Shoestring7's tdi

Enjoying your thread.
Good luck with the car, I expect a TDI 90 is nice to own even though the seats have a slight daring colour :cool:.
 
Two things:

1) Car supermarket in Slough - I take it you mean Trade Sales on the Bath Road going west from Slough?

2) I would strongly suggest you get the oil pump chain and tensioner plus lower sprockets sorted while it’s all apart for the cam belt - see threads on this subject, yours is due at 128k miles and iffy service history.
 
Two things:

1) Car supermarket in Slough - I take it you mean Trade Sales on the Bath Road going west from Slough?

2) I would strongly suggest you get the oil pump chain and tensioner plus lower sprockets sorted while it’s all apart for the cam belt - see threads on this subject, yours is due at 128k miles and iffy service history.

Yes, that was the place. I'd bought a Golf tdi from them earlier in a slightly odd grey import spec. and I think the A2 was similar. It was silver with climate and a plastic steering wheel. Trade Sales was a huge place that got bigger every time I went as they took over neighbouring lots. You found the car you wanted and then hung around until you were spotted by a 'sales' person, who scrawled 'taken' on the windscreen and then took you to a Portacabin where you signed up and paid.

Thanks for the tip about the oil pump drive.
 
I've done a bit of googling and there's a garage not far away run by an ex-VAG tech that's well recommended. They were good enough to return my call on Christmas Eve, so in the new year I'll talk to them about a cam belt change and thermostat, plus anything else that's sensible while they're in there.

Like a lot of these cars, they look pretty good from a few metres away - this after not much more than a quick going over with the power washer to remove the moss.
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The bodywork much better than it has any right to be; just a few minor scuffs. There are some marks on the roof that probably are bird or leaf droppings that were left too long:
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I had a quick go with some cheap clay I've got; always difficult in cold weather. It lifted lots of contaminants, but not the black marks:
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The rest of the bodywork can wait for some decent Bilt Hammer clay to arrive this week - not all clay is equal.

After the wash I risked a quick spin to get some heat into the brakes. The water temperature was still only hovering around 75 degrees on a day where ambient temperature hovered around 2.5 - 3 degrees.

My performance mod (removing the driver's side mat..) made a big difference, and once warm(ish) we were able to get up on our toes a bit.

And the heater started blowing hot air which was a surprise, until I got back and learned about the electrical auxiliary heater. Clever A2.

Not so clever was the appearance of the engine check light.
*sigh*
 
The last time I updated this was before the Christmas break, so I had to wait until work stared again before much more progress could be made on the major mechanical tasks, and the car is now booked in to a local garage later this month. Things weren't helped by the arrival of Covid in the Shoestring7 household; my partner has got it pretty bad, and my son (who to his chagrin was staying with me for the weekend) and I found ourselves facing 10 days isolation which turned into 20 days when he tested positive a little later on.
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We've got no workshop space or even hard standing, so there's a limited range of tasks to be undertaken when the weather's bad.

We did take the seats out and spent a couple of days cleaning and feeding them:

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Back together again:
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One task that looked sensible was to clean the earth strap. It was a bit tricky: the electrical connector was stiff and access to the bolt isn’t easy, but with a little perseverance we did the job:
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While we (I include my son in this - we’ve got a few father/son projects on the go) we’re under the bonnet I took a peek at the EGR valve area;
afd9fe2e139948a427f425fbc0e998a1.jpg


There’s a lot of oil in the area which doesn’t look good.

We tried to get access by removing the heating duct, but hit a snag. I’ve seen some suggestions that the two torx fixings under the scuttle panel can be accessed without removing the wiper. It doesn’t appear to be the case here;
d5fb3a3b6915e36d4caad92ca3973619.jpg


So Plan B involved taking the wiper off. While the 16mm nut came off easily the wiper didn’t budge. There’s not easy leverage to be had, so it looks as if I’ll need a small puller to make any more progress.

I’ll post on one of the EGR threads but if anyone reads this; tips welcome!


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Park the wiper at the top of its travel to take the arm off without a puller - don't know why, but removal in the vertical position has worked every time for me, where often it won't budge when horizontal.
 
While we (I include my son in this - we’ve got a few father/son projects on the go) we’re under the bonnet I took a peek at the EGR valve area;
afd9fe2e139948a427f425fbc0e998a1.jpg


There’s a lot of oil in the area which doesn’t look good.

We tried to get access by removing the heating duct, but hit a snag. I’ve seen some suggestions that the two torx fixings under the scuttle panel can be accessed without removing the wiper. It doesn’t appear to be the case here;
d5fb3a3b6915e36d4caad92ca3973619.jpg


So Plan B involved taking the wiper off. While the 16mm nut came off easily the wiper didn’t budge. There’s not easy leverage to be had, so it looks as if I’ll need a small puller to make any more progress.

