Humph! Clutch busted through bulkhead!

I bought my Cabbie a while back but only started driving it last week after passing my test, tuesday, on wed nite i lost my fan belt somwhere an got stuck for 2hours miles away from anywhere, finnaly got a jump start from my boss (cheers Gordon), an had to drive home in the pitch black with no lights following the fog light on the works van! Great fun, what a start to life with my golf, LMAO!  :?

So, thursday, fitted fan belt, charged battery, got alternator checked, so far so good. Reversed out the garage, BANG, WTF!! Clutch not working!?  At first i though it was the cable that snapped, but got it towed to my mates workshop, had a look an it turns out the bulkhead is rotten an the thing got pulled through!!!!

I've had a look around an i see you can get a kit with a patch for fixin it, common problem looks like?
I've been advised against this though, in case the patch gets pulled through as well.

Has this happend to anyone here?  Whats the best action to take?  Patch? Weld?

Any info would be great!

If the patch (its a shaped rectangular panel, around 4"x4") gets pulled through, you have more serious issues! Yes its a common fault, common enough to have companies supply this little panel. You could do the job properly and have it welded, seam sealed and painted in and its going to last 10+ years, or you could bodge it and stick it there with seam sealer, like someone did to my car.

In fact, out of all 3 of my Mk1 Golfs, 2 have this panel - the other is an auto!

Cheers, im thinkg about welding a bar aross the whole bay an drilling it?

GTG4V1N said

Cheers, im thinkg about welding a bar aross the whole bay an drilling it?

Won't look as good, but perfectly okay as a repair. I'd make it a flat plate of metal, rather than a bar, though.

i expect every mk1 golf or jetta owner has suffered the same issue!! if they havnt then they are lucky or got a left hooker version!!
If you just put the sticky backed repair plate on it should be fine, welding up that area requires an element of luck or stripping out under the footwell as theres a fair bit that can catch light from heat!! and personally i would rather have a bare metal plate than a frazzled car! you can hardly notice the plate once its fitted and any mk1 oficinado will know exactly why its there! plates about ?10 from gsf and places like that

I had my bulkhead re-welded after having the same problem.  This was done 2 years ago and I have had no problems since.  The only thing was the guy that did it cursed for about 3 days because it is such a funny angle to get in..  I, of course, felt nothing  

Don't let things like that put you off the car, its just one of its quirks that you will get to love (and fear!).

GTG4V1N said

 Has this happend to anyone here?  

This has probably happened to everyone on here!!!  

All three of ours have been patched, and Rach's has too.

Once patched with the metal plate we've had no more probs

Good luck!  

Yep it happened to me about two years ago, Car wouldn't go into gear got that bad had to call AA out. Told me I needed new clutch. These are the guys who told me I needed a new radiator when hose was leaking. Checked with local mechanic he knew what it was straight away and made and welded plate in. End of problem. I have seen plate from GSF, it is very tidy.

Yep this has happened to me as well dude, I siliconed it in there and it has been ok for 6 months or so, but now I ve got the engine out for a conversion I'm gonna weld it in.
Bob.

Yep it happens to all of us Mk1 owners at some point !!

Took the opportunity to have the plate seam welded while the engine was out, but ran it for 6 years just using the stick on plate