HOW TOs - Cosmetic Related Bible

[Shady Pioneer]

Here is a list, a bible if you wish, of all things that users on this forum have put together, bundled and linked to in one place. The HOW TOs are linked so just click what it is you want to view and the HOW TO will open in a new window.


This is a work in progress so if anything is wrong, let me know. Thanks to Mew for helping me with code it's just a case of gathering all the cosmetic HOW TOs now. There will be one for Mechanical HOW TOs as well but that will be done later.


If you have a guide you've done yourself, PM me with it and I'll add it to this bible


Please note: This is a HOW TO Bible for HOW TOs that GolfGTI.co.uk members have made, not for outside HOW TOs as it's effectively stealing, so this will be filled up within time.


Exterior HOW TOs

MK3 Boot Struts as Bonnet Lifters by Shady Pioneer
Paint Brake Calipers by eightyeightmph
Remove Rear Bumper by Len
Remove Front Bumper by Len
Remove Rear VW Badge by Shady Pioneer
Remove Driver's Door by Vdubbster
Change Standard Rear Wiper to Aero Wiper by Guy


Interior HOW TOs

LED Heater Controls by markc123
Fit Electric Windows by Rmachines


Misc. HOW TOs

Retro-fit MK3 Key & Alarm Fob into a MK4 Flip-Key by eightyeightmph
Find Paint Codes & Colours by bulk66
Know What PCD You Have by Shady Pioneer

[Shady Pioneer]

Put together this little write up for using a pair of boot struts from a MK3 Golf as bonnet lifters. Costs the price you pay for the struts from a scrappy but that should be anything between £4 - £10. I paid £5


You'll need a 13mm spanner, to undo the bolts on a scrap Golf. You can make it easier for yourself if you take a flatheaded screwdriver to pry the back metal casing that holds the strut in place on the bolt. You'll see what I mean when you look at one. Obviously take the struts off, keep the bolts and washers for them too.


Now locate the following places on your Golf:


One next to the washer bottle:



One next to the air filter:



For these two above, you'll need 2 nuts for which will fit onto the bolts from the boot struts, and place them under the small gaps (you'll see what I mean when you're there). Screw the bolts in on both locations. Also to note, you'll have to pull off on either side a spongy type piece of material, easy to do, just pull it and it'll reveal the hole you need to use for the strut bolt.


One on the bonnet nearer the back:



The other is in the same location just on the other side


The last two you'll need to remove the bolts and replace with the ones from the boot struts. Also to note that you'll want to cover up the area with paint or something to stop it from rusting as it's bare metal under the original bolt.


You'll end up with this:



Oh and you'll find that if you look at where the boot bolts need to go, you'll have some sponge type material that helps soften where the bonnet goes down, they have a groove in them which conviently looks like the boot struts were meant to go on the bonnet in the first place

[Shady Pioneer]

Here's eightyeightmph's caliper painting thread...moved from the main site (as it will posibly get lost) and i will keep it here for us mk3 owners

Just thought I'd give it a go....

First I picked up a can of Halfords finest brake caliper (HT) paint. In red of course as I'm giving my valver that Anniversary look.

Pop the car up on stands ( I did one side at a time ) & drop the wheels.
Grab yourself a nice big wire brush or an attachment for your drill & have at it with the brakes.

NOTE: You will sneeze/cough/spit black if you don't wear a face mask!



I happened to have some painters masking tape lying about but any will do. Mask off everything that you don't want to paint, valves, pipes & disks being the obvious.



It says on the can that the paint is 'touch dry' in 15-20mins. As it was flippin' cold I had to double that & at one stage resorted to placing a heater near the brakes.
Anyway, as I had done a blinding job cleaning up the calipers but had no primer I'd put a thinish first coat on.



Please excuse my naff camera phone pics. I can assures you the paint is bright red not barbie pink!

Once this was dry (both front & rear) I put the second coat on.




It started too look pretty good, after it had dried I was happy with the finish & voila.




With my filthy wheels back on I think it gave the car the 'right' look!



Thank you for your time!

88's VW Emporium!

[Shady Pioneer]

End result:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mark_croston/3326304695/


The heater controls are lit by 1 bulb, with a green filter. It illuminates the centre dial properly, and trys to do the oute controls by a horrible bit of plastic. The dials themselves are clear so will light up in any color you like. I have not yet done the dials - these use green plastic so your options are green, purplish blue with blue LEDS or extra work to put LEDS of your choice in the actual knob. The way I did it the dimmer still works.

I used 20kmcd white 5mm LEDS. I added 1K resistors to reduce the brightness (I had these from a previous project, pre-wired). Other tools: dremel, soldering iron, wire, small bit of PCB, 5mm drill, superglue, hot melt glue, white paint (with small brush). Buy your LEDS from http://www.phenoptix.co.uk/.

