VW Scirocco Tuning

"Thank you for reading my VW Scirocco tuning article."

Production ran from 2008 - 2017 when volkswagen  decided to create a third generation Scirocco.

This Scirocco was based on the Golf Mk5 platform (PQ35) and featured a new coupe body shell going on to win car of the year in 2008's TopGear magazine.

There was a minor facelift in 2014 with subtle styling changes and revisions to the engines.

• 1.4 TSI 122 bhp 2008–2017 122 PS (90 kW; 120 hp) @5,000 200 Nm (148 lbft) @1,500–4,000
• 1.4 TSI 122 bhp BlueMotion Technology 2009–2017 122 PS (90 kW; 120 hp) @5,000 200 Nm (148 lbft) @1,500–4,000
• 1.4 TSI 160 bhp 2008–2017 163 PS (120 kW; 161 hp) @5,800 240 Nm (177 lbft) @1,500–4,500
• 2.0 TSI 200–211 bhp 2008–2017 211 PS (155 kW; 208 hp) @5,300–6,200 280 Nm (207 lbft) @1,700–5,000
• Scirocco R / 2.0 TSI 2009–2017 265 PS (195 kW; 261 hp) @6,000 350 Nm (258 lbft) @2,500

Diesel engines

• 2.0 TDI CR 143 bhp 2008–2017 143 PS (105 kW; 141 hp) @4,000 320 Nm (236 lbft) @1,750–2,500
• 2.0 TDI CR 170 bhp 2009–2017 170 PS (125 kW; 168 hp) @4,200 350Nm(258 lbft) @1,750–2,500

The Scirocco is a good car tuning project to execute. With the right mods your Scirocco can be transformed into a fun car. Don't waste money, do your homework and follow our unbiased guides to each performance upgrade to avoid disappointment.

 

Top end power should be your overall aim on the Scirocco with a nice fat peak torque band.

The best power gains come from larger engine sizes. The more you start with the bigger the return on investment so engine swaps are good value mods for small engined cars.

Engine tuning mods.

These mods motorsport upgrades are usually carried out by our members, decide how far you wish to go in your tuning project before you get going.

Getting the correct grade of tuning upgrades for your planned usage of the car is essential. Stage 3 (competition) mods just don't work well on the road difficult in stop start traffic.

Please watch TorqueCars Video tutorial on car tuning. And be sure to subscribe and support our new channel.

Stages of Tune

Stage 1 mods: Lighter flywheel, Panel air filter, Sports exhaust, Remap, Alloy wheels, Suspension upgrade (drop 30-40mm).

Stage 2 mods: fuel pump upgrades, Ported and polished head, Power/Sport clutch, Fast road cam, high flow fuel injector.

Stage 3 mods: Engine balancing, Sports gearbox, Competition cam, Internal engine upgrades (pistons/head/valves), Adding or upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger).

You need to keep as much low end torque as possible and aim to achieve a long power band rather than a narrow top end power hike.

In this article we shall give a brief overview to the best upgrades for your car, but we'd encourage you to spend some time on the site looking into the details of each type of performance mod.A fast road cam proves to be one of the best NASP power modifications you can do from a single upgrade to your engine.

The exhaust & intake durations play a large part in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car impossible to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a cam upgrade with other mods and finish with a reflashed ECU to fully release the power gain.

Don't forget to pay attention to the fuelling when you are increasing the power - it makes the car more thirsty.

If you find you experience flat spots and power surges after your sports mods you should check the fuelling and try a higher octane fuel as well. Increasing the injectors is another beneficial modification and will deliver sufficient fuel.

If you've uprated your fuelling with bigger injectors you will also need to get a bigger fuel pump to supply it.

Intake and Exhaust Tuning.

Now we move on to the intake and exhaust and ensure proper flow through the engine. Contrary to popular belief there is usually a small power gain reached by fitting an induction kit, they only work well and are recommended after you raise the engines power to the point where the standard air intake box cannot cope!

For most Scirocco engines TorqueCars would suggest you just go with a washable panel air filter. On heavily tuned engines and turbo vehicles an induction kit will help release the power providing you address the problem of supplying cold air.

Sports exhausts will certainly help air flow out of the engine but do not go too large or you could will reduce the flow rate. Stick to 1.5 to 2.5 inches as a rule of thumb.

Head work including a polish and port and 3 or 5 angle valve job will really help to release the potential of the engine. Your clutch can fail if it starts to slip and the standard clutches are only ever good for power gains of up to 43%. Fit a power clutch to avoid power leak through the transmission. The best mods in our experience for your Scirocco are a remap especially on a turbo, a fast road camshaft and sports exhaust, with a good air intake.

Remaps offer massive power gains on all turbo charged cars. On NASP engines the benefits are doubtful. However a remapped ECU on a NASP engine will help unleash the potential if you have done a lot of mods.

We've also seen some tuners playing with twincharging applications and making some seriously high power figures.

Despite the large cost involved adding forced induction to a NASP engine will give large power gains. It is often cheaper to bolt on a supercharger than it is to get a turbo working. With a turbo the boost curve is related exponentially to the engine speed making it difficult to map fuelling with.

It is easier to map a supercharger because the boost is correlating to engine speed on a linear curve. Decreasing the engines compression ratio will allow you to add forced induction, water injection may also help prevent detonation.

Handling/Suspension upgrades

Improving the handling for many people first priority in your Scirocco tuning project.

Fully adjustable suspension allows you to fine tune the handling of you Scirocco dramatically benefitting your drive.

Drop the car by as much as 30mm - 36 mm and fit motorsport grade stiffer dampers, bigger drops will need other modifications in most instances.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

The benefits of alloys include lowering your unsprung weight and more efficient brake cooling via the extra air flow they allow. Don't forget that your choice of rubber greatly affects your cars grip and handling. It is not worth compromising performance with cheap tyres when you can buy soft compound performance tyres.

Large Scirocco alloy wheels can decrease performance. If you get big alloy wheels you will be changing your final drive ratio.

Because of this aim to keep the overall rolling diameter of the wheel the OEM setup. In all cases we do not recommend going above 18 inches.

There is a more updated version of this VW Scirocco Tuning article on TorqueCars.com.

For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss Scirocco options in more detail with our Scirocco owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased VW tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

We need your help improving this article, so please send us your feedback in the comments box below and pass on any tips, points or facts we have wrong or have not covered.

We really do love seeing our visitors car projects and which mods work best for them, this site is very much a community effort, and we remind our visitors of our non profit non commercial approach to running this site.

All of your comments are used to improve the accuracy of these articles which are continually revised, tweaked and updated.

This article is flagged for an update, so please pass on specific tips below that I can include. All articles, and content was written by me, Waynne Smith TorqueCars founder. Some outlines are just too general so I appreciate your feedback and suggestions. This entry was filed under Volkswagen. You can leave a response below or join our forum to discuss this article and car modification in detail with our members.

If you liked this page please share it with your friends, drop a link to it in your favourite forum or use the bookmarking options to save it to your social media profile.

Please watch this video and subscribe to my YouTube channel.