The doom blue Passat - rim job

[bunglebus]

12 minutes ago, xtriple said:

Now that is the way you should lower cars, none of this expensive coil overs shit, just 3 tonne of concrete slabs!   I hate any VAG product but it seems this is earning its keep admirably.

It is on lowered springs anyway but I think it was on the bumpstops today. No wonder they end up like this

20180718_122504 by RS, on Flickr

 

8 minutes ago, TheDoctor said:

Hey, how come you didn't get any shit for painting your bonnet? ???

 

No idea. The lacquer was knackered anyway - roof and boot may get the same treatment eventually. Never had anything but positive comments about it anyway - might as well have a bit of fun with old cars eh?

[bunglebus]

Today has seen much spanner twirling. The N/S CV joint was making horrible noises and I knew the pads and discs were all getting pretty worn. Also wanted to fit the rear caliper I bought ages ago, because it used to get very hot after a run. I'd moved the piston back and forth half a dozen times and not had the problem again, but better safe than sorry. There's a front engine mount that looked a bit suspect, fuel filter was overdue, as was the engine oil, and I wanted to change the gearbox oil as it's never been changed.

Not much right?

Of course when I woke up it was pissing down, so I didn't get started until 12. 

First problem - made worse by this being the only car

 

20200314_120438 by RS, on Flickr

 

A call to the motor spares shop and a mate saw a 17mm sump plug tool delivered - didn't have to send the Mrs on her bike!

 

In the mean time I cracked on with the front pads and discs.

 

20200314_123059 by RS, on Flickr

 

Are these discs OK? The inside edge of the pad is not in contact with the working surface of the disc, so surely a lip will develop on the pad.

 

20200314_125451 by RS, on Flickr

20200314_132654 by RS, on Flickr

 

Onto the bit I was dreading, CV joints. The N/S was pretty easy, undo that 17mm hex head bolt, undo 6 torx bolts at the gearbox end and the driveshaft pops off. Clever part is you wind the big bolt back into the end of the CV joint and it pulls it off the snap ring on the driveshaft.

Drivers side was a bit harder as there's no space to pull the CV out of the hub, so resorted to undoing the notorious top pinch bolt to release the hub from the upper suspension arms for more clearance.

All back together, oil changed and ran out of daylight. A quick drive around the block confirmed all is well.

Tomorrow I need to go and find my brake wind back tool and collect the pads.

Doesn't seem like I can do the gearbox oil as the drain is a 16mm security spline. Special tools, ugh.

However the car rewarded me with a rare appearance of photons from the boot light, seems to work if you leave the boot open for ages.

 

20200314_180118 by RS, on Flickr

 

I should also mention that trying to align the wheel, wheel spacer, disc and hub, while getting the bolts in, is a right pain in the arse.

[bunglebus]

1st day of no work for the foreseeable, so time to do some spanner twirling.

 

Today's mission, rear pads and discs and a caliper

 

1st problem, one slider seized solid and needed some persuasion to come out

 

20200318_113806 by RS, on Flickr

 

Lots of scraping and wire brushing and a liberal smear of copper grease saw it sliding in and out like...well you know

 

Other side had the same problem, same solution. Anyone that doesn't have a caliper wind back tool, should get one. Saves a lot of effort.

 

20200318_120945 by RS, on Flickr

 

Onto the caliper. HBOL says "scrabble about under the car trying to remove two dozen 10mm nuts that haven't moved in 20 years. so you can drop the exhaust heat sheild on your face and de-adjust the handbrake cable" 

Rich says " use mole grips to release the tension from the sprung arm on the caliper" and pull the cable off. Easy.

 

20200318_131805 by RS, on Flickr

 

Think I might get someone else to replace this brake pipe,  even though it's only a short run and I bought a flaring tool.

 

20200318_125622 by RS, on Flickr

 

All back together, bled out using the "one man" tool, replaced the fuel filter as I was feeling adventurous too.

Next job is gearbox oil, drain plug tool arrived today - 16mm security spline for some reason.

[Bren]

I put titan sinto fluid in ours - they use it in the B6 passat. The gearchange was then comparable with a ford - much better.

[bunglebus]

17 minutes ago, Bren said:

I put titan sinto fluid in ours - they use it in the B6 passat. The gearchange was then comparable with a ford - much better.

I've bought 75/90 full synthetic at £how much? per litre, hopefully it'll make a difference.

[bunglebus]

Been waking up at stupid o'clock lately, so it seemed a good a day as any to crack on - final mission for now, gearbox oil. Looked lovely outside but didn't factor the wind into my judgement. Both me and the drive have had a lovely shower in hypoid oil. Good job I don't mind the smell.

