Crasher

I have been doing this for 40 years and I have to constantly study in my spare time to keep up but it is my life and I want to learn, if you are just an average person who isn't consumed by cars then it isn't going to work. Garages are finding it increasingly hard to find good candidates to train as the reputation of the job is so low that youngsters with the aptitude to work on modern cars don't want to know and the money is rubbish. This leaves employers with staff you just can't rise up to the challenges of modern mobile computers, sorry cars; the complexity is beyond belief and most people can't read a VAG current flow diagram.

These racks have been an issue lately, I had to rebuild one a few weeks back with the VAG seal set 1H0 498 020 which is £48.23, very time consuming and no good if the gears are worn. I spoke to TRW (the original manufacturer) today and they have four recon units due into them from TRW Germany at the beginning of April, however two are back orders so that only leaves two being available, the typical price would be £230 all in BUT there is a £100 surcharge until they get the old one back. The pump, originally made by ZF, is easy to get as it fits all sorts of VAG cars, a TRW recon is £140 all in and there is plenty of UK stock BUT there is a £75 surcharge.

Please be aware that Tony AKA "odd job" of Nottingham VW/AUDI breakers is gravely ill in Nottingham QMC intensive care in a coma after suffering from meningitis and a stroke. My prayers are with you my old friend....

Part Two Non genuine parts used Bolt x 2 (Würth M6x40) £0.84 Washers x 2 (Würth M6) £0.29 Oil pressure switch 028 919 081 H (Febi) £4.62 Oil pressure switch 068 919 081 D (Febi) £7.02 Sensor 025 906 041 A £7 (Febi) Sensor/switch 701 919 369 D £24.96 (Febi) Sensor 357 919 369 F £14.63 (Febi) Oil cooler seal 038 117 070 (Febi) £4.40 Oil cooler seal 038 117 070 A (Febi) £4.40 Sump washer N 013 849 2 £0.49 (we actually fitted plug N 908 132 02, by Febi) 6.5 hours labour @ £55 + VAT per hour (reduced from the 8 booked) £429 12 point hub nut N 90587602 £8.34 (Febi) Ball joint plate 1J0 407 175 £5.50 (Febi) (These look expensive, something I will have to look into) Bolts x 3 N 101 277 07 (Febi) £4.61 Parts total £381.89 £400 in parts plus 275 in labour @ 55 / hr plus VAT. The labour was £275+ VAT for the thermostat job and £82.50 + VAT (1.5 hours) for the CV joint boot. The CV boot would normally have been 1 hour but due to us having to remove the drive-shaft from the car, we charged and extra half an hour. Labour £429 To say I am p*ssed is an understatement. They have changed so many parts without even getting in touch. As I have said, Roy did keep you informed as much as we could Also (as just one example, there are more but hopefully you will get the point) ---- I had removed the cowl which fits over the housing (which covers the 3 sensors), as it was only going to be removed again. They had ordered and fitted a new one (no comms). It would have not happened IF you had told someone that you had the part at home, as we were fitting new switches we thought it prudent to fit a new cover as it was missing as far as we were aware. When questioning the part on the bill (ie don't need it) with Steve C - (ie, one of the two partners who carried out the works) - he said he did not know I had it and so didn't see why it needed to come off the bill. I reiterated I didn't need it - and Steve said he would need to take off the fan / and other parts (or word sto that effect) to remove it!! Bear in mind I was coming from work and had a suit on, I think he assumed I knew diddly squat about cars. I fitted it with the thermostat housing and assumed (incorrectly) it would not come off easily but I nearly had to break it to get it past the fan motor I said it wasn't complicated and that it simply clips into place - after which his attitude completely changed, rammed his hand down by the housing, ripped it off, stormed into the office, threw it across the counter shouting at the office guy - and I never saw him again. Yes I did have a mild temper tantrum, most people would in my situation, I was up to my neck in Passat 3C steering column electronics fitting cruise and a new steering lock which was giving me grief coding it in and I was dragged off this to come and explain what I had done and then got moaned at for doing the job properly. When I went back into the back office the phone rang (Roy was busy) and the conversation lasted for nearly half an hour and as I was finishing Roy came through and said Storm Guy says goodbye or words to that affect and I assumed you were