First, get those controls out. Remove the ashtray and prise off the heater control panel. There are 2 screws at the bottom of the ashtray area and 4 in the heater controls. Get the ashtray / switch panel out of the way. Now the fun bit: remove the multiplug from the fan controls. Remove the plug from the illumination. The 4 control cables are clipped to the heater contols with around the force of 10 tigers. Prise the clips off one by one, taking care not to snap the plastic of the heater controls. Then remove the steel wire from the control arms - label the 2 for air direction (my temp one was blue, and therefore easy. Now you can come back inside. Didnt take any piccys here  .

You should end up with:


Take the white hood off - this has the bulb / green filter in it. Remove the clear plastic.

Basically, we are going to add a number of LEDS to light the dials directly. I added them to these locations:

Red X for LED. Green is where I dremeled a bit to allow the light to spread.

The 4 leds which line up with where the acrylic light guide used to be (around the central control) are sanded flat and glued in. The others shine directly onto the faces, so I sand them flat and add several coats of white paint (or tip ex) to the front of them. This reduces the effect of hot spots - the normal led would leave a vey bright spot on the dial. To help the light spread, I painted areas around these LEDS white.

Once you have all the LEDS in, cut a small bit of PCB (prototype with the tracks and holes) and shove it into where the bulb used to be. Solder 1 wire to each track (use a meter in the car if you need which is +ve), and modify the white shroud to fit past the LEDS if needed. You could just wite it into the car, but this stops you cutting the loom. Join up all the wiring and secure to the back of the shroud.


 Test  .


In the great haynes tradition, refiting is a reversal of removal. Only much more annoying. BTW, when you have the heater contols out, you have awesome access to the back of your headunit to tidy up the wiring and stuff.

I need to do another set to iron out some kinks and get enough phots to do a decent tutorial. Expect ths post to e edited over the next couple of days - a few diagrams would not go amiss.

[Shady Pioneer]

Lift hatch and under the door seal there are 4 bolts (10mm). These are hidden by plastic covers that just need to be levered off, only gently as they wil fly off!
Then under the bumper there are 3 bolts, one in middle and each corner. They are on little extention pieces from the back leading edge.
With all 7 bolts out all you have to do is pull backwards.
Best way I found was to grab the bumper by the arch and yank it back one side at a time.

Pics:

This is two of the upper bolts to show their location.


The next two photos are of two of the 3 bottom mounts.




This is the old side mount fixed to the new bumper.


This is what the side slide mount goes onto on the car.

[Shady Pioneer]

Well removing the front bumper was dead easy! 5 bolts and it was off!

The most difficult bit was getting the fog lamps out!

I do have pics, but due to other problems atm not got round to posting them so watch this space

First a couple of the 3 top bolts and their location.





A note here about the grille.

Mine is a bit different coz its a mesh replacement one.
But the thing to watch on all of them is the 2 outer clip in fixings.
You may need a torch to see them properly and when you locate them use a thin flat bladed screwdriver to push into the clip and it should pop out ok.

Next the bottom bolts.



There are 2 either side like this one in the photo.
Then in the centre section 3 more.
All located below bumper/number plate.

So the sequence for the front bumper is :-

Bonnet up and remove grille.

Indicators and for lights.

Top 3 bolts

Bottom 5 bolts

Oh yeah forgot the inner wheel arch! There are 2 prise out fixings in each side!

Then you just have to pull the whole thing off its side mountings. I pulled one side at a time from the front grabbing the wheel arch edge.
Then the other side.

[Shady Pioneer]

I've read threads on this in the past, such as http://www.pocketrocket.ca/switchblade_key.html but not sure I've seen one on here so this is how I've spent the past two days;

Heres the finished article, the MK4 flip-key fob next to the original MK3 Key & SIGMA alarm fob




First of all get yourself an adaptop blank so that you can get a copy of your key cut that will fit the MK4 fob & get it cut.

Next get yourself a MK4 fob, I picked one up on ebay, make sure you get the 2 button one rather than the 3 button.

Next take them apart, the MK3 one comes apart by inserting a coin into the join & twisting it, the MK4 slides in apart down the middle then the lower part is prised apart, the top half is held together with a screw hidden behind the VW badge.



The key is 'sprung' so take note how it comes apart so you can put it back together;



The important bit out the MK3 key, the factory imobiliser chip;



This is the the two circuit boards out the fobs, the larger is the SIGMA which I need to make fit in the MK4 fob (right)



Inside of the fob, take a dremmel & do a bit at a time



This shows the SIGMA board next to a modified one next to the MK4 one, I replaced pars of the board with wire to make space.



Switch between the fob & the circuit board taking off what you can until it fits snug.



Next up grab the imobiliser chip & clear space in the top of the fob for that



Make sure it fits together then its time to look at the buttons & getting it to light up!



The little LED on the SIGMA fob was in a different place to the MK4 fob, it also didnt fit the space so I took the LED off the MK4 circuit



Tested it & was glad to see it worked & was brighter than the SIGMA



Then attached it to the modified circuit & positioned it in the right place to shine through the original lense



After that it was just the small matter of getting the button to work.

