Picking up a DSM today.

[Esibnitsud]

I am going to be going back to do a compresision check on a 90 talon tsi awd, and if it goes well i am planning on buying it. The guy wants 2500. I will be the third owner. At 75k there was an engine fire. The engine was replaced and now has 105k on it. So the ododmeter reads 178kish. It ran fine though, and for that price i can afforrd to fix a few things when/if they go wrong. The timing belt was replaced 15k miles ago. Since it had an engine fire, I need to check all the electronics inside it to, which i didnt do yesterday (cause heat=melted wire shielding=shorts) One thing that was wierd was a heat shielding wrap on a bunch of the engine parts (i think it was on the exhaust manifold and stuff.) It looked kinda like http://www.heatshieldproducts.com/exhaust_wrap.htm and i was wondering why they would use it, since i have never seen it before.

Now, what type of things should i do when I get it. I was planning on first changing the oil, and filling up any low fluids. Changing the spark plugs and the wires and cleaning the engine bay up. What are some other good things to do when i first get it (anything specific that DSM's often need?)

I am going to have a 3" exhaust done my a local muffler shop at some point. I will be making my own intake as well as getting a K&n Filter. What MBC would you recomend, or are they all pretty much the same? Also, I was looking around and I couldn't find any nice but inexpensive boost/etv guages. Anyone know of a good site to get them from?

Also any other things I should check on the car?

 

[Quasimondo]

Drive it a bit and make sure the tranny shifts butter smooth. I didn't check that on my first DSM, a '92 AWD and I ended up going through two transmissions and two clutches before I gave up

 

[Esibnitsud]

The first thing i noticed was how nice it shifted actually.

 

[Eclipse96Ryder]

check behind the valve cover like below the intake manifold and check for fluid...something like oil and coolant i think. this would possibly mean the head gasket is leaking. also when you hit boost check and see if white smoke comes out of the exhaust because that could also mean a head gasket or blown seals in the turbo. check and see if it leaks an oil from under the car...most likely it could be the transfer case but sometimes oil leaks turn out to be big deals.