While the website in general, and our how-to videos on YouTube, explain things about our parts and swaps well, questions will always be asked, so here's some of the most common ones we get asked...

Q- Is this swap truly DIY at home?
A- YES! We've had customers do it on their driveways with no previous experience, and customers do the full swap within a few weeks start to finish. We've never tried it, but we're convinced the full swap can be done in a weekend if you was very determined!

Q- What is the best engine option of the ones you have available?
A- They all have huge benefits, but overall, thinking with head and not your heart, it's probably the 1.8T. The 1.8T is the easiest swap, cheapest to tune, and joint easiest to work on and get parts for with the TDI. For insane power the VR6 with a huge turbo is probably the best base. For the best sound personally it's the VR5 for us. And for massive performance while also having absolutely ridiculous fuel economy, it's the 1.9TDI for sure. No matter your choice, it's a winner.

Q- How much heavier is this vs the standard engine?
A- Very little at all. In fact, weighing them back to back, the 1ZZ engine and gearbox was only 5kg lighter than the 1.8T engine and 02M 6 speed gearbox. The 1ZZ is actually a fair bit lighter, but the Toyota gearbox, despite not being very strong, is much heavier than the super strong 02M box. The 1.8T isn't as tall either, so the centre of gravity is lower. The VR swaps weigh more, but still only a similar amount of a K-swap or V6, not enough for most to even feel, and certainly not enough to spoil the handling. The DSG gearboxes are also heavier, but again, the benefits outweigh (no pun intended) the extra weight.

Q- Are they an easy swap to work on?
A- Yes, far easier to work on than the factory engine, and much much easier than other swaps, many of which are a nightmare to work on. The 1.8T for example- The cylinder head, both manifolds, turbo, gearbox, sump, literally everything, can be removed with the engine still mounted and fully in-situ. In fact doing a cambelt change, for example, is easier than it is when fitted to the factory Audi TT.
The VR swaps require a modified bulkhead with access panels (which we are also producing, watch this space) to have good access, with that installed this also makes the engine a doddle to work on. And K-swaps and V6 swaps give such bad access we've already had many owners of them enquire about our bulkhead.

Q- How do they drive?
A- Well thanks to the sub 1000kg weight of the ZZW30 MR2, they drive fantastically, and if anyone's experienced say, a tuned 1.8T or VR6 in a Audi TT or something, are quite impressed, and think it will be like that, they are in for a BIG shock, as with these cars weighing around 400kg less, the same engine makes for something that's a rocket ship in comparison. The 1.8T swap with the factory K04 turbo is quite funny actually, as the combination of the light weight and the super fast spooling turbo giving big low down torque means you can drive around in 5th gear with no issue in places where you'd normally be in 2nd or 3rd to not massively bog down in a normal car, making for a very easy/lazy drive when you want to, but an absolute rocket when you want to drive hard.
Conversely, people ask about how they drive with massive power, and bigger, laggier turbos, as they know they would be insanely fast when driving hard, but big turbos on typical cars mean they don't drive great at low rpm. But once again, thanks to the light weight, using Stav's 1.8T as an example as it has a massive 700bhp capable turbo and revs to 8600rpm, it has noticeably more low down grunt than the standard 1ZZ, and stock engine ones drive fine at low rpm, and looking at dyno graphs, it has more than a K20 too. He literally daily drives that car with no problem, more than enough grunt.

Q- Why one of these swaps rather than a 1ZZ Turbo, or 2ZZ, or Toyota V6, or K-Swap?
A- While a lot of it is personal opinion, the simple fact is bang for your buck. Turbocharging a 1ZZ to any decent level costs a lot, the results tend to be pretty average, and it's neither a particularly strong engine or transmission, and with a fairly low aftermarket support, well, it's not great. A 2ZZ swap, if you could DIY it for super cheap, seems promising on the fact of it, but it's not as simple as a straight swap and if you're paying someone it tends to cost not a lot different to a 1.8T swap, but the result is about 60 horsepower and 150lbft less than even the most basic setup. Again, could boost a 2ZZ, but it's a very expensive way to do things vs other options. Toyota V6 swaps tend to be insanely expensive for the mediocre result at the end, and are absolute nightmares to work on too, not for us thanks. K-Swaps, well they're better than the other options, but they're also actually how this all began. Thomas wanted to get a MR2 Roadster and give it some good power, and looking online it seemed a K-Swap was the way to go. So he bought a K-Swap kit from the USA and set to work. He soon realised the kit wasn't great quality, working on many aspects of the engine once installed was pretty terrible, and the cost to make everything work correctly, all electrics etc, behave like the OEM vehicle, was massively expensive for the result. So he ended up removing it all, selling it on, and designing his own swaps, which eventually created the business you see here today.
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Q- Are these swaps legal? What about MOT/V5/Emissions/Whatever?
Obviously we can only talk about the UK here as other countries rules vary wildly, but here, yes, perfectly legal. Our setup keeps the check engine light working correctly, as well as the ABS and all other lights, the car literally behaves like a factory car. Emissions is much the same too, to pass emissions you'd need a suitable catalytic convertor no different to the factory engine or any other. With a 1.8T swap you don't even need to change that on the V5, but of course tell your insurer! Emissions is tested on the age of the car, so what engine is fitted is irrelevant, and thanks to the engines all having wideband lambda control and being originally from vehicles around in the same era as the MR2s original engine, there is zero reason they can't pass a UK emissions test just as easily as the factory engine.