OK. By the time I came back through, you had gone. You do seem a little obsessed about this cover though, it’s no big deal which is why I took it off and told Roy to credit it. This from an experienced VW professional. Sorry guys, am sure you've had great experiences with C&R but if this is the attitude - doubt I will ever be going there again. Will trust and hope the workmanship is spot on, but as I say will see in the morning. Yes, 35 years of experience and not too many complaints, yes some, we are all human and we all make mistakes, myself more than most, I think I try too hard. When told we have screwed up, we try to put it right which is why John gave you a 1 hour refund the next day when you called to say you were unhappy. Brilliant customer service? Make you're own mind up - but if you choose to use them be crystal about keeping you informed on costs - and I mean crystal, though even that may unfortunately not help you in avoiding costly surprises. Even when working on a newer car, it is difficult to keep a customer totally informed about every part required, when re-doing failed work on a 21 year old car it becomes much more difficult as the parts tend to be harder to get hold off and the fastest supplier isn't necessarily going to be the cheapest and you wanted your car the same day initially, this is getting to be a challenge on cars of this vintage, cars don’t get cheaper or easier to run the older they get. We do our best and try very hard not to compromise quality. I often run into trouble with customers on bigger jobs over costs because I am almost insanely fanatical about getting things right. Again it doesn’t always work out and I cause John and Roy stress trying to explain things to people but I would rather someone moan about the cost rather than my quality, it was Royce who said, "The quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten". Johns reply I was not in the office Wednesday but Storm Guy rang and asked for me first thing Thursday morning. His main issues were that he did not understand the labour on the invoice which Roy had not made very clear because he should have altered the text to say “labour for water issue”, “labour for CV boot kit” and “labour used on job but NOT charged for”, I explained this and he seemed ok about it. He also used the plastic cover or trim as an excuse to have a moan and said that Steve had told him it would take over an hour to remove but then took it off in seconds and had a go at Roy and then disappeared and did not return – I explained that Steve had specifically asked not to be disturbed that afternoon because he was trying to sort out an in depth electrical problem and apologised if he had seemed a bit short with him as a result. Storm Guy then moved onto the fact that the parts had added up to about £400 which had shocked him and that we had not properly informed him of what was happening, I talked to Roy about this and I explained to him that this was not true as I had been in the office on a number of occasions when Roy had phoned him for authorisation or to tell him what we were doing and had spoken to him or left messages. He had been told that we were ordering all genuine pipes etc and was ok about this – I think the problem was that he never asked for any costs, just agreed with what we were doing and I don’t think he realised how much some of the parts were adding up to and then on top of that Steve fitted new sensors which I explained made perfect sense as they were old and it would have been silly to put the old ones back. I said that I had looked at giving him a 10% discount of the parts but it only came to about £38.00 so as a goodwill gesture I suggested a reduction of one hours labour which was £66.00 and he asked if that was the best I could do and I said that bearing in mind the fact that we had already reduced the labour figure by 1.5 hours, I felt this was fair and the best I could do. He said ok in that case you would accept it. We finished the conversation on good terms and I assured him that we had done a thorough job and I was confident he would be pleased with the work and he agreed it all looked good so far. Before we came off the phone I asked for his credit card details and as soon as I came off the phone I put the refund through our PDQ machine. As far as I was concerned it was sorted! Steve… I have tried my best to remember everything correctly, it was a week ago and we didn’t make notes at the time plus it is late and I have had a full day. If anyone has any questions, please feel free to ask me and I will do my best to give you an accurate answer.

