MK1 Cabriolet GTi 2.0L, Helios, Restoration - MORE UPDATES!

Looks tidy. If it's waterproof that must mean you were able to suck all the Stella up!  

Cheers Darren - Might get some of this stuff nearer summer and pad out the car.

Need to finish my boot re-vamp and get my coilovers bought and fitted 

Great weather today meant I managed to lay down any of the last foam bits and also get the rear carpet in! It's not completely down yet as i've got to finish off where the seats sit but the important parts by the sills etc are all in. Also managed to respray the handbrake lever as the paint had come off and was completely bare metal which was rusting away.

Some pics of the progress!



Final part of the underlay put down, you can see i've also remove the knee bar, stereo and put the steering wheel on.



Need to grease up the runners before I put the seats back in but will do that when it's all finished and ready.

Looking tidy, it will be interesting to hear what a difference all the under carpet gubbins makes

Totally agree,
Looking first class already! Is that new carpet to? 

Thanks guys, I do hope it makes a difference! If it does nothing to the noise it's at least made it look pretty and weigh it down  

Yeah it's a newton commercial carpet, had it a month but obviously this is the first chance to lay it down, I've got the front to go in soon but going to sort the wiring out first and replace the doorcards with black ones I've got. Trying to find a black centre console and knee bar at the moment so I imagine it'll go in when those have been fitted.

Looking good. Will be better than a new one when's it done.

With the door cards out and the wiring exposed etc I thought I'd take the time to mount the solenoids on for my Rclick remote central locking kit. I know it's not exactly OE but in the winter when the cars frozen it makes life a million times easier, not mentioning locking when away from car etc.

Some of you will know how tight for space the MK1 doors are, which proved a pain when finding somewhere to mount the solenoid. Finally found a good location which gives me enough room and doesn't compromise the doorcard. With some bending of the wire and fiddling it was finally working. Got to do the other side later in the week then thread through all of the wiring. At one time the car had an alarm which means it's already got the LED blank in the dash, so I'll locate the LED to go there. Once all of the wiring and electric windows are working again I'll get new door membranes and clean up the inside of the doors but for now they are just loose, plus I still have 5 sheets of soundproofing left to fit - no point sticking them to dirty doors.

Anyway here's a little pic

Small update here guys, been really struggling with an issue where my hazards and indicators aren't working off the stalks. Silver lining is that I've had chance to remove any old wiring bodges and repair it so it's all factory again, using proper heatshrink and loom tape etc. For some reason I have an electric window on the drivers side but a manual winder on the passengers side, I've repaired the electric window which is useful but still got to source the reg and motor the other side.

Giving a break from the wiring I decided to test fit the door cards to see how they looked, I need to clean up and lay down more soundproofing on the inside of the doors before I put a new plastic membrane but I couldn't help myself dry fitting them! I also fitted the single lamp front grill, looks a million times better than the debadged on that was fitted originally but sadly I forgot to take any pictures… got some of the doorcards though!





Inside looks like a bombs gone off but it looks worse than it is, once the indicator/hazards issue is resolved then I can put it all back together and put the front carpets in!



Anyone else just love wiring?

Still no further with the indicator issue yet but decided to remove the badges on the back so I can refurb them using Chortles badge kit. They are all prepped just waiting for replacement foils as mr postman bent them enroute and they are ruined I also thought it would be a good time to replace the "M3" style rear lights and refit the originals. Someone had tinted them with red spray but I managed to strip it off with thinners and polish up, they look really good now.

Loving the original lights !

Someone had put some Crystal M3 lights on mine, within a month I had sourced and put back to stock 

The MK1 got some more goodies this month, some new rubber gobbins and seals from Classic-VW and new mats from our own GavB95!

So much more to do but nothing that can't be done with a little bit of time, can't wait to actually get out with the roof down with the weather being how it is! Still haven't had time to fix the indicator plug issue but quickly washed her down and put the new bits on this evening. Here are a couple of pics of the progress!

New stuff, always looks good  

My lock grommet is probably in need of replacement, are they easy to fit or a pain in the …?

Yeah the old one had gone solid and started to crumble away - in fact half of it was missing, letting in water. It was very easy to change though, just pop the board cover off the back of the tailgate, undo two chunky philips screws and the lock barrel drops out, pull the old seal off and put the new one one. Literally took 5 minutes and looks a million times better.

Oh that's ok then, I know on some cars they can be a PITA!!

Apologies for a late response, but your door cards look great   

Matt

hi darren, i have same colour car and am on lookout for a nice interior, i can get hold of a lower dash panel for you if you still need one, im in rochdale, pm me or phone me 07807427451

Finally got the indicators working! The plug on that went into the back of the fusebox had corroded when it had once leaked and was losing connection when plugged into the box, but when you tested the current and wiring etc it was perfect, it was only when you removed the pin from the plug was it clear that it was corroded inside. A good blast of contact cleaner soak over a few days and poke around to clean it out, it's now working!! The washer motor wasn't working either, but I checked the motor and someone had bodged a Renault pump (with a rear washer jet pipe blocked with a rusty screw…) so I sourced a VAG single outlet pump and fitted that, so that's all sorted too. The old battery that was fitted previously was on it's way out so decided to get a nice fresh Bosch S4 installed, the car is a weekend toy and only gets used every other day so it made sense to get a decent one. The good news is now that all the electrical is working, I can put all the interior back in and get the mechanical side of things back on track. Got my eye on some decent adjusable coilovers so will change all of the suspension parts like top mounts at the same time - the ones on it at the moment have definitely seen better days!

Looking great there dude, i'll defeintely be picking up some tips from you for sorting out the interior!

Got some MK2 chunky stalks to fit this weekend, needs bit of modification on the plastic column cover but shouldn't be a problem.

Going to fit the door membranes in tonight so I can get the new doorcards in properly, thought I had a leak when it rained the other day but it turned out to be water dripping off the window runner and through the unprotected doorcard slot!

Popped all of the side trims on with new clips last night so they will hopefully keep attached instead of dropping off.