Hey guys, new to the forum (it's great!) and new to T4s, but not to TDIs. I coaxed my a4 Jetta tdi to 350k miles before it decides to die. I'm fairly facile with the ALH TDI motors, so they definitely interest me as a power plant for a syncro TDI swap in a t4 camper van for my wife and our dogs. I know they are definitely low on power at baseline, and I'd want to get at least injectors and a chip to tune the ECU, probably a FMIC as well. That's what I had on the Jetta and it moved. Well.
My concern or query however, is how much better is the AXG 150hp 2.5TDI? I would love to get my hands on one of these guys, I just have some slight reservations. Mainly on being able to find parts as well as the über short timing belt change interval (times 2 belts). I'm not worried about changing the belts, I did a few of the timing belts myself on the ALH, and I still have those tools. The other concern is that getting parts will be difficult at best. Unless a lot of the ALH parts potentially can be made to fit?
For those that have driven both flavor of this swap and that have made similar decisions already about this here in the U.S., what drove your decisions? Any tips or hints? I know that Justin (?) aka greaseworks (?) is on here and I've seen more from him here than the other forums, so I'm hoping he and cavevan both will chime in.
I look forward to putting more technical topics up here and growing this forum and community!
-Ryan