Yeah, I'll be chasing VWoA to sort this out. It took all 900 miles for the car to recover to ~95%. The first 300 miles of the journey were very tough - the first hundred I had to baby the throttle to avoid spluttering and flashing CELs (= lots of misfires), going up a low grade hill with cruise control on was enough to cause it. The second hundred eased a little, but I still couldn't accelerate without misfiring. The third hundred I could accelerate but any boost from the turbo caused it to happen again. The degree to which this would happen varied too, as obviously the oil was working it's way through the system. Periodically the cat would start stinking of rotten eggs, and the car would behave better for 10 miles or so before relapsing.

I stopped and slept at about 250 miles, got up and 7 and drove to the 300 mile point where I needed gas and phoned the tech that had worked on the car. He was surprised that I was still suffering, but still confident that the coilpacks were fine (my immediate concern), so we decided that injector cleaner might help. So I threw a bottle in with the gasoline, and when I restarted the car I pretty much immediately got a big puff of grayish white smoke out of the exhaust, and an immediate improvement.

That wasn't the end of it though. Bad spluttering patches still occured periodically, and hard acceleration was still met with misfires. I used another bottle of injector cleaner when I refilled the tanl 350 miles later, and eventually, about 100 miles from Boston the car started to feel like it really would recover.

I'm obviously concerned about my catalytic converter at this stage. My emissions warranty has either expired or will in 2000 miles (I can't remember whether it's 7yr/70k or 8yr/80k), and I would like that warranty extended by a suitable length of time/mileage.

I'm also concerned that the engine sounds a little raw at 3k-4k. But that may just be me being over-sensitive - I don't usually spend my time revving the engine and listening to it.

Anyway, I'm home. It rained solidly from the western edge of Pennsylvannia to Boston, ~600 miles. And I mean _rained_.

The last place I want to take my car is back to Quirk. If I have my way, they'll never touch it again.