Of course I cracked the filler plug off first, same tool required to do the hub bolts as luck would have it. Drain removed with new 16mm security spline.

Makes a change to see nice golden oil coming out of my car, used to black diesel contaminated stuff.

Filling is always fun with the 1l plastic bottles, but a length of hose that fitted over the bottle pipe and into the filler hole allowed me to do the job from above, punctured a hole in the bottom of the first two to allow air back in. Last 500ml was squeezed in from underneath until it started to come out.

Still a bit notchy on 1st and 2nd until the box had warmed up, now it's like butter. Hopefully it'll stay that way now it's circulated around the box, might put some of that Molyslip stuff in later.

Worst part of the job apart from the soaking in oil was getting the bastard pattern undertray to go back on, the plastic inner arch captive nuts are absolute shite so a couple of self tappers per side have been fitted instead.

Enforced time off might mean I get around to the less important stuff like the cigarette lighter bulb, rocker cover gasket, finding matching side repeaters and dismantling the locks to see if the microswitches can be matched up and replaced. Might even upgrade the sound system as I have a couple of amps in the garage, but as it is often full of stuff this might become annoying moving a sub out of the way.

 

[bunglebus]

Grr. Ages ago I noticed that where some imbicile spanner monkey has jacked my Passat up on the sill seam rather than the jacking point, it was bent and the underseal was damaged. I then promptly forgot all about it until I was replacing an undertray fixing the other day and saw a split in the underseal between the floor and sill. Pushing made that sickening crunch noise.

So after a fun hour getting the torx screws out of the sill cover, I found this

And this

Then the rear wheel arch liner came offwhen I noticed another problem

That has mostly been caused by Fritz being a bit generous with the rustproofing which has blocked the drain hole. Go figure.

Then after a quick wazz over with the wire wheel, I had this:

I worked out where to cut and broke out the angle grinder, shitting myself because there's loads of waxoil in the sill that wanted to catch fire. Inner sill etc is absolutely mint, thanks to this treatment 

not too bad a shape to make although there's a drain plug and a couple of trip clip holes to replicate in the patch. Planning to finish one repair at a time to preserve strength and my nerves! Packed up at this point as I was sweating my tits off in jeans and a jumper, PPE all the way! 

[bunglebus]

Progress is slow because things keep jumping the queue - today son-in-law needed anti-roll bar drop links and a few other jobs done on his Astra, A-class is the father-in-laws and being borrowed while I have no Passat - problem being only my girlfriend is insured on it, and she's a learner, so if we need to do anything, both of us have to go out.

Still, makes for quite an Autoshite picture don't you think?

 

20200528_132731 by RS, on Flickr

[bunglebus]

Got my panel made and fitted. Had great fun trying to weld with the wind doing its best to blow the gas away but it's on and solid. Got to tidy up a couple of areas.

Realised too late I formed the swage line the wrong way! Oh well

 

[dave j]

Good work! Nice to see a Passat getting some attention

[bunglebus]

I'm still annoyed that it needs it, thanks to some useless tyre jockey

[bunglebus]

Another day of terrifying the neighbours with my welding mask

Actually really impressed with this, think it came from Aldi. Never had an auto dimming one before but it's a revelation, just keep it on and have both hands free.

[bunglebus]

Another day, another hole. Finger sander is a great tool for cleaning up the old spot welds, another Lidl/Aldi jobbie.

Making this repair in two sections as it's too complex for my CAD skills

[bunglebus]

A nice bit of progress today, got the top section welded in

Made the bottom section and welded that

A quick blast with weld through primer, doesn't look too bad. There are places that need more welding to make a full seam but it's solid at least

Another Astra 1.6 auto joined the fleet temporarily to further impress the neighbours 

[bunglebus]

Third hole cut out

Patch made

Welded in

Overall view of the sill so far

None of this is going to win any beauty contests, and I'm still fighting the waxoil contaminating my welds. It's strong though

[bunglebus]

So, the bit I'd been dreading. Somehow I've got to make this mess

Look like this (mirror image pic of the other side)

For now I've settled for attacking any bubbly crusty bits with the grinder, using a rust remover and coating with Hammerite type stuff, while I ponder what to do. £60 for a wheelarch, or use my limited skills to try and approximate this area of curves and angles

[bunglebus]

Bit more progress. Chopped out the rot in the end of the sill

Strangely, the inner and outer sill "float" at the end, only seam sealer connecting them to the inner wing/arch area

Spent ages making a repair panel

Still not sure how to go about making the return lip, it curves in two directions. I was going to make a separate section and weld it in, I could try and bend a lip on the end of the bit I've made but typically I haven't quite left myself enough material to do so.

