davidwort

Is this true? or are you yanking our chains? :) I know my wishbone bushes need doing, part of the advice from the last MOT, I might aswell replace the whole lot I think, is it going to be a nightmare doing it myself? How much would a garage charge d'ya think? questions questions always more questions :) Garages would just replace an entire wishbone, the labour in pressing out old bushes is not cost effective. However, as I've just helped do the job I would say that you can replace the front and rear wishbone bushes with a big vice to press them in and out, we used a big (like 50mm) socket, to push the rear bush in, but had to cut the old one out with a hacksaw (carefully). Inner roll bar bush requires a partial drop of the subframe, I wouldn't want to attempt this on axle stands! Also, a number of parts can sieze solid if they haven't been off before and you may need to replace nuts you maight not have thought you needed. If you do the ball joints, your wheel alignment will also have to be re-done, might get away with it if you only do bushes and your car hadn't been set up to compensate for worn parts. David.

No, they're damping adjustable and the rear legs have a movable spring baseplate 2-5 positions depending on whether the rears are the cheaper adjustable damping off the car or top adjustable, I think all front Konis that fit corrados are top adjustable and only the coilover kits are front ride height adjustable. took me ages to sort out which ones to get as they list about 6 for the corrado, depending on whether you want standard ride height, pre 92 cars or just front inserts and not the whole leg. Should be able to source 4 damping adjustable konis and H&R springs for under 500 quid, fitting extra. David.

GL5 spec gear oil, synthetic based 75/90 is probably the best, the recommended oil is 80/90 gear oil, GL4 spec. Halfords do 80/90 and 75/90 I think, VW sell fully synthetic by the litre too, this used to be supplied only for 'problem' new cars before VW would give in and replace a gearbox under warranty. It may help, especially with a cold box, but won't fix a worn synchro or worn selectors. David.

Started to finally change all the bushings and rubbers on my front suspension, here's what the roll bar bush and drop link bushes look like compared to the new ones, both wishbone bushes were in pretty good nick visually, but the rubber was probably much more worn, these got squashed to bits pressing them out of the wishbone so not much point in taking a pic of them. Car feels much better already and I've still got konis and rear beam bushes to do yet. This isn't really a 'do on the drive at home' job though and pressing out and in bushings to wishbones is not easy, be warned :) David.

Have a look at the Club GTI Forum posts about 42 v 50mm inlets, as a brief summary 50mm is OK for highly tuned high lift cam engines but the 42mm is the later design and there's a bit more to the shape than just mm bore, the 42mm actually performed better on a 2.016v block with a ported head and KR cams than a 50mm did throughout the rev range. I'd say use a ported and rough polished 42mm inlet, that's what I've got and the engine is strong throughout the rev range on KR cams. No point in using the 9A inlet cam with a ported head as the 9A inlet gives good low end torque but poor top end and top end is what a ported and polished head really gives the most benefit to. As far as polishing the inlets and exhaust goes, a mirror finish won't harm the exhaust ports (but won't gain anything much either) but the inlet wants a rough but smooth (if you see what I mean) finish, mirror polished can harm mixing of air and fuel, which I think is where the confusion is - sorry coullstar. Matching exhaust ports is a good idea, so is internally cleaning up the standard exhaust manifold, but it's hard work as it's cast iron! Also, 42 and 50mm should be swappable as the port matching would be the same to the head. David.

Don't think that's true, it's getting the air in that's the problem, exhaust gasses (to a certain extent) will get themselves out due to the heat and expansion. Exhaust ports need to be shaped well and not have any bad steps in the flow, e.g. between head and manifold joints, but it's the inlet that gives the most gains if done properly. You have to remember that the exhaust ports will soon soot up with deposits anyway, it might be true that polishing them will help to prevent this a bit though. On inlet ports bigger is not better, because you will eventually just lower the gas speed and torque. What you need is better flow and port matching together with removing casting marks that affect flow. I reckon on a DIY job where you don't have experience of porting and flowing heads it's best just to clean up casting marks and make your manifolds fit the head smoothly, use the gasket as a template and match the faces. David.

Don't think it's technically that advanced, G60 might use a bit of power to drive the charger but it is a fully electonic fuel and ignition system, suppose the head is a bit prehistoric but good enough with the forced induction. The 2.0FSI turbo on the other hand sounds pretty impressive! Trouble is, with so many saftey features and good handling how many mkV GTI's are going to get written off :) David.

as said by others, I wouldn't put that in a decent engine/car. If it was a 50 quid runaround that you were only going to drive for a few months and didn't give any stick then it would probably out-live the rest of a banger, but not in a high rpm 16v that you plan on keeping! David.

Back to my original problem (slow water loss), found the culprit, rad was changed a year or so ago and I carefully tightened the rad fan temp sensor into the bottom right (viewed from front of car), but when I checked again it had worked slightly loose after about 10,000 miles and was just weeping water, have to be careful tightening it though as it's a metal thread into the plastic part of the rad. David.

not sure about that, as the 3 rivets near the motor (in a 10cm-ish triangle shape) are fixing the regulator interface with the motor to the door and not the actual motor itself, I'm pretty sure the motor unit is bolted to the regulator unit with one bolt either side and it just has a rubber pad between it and the inner door skin. I will look at my spare door though, to double check as it's a year or so since I did the ones on my car. David.

from what I remember when changing the whole regulator and motor, it's the regulator itself that is riveted to the door (in three places), the motor attaches to that with a couple of bolts I think. Might be difficult to get at but in theory you should be able to swap the motors over, I need to attempt this again as my passenger door motor keeps jamming, grazed my knuckles and scratched my arms pretty badly changing the regulator last time :cry: I think work thought I'd been self harming :!: I've got a spare(door with regulator/motor in it) at home to replace my knackered one so will take a look at it and report back 8) David.

