new to me 1992 golf Cabriolet

Yes , so i cleaned the throttle buttlerfly and linkages and lubed them a bit. The action is a lot smoother now.
I changed the oil and the pressure came up to 5 bar with cold engine (no more engine oil light). I used 20w50 with a mobil 1 filter. Ill soon change the engine oil again. I dont know how well that was taken care of before.

Now i noticed a leak at the plastic (?! Plastic really?)  inlet manifold. Ill change that out ASAP for an older style. Couldnt find one , yet.

Yes , so i cleaned the throttle buttlerfly and linkages and lubed them a bit. The action is a lot smoother now.
I changed the oil and the pressure came up to 5 bar with cold engine (no more engine oil light). I used 20w50 with a mobil 1 filter. Ill soon change the engine oil again. I dont know how well that was taken care of before.

Now i noticed a leak at the plastic (?! Plastic really?)  inlet manifold. Ill change that out ASAP for an older style. Couldnt find one , yet.

AllMacs said

Yes , so i cleaned the throttle buttlerfly and linkages and lubed them a bit. The action is a lot smoother now.
I changed the oil and the pressure came up to 5 bar with cold engine (no more engine oil light). I used 20w50 with a mobil 1 filter. Ill soon change the engine oil again. I dont know how well that was taken care of before.

Now i noticed a leak at the plastic (?! Plastic really?)  inlet manifold. Ill change that out ASAP for an older style. Couldnt find one , yet.

Yep I hate those frigging fargin daffodil plastic flanges with a passion,,,,,,,,,, The sooner the better as if they leak they are a nuclear reactor meltdown at a moments notice as all the strain is on the other bolt and plastic under pressure is similar to Moby Dick,,,," There She Blows."

Retrofitted the plastic manifold to an old style aluminum one. I also wantes to replace... or better verify that the thermostat is present and then replace with a new one. It seems that it more elaborate. Since the power steering bracked is right there. I suppose that all has to come off first? Or is there a way around that?

AllMacs said

Retrofitted the plastic manifold to an old style aluminum one. I also wantes to replace… or better verify that the thermostat is present and then replace with a new one. It seems that it more elaborate. Since the power steering bracked is right there. I suppose that all has to come off first? Or is there a way around that?

Nope, you have to remove the Bracket, but it isn't that hard as you can remove the 2 10mm bolts off the back of the pump to bracket.

Remove the long pivot bolt the adjuster and the 2 bolts on the pan, and it can swing out of your way.

If you ever run across an older Diesel Golf as in 79-82 they all had the same metal t-stat covers.

With those plastic parts it is best to buy a spare and carry it in the boot….Better to have available and on hand than to be stranded till daybreak.


Here is a how do I flush my Radiator thread where I have pictures of taking that bracket off.
How I change out my Water Pump | Volkswagen Owners Club Forum

Great info , thank you im working myself slowly through the issues. ( didnt think there were so many)

AllMacs said

Great info , thank you im working myself slowly through the issues. ( didnt think there were so many)

The joy's and surprises of ownership that and POS
Previous Owners Screw-ups.
The Red Badge of Courage with stitch cluster is next.

I found a broken vaccuum hose . It was behind the manifold. There are two connected to the manifold. I dont know where this one may connect to. I have an AC . I wonder if there was a tee to the reservoir in the hood? 
Do you guys know maybe?

Well that would be an issue, it goes over to the charcoal filter on the left front fender inner.



Kammy's site is a wealth of information… She's a really nice person…

Get to know….. WWW.CABBY-INFO.Com

Iam on the cabby site actually a lot. I saw that diagram on there. The hose youve marked is one of the two connected to the back side of the manifold. There is a third hose ( the broken one i pictured) in that same vincinity and i dont know where it goes to. 

I've never seen a third hose….

If you have cruise control don't get those hoses confused with your engine vacuum hoses.

You also need to peruse the HVAC as they have a separate hose for those servos.

If they moved the Vacuum off the check valve that attaches to the Throttlebody front as there is a line that goes from there over to a "t" with a check valve, then up to the Vacuum Balls and over to the feed through to the HVAC fresh air vent.

then are you missing the hose that runs from the windscreen washer bottle to the nozzles, as that could be your 3rd hose.

I didn't have time to mess with the vacuum system today.
Today I actually had to fix the alternator. When I checked the temp gauge in the cluster I cleaned the contacts of the plug with my fiberglass pen. I noticed that there are some instrument lights not working. When I put the cluster back in I also noticed that the speedo gauge was first bouncing and then stopped working all together. So next I have to figure out if the speedo cable is broken stripped or the receiver is broken or stripped.

When I am dinking with a new to me car, I always replace the bulbs first time.

The bouncing the speedo, be sure that your cable is clipped to the back of the cluster.

Carefully take the left or right side vent out.
see: Cold Hands\ Whistleing Vents? | Volkswagen Owners Club Forum  

On removing them with out breakage.

Worm your arm carefully behind the  cluster and verify that your cable is fully seated and clipped.

I have how to repair your flaky water temp gauge see the link in my signature.

I have a question about the dash cluster . Ehich side is plus for the light bulbs? I want to install LED's i have build. I could use the multimeter, but it would make it a lot easier knowing before.
Update: knowing that pin 2 of the voltage stabilizer is ground helped me to figure out which pin of the lights is plus.


The cluater cable was securely in . Ill take the cluster out again today and verify the cable is nor rounded and that the gauge gear works.

Well the Bulbs sockets are one side is ground and the other is +. I think IIRC the side nearest the speedo is ground, but using your meter to pin 2 of the lamp pads is the easiest way.  If they don't light up one way, then turn them around.

While I went the LED route in 2004 with make my own, I  would buy them off the interweb.  The Biasing resistor is Crucial use what is recommended IIRC it was 640Ohm 1/4 watt.  But what I noticed is that they all burned out within a week of each other and I said the heck with it and went back to Long Life 3watt incandescent bulbs but I used sockets for them out of a Saturn, Honda, or Isuzu.  You can pick them up at the Breakers, then look up that cars instrument warning lamps…(higher wattage).  That was about 2006 and I haven't had issues with them since….  besides, with LEDS you can't dim them….They stay bright even at lower dimmer settings….IMHO

What I wound up doing is use 3 white 5600k LED in series, I added a 3.3ohm resistor.  think the instrument cluster sees 10v, so that would be alright.

As far a the speedo cable is concerned, I found out that the shaft of the cable broke inside the speedo receiver. It looks like someone tried to glue it. I think Ill try that again.
I have a spare cluster, but no spare speedo cable.
Something to fix down the road

The lights aren't powered off the 10V stabilizer they are from B+ battery.

The 10V stabilizer powers only the Fuel and Water guage, and if it goes wonky can cause the tach to read about 500rpm low.

I ordered a new speedo cable is there any advice on how to get the remnants of the old driveshaft splines out? Remember its bren glued. I have a spare cluster . But I am not sure if it works ar all. It has a working speedo , though

I would suspect that you have to use dental picks and gingerly remove the bits.  I have used heated straight pins and melted them in to plastic, remove the pin and place a wipe of super glue then the pin back in the hole and it usualy holds well enough to remove bits.

I suspect a photo of it would be better for us to see.

Your response made me realize that i didn't illustrate the problem clear enough.
I am talking about the hexagon shaft that goes into the odometer receiver (see photo of my spare part)