I have had to do this in two post as I was exceeding the character limit Some of my customers have been coming to me since I started working on cars when I was 16, I am now 52.... Anyway, myself and John with the help of Roy have put this together from the best of our memories as best as we can after a week of TPS, ECP, GSF, TRW, Febi and Andrew Page etc incompetence induced misery… WHY is it that trade car parts suppliers are so utterly hopeless at getting the right parts to us on time even when we give them their own, the VAG and part manufacturers reference numbers? My name is Steve Cresswell, the C in C&R and my business partner John Russell has contributed to this reply after mine. We have been here since August 1988. It does concern me (as pointed out to me by Kevin my customer who alerted me to this thread) that some people are not aware we have workshop facilities, they actually came first many years before we started selling parts and one of the reasons we did so was to enable us to obtain parts more reliably by having stock and then we started selling the bits we kept, it’s still a struggle dealing with suppliers though, parts are THE bane of my life! Storm Guy booked his car in with us for Monday 7th March to deal with water leaks that previous attempts had failed to resolve, I don't know who had done the work but the parts were Topran/JP copies which I have seen cause problems in the past as they are made from copies of the originals and of sub standard Nylon 66, in fact we actively avoid buying anything made by JP Group or Topran if we can possibly avoid it. We had already ordered in a few parts but expected to need more. My reply to your points Explained the context and that I was happy for them to replace the thermostat housing parts and crack pipe with genuine VW parts in an effort to resolve the leak. When I removed the water transfer pipe (I refuse to use the other name for it) I found the bore into the block behind the water pump was heavily corroded and there was no way it was going to seal with just a new pipe and O ring, as was evidenced by the previous attempt at smothering it with Red Hermetite sealant which had failed to stop it leaking down the block. Unfortunately both the pics I took of the corrosion were blurred; the finished job gave my little workshop use camera something to focus on To gain access so I could get my air die grinder in there, I had to remove the oil filter housing and oil cooler which meant ordering the Hengst type housing seal for the next day because for some reason we only had the Knecht type in stock (obsolete from VW), we normally keep both but we had both oil cooler seals in stock. With some gentle work with a cast iron cylinder head porting paper roll, I got a nice surface finish in the bore to which I applied a thin smear of Würth RTV just before I pushed the pipe in, this should seal the surface and prevent corrosion. With the oil filter housing off and drained, we thought it prudent to carry out an oil and filter change too whilst we were under there. We had to fit a new drain plug because the old one had damaged threads and the sump thread was a little burred so I ran a thread chaser through it and we used the new style one time use plug, we keep a bin full of Febi ones in stock. I found the mounting face to the head was covered in more red goo with some advanced aluminium oxidization so I cleaned this off by carefully running a Stanley knife blade over it and then cleaned it with brake clear and blew out the threads with air. Again a slither of RTV just before fitting the housing should prevent future oxidization, and then I rebuilt everything using all new fasteners and the threads were brushed with a light coat of Würth aluminium paste first. Whilst fitting all the new genuine VAG TPS supplied coolant parts (BTW, the chaps at TPS Bulwell say hello), I thought it a good idea to fit new temp senders as the ones in there were the cars originals and we all know how unreliable they are. I also thought it a good idea to fit two new oil pressure switches but I cleaned up and re-used the temp sender as it is not so important and it is impossible to buy the correct style NTC blade senders now.The switches and the sensors are by Febi Bilstein. When we were ready to re-fit the oil filter housing, we realised that the gasket had not turned up as someone at TPS had screwed up and forgot to order it so we had to wait until Wednesday to finish the job and run the car up then. Also to fix a broken drop link with my Meyle part - which was going to be sorted separately but thought might as well get it fixed while its in with them. The top of the thread into the end of the ARB was damaged and required the thread chasing which meant disconnecting it at the other side (rusted solid, the bolt snapped) so it could be rotated down for direct access. The end of the bar was heavily corroded so I cleaned this up with a flap wheel and treated the rust pits with black Eastwood Rust Encapsulator and then sprayed the end of the bar with Eastwood Under Hood Black. The flailing end of the ARB had ripped the outer CV boot open so we got permission from Storm Guy to replace it. As is usual with the PR-2E1 suspension, it was extremely tight into the hub splines due to the factory use of thread lock on the splines and so to extract it I had to use a three point hydraulic press mounted to the disc bolt face. This prevents impact damage to the end of the CV joint, common when employing the “usual” method to remove it but it takes longer. With the shaft dropped down, the CV then refused to come off of the shaft in the “usual” manner so we had to disconnect the drive-shaft from the gearbox and press the joint off in the floor press using a support collar. The inside of the CV joint was corroded (what made it evil to get off) making it very stiff to move so we soaked it in the degreaser bath over lunch and then worked it until it moved smoothly, flushed it out with brake cleaner and then pumped it full with new genuine CV grease, checking that it operated smoothly on the shaft before installing the boot and squeeze clip. We used a genuine VW boot kit of the new Elastomer PQ35 platform design and also we had to replace the ball joint bolts and lock plate as the bolts are one time only and the lock plate was rotten. I will stress, I clearly asked the guy on the desk to keep me updated! Car went in on Monday morning. We called for each stage of the job and often got an answering machine and we left a number of messages saying what was going on, if it becomes necessary to prove this, we can get the phone record logs. Researched the genuine main parts - total appx £130. The parts used are as follows, all genuine parts prices are the current VW retail including VAT Water transfer pipe 021 121 050 C £30.64 Thermostat housing 075 121 113 D £42.60 (incorrectly described as “thermostat” on bill) Housing 021 121 121 A £18.11 Thermostat 075 121 113 D (incorrectly described as “housing” on bill) £32.89 Cover 021 121 133 D £18.11 Bolts x 2 N 904 762 01 £7.51 O rings x 2 N 101 392 01 £6.86 Seal 021 121 119 A £7.49 Bolt N 0147821 £3.24 Thermostat O ring N 901 368 02 £4.93 (on the bill as water pump O ring!) Bolts x 2 N 101 961 03 £1.03 Bolt n 105 821 03 £0.71 Seals x 2 N 903 168 02 £5.04 (it should read 3x and incorrectly described on bill as a water pump seal) Clip x 3 032 121 142 £2.81 Oil filter 021 115 562 £18.32 Oil filter housing gasket 021 115 446 A £12.34 Bolt £2.18 3 litres G13 coolant £26.46 Quantum Platinum oil £20.38 Outer CV boot kit 1K0 498 203 £24.89 ARB bolts x 2 N 019 504 3 £5.99 ARB nuts x 2 N 902 264 04 £2.35 See part two

