One of the best mods you can make to any car is fitting it with a great sounding exhaust. Sr Mod Expert Alan Wei hooked up this veedub owner with a quality exhaust system from AWE Tuning. Renowned worldwide for their work with Audi, AWE Tuning also offers a full line of upgrades for the VW/Audi 2.0 TFSI family of motors, including for the VW Golf GTI, it was only natural Alan would recommend an AWE Tuning Cat-Back Exhaust for VW Golf GTI Mk VI to give the GTI Exhaust a whole new sound.
This particular GTI rolled in already lowered on a set of ST Suspensions XA Coilovers for VW Golf GTI MK VI, giving this dub the drop it needed to look and handle its best.
Here’s how the ST Suspensions coilovers look installed in the rear suspension.
Offered with Round Silver tips (pictured) or Diamond Black, the AWE Catback for GTI MK VI is customizable to suit your specific tastes – and thanks to AWE Tuning’s exhaustive testing, we can tell you that this catback alone is good for a tidy gain of +17 HP and +12 FT/LB of torque, which isn’t bad at all for a catback.
With a diameter of 2.5in, this system offers a significant improvement in exhaust flow and the T304 Stainless Steel construction means that even if you don’t live in Sundrenched SoCal, this exhaust system will stand up to the abuse of corrosive winter roads (not a surprise, since AWE’s out in PA, where they actually have seasons, unlike here). Now, some of you may have reservations about this being a 2.5in diameter system rather than a larger 3in system – and there’s a very good reason for that. It turns out, AWE’s first few prototypes WERE 3.0 inch, but what they found was that the effort it took the 2.0 TFSI to move the large mass of air in the 3.0 inch system at lower rpms resulted in a loss of torque – that’s a bad thing – and with very little gain up top to offset that torque loss. Obviously, AWE wanted the system that’d perform better, and so the final production system was downsized to 2.5in, creating a much better performing exhaust. If anything, it’s a testament to how important the DESIGN of your exhaust actually is, as well as just having a large diameter tube.
The AWE Tuning Catback has been specially tuned to eliminate drone and create the best-sounding and best to live with exhaust they can.
Sr Tech Dave takes one last look at the tips to ensure they’re lined up to his satisfaction before we take the car off the lift. Like AWE, Dave is extremely particular about attention to detail and always takes extra care to ensure everything’s perfect before he lets any customer install out the door. After this final check, we took the GTI back outside to take a few more photos.
The ST Suspensions XA Coilovers give the car an excellent stance and allow for a drop range of .4″-1.6″ up front and .6″ – 1.6″ in the rear, allowing for both a conservative drop or a slammed look.
The polished tips of the AWE catback are beautifully finished – jewel-like would be an accurate description.
The silver round tips fill out the fascia beautifully.
From this angle, you can also see that the tips peek out JUST A BIT from the diffuser, creating an aggressive look that doesn’t go overboard with the extension of the tips like some other systems do.
With the car dropped and purring beautifully with the AWE Exhaust installed, this GTI is really how the car should’ve come from the factory.
Interested in modding your GTI? Talk to our Mod Experts like Alan, give us a call at 714-582-3330 (x8006 for Alan), chat live on ModBargains.com or just stop by the ModAuto showroom in La Habra, CA any day during business hours to see what we can do for your ride.
Thanks for reading, and we’ll see you next time!
Story, Video & Photos Nick Gregson