herisites

Well we got the stereo to fit better than it was but it still sticks out a bit. But then mine has 3 RCA's going into the back of it so its a bit tight!

I have just done this job mate (see my gallery!) and you have got yourself in for a treat of a job! :lol: I dont think the matrix is any different tbh but not 100% sure so best to find out! I didnt drain my whole coolant system. What i did was bypass the heater matrix by putting a piece of 22mm pipe between the 2 pipes entering the matrix in the engine bay. If you havent topped the coolant up you may find that enough has leaked for you to be able to remove/connect the matrix up without worrying about coolant going everywhere.

Cheers Faye! Im glad i was doing it myself and saw it like that then seeing someone else doing it tbh, i can imagine you being a bit WTF!! :lol: The next BIG job is fitting the supercharger 8) but need to sort few things out before that like the sodding wheel bearing, clunking top mounts and fit my new brakes.

Well it needed doing, there was a good guide available and if i had got it done by a garage it would of cost me a fortune and i wouldnt be able to afford my supercharger for a while so i had no choice but to do it myself really, but at the same time i done it for more experience, i now know where everything goes under my dash which i didnt before so was a good thing imo! We spent both days on it but thats mainly because i became rather unwell on saturday so had to go bed with the job half done. And i also wanted to take my time and try to make it better than it was before. We started about noon saturday and finished about 6pm ish (with lots of tea breaks though and we popped out for a bit to get some draft excluder for the de-rattling). Then pretty much the same for sunday. But i spent all night cleaning my interior carpets etc sunday night as they got a bit wet :(

Well i fitted my new heater matrix over the weekend and all i can say is OH MY GOD WHAT A JOB!!! :shock: :shock: I decided to take the long route and take the whole dash out so that i could clean it all up and (supposedly!) de-rattle the dash. I personally cant see how it can be done without taking the dash out tbh! Anyway i took some pics along the way to amuse you all :lol: This was about half way through, all the bits connected to the dash shell had been removed so was about ready for the dash to be lifted out: My mate took a picture of me and you can see from my face exactly what im thinking ... "What the f**k have i got myself in to!" :lol: I decided to return the favor and took a pic of my mate a little off guard, he looks a bit spaced out maaaan! :lol: I was working on the dash so long i actually became a part of it :lol: Back to being serious now :lol: DASH OUT! What a scary sight! :shock: Then all the fan ducts and the main heater core came out: Old Matrix Vs New Matrix This shows how minging the old matrix is! And whilst it was all out i serviced all the heater control components to make sure all the direction cables worked, its made such a different just greasing up the cogs and then putting it back together with the cables as straight as possible! Then put it all back together again using lots of sticky back foam/felt wherever plastic touches plastic to get rid of unwanted squeaks and rattles (although tbh it still rattles just not so many squeaks :lol:): So quite an accomplished weekend. Although now im just really worried that i havent done it right and it not going to last long or something else wrong with the car caused it to go in the first place etc etc but im sure it will be fine!! My heaters all work now which is great! :D Took it out after bleeding all the coolant etc and the car still bloody rattles like hell so next job is gut the rest of the interior, lay down some sound proofing and apply more felt between plastics etc!! Oh and the guide i used was THIS one on the Corrado Club of Canada website, bloody good guide!! Just not 100% the same as its an american spec car so has more work because of cruise control, AC (if you have it!) etc but i dont think i could of done it without it tbh!

Stunning mate 8)

Cheers for that. I thought maybe an air lock as well so we just kept on running the engine hot and adding more and more water whilst squeezing the radiator hoses to get rid of as much air as we could. If the aux pump is seized would the fuse be blown? I checked the fuses you shown on the previous page and both are fine. Any others i should check? Also from searching would mine have a heater matrix bypass valve or do new ones have it built in? When mine went my passenger footwell got wet and im led to believe the bypass valve is supposed to stop this happening?

