Mars Red Y plate GTI

Hi All

First post as have just got myself a Y plate Mars Red GTI unseen off eBay. Non runner that has been in a barn for ten years…bit of a bank holiday moment of madness that I may have paid over the odds for but had a Mk1 itch that needed scratching….plus it was only 5 miles away and appears to have lived in the area (just outside Southampton) for all it's life which is quite nice. Not new to the VW game as had a heavily modified Polo GT brought up to full G40 spec, including engine, with a nice set of 15' BBS RS's (which I now regret getting rid of) for ten years which I did the show scene with for many years before it finally departed six years ago. It's partner in crime was a C plate Mk2 Golf GL auto that was family owned from new and finally pensioned off at 264k. Had a bright yellow Exige in the middle but a rethatch on the house was the end of that but the Mk1 joins a VAG stable of a white Scirroco GT TDi (Mrs's), an A6 3.0 Le Mans Avant (family wagon) and Bora 130 TDi that's just clicked over 232k (daily driver of which I've done over 200kof those).

 First impressions of the Mk1 are that it's pretty solid although is going to need some serious work on the interior (already got a replacement set of matching seats in the garage). It's got some tasteful late 90's mods - TSW alloys, Mk2 chin spoiler, eyebrow spoiler and Supersprint exhaust - but my aim is to return it to standard save maybe some nice BBS splits and a set of coilovers. Still waiting for my trusted mechanic to get it running (I can cope with taking working engines apart and putting them back together but getting the to work in the first place is a black art to me I am afraid) so not got it home yet - two weeks and it's killing me! ;0)

Paint work is far from perfect with a fair number of panels suffering from the odd bubble or two. The fullness of time will hopefully see a proper restoration and respiratory but for now I was to get it back and running and shake off ten years of spiders…which leads me onto my question. It's Mars Red and whilst not fully Mars Pink, I am looking for views on the best way to bring the paint that does remain back to it's former glory. My simple mind says a good clean, clay bar and the out with the T-Cut but before I do that and make a horrible mess - is there a better route I should be taking?

Hello and thanks!

Steve

Good luck! I've got an A6 3.0 Quattro TDi Avant too

Welcome to the forum, sounds a nice find and good base project. Get some pics up for us to drool over!  

Ref the T-cut, if the whole car needs going over which I'm guessing it has to, then you're best off with a DA polisher and polishing compound. This will be the most gentle way of getting it back to its gleaming red.

I guess a new DA kit is going to cost in the region of £150, so you could consider putting the car in with a good detailer and get the whole car detailed for about £200 or so. You'll see how well the whole car can look then.

Good luck and keep us updated  

Welcome to the forum mate.

Welcome….good to see another one being brought back to life…  

Thanks all - got a replacement red stripe interior, headlights, steering wheel and some nice 14' BBS RJ's (thanks Trailsraider on here) - just need a duckbill and she'll be back to standard(ish). @ Hairyarse - did some thinking about the detailing idea but decided half the fun was going to be in doing it myself…so machine polisher is winging it's way to my door as I type…and a Haynes manual…and she thought this was going to be a cheaper alternative than the Porsche itch I also have!  Actually that's not true - need the car back from the garage but at least that's giving the Mrs some time to make the difficult decisions about all the junk she's been storing in my garage for the last three years since my last toy moved out!  I'll get a picture or two of it nestling in it's ten year barn slot over the next few days!

Stick some pics up when you can matey,

Smudger

Ok…Golf pictures are from the eBay advert and don't do it justice…it's much worse in person In the barn….



Out in the open….





It's got an engine and vaguely looks like a DX…



Interior needs some work….





As we're VW fans thought I'd include a couple of my G40..





and because I'm a tart and a show off…the Exige…


 

Love a G40. Interior does need work by the looks of the pics as you say but nothing impossible.

Good luck with it.  

Good luck with your new project. Looks great.

Time for an update - is a mod able to move this to the Projects section please…think this is going to be a long process! ;0)

Time flys with these things doesn't it - owned it over 7 weeks now and still only managed to drive it half a mile!! So - the car was recovered from it's ten year barn nest to my local garage. It's one of those independent local jobs in a shed with a couple of petrol pumps out the front with a random brand that charges £2 a litre. Richard, the owner, has been looking after my other cars for the last four or so years so know him reasonably well and as it's a half mile from home it was a no-brainer. Since he's had the Golf I've discovered he normally has at least one classic in there that he's working on and is a dyed in the wool Ford man himself with a Mk1 RS2000, 2 Lotus Cortina's and 3 Zephyrs at home.

Anyway, he was tasked with getting it running and getting it an MOT. Quick run through an MOT amazingly revealed not too much wrong - replacement headlight, clean of windscreen washer jets and some welding to the rear left chassis leg and a CV boot was all that was required. A new fuel pump, plugs, HT leads and dizzy later and he had it going but only on three cylinders. At this point he was off to Le Mans for a few days and I had a couple of days off so she came home for the first time:











Everything inside had a lovely covering of mold:





So to work….first thing was to strip out what interior there was, clean and fit the new interior I had got from eBay and re-fit the under dash trays which had been removed for some reason. A full day of cleaning, swearing and sweating later and it's now looking pretty good - although not entirely convinced I understand how the rear seats attach properly (strange bar on one side - should there be one on both sides and how do they attach to the chassis?) so they are just "in place" at the moment. Steering wheel also still needs changing from Seat one - have removed the giant red center for now which make it look less offensive. Pics to follow once I get those final bits finished.

