Close as a...

Despite the tremendously bad weather which has been plaguing the Mid Atlantic, time was made to do a trial run on the wheels for the Passat. Verdict: It's close. Damn close.



Perhaps dangerously close? I suppose time will tell on that one, but as Jason said at least it'll be easy to tell when he bends one of the barrels on a pothole: just listen for the sound of metal as it rubs on the upright...after taking a good look at this shot I think he may have more trouble with the tire than the wheel, but a 225/40 should stretch pretty good on the 9.5" wheel.



Tires are en route, but as more snow is forecast for tomorrow and Wednesday getting them onto the car will probably take a back seat until the roads are cleared a bit. With Jason's luck the car would end up in a ditch, so better safe than sorry there.



Once the tires and mounted and balanced a second trial fit will happen, and if necessary a 3mm spacer will find its way onto the car, but as is is the fitment is near perfect from the outside.



_WRS

With the Fox no longer, introducing the B5 Wagon

It's tough sometimes with cars. Like all relationships, sometimes you're just more in love than other times. Some of us may entertain ideas of selling our current chariots and upgrading / downgrading for more power / prestige / room / or whatever, while others may look for something more simple, stripped down and basic. It happens all the time. 'The grass is always greener on the other side' and all that crap.



Well Jason, who pretty much has honorary status as an official part of the team now, has these feelings more often than not. In fact, I can honestly say not a day goes by that he doesn't propose dropping everything and buying some random car that could be 'so cool' with x, y or z done to it. Bad bad ideas as he says. So bad they are good. I beg to differ, but then I tend to be more conservative on that front. Usually it involves something that will be impossible to get parts for, or close to impossible to keep on the road (see also: Crazy like the Fox) and so they don't always come to fruition, luckily for him.



Anyways, this 2000 Passat B5 Wagon is Jason's daily driver. Sure he has an '88 Scirocco 16v that he could put money into and drive, which would be fun and fast, but he's a big wimp when it comes to really driving cars (haha) and so he needs something 'cushy' to drive everyday. This Passat was on the chopping block until recently, but after the chips were cashed in on the Fox project, he decided to hang onto it. Unfortunately these fantastic 19x9" Touareg wheels have already been sold to Arno over at Baak 2 Basics, so it was time for some new rollers...the bent and abused steelies simply not being sufficiently pimp for the wagon. The choice: fan-freaking-tastic Miro 111 wheels in a positively massive 18x9.5", all the way around.

Boo ya!

Tires will be 225/40 R18, and seeing as the final offset on the old Touareg wheels was the same as these (et40) the extra .5" shouldn't pose too much of a problem for the old girl. As you can see Jason's taking no prisoners with the ride height (Vogtland coilovers) so it should be sitting very pretty by this time next week. I for one am excited to see it.



I mean just look at that! No lip, spokes go right to the edge, and well, I couldn't ask for much more, and it's not even my car.

_WRS