S
Sarge
Guest
How I rebuilt my A2
This is the story of My A2 (Shoby Car). In loving memory of my late Nephew 'Shoby' who sadly passed away at the tender age of 4, (You'll always be in my thoughts and in my heart dearest Shoby).
My brother had bought a new A2 for Shoby and he used to love it very much, being able to see out the windows perfectly whilst in his baby seat, this was perfect as he was often having to be taken for a drive in it, to get him to fall asleep, as he had some learning difficulties. The A2 became associated with him and I called the A2 'Shoby car'.
So, when my Lady indoors wanted a car, without a second thought, I decided it was going to be an A2!
I looked around but I didn't see one that appealed to me on the road, and to make it 'extra special', because of all the love that would go into it, I decided to look at one I saw online at a salvage dealer. I was careful not to buy one with any body damage on it because I know these are very hard to get repaired, as my brother had experienced a 3 month wait to get a knock fixed in the rear wing at an aluminium specialist body shop.
Finally, I saw this car and thought I could make a nice little run around from it as I really liked this car, with three main reasons being 'Shoby car', it being an all aluminium, and all the personal work that would go into it, making it three times as unique to me. The online pictures showed it was fire damaged inside with it starting under the dashboard causing it to melt down, together with lot of other areas of damage, basically the complete inside of the car looked destroyed.
After taking a look it from salvage yard pictures/description, I went down to the dealers to ask the prices for the wiring loom. I was quoted £433 for the 'Main Loom' which runs along the sills and under dashboard, all other parts would come from used spares sources. After factoring it into the costs, I thought I'd go to buy the car and get on with the job.
Off we went to Gloucester to see it, and after a light examination of the car, I paid for it, eagerly taking delivery a few days later. The project had begun, I made a thorough examination around it, listing what I needed and then went on my merry way down to the stealership with car details in hand, to order the main Wiring Loom. What I didn't know was, I was in for a massive shock! as it turns out, the wiring loom I was quoted for was for one of the smaller ones under the bonnet and NOT the Main loom which I asked for and needed, this main loom would now cost me a staggering £3200+ !!...WHAT?!
The dealership had got it wrong, very wrong, and now had caused me a massive problem!. I got home to collect my thoughts and see what my next step would be.
I called other dealers and they either told me they didn't sell the part or quoted me the same price!!
SO, I was left with the car on driveway and no real way out, to make matters worse, I had also paid for and bought a set of sports seats, door panels, and dashboard from a spares place costing me over £800 for these items.
Having thought about it a little while, I decided I had no choice but to get on with the clean up and see how the search for a used petrol main loom goes. Mine being Petrol, and sods law seeing to it that I would only have access to Diesel wiring looms at scrap yards, meant that I was in for a long wait. The search for the parts began.
At one point, out of desperation, I decided to travel many miles and extract a loom from a Diesel A2, and then rewired my car back together only to realise that because of the mistakes in the Audi's diagrams I was unable to make the modifications to the petrol requirements, so after a long few months of waiting and searching I finally found a A2 petrol car. After a 3.5 hour drive we arrived at the yard and saw that the car was totally mint!, it had a 'destruction order' according to a big car salvage/recycling centre in Pool Bournemouth, I pleaded with them to sell me the car as a whole but they said they can't due to this 'destruction order'.
This little car was apparently abandoned, and it was sitting in a corner all shy and immaculate!. I couldn't believe that I was going to have to smash a window to get into this car as they had no key!, it seemed such a shame, and I even found myself resisting smashing the car to get into it, I felt hurt (wouldn't make a good thief). In the end, left with no choice, I ended up breaking the drivers door window, & managed to open the driver door BUT the rest of the doors were deadlocked!.. bloody heck, this was going be hard work getting the complete loom out of this car and the salvage yards employees were having a laugh (I swear they were taking bets, and I can tell you we weren't the favourites), thinking it wouldn't be possible to get what we wanted out, with car being dead locked, winter weather, raining as hard as I've ever remembered it raining, VERY strong cold winds, oily wet open grounds, which would cause us to slip up into the gooey oily muck several times over while we were working in this weather, my friend Ricky, who came along for support, & I had under 4 hours to get it all done before they closed on a Friday! .