Can i butt in here. I had this problem with my car which i noticed about a month ago waiting in traffic on the M1, i put my heaters on full blast with windows open to keep the heat out of the engine bay and noticed that they went cold after a little while, if i turned them off for a bit and then back on they would heat up again. Last week my heater matrix blew and i replaced it this weekend with a genuine valeo heater matrix and checked all cabling etc and all flaps open as they should and the new matrix is connected up properly and when the engine is hot all the right pipes get hot. We also bled the system a lot to make sure there was no air in it. However whilst bleeding the system i had the heaters on and i noticed it done the same thing, they went cold after a while!! :mad: Any ideas what it could be? How do i check the bypass valves?

Ok guys, really want some help and advice please as im really worried! My heater matrix blew last monday and so i had to run the car with it bypassed all week. This weekend i replaced the heater matrix with a genuine valeo one (what a BASTARD of a job :shock:). Now obviously i DO NOT want to have to replace the matrix again so i want to find out what i need to check on my car to make sure everything is running as it should do and wont blow my nice new matrix again or anything else for that matter. How would i know if my aux pump has seized? As this is what im worrying about now! I dont know if this is dodgy but im pretty sure it is, after replacing the matrix we re-filled and coolant and bled it through getting the car up to full heat with the heaters on etc. The radiator fans kicked in a couple of times as we were bleeding it. But one thing i noticed when i went back in the car was that my heaters started off hot like they should but they cooled down again when the engine was really hot, even though they were still set to hot. It shouldnt do this should it? The heaters should stay hot once hot right? What could this be?

Good choice in colour, but i am biased :lol: its strange how different blackberry looks in different lights as yours looks completely different to mine. Is the paint code LK4Z? Here is mine on 9x16 Brock B2's (which may be up for sale soon :wink:)

Right i have now paid for my supercharger from coxylad and am going to be ordering the brackets and pullies etc from R-Tech on monday/tuesday, so its gradually getting closer for me!! Only thing now is injectors, if im going for an 80mm pulley on the rotrex charge which i have been told will give about 0.5 bar so around 7-8psi?? Will i definately need to upgrade my injectors to red tops? I have been looking on american ebay and they seem pretty cheap (around $200 new) for som red tops that the mustangs use, but just not sure if they are the right ones or not! THESE are the ones i found. Also when i ran Storm Developments to discuss what else i needed for the charger before i knew about R-Tech the guy there told me that some guys run black top injectors from saabs or something and they can be got hold of pretty cheap. Does anyone else know much about these? Rob.

That looks awesome Karl good work mate! Really like the contrast of black and red, looking forward to seeing your interior all done in the flesh ... which will be quite soon btw :wink: :lol:

craigowl - did you do a full write up on how to change it? If so do you have the link?

How would i know if the pump has seized? It hasnt buzzed for ages so i assumed everything was ok? Should i check the fuse anyway?

Ahh so im not being thick then :lol: My water temps have never been high, i dont think i have ever seen it go above 110 degrees and thats when its really hot, general fast driving etc doesnt really go above 100 degrees. So do you think my matrix just went because its 12 years old then? I dont want to fit the new one and it goes again a few months down the line because something else isnt working properly! Like i said though my aux pump hasnt made any noise for a good few months now, so does that mean its ok or should i think about replacing it?

Hmmm i used to get a loud buzzing noise just as you have described but it went away and hasnt done it for ages ... BUT my heater matrix blew the other day so im guessin thats probably why? So i guess i should change my water pump as well as fit a new heater matrix (not looking forward to that!!)? I didnt know it was the water pump buzzing as i always thought the water pump ran off the pullies etc down the side of the engine? Or am i being thick? :lol:

Nice car ... but only on the speedlines and im a fan of the wide look! You have got completely the wrong setup really, if the wheels were 10x16 et15 without the adaptors they would look acceptable, maybe a bit too wide and would still catch the arches, but the fact you have adapators means the offset has gone from -15 to +10!! :shock: so not only with they catch the arches (just a bit!) and handle horrible but they are also putting massive strain on the drivetrain of the car so you will find yourself having to change your wheel bearings every other week! And flaring the arches still wouldnt accomodate those wheels either. I think on a normal set of 9x16's with et15 rear and about et20 front the car will look spot on as the rest of the car looks mint! Here's mine for example:

