Well, Mark Smith has cooked up another fantastic car idea, and is hard at work designing a new mid-engine transverse turbo diesel 2-seat daily-driver sportscar. It's based on a Mk4 Jetta/Golf TDI or similar, which will be disassembled, cut up, rearranged, reconstituted with custom tubular steel subframes, and clothed in a svelte fiberglass body. Still being designed and prototyped as of December, 2009, with lots of internet collaboration. A bunch of us are committed to this idea as our next car to build. So, here's my project pics, let's see where it goes.
First step: get a donor Jetta, and drive it around as a stock car for awhile to learn diesel technology and assure all systems I will use on the Smyth build are working properly. Maybe I can hotrod it some too, chip, injectors, who knows? I'll post pics progress and facts as they come up. Thanks for stopping by! John Phillips
UPDATE June 13, 2011: My BLOG re the build is at http://g3f-jlphil.blogspot.com (please paste into your browser)
Date(s): Beginning December 2009.... Album by John Phillips. Photos by John Phillips. 1 - 105 of 105 Total. 5629 Visits.
1 Smyth G3F Photoshop concept Input from lots of folks on Mark Smith's ffcobra.com discussion thread resulted in this photoshopped rendering of the 2-seater we hope to build. More to come...
2 VW Jetta TDI donor Picked up 12-12-09 Venice Beach, from TDI nut Jeff McGrath. 218,000 miles, 5-spd, clean in and out. No problem chopping this thing apart in a few months!
3 12-13-09 Jetta's New Home I'll drive it intact awhile, make sure everything I need works right, maybe soup it up and be ready to tear it apart for a better purpose.
4 First you cut the Jetta apart... Now Mark? Now? Cut here?
5 G3F-prototypePromoPic
6 4-5-2010 READY to BUILD My tag caused some questions on the street...I just told em I'm cutting this one up to build a better car soon. Will use a Sawzall if the hand blade doesn't work!
7 G3F-frameSilverPowdercoat
8 FrameonPrototype
9 8-31-11 G3FframeJLPCarry
10 8-31-11 G3FframeinGarage
11 G3FEnginePlumbing
12 G3F-WrapWhiteCarbon
13 G3F-WrapWhiteCarbon-NoseView
14 WeldJohnHelmetOn
15 WeldG3FDoorPractice2
16 G3FbracerBar
17 G3FFrameBraceBottom Final iteration P.side subframe brace mount
18 G3FX-BraceLower
19 G3F-Driver-9-19-12-frontgate
20 PickupImage Possible look of Smyth Jetta Mk4-based pickup truck, neing designed as of Nov. 2012
21 G3FDuct1
22 G3FDuct2
23 G3F-JLPHappyStart
24 IMAG1251
25 IMAG1254
26 IMAG1259(1)
27 IMAG1258
28 IMAG1253
29 20130810 222201 resized 1
30 20130810 222224 resized 1
31 20130810 222248 resized 1
32 20130810 222306 resized 1
33 20130809 222301-1 resized 2
34 20130810 101343-1 resized 1
35 20130810 143518 resized
36 20130810 143626 resized 1
37 Tool-Holders
38 G3F-JettaTopHaulAway-CROP
39 20140517 BracketsMounted
40 20140517 CapBrackets
41 20140518 3M5200
42 20140518 3MonBrackets
43 20140518 DoorCapGluedandScrewed
44 20140518 InnerBraceTilBracketsSetUp
45 20140615 150906
46 20140601 163700
47 20140601 163728
48 20140602 195335
49 20140607 154729
50 20140607 201335
51 20140607 154657
52 20140602 195406
53 20140607 201812
54 20140612 185657
55 20140612 185723
56 20140613 153521
57 20140614 153725
58 20140614 151420
59 20140614 151337(0)
60 20140614 131634
61 20140614 165430
62 20140615 105434
63 20140614 164245
64 20140614 164212
65 20140615 120501
66 2014-07-21SHOES worn out By the end of every FFR build, I've destroyed 1 pair of Topsiders. According to that experience, I must be nearly done building the G3F...these things are almost shot!
