Let's hear a little bit about the driver - What's your name and where are you from?
Hello, My Name is Mason Pratt and I’m from Crucible, Pennsylvania. I’m currently living in Port Orange, Florida attending Palmer College of Chiropractics.
What got you into modifying cars and what kept you in it?
Well, I grew up racing dirt bikes and with racing, comes wrenching. I started working on my own bikes at the age of 12 and ever since then I loved tearing my machines apart.
As soon as I turned 16, I got my first car. This addiction transferred right over. At first it was general maintenance, but as I got older and worked my way out of racing bikes, I began to focus on modifying my cars. Nothing feels better than having a car that is unique and I feel that’s what will keep me modifying my cars.
Ok ok ok... Tell us about your ride, what is it?
My ride…. It started as a 1984 Volkswagen GTI. When I first purchased it, it was basically rotting away next to someone’s house with minimal modifications. It wasn’t running and was a rusty mess. The interior had mold and water damage throughout the car. It was beautiful and I had to have it. I had always dreamed of owning a Mk1 GTI and it seemed that this was the only affordable on within 200 miles of me. Once I got it home, I got it running, stripped the interior, and used it as my daily for about a year.
Exterior Mods?
The first mod I actually did to the Mk1 was install the 90’s cabrio clipper kit. It did a great job at hiding the massive amount of rust found on the car. The rust has been fixed for the most part. New floors and rockers were welded in along with the radiator core support for the quad headlight grill. It has a lot of miscellaneous bolt-ons such as louvres, kamei hood scoop, voomeran style spoiler, and I used the original GTI valence to make the front bumper lower. The GTI is lowered on raceland coilovers and sits on staggered Remotec wheels (fake borbet type As).
Interior Mods?
The interior is still pretty much stripped. There’s no carpet, speakers, radio, headliner, it was all pretty much unusable when I got the car and smelled horrendous. The dash was stripped down to the frame and flocked black. Mk2 Recaros, a Renown steering wheel, and Black Forest Industries knob are about the only “interior” it has.
Anything special under the hood? (special is an understatement)
This GTI is powered by a 12V VR6 Turbo. The engine was refreshed before installing with a headspacer, ARP head studs, and Bosch 42lb injectors.
I purchased the Stage one kinetics kit from CTS tuning and made the best of that kit. The turbo is a 60 trim Garrett. I refreshed the transmission and installed a Peloquin differential along with a TDI 5 th gear. The clutch is a Southbend Stage 2 endurance clutch. There is definitely too many parts to list that went into the turbo and swap. It is currently running at a
conservative 7 psi. I’m waiting for the intercooler setup to be installed before I get her on the dyno.
What are some things you've done to your car that others might not notice?
The car is still non-intercooled at the moment, so a lot of people still think it’s an NA engine. Maybe the side-exit exhaust? Other than the questionable wiring under the dash everything is very noticeable. “Subtle” is not in this cars vocabulary……
Future plans for the car?
I’m currently in the process of purchasing my intercooler set up and planning out a better fuel/engine management system. I have a S&P VR6 radiator waiting to be installed. I ordered my Short runner intake. I’m 90% sure I’m going with a water/air intercooler because of size limitations. After the engine is finished I’d like to upgrade to Wilwood brakes all around. Maybe even different suspension. As for the paint…. It took 36 years for it to look that good.
Anything else you'd like to add? (could be about anything)
I just want to say “thank you” to Rubadub Media for providing great content and giving my GTI the opportunity to be featured.
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