While I was pondering, the seam sealer arrived so I applied some to the finished areas

Making sure there's plenty where the factory stuff got damaged

[bunglebus]

So, the dreaded sill end. Slit the end of the bit I'd already made and formed a closing panel

Welded on the inside

Welded on to the sill and ground back

Seam sealed

Also got the square drill bits out to make the trim clip holes where I'd replaced metal in the sill

At this point I had a disaster - having given it a couple of coats of rust preventing paint I thought I'd spray it with stone chip shield. Instead of spraying, it erupted out the sides of the nozzle and wouldn't stop. Somehow I got it on a bit of card, wrapped it in a rag and threw it in the bin. How I only got a few drops on the drive I don't know, but my hands are covered in it.

Still, I felt better reconnecting the battery and alternator and it firing straight up. Always paranoid I'll fry an ECU doing welding

[bunglebus]

I R idiot. After replacing the thermostat several times to try and fix it never getting past about 75c on the gauge, I replaced the temp sender. Two miles of driving saw it reach 90c and stay there. The odd things were with a diagnostic thingy plugged into the OBD, it was saying 86c or thereabouts, and the sender had been changed previously (OK probably 5 years ago) after seeing the gauge drop to zero and back to 90 when hot.

Other than dropping the old sender, followed by the new one and the o-ring, into a recess in the engine block, and losing far more coolant than intended, it went well. I retrieved the new sensor and o-ring but the old one refuses to be removed from its new home, so it can bloody stay there in disgrace.

Oh and the sender definitely talks to the gauge and the ECU, as unplugging it saw a reading of 215c via the OBD. It has 4 connections, how half of it can give a spurious output I don't know.

 

[bunglebus]

Nice. Advisory on one tyre getting low and the usual poor headlamp pattern

[bunglebus]

So, the Passat let me down for the first time ever in the seven years I've owned it, and it was a bit odd. It's been used less since lockdown, and does more silly short runs to Aldi etc but always starts immediately. I haven't used it since Friday, and that was the short run to Aldi, with a stop at the Post Office on the way home.

This morning, I couldn't unlock it. I've been using the key for ages as the remote doesn't work, but I couldn't turn it in either door, could see the button trying to move but I didn't want to force it. The boot unlocked but the way it does when you have the battery disconnected, and you know you're also moving the lock motor. 

Having accessed the boot, the next problem was how to get in the cabin, as the seat back releases are on the tops of the seats inside. Pushing the parcel shelf up (there's a solid metal shelf with a hard fabric cover over it) allowed me enough access to get a bit of metal rod, bent at 90 degrees up past the seat back, and with some guidance from the mrs looking though the window, pushed the release up and got the seat folded. Having climbed in, the doors still would not open, the buttons came up when pulling the handles, but even holding the button up it would not get the lock to release. 

Turning the ignition on saw just the airbag light illuminate, nothing else. Having concluded the battery was flat, I popped the bonnet, connected the old battery that I keep charged via jump leads, put my trickle charger on it too for good measure and fucked off indoors to watch Top Gear.

Started after that if a little sluggish, drove around for 45 mins then waited another half an hour for the spotty oik at Halfords to test the (10 month old) battery, which he concluded was all good.

So it's all a bit of a mystery, I have been leaving my dashcams on all the time as there's been someone causing trouble in the area lately, but they shouldn't be enough to flatten a big ol' diesel battery in 48 hours, surely? It's the highest spec one available for my car, 5 year warranty 110 meant for cars with stop/start, 75a/h 730cca.

The lock thing puzzles me too, if you disconnect the battery you can lock and unlock it manually no problem, but I've always started with them unlocked, disconnected and locked them by hand, so maybe it's an anti-theft deadlock of some kind.

We'll see what the future brings, I've turned the cameras off for now just in case

 

[CaptainBoom]

 

7 hours ago, bunglebus said:

The lock thing puzzles me too, if you disconnect the battery you can lock and unlock it manually no problem, but I've always started with them unlocked, disconnected and locked them by hand, so maybe it's an anti-theft deadlock of some kind.

I can confirm that the doors lock on the Passat with the conventional latch and a deadlock.  If you battery dies whilst the car is locked, you will struggle to get the doors open from the outside.  I had it happen on my Mk4 Golf and my Volvo a few times, climbing through the boot loses it's hilarity the second time.  I can't speak for the Passat but the ones on the mk4 golf are at the bottom of the doors and trigger about 20 seconds after the car is locked, you can hear a light 'thud' as they electrically actuate. 

