Dollywobbler's Dullswagen - For Sale

[dollywobbler]

So, let's recap. I drove to Wolverhampton. Bye bye BX.

 

First crap picture of Golf

 

Grubby

 

Grubby

 

Scrubbed

 

Buffed

 

So far, subframe has been welded, wheels have been balanced, timing belt, rotor arm, dizzy cap have been replaced and the wife loves it. Handbrake cable failed, rear shoes low, roadtrip this weekend.

[Rocket88]

I think that having a W124 balanced on your roof may be a tad detrimental to the fuel consumption figures.........

[chaseracer]

Not as much as having a 2CV as a bonnet ornament...

[dollywobbler]

Happily. I have sufficient parking space that I haven't yet had to resort to stacking cars.

 

Mr Chaseracer got a passenger trip in the Golf with Mrs Wobbler at the weekend. I'm now most of the way through changing the handbrake cables. Annoyingly, I was wrong about the shoes and they're not very worn at all. Oh well. At least I have a set. I'm pleased to report that the shoes did not give me any bother at all in their removal/refitting. Just need to deal with emails and I'll get the job finished.

[hairnet]

scenester

[dollywobbler]

Handbrake now fully operational for scenester McDonalds car park sideways yo. 

[dollywobbler]

Here's why the handbrake went all funny. Rusty!

[dollywobbler]

Just filled it up for the second time. Apparently it's doing 31mpg. About the same as my former 2-litre Bluebird (carb) and 3-litre Mercedes (inj) then! Fuel injection does have its plus sides. Sadly one of the rear brakes is making an odd noise so I'm about to head out to pull it all apart. Probably just dust or metal flakes caught somewhere they shouldn't be. At least I know how to get the drum of pretty swiftly! Lots of practice lately.

[Junkman]

When are you going to get yourself a BX?

[dollywobbler]

Not yet. Need a break from them I think. Got all BXed out.

[barefoot]

Just filled it up for the second time. Apparently it's doing 31mpg. .

My Scirocco did about 31mpg on its original carb (same engine / gearbox), but as soon as I replaced it with a second hand weber it improved dramatically, average 36 ish, best of 41 mpg.

[dollywobbler]

Does still have its Pooberg carb albeit with a manual choke conversion. Increasingly starting to think that the hunting idle is carb related as I eliminate ignition possibilities.

[dollywobbler]

Back from a 320-mile roadtrip and all is not well. Around here, the suspension is fine. The Welsh seem able to maintain their roads. On a long trip though, it's horrific. Hitting a cat's eye is like driving up a kerb at 70mph. The concretey sections of the M5 result in so much road noise that the Vulcan bomber seems like a muted whistle. This doesn't seem right. 

 

It also delivered a pretty pathetic 32mpg. My 2.3-litre Saab 9000 did better than that on a run. I'm starting to wish we'd taken the Discovery - though it rained a lot on the way down, so at least we didn't get wet...

 

On the way down to Devon, the rear brakes were squealing incessantly. So much so that I pulled the rear brakes apart on my sister's driveway to investigate. I think it's worn drums, with the lip catching the shoes and the drum resonating. I attacked the lip with sandpaper, put it all together and re-centred the drums and things were a lot better on the way back, though it still makes a nasty scraping noise when turning left - when forces push the shoe into the lip I guess. Oh and the heater no longer does hot.

 

On the plus side, it sat at 75-80 for a goodly while with no issues other than a twat in a Skoda Octavia who seemed incapable of maintaining a constant speed. I'd overtake him, he'd then re-overtake at about 90mph, then slow down again, then I'd overtake him...

[dollywobbler]

Here's 'happy' me, drumming.

 

Comparison with my sister's Mk6.

 

On getting home, I removed these...

 

And replaced them with these handy off-cuts of copper pipe from when we removed the central heating from the house.

 

Now, to be honest, I reckon this will be a temporary fix. It seems the Mk2 heater matrix is a bit weak, so rather than spec a decent one, Volkswagen fitted a bypass valve to remove excess pressure from the heater circuit. This was doing rather too good a job and the heater was not warm at all. I think I'll probably try and find a replacement as I don't really want 80 degree coolant splashing all over me and the passenger if the matrix does spectacularly fail (as they apparently can). The alternative is to fit a Mk3 heater matrix - don't really want to go there.

