DieselMonte

So finally have nct now. Needed a new abs pump so was done too. And I got a deal on another radio so tried it out. Not a genuine unit but fairly smart. New in the box, has satnav via a thing stuck to the window, all works. Bluetooth CDs etc. Had an adapter loom with a canbus box so plugged straight in. Has some interesting features including a calculator Conversion calculator, alerts for speed cameras and road changes, has android auto but cant quite figure it out. Lists of speed limits and alcohol limits for every country. And bra sizes. Works well, nice and responsive etc. I'll stick with it as the Amundsen has gone into another car.

Bit of VCDS trickery and Bluetooth is now working. Ordered a new sat nav cable and microphone cable. Should be fully working as it should in a week or 2.

So been a while. Was absolutely tortured with a coolant leak at the heater core. Wouldn't seal, wouldn't seal. So tried one of those adapter things from Skoda. Didn't work. Eventually got a new heater core because... ****ed. So that in, plus new silicone hoses to replace the crappy hardlines and FINALLY got it holding fluid. Had to borrow some brackets for the Monte so sourced some ones new genuine. Only €8.00 odd a side plus vat. Exhaust, intercooler and a few other jobs and I'll be able to test drive it finally.

Broke the bonnet catch the other night somehow so swapped it over from a parts car. Central locking button went so swapped it, and it was boosting funny (why I was popping the bonnet ironically) so swapped the N75 too. Now onto some more fun stuff. Have gotten some very nice very cheap upgrades and bits recently. First one being a sunglasses holder. New old stock genuine Skoda one Believe it or not a fair bit cheaper genuine than on eBay. Nice and cheap. Swapped the top vents over to some less haggard ones too. No pics. AND finally got an upgrade from my ropey Swing headunit. Got my hands on an Amundsen+, so Bluetooth and satnav. Neither of which work currently as I haven't swapped the satnav aerial and I need to do some poking around with vcds to get the Bluetooth to work. And I THINK I'll need to put in a mic for the Bluetooth to properly work. Saying that it works well, still have my Bluetooth adaptor so using that. Nice to have a working CD player again too. Did want something Android auto but this is costing me basically nothing and is OEM. Have an oil pickup tube and seal got too, want to drop the sump and some point and have a look see. Nearly 160k so curious to see how it's holding up. Suspect I have an injector seal weeping too. Plenty of stuff to be sorted to keep it in good shape. So mixed start to the year but I intend on making the most of it. Lots to do.

Update: It did fail on something very stupid. And it shouldn't have. Failed on front brake pipes fouling (they weren't) was told it needed a bracket (It didn't the bracket is on the shock), they failed it then your man took it BACK in for a retest on the spot because it didn't print an emissions reading. It passed that with flying colours. Retested it failed again, so to appease the sour bastards I robbed some brackets off one of the Mk1s and cleaned them up. Also got new brake lines which ended up not even working, would not seal on the caliper. So used the old lines which I am NOT happy about. Did come out pretty slick. Drilled a hole in the hub and ran a tec screw through. Ended up finding an OE number so have 2 new ones to go on the SDI. While all that was going down I wanted to swap the gearbox mount as it was poorly. Then broke a bolt. Was over Christmas, Ordered a new one and it didn't come to January 3rd. So was out of it for a week or so. Sorted through other means but I now have a spare bracket brand new just sitting there. Have to do another full test and that's in just under 2 weeks. Have to get 2 tyres on it Saturday as they're nearly on the wear bars. And I'll change the oil before I do the test.

So finally took the time to fix the splitter Took a fair bit of sanding and filling to get the worst out of it. Primed Filler Primed And Painted. Complete rattle can jobbie from start to finish. So far from perfect. I'd rather have been able to take it off. But it's a lot of hassle and I'd have probably broken it. Tape was less than stellar and got a fair bit of overspray. To say I'm rusty would be putting it lightly. That pic is of it freshly painted. Came out fairly well over all. Since wetsanded it and buffed it but there's a bit more to be done, anyhow. Better than paying 350 plus vat for one of the few NOS ones, and still need to paint it anyway. Also have NCT soon so took some time looking it over. Stripped all the brakes, deglazed the pads, cleaned the sliders and rebled. Front discs are a bit low, would have changed them when I did pads only they got lost in transit. Checked over the suspension, all seems fine but I have noticed an occasional knock. Which I can't figure out. Changed the gear oil too as I didn't get doing it when I serviced it. "Only" 50k miles on it from the last time I did it. Still probably fine I imagine but seems gear changes are a bit slicker and I've not gotten the typical crunch into reverse since. Not much else. Imagine it'll fail on something stupid again.

So after having to replace the rear right line (New genuine), I finally have brakes that work.

