Fixing up 1994 bug

[tonysantacruz]

Hello. I've been a VW fan since I was 8 or so. It helped that my Mom and two aunts had VW sedans, heh.
Anyway, I wish I could have scored a 1980 or so bug, 'cause I learned how to drive in a 1984 one, but this one was the pick of the litter available here. I posted a few pictures in the "what did you do to your bug today?" Thread, but now I want to report how's the work going.

First of all, there is a lot more rust than I thought, but it's still in good conditions.

Removing the gas tank and the carpet, there was a hole between the trunk and the interior.

The hinge-spring of the driver's side of the hood is unattached, and now I know why. He's going to weld a few pieces of metal to fix it.

The floor is nice, though.

He fixed a few holes to the left of the pedals. Door covers had to go.

And the spare tire well is in a sorry state:

And today I went to the local parts store. It is known as THE VW parts store around here, and it shows. Place is packed all day every day, but I had time.

The haul:

The plastic thingy to keep the stick shift from jiggling, the hand-brake plastic thingy and cable, the glove compartment knob, the stick-shft knob, the little window anti-open thingy, an antenna, the engine band, wiper arms and wipers, engine covermlock, plastic thungy to keepmthe seat from jiggling, black interior panels -original-, door locks, little wodow open-close thingy, sun visor mounts, the side rails...all for 90 dollars.

I know I'm not close to done, but damn, I loved every minute of it.

[mark tucker]

yikes dat ones wusty better do some real good work so it dosent fold up on ya.new heater channels,new pans,etc.

[nbuscemi]

The EFI on your car is junk. Convert to carbs. Sent me all your EFI parts and I'll properly dispose of it. I'll even pay for shipping.

[tonysantacruz]

Work on the trunk has begun on earnest.

Water filtered from the top left side, in front of the driver, so that's why all the rust in in there. Changing the rubber seals ASAP.

I'm putting the wires into a much neater wire sleeve.

Should be done this week. Driving like hell during the weekend.
Upon checking the back seat, it turns out that it did have seat belts, but they were hacked off with what looks like pinking shears. My guy should have replacements soon.

[tonysantacruz]

Mechanic finally got to work today. He fixed the stick shift jiggling (replaced the funny named "cebollita" (little onion) and put the new parts.

Engine is out and the firewall is going to be looked at. The tin is going to be painted too and he's going to check the seals, wires, hoses, change oil, gearbox liquid and whatnot. There's also some rust under the spot where the battery is, so he's going to get rid of that, too.

There's a bit of braking fluid on the wheels, more caked on the left tire than on the right one. He'll check the seals (?) and see where the leak is.

Tomorrow he's going to show me the upholstery catalogue. I think I'm going to replace the sun visors: they are pretty ratty.

[tonysantacruz]

The upholstery guy should be done by Thursday, and the mechanic vowed everything's going to be ready by then. Today I bought more spares: fuel cap, oil cap (had them, but I want them new), the trunk, engine lid and doors rubber frames, rear seat belts, stereo lid, the wires for the things to pivot the seat, the things that keep the water out of the door when it drops from the window, the hoses for the heating system...they were out of sun visors, though. I also replaced the rear light covers, they were cracked.

At this point, the mechanic has had my car longer than I have, but it's coming along nicely.

Upholstery for the sests, with vinyl on the back.

Another view of the engine, dismounted while they paint the tin and the engine bay.

A slight leak. Any idea what causes it?

Looking good so far. And I have a possible line on the original steering wheel and maybe even an AC. Fingers crossed.

[67rustavenger]

The oil leak in pic's 3 and 4 are most likely from the valve cover gasket being reused. I have the same leaks at the moment and need to get new cork gaskets to correct the leaks. AC? What can't you take the heat? Lol.
Good luck
_________________
I have learned over the years.
Cheap parts are gonna disappoint you.
Buy Once, Cry Once!

There's never enough time to do it right the first time. But there's always enough time to do it thrice.
GFY's Xevin and VW_Jimbo!

[tonysantacruz]

[GArBa]

That rust in the trunk seems to have originated from a huge brake fluid spill.
_________________
cars:
'97 type 1 1600i
'14 type AA Seat Mii (sadly dead after 270.000 km)
'22 type C1 T-Cross
'23 type AC3 Hyundai I10 (VW no longer makes small cars!)
-------------------------
moped:
'82 Benelli Magnum 3v

[tonysantacruz]

I hadn't thought about the braking fluid spill, but it is a strong possibility.

Anyway, that's been taken care of and now for the progress report:

Ugly steering wheel is gone, I finally was able to get my hands on the replacement. Actually, two replacements. If I'm not about to be scammed by another seller in another site, I should have two perfectly fine 1990's wheels.