Luckily the impossible comes quite naturally to me and we focused and dived straight in. During the work, we were told that as the weather is so bad they want to close early, therefore our given time frame was further cut, despite making prior arrangements about this with management, who had left by then, and the staff left behind weren't interested. So on we went, having worked so VERY VERY hard without any breaks or even a chance for a drink, we, being totally exhausted, dehydrated, hungry, and with a 3.5 hour drive to get back home yet to come, managed to get what we needed, interior out, dash out, fittings out, then wiring extracted from it and from rest of car, roof lining out, carpets out and other bits that needed removing. Of course having to take out anything that came in the way .... which, as you can guess was everything!. Anyway proved the betting sods wrong didn't we ..lol
After getting back home, I ended up in bed for a few days, suffering from exhaustion! after the rest, I got straight back into my car and stripped the dashboard out ...yet again... in order to remove the 'diesel' wiring that I had fitted in previously.
SO, this time, again from a bare shell inside, I surgically rebuilt my car back up, stage by stage, starting with stripping down the dashboard again, fitting all the heavy, awkward and precision mounted new wiring under it all, rewiring the complete inside of the car, repairing the wiring looms which lead into the engine bay, single wire by wire!.
The new loom didn't have the wiring for the rear electric windows that are fitted in my car, so had to build and incorporate looms for this. Replacing/changing ALL the interior trims, and also changing all the door trims - rear door trims also needed modifications as mine has electric windows in rear and the new trims didn't. Fitted complete roof lining, carpets etc (VERY long list).
The 'Shoby car' is now ready and I'm SO very proud of it, including the standard of my work, and I very much hope to look forward to years of pleasure from him ...I hope.
Anyway if your still awake you will be able to see a few pictures below.
I would like to thank Shoby for his precious time with us as he will always continue to be an inspiration to me.
Thank You
SARGE
This is the story of My A2 (Shoby Car). In loving memory of my late Nephew 'Shoby' who sadly passed away at the tender age of 4, (You'll always be in my thoughts and in my heart dearest Shoby).
My brother had bought a new A2 for Shoby and he used to love it very much, being able to see out the windows perfectly whilst in his baby seat, this was perfect as he was often having to be taken for a drive in it, to get him to fall asleep, as he had some learning difficulties. The A2 became associated with him and I called the A2 'Shoby car'.
So, when my Lady indoors wanted a car, without a second thought, I decided it was going to be an A2!
I looked around but I didn't see one that appealed to me on the road, and to make it 'extra special', because of all the love that would go into it, I decided to look at one I saw online at a salvage dealer. I was careful not to buy one with any body damage on it because I know these are very hard to get repaired, as my brother had experienced a 3 month wait to get a knock fixed in the rear wing at an aluminium specialist body shop.
Finally, I saw this car and thought I could make a nice little run around from it as I really liked this car, with three main reasons being 'Shoby car', it being an all aluminium, and all the personal work that would go into it, making it three times as unique to me. The online pictures showed it was fire damaged inside with it starting under the dashboard causing it to melt down, together with lot of other areas of damage, basically the complete inside of the car looked destroyed.
After taking a look it from salvage yard pictures/description, I went down to the dealers to ask the prices for the wiring loom. I was quoted £433 for the 'Main Loom' which runs along the sills and under dashboard, all other parts would come from used spares sources. After factoring it into the costs, I thought I'd go to buy the car and get on with the job.
Off we went to Gloucester to see it, and after a light examination of the car, I paid for it, eagerly taking delivery a few days later. The project had begun, I made a thorough examination around it, listing what I needed and then went on my merry way down to the stealership with car details in hand, to order the main Wiring Loom. What I didn't know was, I was in for a massive shock! as it turns out, the wiring loom I was quoted for was for one of the smaller ones under the bonnet and NOT the Main loom which I asked for and needed, this main loom would now cost me a staggering £3200+ !!...WHAT?!