Like all anti-theft things, they are clever... until you need to get into your own car!

[bunglebus]

Don't know if it was deliberate or just fallout, but I found all this fireworks crap on my car this morning 

[bunglebus]

So, it's been a while, mainly because there's not been anything to report, it just does car stuff. Changed the oil, investigated a suspension clonk, minor stuff.

But the locks are misbehaving, and now I have to act. B5 Passats always suffer from the internal door locks failing, mine occasionally do minor sillies like one door doesn't lock. No biggie. But I have ignored several problems that I should have attended to earlier. 

I only have one key, had the car 8 years and my dad still hasn't located the spare. The remote never had very good range, and eventually it stopped working altogether, very occasionally it will surprise me and work but I've mainly just used the key to manually unlock it. A few months ago the lock got very stiff, a bit of WD40 sorted it for a while (yeah I know it's not the right stuff), then it happened a few more times. A bit of lube and it was good to go again. Hasn't done this for quite a while and I forgot about it. The central locking works from the passenger door so often I'd just open it from that side until I had a moment to spray the lock again. 

The other day I happened to try unlocking it from the passenger side, and it only unlocked that door. Hmm, odd. Then the OSR wouldn't always unlock, and I'd have to operate the lock/unlock buttons a few times until it did. Strange. 

Today I tried to lock it using the key and the lock felt really odd, almost as if the barrel was turning in the handle. And the key wouldn't come out. Turned it back the other way, same feeling and of course it made all the windows open. Managed to free the key, shut the windows and locked it from the boot lock (thankfully that also operates the central locking). Got home and took the barrels out, thankfully a 5 min job - tried swapping driver's for passenger's but they are different. And now the OSR will not unlock at all. Fuck.

Looking on eBay revealed lots of barrel repair kits, YouTube showed what breaks and how to fix it, and it looks pretty easy so a few pounds were spent ordering a kit. If that doesn't work you can get a pair of barrels and keys for £20 or so but then I will have two different keys, new ones being non-remote too. That also poses a problem if I want to get a new remote key, as you code them by putting the ignition on with the existing key, and locking/unlocking the door with the new - I can't do that if the locks don't match. 

The internal door latches are more involved - OSF doesn't operate the lights on buzzer, that's just a microswitch that's cheap but labour intensive, NSF I think needs a complete mechanism (under £20), as does the OSR, and I need the door open to remove the door card. You cannot open it once it's locked, pulling the internal handle puts the button up but it's deadlocked. 

Just to add to the fun, the Lupo is not usable until the overheating fault is resolved, so I don't want to take the lock mechanisms to bits in the mean time. 

Bugger.

[bunglebus]

Had a slight stroke of luck this morning - gave the rear door a whack on the inside and it unlocked, so I took the opportunity to remove the door card. YouTube has many videos on repairing the latches, but if it doesn't work it's all for nothing. £20 replacement ordered

Probably not coincidentally, the central locking now works from the NSF, so I suspect this one being deadlocked caused the other faults. Still need to fix the key barrel on the driver's door but that is a simple fix (hopefully)

[tobyd]

Its not a bad job doing the latches - you'll need an M8 12-point XZN / triple square bit to remove the module and punching out the window retainer is a bit gloomy but otherwise there is lots of room. The autodoc / Stark ones i've used for the two offside doors stick the lock-knobs up slightly higher than stock. But since I need to replace the nearside rear anyway (microswitch issue - like you say, its as much work to just replace the entire unit for the price) I might do both and have it uniform. I need to replace the butyl tape stuff on all 4 doors as it is...

I saw (and used) a tip on youtube about refitting the window - if, whilst the panel is off you put the white retainer and inner back into the window when it comes to re-attaching it to the regulator you can lower the window onto the regular clip then gently push the window down to engage it rather than have to knock the pins in in-situ. This video in fact from about 13mins.

[bunglebus]

In a bizarre twist of fate, the remote has decided to work again. Really need to get a 2nd key but will it code to the immobiliser? 

[bunglebus]

Still waiting for lock parts but my suspension arm turned up. Despite what people tell you, 3 out of the 4 on each side aren't hard to do, although extracting the bolt is a bit fiddly without dropping the crossmember. Still, out with the old...

...and on with the new.

This was I think the last remaining original on the car, don't think 23 years and 254k miles is bad going really.

Silence is golden

[Cord Fourteener]

Nice!

Makes mine seem young at just 180,000 miles today!

 

[twosmoke300]

You didn’t have to do the one that the strut needs to come out to do then ?