More on the disassembled engine. They cleaned it up with gasoline, saw that everything's working fine.

Firewall should be painted tomorrow.

I ordered a few more pieces, like the interior vents that go over the luggage place, around the back window. Also a new headliner, 'cause the one it has does not drive me crazy. And new seat-belts for the rear seats.

Finally, I was able to secure an AC unit from these guys:

. They say those work for the older carburated units with a few modifications (substitute the generator for an alternator (?...dunno, not a mechanic guy), with a 5% power loss and an increase in fuel consumption, but with high 90º's temps here from Spring to Fall, I got it. I should install it around August.

I chatted a bit with the guy at the AC place (Cotecma) and I mentioned The Samba as the place where I was getting my VW info and he raved about it, saying this is the site to be for VW heads. I 100% agree. He also mentioned another guy at Facebook, Aza Arriaga Another go-to guy for VW parts in Mexico.

[tonysantacruz]

Fuel tank wasn't that grimey and gets a fresh coat of paint, too.

[tonysantacruz]

So, it's finally done. The mechanic took a bit too long to complete the car -and it's still not where I want it to be. For instance, the rubber around the windows-doors is very crappy and needs to be changed again-, but it's quite nice.

Here's the engine bay with the AC fitted.

Quite lovely and it really helps with the warm weather here.

Now, I think either the AC guys or my mechanic didn't do a good job in placing the boxes with the wires where they should be. Any tips on what should be placed where?
Or even what is what?

[jhicken]

Looking good, keep posting more progress pics to this thread.

-jeffrey
_________________
Der Kleiner Kampfwagens

[hopkin]

It looks like at least one of your relays (not the AC ones) is not mounted in the proper place (Green Arrow):

Here's a picture of my '96 as a reference:

See if you can find some of these relay mounts (PN# 161937501B). Relays #30 & #80 in my picture are mounted in these:

They snap together like building blocks and can all be mounted together. I added one extra relay to my car using one of these relay mounts. You may be able to mount the two relays (Red Arrow in your picture) in the relay block.

You can see what I did when I added Relay #110:

BTW, I really like the color of your car.
_________________
1971 Super Beetle (past)
1971 Super Beetle (past)
1974 SunBug (past)
1972 914 (past)
1991 Honda Civic (Original Owner)
1996 'Open Air' Mexican Beetle (current)
2015 Golf (current)
2017 Dune Edition (daughter's car)

[Bashr52]

What's the deal under the dash on the drivers side? It looks like its all rusty in this pic:

and covered in bondo in this pic:

[jhicken]

Hope you are not just covering over the rust, it'll come back pretty quick and all this work will need to be done again.

-jeffrey
_________________
Der Kleiner Kampfwagens

[tonysantacruz]

Good eye. No, the rust was cut out and the trunk hinge was secured again. That part had a big rust spot due to either water seeping in or a very bad break fluid leak. From what I understand, the rust is gone.

I've had some issues today because the fuel gauge conked out and showed 1/4 tabk remaining when it was bone dry. Of course, the engine sputtered and died of thirst. I put 3 gallons of gas in the tank, managed to re-stsrt the engine, but I think it caught either a big air bubble or gas tank crud (which had been cleaned up last month) and stopped. Lost battery charge trying to stsrt it again, even with the "turn the ignition to prime the pump five-ten times" trick.

Tomorrow the mechanic is giving it a look see. Hopefully it's not that bad...

[hopkin]

You'll probably need a new float for your gas tank. Be sure to get the correct one from Antonio or Aza, the older ones fit but don't work properly.
_________________
1971 Super Beetle (past)
1971 Super Beetle (past)
1974 SunBug (past)
1972 914 (past)
1991 Honda Civic (Original Owner)
1996 'Open Air' Mexican Beetle (current)
2015 Golf (current)
2017 Dune Edition (daughter's car)

[tonysantacruz]

It was quite an odyssey, but the bug is back from the shop. They cleaned the injectors and it ran again, but the car lost power every now and then. So they checked the electrical and changed the wire from the sparkplug thing (distributor?) because the inner metal connector was kinda broken and had intermittent contact.
Now, they did something and the AC won't turn the compressor on. I'm going to take it to the AC shop on Monday to see what's what. I think the AC guys mucked something when they installed it and the mechanics mucked something from the AC when theynfixed the engine.

The mechanic also told me that the starter is kinda winged now, after overusing it on thursday trying tomrevive the car. It may need the carbon parts changed.

Will keep you updated.

[tonysantacruz]

I took the bug to the guys who installed the AC and they checked it out: there was a coolant gas leak and that's why it stopped working. Fortunately the work is under guarantee and it'll be fixed no cost.

Maybe tomorrow, perhaps on Wednesday, will be fixed.