A JYE to behold & a project in progress!

[Chris B]

Hey All. It's been a while since joining and posting an intro thread. Here I want to document the process of hopefully bringing my recently acquired A2 up to scratch.

My aim was to find a car that I could press into service straight away as a back-up car to my Mk1 Scenic all-round daily, which urgently needs some TLC and would potentially leave me car-less for periods of time while I do the work (timing belt, paintwork repairs etc...). I was looking for a frugal, interesting, low tax, rust-resistant, non DPF/DMF 2nd car below £1000, and I found the perfect answer (maybe...?!)

After viewing, asking questions, and test-driving, it was evident this '05 223.000 mile A2 Special Edition was going to need work, some of which fairly urgently!

Though this was a departure from my need for a car that wasn't going to turn into another project as I have plenty of those already! I decided to ignore my common sense and go for it anyway as I felt it was unlikely I'd find another car in budget any time soon that'd tick the necessary boxes as well as the A2 does.

What I considered to be a fair price was agreed, and the previous owner kindly threw in a set of new Brembo brake discs & pads, a new handbrake cable (to replace a knackered LH rear one on the car), a set of 16" wheels & matching caps (albeit with broken-off clips which seems to be a given, but repairable, and I have a 3d printer).

He also got in touch with a friend (apparently a club member) and arranged for delivery that evening of a spare gearbox for £100 to go with the car. Thanks very much to said club member!

I drove the car 65 miles back home from Somerset, and drove it about for a couple of days which gave me time to assess the car and the problems I needed to sort.

Here's what I found to begin with. I'll edit the to-do list as I work through the items, and completed items will be in green:

The good bits:	Not so good bits that need fixing:
Gear change slightly stiff but precise & synchro strong (But --->)	Gearbox extremely clattery in neutral (foot off clutch)
Upholstery surprisingly good given the mileage!	Engine surging/hesitating slightly around 1 pulse/second at any revs when maintaining a speed. Worse when fully warmed-up. Falters badly accelerating at around 3500rpm.
Handles very well	Smoky/fusty smell inside (car had been mostly unused for a while which didn't help here)
Central locking works	Interior needs a deep clean throughout - (In progress)
Air-con works	Very harsh ride (horrific over potholes!) on the 17" wheels
Concert 2 works well, sounds great but CD temperamental	Creaky suspension bushes evident on first drive of the day over speed humps or cornering.
The soft-touch buttons aren't too far gone, but some areas sticky/worn	Handbrake at limit of travel (L/H cable collapsed)
Rebuilt wiper arm already installed	Glove box lid & hinge pins missing
Good service history, and on it's 4th timing belt --->>	Now due another timing belt replacement ASAP
Headliner not saggy, but dirty and scuffed, so will probably need re-upholstering anyway, as I'm sure any attempt to clean it will ruin it!	No record of oil pump chain replacement - Urgent
	Broken dipstick
	Melted front sidelight lenses
	Fuel flap & alarm switches finnicky
	Rear bumper damage and poor DIY paint repair to left corner
	Roof paint issues covered over with rattle-can flag design
	Intermittently no heat from CC unless cold enough for aux PTC heater (probably sticking air distro flaps I expect - can hear actuator hunting for position)
	Scuttle plastic panel missing a chunk directly above gearbox and wiper spindle grommet missing (replacement on the way)
	Black bonnet fitted by previous owner following damage to original.
	Minor corrosion blistering in a couple small corners of bodywork
	Steering wheel leather surface worn away and faded (fair enough for the mileage!)
	Driver-side headlight levelling servo dead.

So, just a short list of things to work through then

I've already been busy cracking on with the jobs in the order that makes the most sense for me given circumstances/budget/free time etc. I'll add new posts below of what I've been up to very soon.
Cheers everyone, and yes, I might be slightly mad (or just a glutton for punishment...!) I welcome & look forward to your thoughts & suggestions, but please bear with me if I don't always reply immediately.

 

[Bordos]

Hello

It quite a list of "to do" bits

Are you going to fix this all by yourself or put it into a garage ?

 

[Chris B]

Hi @Bordos I'll be doing all the work. I couldn't afford to outsource repairs even if I wanted to. The only jobs I let a garage do is tyre fitting/balancing and sometimes wheel alignments if I'm not happy I've got it close enough myself.
Exceptions would be rolling road or ECU tuning if the opportunity/need presents itself, and maybe full re-sprays - though again, it's unlikely I'll ever have that sort of money spare.

