspension parts and stuff like that are made pretty well on Mk2s, but alot of the rest of it is pretty cheaply made and doesn't seem to hold up well. I would be very careful buying one with that many mods, becasue the best VW is usually the one that has been worked on the least (other than oil changes and stuff like that).

I'll definitely rock it as is for now, I'm just looking for something to help me build a plan for sometime out in the future. The po is a friend of mine, so I'm familiar with how its been treated and modded. Luckily, there's no emmisions testing where I live, so that's not a concern.