My secondary car has been a Peugeot 206+ from 2009 for quite some time. It lasted well, but it was time for something else. Although it was still in good condition and it passed periodic inspection, it needed some serious investments if I decided to keep driving it.

The secondary car does not make a lot of mileage each year. Its main use is trips close by. Sometimes my partner or I took the car whenever the primary car is in use for visiting family and such.

I was looking for something like a Volkswagen Polo (2017+). Its trunk size increased to 350 liters from about 250 liters in the 6R and 6C versions. The Peugeot 206+ has a trunk size of approximately 250 liters, which was on the low side. I opted for some test drives at local dealerships, but eventually I did not find a good match.

At first, I decided to only look at combustion cars, and not electric ones. Our primary car is electric, but because of the low mileage of the secondary car, I had not preferred electric cars for a secondary car. Until I found some good deals on used Volkswagen e-Golfs for similar (if not better) prices compared to a Volkswagen Polo.

Today I tested a 2018 e-Golf in Urano Gray, with only 75.000 kilometers, many options and in pretty good condition. Yes, it has some scratches and small dents, but nothing serious. During the test drive, I hooked it up to OBDEleven, and found a few (potentially costly) faults. One had to do with the expansion valve of the heatpump, another involved the speakers not working on the passenger side. Also, the two rear tires were probably still the original ones, but they were dry and showed signs of cracking.

Eventually the deal was closed. The dealer will fix the faults and replace the two tires with all-season ones. It would be ready in about a week and a half.

So why a Volkswagen e-Golf?

So why a Volkswagen? My first company car I could choose myself was a Volkswagen Polo MY2016 with a 1.0 TSI engine. It was a very comfortable car, with many options. This is where I started with adapting the vehicle with VCDS.

Then, in 2018, I helped a friend to turn his MY2011 Volkswagen Scirocco into a MY2015-ish one. We retrofitted Xenon headlights, swapped body control modules, replaced the trunk lid and many other things. Back then, I always said: I hope to have my own car to work on, some day.

I spent quite some time getting familiar with Volkswagen’s PQ26 and PQ35 platform, from coding to wiring to hardware. I acquired a lot of knowledge and bought tools such as VCDS and VCP. I just did not want to pick another brand and start over.

Why this build log?

I have some plans for this car. And most of these plans are based on what I could find on other forums and the rest of the internet. The least I can do, is to share the things I learned from others.

This is the first time I set up a build log for a project. It is different from all the other projects I do, so I figured that a blog would be the best way to document and share the results.