 

[Bordos]

Hi @Bordos I'll be doing all the work. I couldn't afford to outsource repairs even if I wanted to. The only jobs I let a garage do is tyre fitting/balancing and sometimes wheel alignments if I'm not happy I've got it close enough myself.
Exceptions would be rolling road or ECU tuning if the opportunity/need presents itself, and maybe full re-sprays - though again, it's unlikely I'll ever have that sort of money spare.

So there is a lot o work in front of you

There are several very helpful guides here (i.e. for oil pump chain replacement) - and many experienced owners

 

[Chris B]

Well it's been a little while getting round to posting an update. Much spare time has been taken up with resolving starter motor and power steering issues on the Scenic, and various other things which have cropped up recently. You know how it goes!

-I'm currently in the middle of deep cleaning the last of the seats (Passenger front).
-Thanks very much to Simon, fellow A2 owner (unsure if a club member), who I picked up a nice in-tact scuttle panel from on 21st May. That will be getting fitted soon.

The following few posts will be the jobs I've done so far since buying the car to bring things up to date.

First off, I fitted a nice new dipstick with an actual end on it, so I could be sure the car had some oil in it before going any further, I bought Maxgear part number: 27-0759 for just under £15. Fit and quality seem very good, so I'll consider that a bargain.

Next was to hunt down the large 8 legged git I'd spotted crawling up the A pillar while driving the car home days earlier from Somerset:

Sadly, the attempt at avoiding injury during removal failed, so RIP to the spider who was put out of it's misery. As I'd already taken the back seats out to find the Arachnid, I decided to continue stripping out the interior, as a flippin' good clean of all upholstery and trim was needed:

Having got all the carpets out, the front seats went back in and airbag wiring reconnected, as I needed the car to be usable for the time being.

The previous owner mentioned that he'd had to put the original seats back in before selling, as he'd had other seats in the car. I wonder what seats would've required these "modifications" to the rear seat brackets?

 

[Erlingtheyounger]

Well it's been a little while getting round to posting an update. Much spare time has been taken up with resolving starter motor and power steering issues on the Scenic, and various other things which have cropped up recently. You know how it goes!

-I'm currently in the middle of deep cleaning the last of the seats (Passenger front).
-Thanks very much to Simon, fellow A2 owner (unsure if a club member), who I picked up a nice in-tact scuttle panel from on 21st May. That will be getting fitted soon.

The following few posts will be the jobs I've done so far since buying the car to bring things up to date.

First off, I fitted a nice new dipstick with an actual end on it, so I could be sure the car had some oil in it before going any further, I bought Maxgear part number: 27-0759 for just under £15. Fit and quality seem very good, so I'll consider that a bargain.

Next was to hunt down the large 8 legged git I'd spotted crawling up the A pillar while driving the car home days earlier from Somerset:

View attachment 108951

Sadly, the attempt at avoiding injury during removal failed, so RIP to the spider who was put out of it's misery. As I'd already taken the back seats out to find the Arachnid, I decided to continue stripping out the interior, as a flippin' good clean of all upholstery and trim was needed:

View attachment 108947
View attachment 108948
View attachment 108949
View attachment 108950

Having got all the carpets out, the front seats went back in and airbag wiring reconnected, as I needed the car to be usable for the time being.

The previous owner mentioned that he'd had to put the original seats back in before selling, as he'd had other seats in the car. I wonder what seats would've required these "modifications" to the rear seat brackets?

View attachment 108952View attachment 108953
View attachment 108954

I’d bet on TT seats?

 

[Chris B]

The drivers seat in the kitchen ready to be dismantled and deep-cleaned:

The mould on the elastic strap got treated with mould killer prior to a good scrubbing during wet-cleaning::

This was my first clue that some foam repairs & reinforcement were going to be needed:

After a 2 hour session of wet extraction cleaning, I had the backrest done. The water is just from the backrest!

Next for the base. This was a huge improvement, though the fabric has a few worn areas which show as lighter shades where the light coloured threads are more exposed. Still, that the fabric has survived this well after over 200k and 18 years isn't bad at all, I reckon. The upholstery on many cars seats is in tatters by 100k!

And what came out of it:

 

[Chris B]

I’d bet on TT seats?

You're probably right. He mentioned the wheels he'd fitted were from a TT, so makes sense the seats were too. Fortunately, @Clackers sorted out some cover trims for me (mine were missing, along with glove box lid), which will hide the extra holes nicely ;-)

 

[Chris B]

I didn't get photos during cleaning the rear seats, but they got similar treatment, including dismantling the base assembly from the frame to enable a full clean-out and checking of the release mechanism.
I was shocked to see that Audi's solution to attaching the lower plastic release handle to the horizontal bar is cable ties/zip ties! Seems like a very bodge-tastic idea. I wonder if that's one of the reasons I've spotted so many posts about broken seat release mech's? That, and the obviously brittle plastic of the upper backrest pull-tab, which I bet is very prone to breaking free from the sprung locking rod, especially if pulled up with a fraction too much force.

