The Volkswagen Golf GTI enjoys a massive enthusiast following, and as such we’ve seen some crazy bespoke variants through the years. All-wheel drive GTI conversions, massive engine swaps, widebody kits, it’s all been done. However, we’ve never seen anything remotely like this green monster, which pretty much takes everything we just mentioned and combines it into one car. As for the engine swap, it’s actually more like an engine addition. Wait, what?
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Look under the bonnet of this GTI and you’ll see a VR6 engine with a turbo bolted up – not an uncommon sight in the modified VW scene. Look in the back, however, and you’ll see another turbocharged VR6. All combined, the engines are said to produce 1,600 horsepower managed by a pair of gearboxes that can be operated separately or linked together.
For that matter, the GTI owner mentions in the video that all of the car's powertrain components can function independently. At one point the GTI drives away with just the front engine running, and there are separate brake controls for doing individual front-and-rear wheel burnouts. How cool is that?
As you’d expect, a twin-engined all-wheel drive GTI with 1,600 hp is fast. This video shows the car making a half-mile pass at the Pikes Peak Airstrip Attack, where it reached 183.74 mph in what the owner said was a scary run. Considering the car lacks any appreciable aerodynamic tweaks we can totally see it being a handful at high speed. At least the parachute did its job.
The video then jumps over to some quarter-mile drag racing, where the GTI runs 9.06 at 156.9 mph after doing its cool front/rear burnout procedure. Sadly the time couldn’t be topped, as the Frankenstein VW obliterated its gearbox – or rather, one of its gearboxes – on the next run.
The VR12 owner said it’s still a work-in-progress, so hopefully it will come back stronger than ever because this is easily one of the coolest builds we’ve ever seen.
Gallery: Twin-Engine Volkswagen GTI VR12