I will reply in a while when I have gathered my thoughts and those of the others involved and compiled the pictures of the work that show what I had to do,

They also said the rear suspension was Passat, which it isn't!

I think I have one set left in the Blue Igniter make, I will look. I can still get them but dealing with the new owners is not like the previous people. The genuine numbers are 1) N 907 680 01 (obsolete, Classic OK) 2) N 905 402 08 (obsolete, Classic OK) 3) N 907 680 03 (still listed, none at Classic) 4) N 905 402 09 (obsolete UK, Classic OK) 5) N 905 402 05 (obsolete UK, Classic OK) 6) N 905 402 10 (obsolete UK, Classic OK) C) N 100 529 02 (obsolete UK, Classic OK) The trouble with the genuine leads from Classic is they are around 30 Euro's each!

Is your 95 VR6 an R or S chassis? If it is an S the genuine cable is still listed under part number 536 721 555 E. If you have ordered it from the US, is it a right hand drive cable?

You can buy genuine ones from Classic in Germany through VW Heritage, if you can wait they cost £30.73, usual part number 037 133 432.

I will call you tomorrow to work out how I get it to me and what else I want to rummage around in your stash for.......I know I want the exhaust manifold, what is annoying is I just bought an inlet manifold off of fleaBay!

It is not much help but if you ever find a Seat Toledo Mk1 92>99 being scraped, they use the same resistor.

I know this is a very old thread but I think this is important. The master cylinder for the Corrado in right hand drive with ABS (and some others cars such as Golf 3 GTi/16v/VR6 pre 95) is now obsolete from VW and ATE have also dropped it, VW part number 358 611 019 D and ATE part number 10.6123-0600.3. I desperately need a new one (I have a good used one) for a project and I have drawn a blank after searching using every possible means I can think of. I found one company who listed it, ABS in the Netherlands, but according to their cross reference and picture it is wrong but they will not rely to my multiple emails. There are thousands of VW's and Seats in right hand drive countries that need this master cylinder and I think it is wrong that you cannot buy one, the last car to use it only went out of production 1996!

We try to make sure all the kits have both types of bolt in now, much easier that way.

It is normally the upper slipper losing it

I think Roy may have described it poorly to you, the top section of the tank is a metal section that is moulded in and isn't replaceable and this is becoming an issue on the Golf 2, 3, Corrado, Passat etc. What is a concern is that behind the rubber boot, there is an earth strap attached to that metal ring section that is then connected to the body by a stainless steel clip that earths the metal ring to the car. Most of these earth straps have now fallen off so the top of the tank now has nowhere for any static discharge to go when filling with fuel! Personally I think VW should have made the metal section in stainless steel as well as the body clip, they obviously thought corrosion here was a concern (the wheel blasts that area with dirt/water) as the body clip is stainless so why not the neck area? Repairing this earth strap is scary stuff; I have soldered a few male spade terminals on after lifting up an edge but have to admit to shaking like a leaf when doing this even with the cap on and someone watching with an extinguisher. Some may think it is excessive of me to repair this but if I didn

Personally, I new steam clean an engine unless I have no choice, it always causes trouble. You could have water in a switch/sender or plug which turns to steam when hot and condenses into a pool when cold so remove all the switch connections and blow them out with an air line and some water dispersant.

So this is fuse 5 then? Disconnect the wiper motor and see if the fuse still blows.

A few years ago, we took a Golf VR6 down to Superchips rolling road with James from Pipercross to do some tests with the then new Viper VR6 kit. We ran the car on a paper element and it gave 170BHP and then with a K&N panel filter with which it made 174BHP. I then fitted the Viper kit, which wasn't easy as there isn't enough room behind the headlight, and when run up, it made 157BHP-result!

Red Line SI1.

http://www.ilexa.co.uk/acatalog/vagcom.html, a very good complany to deal with and in the UK.

The only VR6 ECU I have ever had go faulty was on an auto where the idle valve went nuts for no plausible reason. In desperation I sent the ECU for testing and they found nothing wrong until I pointed out it was just an idle control fault which they found and fixed.

If I am wrong, I have left the country!

Head gasket failure could explain the noise. When the gasket blows between two cylinders (usualy between 1 and 2) you get chronic detonation, that is the noise-purely pressure waves and not mechanical.

What Bosch and VW part numbers are on them?