Next job was to repair the drivers seat base foam. it had broken apart severely on the outer bolster, but had also split all the way around the edge, where it bears on the raised plastic of the base unit.
Three of the listing wires had ripped their way through the foam, and needed bonding back in place and additional reinforcement so they stay put to keep the fabric tight.

Having removed the hog-rings and removed all loose crumbly foam, the wires were pushed back into place, and what remained of the foam was bonded back together over them with contact adhesive applied by brush:

Strips of denim from an old pair of jeans were cut and bonded in place to reinforce, leaving gaps for the hog-rings:

For the other side of the seat, the wire hadn't ripped all the way out, so I came up with another solution, which would avoid the need to undo yet more hog rings (if I hadn't already...), and I believe this will be more than durable enough. I did the same to the glued side too, as a "belt & braces" measure.
I marked out areas on the underside where the foam doesn't contact the plastic base. Here I would locate a wire on the underside, to use as an anchor point to tie the listing wires down using cable ties threaded through the foam and looped between the two wires.

Here's how it looked on top before tensioning the cable ties:

And underneath. Cable ties marked with the red arrows. I positioned the reinforcement so there would be no contact and risk of noise between the metal wire, the cable ties and the plastic seat base. There is a recess in the base in these side areas, but I bent an arch in the wires (green arrow) to give clearance to a thin web of plastic in the base in that spot (which had also cut into the foam over years of use):

 

[Chris B]

For the front cross-wise listing wire, I used a similar solution with cable ties, though strategically threaded them through the polystyrene block, which gave them a good anchor, without need for extra wires. As these cable ties would potentially rub & chafe on the base pan, they got a strip of fabric bonded over them:

Next, I had to re-construct the outer bolster. Though there was only a small split visible on top, the inside was heavily hollowed out from wear & tear.
I started by cutting the bolster open from the rear, all the way forward enough to get back to solid foam. All inner faces were sliced back with a long sharp utility knife blade until I had a solid basis to bond new pieces of cut foam in place:

On top, all the damaged foam removed, leaving as much original foam in place as possible to retain the shape and density. I kept all cut-out areas rectangular to simplify cutting and fitting new sections of medium density yellow upholstery foam which were trimmed to shape & thickness:

I used aerosol contact adhesive for this part of the repair. The "flap" propped open here while the adhesive flashes off. I didn't get photos of the pieces as they were bonded in, but it was done with one smaller piece for the upper section, and a long skinny piece for the lower half which comes down to the dotted line marked inside the flap.

All bonded back together and the top trimmed flush:

Underneath, the channel which rests on the seat base exists again!

To finish off, I glued a layer of approx 10mm thick lower density foam to give the bolster a consistent surface feel, and add a bit more volume to fill the cover fabric nicely. The edge is trimmed away where the cover seam rests:

 

[Proghound]

Superb stuff I think you might end up becoming the resident seat foam repair guru

 

[Chris B]

Lastly, before refitting the cover, and reassembling the seat, All slightly splitting & vulnerable areas were reinforced with more denim strips bonded on with contact adhesive:

Before repair:

After (ish). This was the first day in a while that I actually got some decent sunlight through the window, and a few discoloured areas are visible in this photo which I couldn't see while the fabric was still wet before, so I gave it a second session of extraction cleaning, this time with more heavy duty detergents!

Seat is now reassembled and back in the car as of 10th May. At the same time, I refitted the front & rear foot well carpets (each having had the same treatment as the seats, and each piece needing about 2 to 2.5 hours of extraction cleaning until it was "good enough". If I didn't draw the line somewhere, either I'd be deaf, and/or evicted from my flat (why do carpet/upholstery washers always have to be so noisy!!)

The drivers seatbelt was also refitted after cleaning and drying. Here's what came out after just a couple of minutes! I used a moderate dilution of Flash all-purpose for this along with the old nail brush. It had a second go in fresh solution, followed by thorough rinsing, running through a towel to get the worst of the water out and hanging to dry for a day. I had a plastic spring clamp at the spool end holding the belt fully extended, and the blue peg marks the last 500mm or so which didn't need to get wet, since that last bit never extends beyond the b-post trim:

Quite handy that the A2's carpets are in separate sections. They all fit in the kitchen quite easily for cleaning! This is the only photo I took doing the carpets. The mini power-head was helpful getting some of the deep down loose stuff out on the flatter areas, and the crevice tool for all the tricky bits.