[Jim Bell]

Sounds like an annoying trip fella.

Well done for the driveway interlude.

 

Hopefully the return trip will be a better run.

[dollywobbler]

The drive home was fine, just uncomfortable. I did the heater bodge after we returned.

 

EDIT - forgot to mention the sheer excitement of changing the alternator belt today. Old belt was fraying a bit but happily didn't fail over the weekend.

[Pillock]

Heater matrix is indeed a weak point. There was a recall on Mk2 Golfs for this exact fault.

As recently as 2009, VW dealers were still carrying out the mods free of charge (as it's a lengthy dashboard-out job)

[dollywobbler]

Replacing the matrix is a dash-out job - Volkswagen's 'solution' was to fit the in-line valve which I've removed. That's a job of all of a few minutes of work! Maybe they started replacing matrices after running out of valves or something.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

I say take the dash out and put two massive jubilee clips round the heater matrix to hold it together than re-assemble the whole lot.

[RichardMoss]

 the matrix does spectacularly fail (as they apparently can)

 

Mine did - the first clue was the smell of antifreeze

[HMC]

That ecomomy does sound a bit off, i had a 1.8 gti 8v that did 41mpg on a 75ish long motorway trip

 

The heater was abysmal on that one too!

[dollywobbler]

The heater is GR12 now! Like a furnace. 

 

I'd expect a fuel injected car to be better on fuel. My BX 16V once managed 40mpg. Apparently fitting a Weber would improve things, but I don't think I can be bothered. Not much cash saving given how long I keep cars.

[Lacquer Peel]

VAG SHITE.

[Pete-M]

That valve was fitted as a recall as cars fitted without it had a habit of bursting the heater matrix and scalding legs.

31 mpg is bollocks for one of these. My GTi's used to average that around the city, regularly.

Pierburg carb is quite probably to blame, they're always knackered.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

Those pierburg carbs supposedly suck balls 24-7-365

[hairnet]

what blx said first thing you do to them apart from putting pez in them

[Lacquer Peel]

SCRAP IT!

[dollywobbler]

I should update this really. So, after new stub axles, wheel bearings, shoes and drums, all is well again! I got a new heater bypass valve on Ebay for about £8, which I thought was ok. I suspect in a month or two, they'll be fetching more as people discover that their heaters aren't working!

 

The handbrake now seems better, though I've used up almost all of the adjustment on one side. Would be annoying if the self-adjuster isn't working properly but as the handbrake does its job and the footbrake feels more effective, I'm leaving it as it is. It stops and is nice and toasty inside.

 

The brake troubles stemmed from me not reading the manual. I over-tightened the bearing nut, which eventually caused this.

 

That wear ridge shouldn't be there - it was catching on the back-plate bolts. So, a valuable lesson. Read the manual first, especially if working on a car on which you are not used to working!

 

We had a run out in the Golf yesterday, where I could once more enjoy a petrol engine that has good pulling power below 2000rpm and the sunroof. I really do like a sunroof, though it would be even better if it was glass and tilted as well as sliding. Eventually, I plan to replace this car with a Citroen GS/GSA, but the more I think about it, the more insane it sounds. After all, the Golf was meant to move me away from complicated Citroens!

 

Overall though, I reckon I've probably spent about £300 on the Golf already in total. It's been expensive times as I've been going through the Golf and sorting it out, and the Disco at the same time. Hoping now to get some cheap motoring out of it. Famous last words?

[Bobthebeard]

Hoping now to get some cheap motoring out of it. Famous last words?

A new thread title possibly?

Famous last words....

[dollywobbler]

Finally found a moment to chuck the new plugs and leads onto the Golf. This lead wasn't very good.

 

They were all rock hard. Glad to have replaced them.

 

The plugs were interesting colours.

 

The second plug required a breaker bar, which didn't make me particularly joyous and did make me quite anxious. Thankfully it came out sweetly in the end.

 

The third plug was rusty.

 

The fourth plug was boring. It didn't warrant a photo.

 

With the new plugs and leads fitted, it runs exactly as it did before. Still a misfire on idle. Running out of ignition options now, so perhaps this is just the joy of a Pooberg carb.