Wierd problem with water temp gauge on my 16v. Firstly, two weeks ago I took the water temp and fuel gauge off the main unit to put a red filter in the MFA display, all slots back together fine no problems whatsoever for the last 2 weeks and 400 miles. Couple of days ago the LED warning lamp on the water temp gauge flashes a couple of times eratically(not regular pulsing), then stops, gauge reading is still fine, this happened near the end of my 20 mile journey to work. On the way home it does it again, a few more flashes this time, again near the end of my journey when the car is fully warmed up. Third journey, same again but more flashes and this time the needle suddenly wavers up to near max and then back to normal. Does this a few times with the LED flashing even more. Eventually on my fourth journey the gauge drops low as wel,l and eventually drops to nothing. Oil temp has been perfectly normal all the time. Now the car runs fine but I have no reading on temp gauge at all and the LED pulses regularly, with occasional 30 sec or so pauses??? Thought I'd try swapping the sender connections as the 16v has 3 identical senders(all have same part no.) for the ECU, gauge etc.. all on same part of head, as I thought perhaps the gauge one may have shorted/died. But no joy, looks like all the sender is fine. Anyone have any idea what else might be the problem? Could it be the gauge unit itself? cheers, David.

nothing wrong with a bit of silicone to help the rubber seal work, there are two types of clip, silly little fragile ones that hold the trim around the light and the heavy 'c' shaped things that take a bit of levering with a screwdriver and ping off (usually grey). just be careful not to chip the glass with the screwdriver when you lever the main ones. David.

wired the maplins lights on buzzer to the wrong terminal on my headlight switch, the buzzer now changes tone with the dash light dimmer control, :lol: David.

I'd check that thermostat in a pan of hot water alongside your old one, check it starts to open at 80 degrees ish. Means taking it all to bits again though :( so I'd make sure you don't have any air in the system first. Whenever I've bled the valver system it's usually air in the top rad hose that's the problem, once that feels full of water it just needs a small top up after a few miles driving and that's it. I take it you can feel hot water running through the hoses into the rad when it gets up to temp? - or not, should be able to tell if water is getting past the thermostat properly. David.

Pump is not too bad to do, but you've got to get past the alternator and bracket and then PS pump and brackets first, bit of a fiddle and time consuming. Worst bit I found was getting the pulley off the old pump and onto the new one without damaging the pulley itself, the hex bolts can be a pain to get undone, or at least the last one is when you have nothing else to lever against and you can easily damage the pulley with mole grips etc.. Worth having a good read of a haynes golf or passat manual first. You'll need a 13 and 17mm socket + a ratchet and extension bar, probably a 17mm ring spanner and it's best to have an allen key type hex socket for the pulley bolts. Good time to change your thermostat too as they are v-cheap but difficult to get at without doing all the above. Get all full pump, not just the impeller. David.

don't need to do that, glass is only held on to the main unit by the metal clips around it's edge, remove the outer black plastic trim (should be silly little metal clips holding that on, easy to break) Then get a flat screwdriver and carefully insert it into the main glass clips and pop them off one by one, glass will just pull away from the rubber seal then. be careful not to damage the edge of the glass when refitting. David.

just the postage really, at worst a couple of quid from my local scrappy, think I've got another (just the) filter bit knocking around anyway but I didn't bother mucking around with that and whacked a whole unit in instead, there's about 4 or five pieces to the whole thing, makes life a bit easier, David.

What car is the cig lighter from? you can use the filter from an audi 80 or similar, but it's easier to use a SEAT complete cig lighter unit as all of the parts are identical unlike the audi, jsut means less fiddling, I can get another SEAT one if you want, loads nr me.

dont you mean steelies :wink: ah, but p'raps it's meant for the space saver spare 8)

cool, wish mine had come with these as standard :roll: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 18774&rd=1 David.

It'll fit, cause the G60 golf had the cable change O2A box, but you'll need a passat clutch release lever in place of the corrado slave cylinder (hydraulic in most passats and all C's) unless you fit the corrado hydraulic stuff and all the gear lever gubbins and the cables. Can be done though, the O2A box is stronger but most don't like the feel over the rod operated mk2 boxes. David.

think you'll have the opposite problem with the Eibachs, back drops OKish but front is too high, I'm even thinking of hacking a coil off mine, I think they suit the heavier VR6 better. David.

Thought I might as well tack this to the existing thread although it's the early style dash. Spent this weekend fiddling with a few SEAT bits and some red filters from Audi switchgear, so far I have: red filter for main clocks (thinking of just doing this bit blue like golf IV) red filter on MFA red cig lighter and ashtray light red HRW and Fog switches red filter in headlight switch (the 'bulb' shaped symbol) red filter on heater controls red filter/LED in sunroof switch (window switches to do) oil pressure and voltmeter are Audi red gauges anyway all the controls look better in real life, difficult to get a true representation in a photo. David.

No help on the blanks but: I was playing around with some spare switches yesterday and fitted the red colour filters from some Audi 80 switches inside the corrado switches, works a treat, lovely clear even red glow from the HRW and fog switch and no fiddling with LED's, original bulbs left in place. Should be able to fit a red colour filter to the headlight switch too as this is just clear/white at the moment. Might see if an Audi cig lighter surround will fit the VW one too. David.