More to follow soon, as I've got to get cracking on wet-cleaning the front passenger seat before it gets too late in the day to inflict 90 odd decibels on the poor neighbours!

 

[Chris B]

Superb stuff I think you might end up becoming the resident seat foam repair guru

Cheers mate haha! I'm not in any hurry to do seat upholstery too regularly, as my fingers/joints/tendons would be in shreds with the fiddly force needed unclipping/refitting and tensioning the fabric back into place. Just doing the foam or fabric repairs isn't too bad, aside from avoiding getting high as a kite on adhesive fumes!

 

[Chris B]

Well, since last post, have been busy with the front passenger seat. Now all done and re-installed. It came up lovely, clean & smelling fresh after pulling a lot of brown muck and silt out of it.

While some repair to the foam was needed, it wasn't nearly as bad as the drivers side. Outer bolster area was split from below but enough of the foam was in tact that it just needed bonding back together. Minor splitting continued around the front, again bonded together and then reinforced with strips of fabric all around the "trough" the same as for the drivers seat. On top, only the outer listing wire had started to lift out of place, so this got the cable-tie treatment to keep it secured down.

Before the strip and clean:

Had to get a little creative to keep the split open while gluing:

After repair and back in the car: (Spot the annoying dark patch that only became visible out in sunshine... )

 

[Chris B]

While the seat refurb was on the go, I decided it was a good time to service the gear lever assembly before the centre console and then the seat went back in the car.
I'm pleasantly surprised how sturdy the design is compared to many (Toyota, I'm looking at you!). Also the design allows all parts to be dismantled fully & easily which is nice.

The old grease had gone a bit thick and there wasn't a lot to go around; The "push down to unlock reverse" was stiff, and the pivot ball was covered in rubber debris from the silly rubber boot disintegrating which won't help lubrication!

There seems to be a lot of disagreement generally on the best grease for these mechanisms, but as I had a tub of Keenol lithium grease to hand, I decided to give it a go, and am very happy with the results. I'd considered silicone grease, but I tend to find it doesn't have much "staying power". Also, I gave red rubber grease a go on the reverse lockout sliding bushes to begin with, but it was much too thick and made it sluggish.

Aside from the gearbox issues which I'll be sorting out later, the gearshift is now much slicker than before!

 

[Chris B]

All of the centre console parts got a thorough clean and are now back in the car, looking and feeling much nicer (apart from the front lower side panels, which are covered in sticky soft-touch which I'll have to sort out soon).

There's not much to show in the way of pictures, but here's a sample. All parts were in a similar state before starting.
Note the "modified" wiring for the completely missing ashtray:

The magic ingredient for cleaning all the trim parts so far is a household spray called "Elbow Grease". The stuff is amazing, and can usually be found in some hardware stores and Poundstretcher type shops, as well as online. For many jobs, I dilute it 50/50 in a spare spray bottle, as it's more than potent enough for most jobs, and makes a great pre-wash spot-cleaner for upholstery too.
It's very effective on grease & dirt, or as here, used neat on the upper console panels, very good at removing layers of black shoe polish that had been applied by a previous owner, along with the soft-touch coating it was embedded into. Used with a soft nail brush and lots of rinsing in between, it brought these back to clean non-sticky black plastic.

On the left half is the dull, sticky shoe-polished surface, and on the right is the cleaned area: (ya know, I'd wondered why I got a dark mark on my left trouser leg after driving the car before taking the interior out... )

The cubby tray (and a couple other areas) is a bit patchy where some of the soft-touch has worn away, but as it hasn't gone sticky, I'm going to leave it be for now, as it's easy enough to remove later. I may well make a removable felt or rubber insert for it so stored items don't slide and rattle about.
Also, post-cleaning off what I suspect was more shoe-polish and hand-residue from the gear knob, it looks a bit sad. I have a new Chinese replacement on the way, though if I'm not happy with it, I may see if I can renovate the original.

 

[Chris B]

So far the only other trim parts that I've cleaned up & refitted are the drivers side front inner sill trim and upper & lower B post trims, as well as the upper B post trim for the passenger side, so I could fit it before the seatbelt went back in.

The sill trims especially was looking very tatty. Not only dirty but heavily scuffed and dull, so after cleaning, the sill and lower B post trims got a "special" treatment.
Before:

Please if anyone is tempted to try the following (the results are worth it imho) practise on an unwanted part first, and please don't blame me if it goes wrong!