I took my car back to the garage and told them that changing the rear wheel bearings has done sweet FA and they were surprised! So one of them (different guy to the last one, more my age!) jumps in the car with me and we go for a drive. As soon as we get up to speed i can hear the droning and point it out. He says there is definately a noticable noise that is quite obviously coming from the front that the other guy (who's supposed to be the pro, this guy hasnt been working there long!) should have noticed. We were then trying to figure it out as it wasnt a classical wheel bearing noise ie it wasnt making the noise under load more generally and if i turn the steering from side to side slightly. He then suggested one thing which was that he replaced the wheel bearings on a car a few weeks back and apparently the noise didnt go away from that either. It turned out to be worn top mounts and the noise was actually coming from the tyre. And i told him thats its funny he should mention top mounts as i had diagnosed the other day that the clunking when i turn my steering at very low (and stationary) speeds was the top mounts! But the top mounts (including bearings) were new when i put my coilovers on. So he could only suggest i fitted them incorrectly. He told me to go away and check the top mounts and try to sort out the clunking first and if that doesnt sort the droning noise then take it back and they will 'see what they can do' about fitting new front bearings. So any ideas about the top mounts? I got a mate to turn the steering stationary whilst i had the bonnet up and watched the top mounts and as the wheels were turning i could see the top mounts turning as i heard the clunking noise. My mate suggested it could be something simple like not done the top mount nut up tight enough due to the coils turning??

Like the wheels, not liking black though. What wheels are they?

Yeah i wish i had £750 to spend on wheels mate! Im in no rush at all to get any other wheels, still not 100% sure on what im going to do as i could also just get 2 7.5 x 16 Brocks for the fronts and stick with 9's on the rear as the 7.5's have less dish and therefore give better clearance so would accomodate the 288's, but if i wanted to go for 312's in the future (most probably will!) i dont think they would fit so i will be back to where i am now. Plus i would have to fork out for tyres to fit them and get them sprayed the same as the rears so would end up costing a lot!!

Kev, i keep seeing the thread title "What's beaten you in your C...?" and then your username with it thinking you have posted that something has beaten you but every time you disappoint!! :lol: Hurry up and get beaten by something!! :lol:

Here is a link to a guide on how to replace the heater matrix, it explains how to remove the complete dash as well as has lots of really helpful pictures!! LINK

Well my new heater matrix arrived this morning, so im all set for the weekend now! And also arrived this week are my new 288 brakes as shown below: And after a clean up with a wire brush and a lick of paint the calipers now look like this, along with some nice grippy EBC Red Stuff pads: I also ordered a full kit of Goodridge hoses to go with them which should of been delivered as well so just meed to check if they have or not. Might as well make this post a formal Update so also on the way is a straight through Decat pipe which should be here soon (cheers Joe M). And the reason for the decat and the bigger brakes is i also have a supercharger on its way!!! FINALLY!! For those who didnt see me seal the deal i have bought CoxyLad's Rotrex charger off him which also included an oil cooler. Payment has been sent so just waiting for Ian to send it now (no rush though mate!) and then i just need to order the mounting bracket, pullies and belts etc which im getting from a company in Denmark called R-Tech. Then i just need Red Tops depending on the power im going to get from it (gone for an 80mm pulley so i should get some nice power from it!!) and get it all set up at Stealth. Also on the list of things to get are some Eibach ARB's so it goes round corners a bit better :D Im also on the look out for some new wheels as my Brocks just aren't practical :( i love how they look but the ride is very uncomfortable, they put a lot of strain on the drivetrain, they torque steer and pretty much go where they wanna go so if i go and put another 100bhp through them they are just going to be silly! Plus the fronts dont fit over the 288 brakes! So im looking for some sensible 7x16's, preferably BBS RX2's which came on the Golf Mk3 Anniversary. Sorry to disappoint but i guarantee no-one is as disappointed as me as i love the Brocks, but i want more Go than Show now! The car is still going to look sweet on the BBS's though :D Its not going to be done in time for the Summer Scorcher but it should definately be done for Edition 38 :D

Here is a pic from when i first done mine mate. Although i have sprayed it now to blend in better (although these rubber gromets dont really like spray as it peels off easily!!)

Hi mate, you just cover the hole with a rubber blanking gromet which can be got from Halfords no probs. I cant remember the size now but i just got a bag with i think 19-23 mm sizes and one of them fit lol.