Right... where were we?

Oh thats right... Engine in and running. Turbo dripping a bit of oil... ECU wedged in the Engine bay...

Right. Ive now done a good 400 miles trundling around locally to work and back and a couple of short bursts on the motorway.
Turbo oil drip/smoke seems to have calmed down.
I do get a puff of smoke on start up, but other than that its no worse than the AAZ that came out.

Main observation afte the first 400 miles or so is how quiet it is.
I put this down to using the JX airbox setup.
Turbo noise is quite loud... sounds kind of like a police car following sometimes :)
No major issues apart from a dodgy N75 valve (see below).

Power and driveability is fantastic. Its so much more driveable than the AAZ.. and that was pretty good if I'm honest.
Cruise control is so much better than the mechanical vacuum operated version, and the first high speed motorway run was great!

This was my first "official" test drive... snowy day in the North... TDI's have a reputation for running cool, and this is no different. Many TDIs have a coolant heater for this reason... something i may look at for next winter!

Oh yeah... as I'm now officially cable free, accelerator cable and cold start cable have both been removed. I now have this nifty panel that replaces the Cold Start Handle :)
Available HERE

After a few test drives I had my first "wobble".
Foot to the floor hard acceleration, always uphill. Power would drop, and it would struggle until I turned off and back on again.
Read the fault codes...

00575 Intake Manifold pressure control difference... points to a faulty N75 valve.
Replaced with a new Pierburg unit and all seems fine.

No faults since, and no fault codes.

Next was the timing... It was close, but the final adjustment is made with VagCom...
This is as close as my patience would allow to the "optimal".

First tank of fuel... averaged 26mpg.

On the face of it that doesnt seem that great, but that includes a lot of time idling... warming up to bleed the rad... warming up to do the timing... and generally sitting around just idling.

Also, ive probably driven it a lot harder at times than I would normally, and the N75 fault will ive no doubt have cost a few MPG too.

Second full tank will be a better indication....

Quick catchup...

Turbo arrived and swapped but still getting some oil in the exhaust when cold.
I'm putting this down to the shallow angle of the oil return, which is still a "cobbled" version.
I'm going to get a proper on made up now and see if that changes anything...

So.. Ive wired the cruise control up.
It turns out the Sharan I stripped had slightly different wiring to the digrams I had.
Turns out the Sharan has 2 more wires to the switch than the T3 original stalks (6 vs 4). A bit of faffing about and it all works.

For future reference...

Black wire is IGN live.
Red is the SET button
Blue is the RESUME button

White connects to the Grey wire from the ECU to tell it that Cruise is ON.
You also need to connect the Black/Green wire that goes to Pin 66 on the ECU to this wire.
I still dont know why, but the ECU needs to see 2 "ON" signals.

Anyway I turned the cruise on with VagCom:
Connect to the OBD port.
Goto "Engine"
Select "Login"
Enter "11463" and click "Do It!"

That should turn it on.

Erm... what else...

Not much really. Van drives really well and pulls really strongly.

Ive reset the rev counter so its closer to the readings given by the ECU, as the rev counter gets its signal from the alternator its not accurate. There is a trim screw on the back of the rev counter under the white sticker to adjust... it'll never be 100% accurate, but its close...

Speaking of VagCom, im not a fan of having the OBD port just dangling, so ive made a bracket to house it under the dash cover:

Ive also tidied up the wiring in the engine bay a little. I'll do this in stages as its really time consuming and tedious :D I could also do with shortening all the wires to the pump really as theres a lot of wire to lose there. For the moment its in and working and once its proved i'll finish off the engine bay.

For now, i'm going to drive it around and see if any issues develop.

Its now officially a TDI!

Slow and steady progress...

Silicone hoses arrived, and Ive now fitted the maf and airbox in the factory locations.
TDI conversions are quite common in a T3 nowadays, but I'm not a fan of the way the engine bays always look. I wanted it to look standard... Battery and Airbox in the standard locations, and as little evidence of the conversion as possible.

Ive also made a wiring loom for the front end wiring... 16 wires in total.
6 for the throttle pedal, 4 for the cruise control, 2 each for clutch and brake switches, and one each for the speed sensor and the immobilser wire.
All sleeved and routed sensibly down the chassis and up into the front through the original wiring grommet behind the headlamp...

Immobilser is mounted in the dashboard.
Ive fitted speed sensor to the speedo that will give the ECU the correct signal... As mine already had cruise control, it had a speed signal unit in the speedo, so its simply a case of removing it, fitting the RJES unit, and connecting the wiring.

Cruise control wiring is connected to the stalks, and pedal switches are wired.
The Sharan brake pedal was a 4 pin switch, as the ECU requires 2 signals from the brake switch....but to simplify things ive used a 2 pin switch on the pedal and given the other signal to the ECU from the brake ligt wiring in the box in the engine bay.
Front end loom connects to the ECU with 3 multi connectors. That way if i need to split the loom for any reason, I dont have to remove the whole lot.

A couple of other bits... one is the Intake Air temp sensor that up until recently was just dangling. Its now fitted into the intake pipework from the chargecooler using a fitting from Mario at M V Engineering.

Ive also blanked the blow off valve on the original JX manifold with a machined plate.

Accelerator pedal has been mounted on the bulkhead, im not particularly happy with this as there is quite a bit of flex in the bulkhead when the pedal is pressed. I'll add a bracket here to strengthen it before I call it "done", but for the time being it works...

Ive discovered that the turbo is passing a lot of oil into the exhaust, so will fit a new replacement.
The AFN with a JX pump seems to produce about 6 bar of oil pressure at idle when cold, which may be something to do with the oil in the turbo, but I figure a new turbo will have the best chance of keeping the oil where it should be.
Currently waiting for the Turbo, but Ive assembled the exhaust and done the maiden voyage... a short drive of about 10 miles. Nothing to report really... It pulls incredibly well, especially at the bottom end of the rev range. Sounds great too! Just smokes a little which I put down to the turbo.

Once the new turbo is here I'll swap it and refit the exhaust and undertrays properly.

Other jobs... mount the ECU properly, wrap up the wiring loom in the engine bay, and sort the cruise control... Then decide where I'm going to take it for a shakedown :)