After thorough cleaning & carefully trimming away (under magnification) any burrs from the edge of various scratches and gouges with a sharp scalpel, the plastics were given a very careful blow-over with a propane torch (yes really!).
This is a method I've had good success with in the past at bringing back dull or scuffed nylon or polypropylene without need for temporary fixes like "back to black" or paint which will scrape/flake off, but has to be done VERY carefully and needs some practise, and it's crucial not to rush, using only quick (but direct) sweeps of heat, and stopping often to let the part cool. A blow torch seems overkill, but I find less risky than a hot-air gun, as you need to get enough heat into the surface quickly, without letting the part get hot enough to risk it deforming. With a heat gun, I find you have to dwell too long.
This process reduces & blends the scuffs, and brings back the original colour without affecting the original texture.

Here is the result. not perfect, but a LOT better. (The yellow tinge isn't visible in person. I think that's an effect of the sunlight and my camera.)
Ideally I would've used a torch with a wider flame rather than the standard plumbers torch, as it can be tricky to avoid patchiness. At the front where it curves upwards, I see in the sunlight it's a bit patchy, so I may give it a bit more love later. No I haven't got as far as cleaning the door cards yet!

 

[Chris B]

Here's a to-do list of interior jobs still to do.
Cleaning:

• Boot floor & side carpets
• Door cards
• N/S sill & B post trim
• Rear sill trims
• Fwd centre console side panels
• Dash centre vent/cup holder assembly (plus fit new foam seal)
• C/D pillar and boot lid trims

If the car smells nice and fresh having done all that, then great. It's vastly better already. If not, then I may have to consider removing & re-trimming the headlining, as that may have copped a lot of the smoke or whatever the smell is. Alternatively I may try a careful cleaning in situ (likely to be a disaster) or buy an ozone generator to see if that does the trick. There are some grubby marks and a scuff in the middle though unfortunately, but I may live with them unless I fancy pulling out all the trim panels to get it out...

Other interior jobs (not counting modifications I may do at a much later date):

• Fit replacement gear knob
• Track down a glove box (wanted post incoming)
• Buy an ashtray (don't smoke, but it'd fill the gap and every storage place counts!)
• Repair the CD player (replacement laser pickup on the way from China)

More posts to follow covering other jobs I've already done., for anyone who I haven't bored stiff already!
More pressing though has been sourcing a replacement tyre (soon to be two so I have a matched pair). After getting the passenger seat and seatbelt plugged back in Sunday night, I took the car for a test drive, as it'd been stood for nearly 2 weeks. Unknown to me, the rear offside tyre must've been quite low on pressure before setting off.
A mile or two later after only 30mph roads where the handling had been normal, I was noticing the steering felt a bit less precise, but wasn't sure if I was imagining it. By four miles, and a short stretch of dual carriageway, I was very sure something was wrong, so pulled over to check the tyres.
I discovered the tyre was blazing hot and the shoulders had done a good impression of a F1 car's tyres after a hot lap.
The problem with these low-profile tyres is they don't look much different when low on pressure!
I assumed I must've picked up a nail after setting off, but it turned out to be leaking at the bead/rim. Once moving, the sidewall flex will have accelerated the loss of pressure.
Sods law, of the four tyres, all recent with lots of tread, of course it was the more expensive Sumitomo tyre that got destroyed, rather than one of the two budget "Aptany" ones on the car . I'd never heard of that brand before either.

New Falken ZE310 about to go on, £85 lighter. Getting one for the other side on Thursday. Speaking of light... These ex TT wheels definitely aren't! I weighed it after cleaning it to take to the tyre shop, and it clocks (with tyre) at 18.8Kg! (less the 80g of balancing weights )
I'm hoping the 16" wheels I got with the car will be a bit lighter if/when I decide I can afford to refurb them and buy 4 tyres to go with.

Took the opportunity to check the brake assembly, and condition of the suspension while I was in there. The brakes are in great condition (assuming other side the same) with lots of life on the shoes (tempting fate there, - I bet the wheel cylinder will spring a leak now I've said that!), though the drums are nearing end of life in terms of spec'd wear limit:

While in there I clocked the shock bump stops are in a sorry state, as are the axle bushes. There's a job to look forward to (not!)

Also, pleased to see the spring perches haven't rusted too badly. They do need a good clean-up and a good coat of rust protection though:

 

[Alan_uk]

Hi Chris. As a new comer to this forum you have provided some excellent postings. I think the upholstery postings should be in a How To thread.

How-to

How-to guides from our members

www.a2oc.net

PS The site search engine is not brilliant. Use google or duckduckgo and the site url as prefix. E,g,

site:a2oc.net space saver

 

[dj_efk]

Agreed really enjoying this thread!