The dealership had got it wrong, very wrong, and now had caused me a massive problem!. I got home to collect my thoughts and see what my next step would be.
I called other dealers and they either told me they didn't sell the part or quoted me the same price!!
SO, I was left with the car on driveway and no real way out, to make matters worse, I had also paid for and bought a set of sports seats, door panels, and dashboard from a spares place costing me over £800 for these items.
Having thought about it a little while, I decided I had no choice but to get on with the clean up and see how the search for a used petrol main loom goes. Mine being Petrol, and sods law seeing to it that I would only have access to Diesel wiring looms at scrap yards, meant that I was in for a long wait. The search for the parts began.
At one point, out of desperation, I decided to travel many miles and extract a loom from a Diesel A2, and then rewired my car back together only to realise that because of the mistakes in the Audi's diagrams I was unable to make the modifications to the petrol requirements, so after a long few months of waiting and searching I finally found a A2 petrol car. After a 3.5 hour drive we arrived at the yard and saw that the car was totally mint!, it had a 'destruction order' according to a big car salvage/recycling centre in Pool Bournemouth, I pleaded with them to sell me the car as a whole but they said they can't due to this 'destruction order'.
This little car was apparently abandoned, and it was sitting in a corner all shy and immaculate!. I couldn't believe that I was going to have to smash a window to get into this car as they had no key!
, it seemed such a shame, and I even found myself resisting smashing the car to get into it, I felt hurt (wouldn't make a good thief). In the end, left with no choice, I ended up breaking the drivers door window, & managed to open the driver door BUT the rest of the doors were deadlocked!.. bloody heck, this was going be hard work getting the complete loom out of this car and the salvage yards employees were having a laugh (I swear they were taking bets, and I can tell you we weren't the favourites), thinking it wouldn't be possible to get what we wanted out, with car being dead locked, winter weather, raining as hard as I've ever remembered it raining, VERY strong cold winds, oily wet open grounds, which would cause us to slip up into the gooey oily muck several times over while we were working in this weather, my friend Ricky, who came along for support, & I had under 4 hours to get it all done before they closed on a Friday! .Luckily the impossible comes quite naturally to me
and we focused and dived straight in. During the work, we were told that as the weather is so bad they want to close early, therefore our given time frame was further cut, despite making prior arrangements about this with management, who had left by then, and the staff left behind weren't interested. So on we went, having worked so VERY VERY hard without any breaks or even a chance for a drink, we, being totally exhausted, dehydrated, hungry, and with a 3.5 hour drive to get back home yet to come, managed to get what we needed, interior out, dash out, fittings out, then wiring extracted from it and from rest of car, roof lining out, carpets out and other bits that needed removing. Of course having to take out anything that came in the way .... which, as you can guess was everything!. Anyway proved the betting sods wrong didn't we ..lolAfter getting back home, I ended up in bed for a few days, suffering from exhaustion! after the rest, I got straight back into my car and stripped the dashboard out ...yet again... in order to remove the 'diesel' wiring that I had fitted in previously.
SO, this time, again from a bare shell inside, I surgically rebuilt my car back up, stage by stage, starting with stripping down the dashboard again, fitting all the heavy, awkward and precision mounted new wiring under it all, rewiring the complete inside of the car, repairing the wiring looms which lead into the engine bay, single wire by wire!.
The new loom didn't have the wiring for the rear electric windows that are fitted in my car, so had to build and incorporate looms for this. Replacing/changing ALL the interior trims, and also changing all the door trims - rear door trims also needed modifications as mine has electric windows in rear and the new trims didn't. Fitted complete roof lining, carpets etc (VERY long list).
The 'Shoby car' is now ready and I'm SO very proud of it, including the standard of my work, and I very much hope to look forward to years of pleasure from him ...I hope.
Anyway if your still awake you will be able to see a few pictures below.
I would like to thank Shoby for his precious time with us as he will always continue to be an inspiration to me.
Thank You
SARGE
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