Next was the outside so started with removing the bumpers, grill and Mk2 Golf front splitter to discover I was missing the lower grill trim and that the rest of it was in need of a re-spray. Passenger side grill surround is also broken (missing big bit of the circle and the screw mounting points are largely gone) so that's another thing for the list. Sorry for picture quality - these ones were taken on my very old iPhone:





Also discovered this - appears to be another connector doing nothing in the front drivers side bumper near the indicator - anyone got any ideas?:



Heat gunned the wheel arches and bumpers:





Next was swapping over the drivers door (which had had an argument with a scaffold pole) to a new one that had come with the car. Whilst the new one doesn't have a massive dent in it, it does appear to have been sprayed with all the rubbers and ancillaries on it so not convinced it's a vast improvement. Also discovered that the doors stay strap has been pushed / pulled out of the chassis at some point…which is why the door doesn't stay open. More welding then but on the bright side it's the only really nasty bit I've found thus far.



That said, there was a nasty old Armor door plate on the passenger side which, when removed, I discovered this underneath…even nastier.



Oh well - long project and all that. I'll rub down the door plate, spray it and stick it back on for now.

Next was the paint work and trying to get a degree of shine on it - another day of hard slog with the clay bar, machine polisher and three hundred gallons of polish and paint renovator and I think we've getting somewhere…although there's a long way to go and it'll never be perfect until I get it properly resprayed.

Got a new lower grill trim and rubbed them all down along with the wiper arms and center caps for the BBS's I've treated it to. Garage is currently a very smelly spray booth:



Onto the engine and to see whether we couldn't get it onto all four cylinders. Whipped out the injectors, gave them a wipe down and swapped them around between cylinders and hey presto, we've got all four running….at which point it had generated enough heat for the radiator to reveal it has a leak on the top left mounting point…grrr! One step forward….one step back.

Still no insurance (probably should get that sorted given the quote was only £118!!) but it does now have a tax disc (which bearing in mind it is unlikely to get driven on the road in June was probably a bit of a waste of money at this stage). Still - it's all progress and we're inching closer to getting back on the road after ten years.

Most of this thread is before / during pics but process is ongoing - still spraying and waiting on a new duckbill for her - but will get some 'finished' pictures posted as soon as everything comes together. However, in the meantime here's one of her pushed out of the garage this morning:


 

That is cleaning up nicely.  I am not to far away from you in Christchurch.

Yep - about half an hour away - I'm in Wellow just off the M27 / A36 junction (well, a few miles off). My parents live in Ashley Heath so even closer! Are there any meets down this way - seems to be Berkshire or Bristol as the closest.

No meets this way yet, but I think we should maybe start one.  Myself and Richie VR have been trying to meet for a while.  He is only down the road in Bournemouth.  Maybe we should all try and arrange something for this area…

The connector doing nothing is the outside temp sensor, why do you feel the need for a rusty old pile of tin when you've got that exige?

butleraw said

No meets this way yet, but I think we should maybe start one.  Myself and Richie VR have been trying to meet for a while.  He is only down the road in Bournemouth.  Maybe we should all try and arrange something for this area…

I'd be game - need to get it up and running and build some confidence that it won't leave me by the side of the road before I contemplate the massive 20 mile journey to your part of the world though!  

abfmk1 said

The connector doing nothing is the outside temp sensor, why do you feel the need for a rusty old pile of tin when you've got that exige?

Ahhh - thank you. Should it be mounted somewhere sensible in the bay / bumper carrier rather than rattling around loose?

Sadly the Exige departed the driveway about 3 years ago when my house needed re-thatching; an eye wateringly expensive process that soaked up the £20K I sold it for with little in the way of change.

The Golf is a belated and supposedly cheaper replacement…although not certain it'll work out that way.

the cars looks awesome, nice to see another mk1 making it back onto the road.  

This forum is dangerous….

As you can see from the pictures, the interior it came with had seen better days and I managed to secure a replacement red stripe interior before the car had even arrived. However, the replacement wasn't as good as I'd hoped; the frames were quite rusty and the material was as faded as the one in the car (unsurprising really as they are probably both the same age, give or take). It'll do for now but the ones that have come out of the car have really good frames and I reckoned I could get them refurbed and potentially flip the red stripe material over so that

Sent the pictures to a four local upholsterers and got no reply - obviously the recession has ended. Chased one of them on the phone yesterday and they reckoned £200 - £300 per seat and the same for the rears!! Hmmmm - that could be nearly a grand then.

Having read through a few of the project threads on here I was bitten by the "how hard can it be" bug and so started taking apart the worst of the seats and now we have this:



However, not certain where that's got me.

Might still take it to the upholsterer to get them to do this one and then see what the price / results are like and then get the rest done. I'm hoping the price might be more reasonable if I do the disassembly and they do the bit they are good at - namely the sewing bit and putting it back together nice and tightly. We'll see.

butleraw said

No meets this way yet, but I think we should maybe start one.  Myself and Richie VR have been trying to meet for a while.  He is only down the road in Bournemouth.  Maybe we should all try and arrange something for this area…

indeed we should…

the outside temp sensor you have floating about has a small bracket on the inside of the bumper to clip into.
if isn't broken.
which it normally is.
hubbadubba lives in swanage too