alright geezers has anybody got any spare joints or driveshafts knocking about so you can measure up the spline sizes and the precise length of the shaft for me??

i'm still researching the idea of converting my pickup to auto and i need to devise a cunning plan for the shafts and joints.. it appears that the flanged inner joint from a polo gearbox fits on the felicia shaft

Tom...

I do have a few but what exactly do you want to know

also they changed splines randomly around 1998 on the shafts.

golf and older audi outer joints fit into the hubs (and nova/corsa ones too) so shouldn't be too difficult to find something that works..

or you can fit different bearings and use octavia flanges to use the bigger newer cv's

ahh top man jimbo..

the problem i have is by my blind reckoning the auto box fits directly to the engine wiithout the adaptor plate fiitted which offsets the centres of the diff sliightly more towards the drivers side.. as you have already said, the polo outer joints fit the feliicia shafts but they are ever so slightly the wrong length, i can shorten the drivers side shaft by turning approx 5mm off each end..

i'm going to have to do some more lateral thinking methinks..

also on another subject whilst you are here so to speak :p any idea how i can make the speedo work? the vw auto boxes use an electronic impulse sender for the vehical speed instead of a cable drive... was maybe thinking about swapping the speedo head out for the 6n polo one?

the polo gearbox mount fits ok, just going to weld the circular bearer to the square plate that fits over the standard felicia gearbox chassis mounting, also the rear dogbone can be modified to fit the feliicia subframe..

then all i need to do is figure out how to wire in the gearbox ecu then i'm laughing as it were

have you actually got any measurements to back up the placing of the diff mate?? as you may find that because the bellhousing is going to be deeper to accomadate the torque converter it may well be that the diff is in the same place as the manual box.

just a thought off top of my head..

i bet if you were to remove the impulse sender you could find a cable drive that fitted somewhere off the vag range which may be simpler than getting the polo cluster to fit?

i think you might be right thinking about it, comparing it to a normal 085 vw gearbox the auto box has a wider diff..i think i need to chuck it in there and do some meauring up.

i suppose the speedo drive from a mk2 golf might fit

I hope nobody minds if I nip in with a quick CV joint question that doesn't really deserve a whole thread to itself:

Is the part indicated below supposed to be attached to the CV or the diff casing? On mine it's attached to nothing and rattles around annoyingly - I'm hoping it doesn't mean I need a whole new inner joint...

And before anyone mentions it - yes, it's a right old mess with everything leaking out of everywhere and no, it wasn't me that fixed the boots on with cable ties.

P.S. it's a shame you don't have many other options Tom - having experienced an automatic 6n Polo once I can say without a doubt it was the most horrible gearbox of anything I've ever driven.

i've canned the auto gearbox idea now, it's prohibitively expensive, and i may not ever be able to get it work right...

anyway if reference yo you inner cv, that metal ring is supposed to be attached to the joint, they always fall off, it won't do any harm without it on there

Yeah, that ring is just extra protection from stuff getting to the seal; if it's loose, cut it off.

And for the record, you can do a perfectly good job fitting CV boots with cable ties if you do it well with the right size tie!

you could always use a jubilee clip on there too, just unwind it all the way till the end seperates, then whach it on, that way you wont need drain the gear oil and remove the shaft..

but as darren says above^^ a cable tie is also ok and it wont fail the mot on that so long as it's secure

Cheers chaps - good to know it's nothing critical. As it is, the boots are starting to crack and the driveshaft seals are peeing oil everywhere, so it's all coming apart as soon as I'm able to get the front wheels off, anyway.

Robin out of interest was the ring just loose or was there a small gap between the driveshaft and diff? I only ask as after doing my inner boot today the shaft isn't 100% flush.

there's supposed to be a gap between the gearbox and ring thing, but no gap between the ring and the cv joint... so long as the inner joint is fully home there's nothing to worry about, there is a circlip that prevent the shaft from 'falling' out.. on mine i just cut those rings off in the end because i was being too much of a skinflint to pay out for some new gearbox oil

Is that the small wire type circlip which goes in the groove on the gearbox end spline? I removed that and it went in easy as pie no problem, i figured it was necessary so put back in as best I could, although I think that could be what's stopping it going all the way in.

I know these last couple of weeks I've prooved my lack of knowledge on here but hey I'm a beginner! This may be silly but if I were to remove the circlip that sits in the spline on the gearbox end of the drive shaft what would happen? Am I right in saying that retains the cv joint on the drive shaft? When I stripped the shaft down I could see quite what it did and seen as it seemed to be at least part of my problem when putting the shaft back in I'm tempted to refit without it. (that is unless it's really really necessary.

it's the spline that transmits all the driving force to the shaft, the circlip only retains the shaft into the joint, i can't see why you shouldn't do that but i wouldn't recommend it.. i suppose at full lock the shaft could potentially seperate and fall out the inner joint

Which clip are you talking about, Ben? The one on the inner end of the spline on the part of the CV joint that goes into the gearbox, or the one which holds the tripod bearing carrier (which is inside the inner joint) onto the driveshaft itself?

The one on the spline, I could not get it to sit tight and in the recess so I popped the new one I bought and that was the same, it streches so much to go over the end of the shaft that once it's in the groove its loose. Although I managed to get it on good enough to get the shaft most the way on, enough that I was going to leave it but now the car feels a little like it's pulling to the side i haven't done any work on.

You should be able to squeeze the circlip in a bit when it's in the groove. I've had a fair bit of grief trying to refit driveshafts on my car because it has an LSD in it, and there is no bevel on the diff side gears to ease the circlip into it, so I found that putting grease on the circlip and in the groove allowed me to place it centrally so it would go in properly. Once the circlip is engaged in the diff, there's no reason for it not to go all the way in, so I'd check that. No circlip is a bad idea- the shaft will pull out of the box, with messy consequences!

drop the ball joint back out of the hub and straighten the steering (jacked up,wheel off obv) and use the hub knock the shaft into the diff, by pulling the hub away from the gearbox a few inches then pushing it back in quickly. Try turning the shaft a bit if its still tight and it should knock in ok.

dont run it without the circlip/locking ring as it will come out of the diff and knacker the splines on both the diff and the joint

Thanks guys, think I'm gonna give the above ago although the slight pulling to one side i was feeling seems to be present when just coasting, my guess is pothole tracking adjustment lol.

Yeah, that or tyre pressures being uneven.

pulling to one side is not going to be a problem with the cv joints or gearbox, it will be something like tyres, or a sticky brake caliper