Q- Do you do drive-in drive-out swaps?
YES! It's talked about on the Our Products page, but yes, a basic drive-in drive-out swap for 1.8T, VR5 20V, or VR6 24V, all with the 6 speed gearbox, is £6000 plus the donor engine/box. We can build the car/engine/transmission to absolutely any spec a customer wants, but that's impossible to put a price on without more details, so you'd have to contact us for that!

Q- What ECU do you run?
Well that is part of the beauty of these swaps, as unlike most factory ECUs and most engine swaps, the Bosch engine management on the 1.8T (ME7.5) and VR5/6 (ME7.1) is very capable, and we've engineered these swaps to allow the engine to run on the stock ECU with no issues and the car to behave like a factory car.
These ECUs have drive-by-wire throttle, full wideband lambda fuel control, great knock control, and much more as standard, and specialist tuners of these ECUs can make massive power gains while retaining the factory ECU.
To get the ECU to work you need to get it de-immobilised, which is cheap and simple, and you can buy de-immo ECUs on eBay for very little. Anyone able to de-immo the ECU can also delete any fault codes that may show on the converted car too, as they are all very modifiable and common, which is one of many reasons we decided this swap is the best all-round option.
For big power levels an aftermarket ECU is always better though, adding many more options and capabilities. Our preferred option for this is Ignitron, a hugely powerful ECU, far more capable than most aftermarket ECUs on the market, but is also completely plug and play in to the standard loom, and even still has the full functionality of the factory ECU, something almost no aftermarket ECUs have.

Q- Where do I get the gearbox output flange and oil seals? What about replacement sensors and so on?
Thankfully, with these engines and transmissions being so commonplace and popular, parts are quite easy to source. There are countless options here, but here's a few we like to do, which may well be your chosen way too...

Firstly, and most commonly asked, the 2wd gearbox output flange. It's common to hear you need part number 02M409356A, but NO, that will maybe work (no idea, we've never seen one), but it's expensive (hundreds usually) and our kits aren't designed around that part because it's bad value, SO DON'T DO THAT, it's a waste of money. You just need an offside (presuming RHD) one from any FWD 02M gearbox, so from any PD130/150 engine 1.9tdi VW/Audi/Seat/Skoda, a Seat Leon Cupra R, and so on. The part number for this is (we think at least, will check for sure) 02M409356F. We've seen VW breakers sell these for £30 or so, which is much more like it, but often a complete 1.9TDI 6 speed gearbox can be bought so cheaply, you can just buy it for this flange if you like!

On a related note, the difference between a 2wd and Quattro gearbox (aside from the transfer case, which we don't use), is just the bellhousing, and you can simply unbolt a 2wd one and fit a quattro one. This is what Stav has done on his own car- It's running a TDI gearbox, fitted with a TT quattro bellhousing. 10min job.

The gearbox flange oil seals- Part Number 02M409189, they are literally £10 for a pair, grab a set.

Sensors, again, thanks to these cars/engines popularity, it's easy to get them all. Get genuine Bosch ones if possible, they are cheap and common, especially important for MAF sensor, MAP sensor, Lambda sensor, and Ignition Coils. Presuming you have a 225/BAM setup, the MAF is different and bigger than the more common 180 models, so make sure you get the correct one! For the Lambda sensor, its the 5 wire one, the 4 wire is the post-cat one and not required on this swap. For the sake of around £35 each from EuroCarParts and similar, a set of new genuine Bosch coils are a good move in our opinion. Misfires are caused 99% of times on 1.8Ts by old plugs or bad coilpacks (and bad includes new but non genuine), but fresh Bosch ones will last for ever and can handle any power you like- Stav's running them on his at over 500 horsepower and people have with hundreds more with zero issues- They are more powerful than most aftermarket 'upgrades'.
For good places to get genuine parts, Euro Car Parts and GSF Car Parts often have most the sensors etc in stock at your local store, and for maybe more obscure parts, Autodoc is fantastic. And don't forget eBay for stuff that doesn't have to be genuine, such as oil seals etc...