Had to get a new master as I damaged one of the threads on the old one, can't be helped. came with bolts to put into the bottom holes. Obviously they make the same master for ABS and Non ABS. Not a lover of it but if it works... And one of the brake lines under the car started weeping when I put pressure to it, so getting a flare tool and doing it next day. Put coolant to it and quickly lost it because of a dodgy O ring going into the heater box. Silly stuff. Got a box of O-Rings so that'll be done next day too. Really that's the worst of it now, all that's stopping me in my tracks. All things considered, it's not much. Oh and I've been trying to see about fitting some driving lamps I originally got for the justy to this. Best place will be to put it onto the bumper in the grille. Have to see how much room I'll have with the intercooler though.

Cost me nothing to change it when I get bored of it

Also got some photos that were took coming over hartside pass on the way home. Think it was a guy called bikerphoto? Fun times.

So due another service again. Ordered quantum oil online. Very impressed how well it was packaged, wrapped twice and boxed. Pretty cheap too, and quantum is genuine for VW afaik. Stepped up to 5w40, figure a thicker oil would be no harm given its getting up the miles. Full kit assembled. Air, Oil, Fuel, Pollen, engine flush (why not) and Gear oil. Didn't get to do the gear oil as I ran out of time. Used the engine flush as instructed and the oil drained like water. Air filter rotten again Serviced up, primed the fuel system with vcds and did some tweaks while I was in there. Figured out how to get speedo readings on the radio, which was cool. And said I'd try the needle sweep function. 20231014_182954.mp4 Ready to go another bit I reckon.

Imo I'd ""just"" be putting a 1.8t in and keeping it fwd. Not worth the hassle to do much more

New timing belt, water pump and coolant done end of last week. New accessory belt too, not needed but when all going on may as well All Gates Kit too. New Rear right caliper, refreshed the brake fluid too. Old caliper was beat.

New map sensor installed. Bolts were rusted beyond recognition so had to take the pipe off and try remove the bolts. Ez outs worked pretty well. New one in with bolts I had laying around. Didn't fix the code I was getting oh well.

Test fitted the brakes today. Tried to do heatshields but the stub axle bolts wouldn't budge. So deleted them instead. Said before but old pads and discs on purely to get it moving. Will have new discs and pads when I can afford to.

Carpet in. And made my way down the country to get some bits off of this. Namely... Full 312mm 256mm setup off of it. And the front lines to boot as they're nearly new. Better than what I have. Did try getting braided lines but mtec had em on backorder, so cancelled it. Was going to paint them silver. But they were mostly green, and I had the correct green so. Quick hit of green. Also got 256mm rear heatshields to go on too. Getting there.

Iirc genuine arb bushes for these are more or less one size fit all. Just remember when I got some for mine off work we only stock the one bush. They're only a few euro. Got spurious ones and they wouldn't fit, way too small. Some squish is fine. Not a fun job to do but not hard.

I have like 2 or 3 sets of seats out at the minute lmao. See he got it sorted but if anyone wants pics I'll nab some

The genuine droplinks are a farce 70 odd plus vat each and doesn't include nuts. Put meyle in mine last time. For 18 each all in. Should say the 1j0 bushes that price is in euro not £. Worth pricing stuff genuine for the most part but some stuff is silly money for no real reason.

I've Reused mine. Fyi the genuine bushes are only 20 odd plus vat. 1J0 407 181.

So had it at a few shows since. Local cars and coffee which was actually busy I just didn't bother taking a pic of it until I was ready to leave. Sat idling for 20 minutes in a queue to get into it. Got a free T shirt though. Another show in Knockbridge today which was a big one. And that all was fine. Even got a little placard for going in. And then instead of heading home I went into dundalk and it started running poor. Parked it, looked it over, Cleaned the carb, new plugs, etc etc. Got it going again, for about 5 minutes. Died just off the motorway coasted into the big car park and there it sat. No spark. Lucky I had gotten an AA membership for retrorides and... Got it home luckily. 99% it's the coil gone again. Absolutely 0 spark. Think all of my working on the car earlier made no difference, all it did was let the coil cool off and let it work for a bit more.

Probably both Place was a furnace

Bumper off to finally fix the damaged lip. Got a small fibreglass repair kit from halfords and set about fixing it. Not too hard actually. Kit had a lot more stuff than I needed so I have lots spare for the vRSDI. Only trouble I had was the resin set VERY quick. The way it was setting it was turning into jelly in the cup, so I ended up dumping that out in a lump and making more. Did 2 layers, Seems to have set very hard. Looks bad, but the patches are behind the bumper and the bottom of the splitter can't be seen. Gave it a clean waiting for the resin to set. Gave the intercooler and the spotlamps a good clean since I had access. Also tightened up the intercooler for hopefully the last time. Gave it a good polish too. All together. I'll just paint it on the car. Everything behind the bumper is fixed so no point taking it off again.

New tyre time. 4 new Pilot Sport 5's. Like a new car again. Then not long after the doors started locking and unlocking constantly. So took the switch apart and found corrosion. Cleaned it up. Works fine now.