I’ll post on one of the EGR threads but if anyone reads this; tips welcome!


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Hi Charles, Try this on ebay at £5.99
Ami
 
What DA polisher did you buy? It's on my birthday list :)

It was a Meterk bought on Amazon for about £80-. There are plenty more expensive but this seems to do the job and looks robust enough for an amateur. We used Macquires compound and polish (Halfords were as cheap as anywhere) and there are loads of videos on YouTube to learn from:
Dual Action Polisher Kit, Meterk Random Orbit Car Polisher and Buffers 1200W Car Polishing Machines 6 Variable Speeds Orbital Sander Machine Soft Start 150MM Base Detachable U-Handle


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It was a Meterk bought on Amazon for about £80-. There are plenty more expensive but this seems to do the job and looks robust enough for an amateur. We used Macquires compound and polish (Halfords were as cheap as anywhere) and there are loads of videos on YouTube to learn from:
Dual Action Polisher Kit, Meterk Random Orbit Car Polisher and Buffers 1200W Car Polishing Machines 6 Variable Speeds Orbital Sander Machine Soft Start 150MM Base Detachable U-Handle


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Thanks. I will check it out ?
 
The puller arrived at lunchtime today.
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Which is just as well, because that wiper was FT and not going to shift without a fight. At one point I worried it was going to destroy the Chinesium puller, but eventually with the liberal application of penetrating oil it freed.

The scuttle panel was a worry also, it looks pretty brittle and has also probably been on the car for 15 years.

So after and hour or so we ended up with access:
0d99eddc49d33d4405d7271bffa7164f.jpg


It didn’t take long for my young assistant to remove the EGR, which actually looked fairly clean;
5b4e8f1230043d610531da1990b9e4b0.jpg



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The problem is this next component, the one with what looks like a vacuum feed and an oily witness to something going wrong:
7aa8928fc0e536050d6ec5d97f29cd49.jpg


Can someone tell me what I’m looking at?

It’s an ATL motor.


Charlie


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The problem is this next component, the one with what looks like a vacuum feed and an oily witness to something going wrong:
7aa8928fc0e536050d6ec5d97f29cd49.jpg


Can someone tell me what I’m looking at?

It’s an ATL motor.


Charlie


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Anti shudder valve removed
Oily Egr valve with diaphragm still to remove in photos
 
My son Marcus has written an explanation on how he disassembled the Audi’s climate touch controls and replace the worn buttons. He's only 17 but studying motorsport engineering at college so knows which end of the spanner is which - certainly more than I did at that age. He's also stuck with me in Covid isolation.

"First I disassembled an old Audi A4 climate control unit, to get the buttons from. The buttons on these are the exact same size as on the A2 however they do not have the soft touch finish and are slightly darker but they should last longer.
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We decided it would be easiest to push them out from the back instead of trying to pry them out from the front. This was a fairly simple task, you just need a long T6 Torx bit. I removed all the visible screws on the back of the unit. There are clips at the top which I just pulled open. Once inside there is a PCB which is attached to the front cover, a few more screws then that comes off too. The front plate has two flat metal contact strip things. These were riveted on, unfortunately i did mangle them taking them off, it may not have been necessary to remove them.

tempImage98OeXP.jpg
 
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Next was the task of pushing the buttons out, most were simple enough just using the same Torx bit as a poker. Some did need more force than others, I was trying to avoid damaging them as much as possible. The front faceplate did unfortunately suffer casualties in some places for the more difficult switches.
tempImageCnhySx.jpg


Once all of the switches were out I went out to the car and used a Stanley knife and self-tapping screws to remove the old switches trying to not scratch up the faceplate on the A2’s climate control unit. By screwing the self-tapper into the front of the switches you can easily pull them out with pliers. It was a simple matter of taking the old out and pushing the new ones in. The only one which gave me trouble was the auto button as it is made of two pieces, the front cover and the backing, I did just use the knife and gently pry against the unit's front cover.
tempImageIvtm64.jpg



There is a slight difference in colour and texture in the two but in ambient light it is hard to see."
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A bit more progress on the on the Shoestring7 tdi 90.

By the time we attempted the ASV/EGR clean for the second time the car had a better idea of what was required of it. So it didn't resist when we took the wipers off, the shuttle trim and the heater inlet.

The Anti-Shudder Valve came off and got a good clean, as did the link pipe:
IMG_4875.jpeg


IMG_4876.jpeg


The EGR valve didn't get the memo - the pipe under the EGR stumped us, and running out of time we ended up cleaning everything we could reach and buttoning things back up again.

Later on I popped up the road the long way to the supermarket for some essential supplies. The EML happily glowed all the way there, but when I started up again to drive home it had been extinguished.

I'll take that.
 
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