The problem with this is the SIGMA only has one button which does on/off, the MK4 has one for each.



After scratching my head for a while I decided to just 'botch it', basically it was too complicated & not enough space to mess with the switches



Thanks to the rubber button press it looks OEM, you just have to push it in the middle for it to do anything, I also extended the switch inside so you push it just as if you were using a stock one.



And basically thats it, I tested it at every stage to make sure I hadn't fcuked up & it works a treat!

[Shady Pioneer]

Ever Wondered what your VWs paint colour is? Look up your paint code here:
You can find the paint code either on a sticker in the boot... It should be under the boot carpet some wear near the spare wheel or the best place to look is in the service book that should of came with the car on the front page...

failing what he said, you can also get the colour and code from a quick call to the main dealers parts dept after giving them your Vin number

L041 - Black
L90E - Alpine White
L94E - Oak Green
L97A - Diamond silver
LA3A - Mars Red
LA3G - Classic Red
LA3W - Red Spice
LA5E - Maritime Blue
LA5G - Pearl Blue
LA5T - Medium Blue
LA5U - Royal Blue
LA5W - Blue Lagoon
LA5Y - Helios blue metalic
LA6U - Capri Green
LA6V - Lhasa Green metalic
LA6W - Fresco Green
LA6Z - Calypso
LA7S - Stonehenge Gray
LA7U - Pearl grey
LA7W - Reflex Silver
LA9B - Cool White
LA9V - Brilliant Black
LB1B - Sunflower Yellow
LB1D - Mellow Yellow
LB1M - Harvest Moon Beige
LB2A - Sundown Orange
LB3Y - Colorado Red Pearl
LB4V - Samoa
LB5B - Aquarius Blue
LB5N - Indigo Blue Pearl
LB5Q - Speed Blue
LB5R - Deep Blue Pearl
LB5S - Blue Silver
LB5T - Steel Blue
LB5W - Pacific Blue
LB5X - Blue Spirit
LB6U - Mint
LB6W - Pine Green
LB6X - Alaska Green
LB6Z - Montana green
LB7Z - Satin Silver
LB9A - Candy White
LC35 - Titian Red Pearl
LC3L - Hot Chilli Red
LC3T - Indian Red
LC3X - Matchstick Red Pearl
LC3Z - Terracotta
LC4P - Purple Violet Pearl/Mulberry
LC4T - Twilight Violet
LC5F - Blue Graphite
LC5L - Mystic Blue
LC5P - Dusty mauve
LC5R - Marlin Blue
LC5S - Appassionato Blue
LC5U - Aqua Blue Perlescent
LC5X - Ink Blue
LC6M - Bright Green Pearl
LC6P - Dragon Green/Emerald Green
LC6V - Green
LC6W - Rave Green Pearl
LC6X - Baltic Green Pearl
LC7V - Blue Anthracite
LC7W - Papillion Silver Helios.
LC9Y - Luxury Black Helios.
LC9Z - Black Magic Pearl
LD1B - Yellow
LD1D - Double Yellow
LD1W - Wheat Beige
LD2B - Snap Orange
LD5Q - Shadow Blue
LD6S - Northern Green
LD6T - Electronics Green
LD6W - Venetian Green
LD6X - Reed Green
LD7U - Offroad Gray
LD7V - Silver Gray
LD7W - Platinum Gray
LD7X - Platinum Gray
LG3L - Red
LG5A - Vapour blue
LG5T - Dark Blue Pearl
LG5V - Galactic Blue Pearl
LG7V - Desert Wind
LG9R - Silver Arrow
LK5S - Riviera Blue
LK7Y - Storm Grey
LN5Y - Windsor Blue
LP3G - Flash Red
LP5U - Bright Blue Met
LQ3A - Monza Red
LR1V - Bolero Beige
LR1W - Birken Pearl
LR5U - Antibes Blue
LR5V - Fjord Blue
LR5W - Luna Blue
LR6X - Marais Green
LR6Y - Waterworld Pearl
LR7R - Cairo Gray
LR7T - Coucou Gray
LR7Y - Silver Atmosphere
LR8V - Nocturne Aubergine
LR9A - Campanella White
LW5Y - Bright Blue Pearl
LW5Z - Jazz Blue
LY3D - Tornado Red
R902 - Arctic White
LZ5T - Europa Blue Mica
LZ3N - Ruby Red Pearl
Z6U  -  Imperial Green

[Shady Pioneer]

If you're looking to replace your rear Volkswagen badge with a new chrome one, black one or Highline one, you'll need to remove the old one. It's only stuck on but needs careful prying out with a thin flatheaded screwdriver. Once you've got a good amount off to allow you to grip it or place your finger under it, then do so and pull it the rest of the way.


You'll most likely need to get rid of the residue left from the old sticky backed badge so clear it with some elbow grease


Once clean, take off the protective layer from the new badge's back then place into the recess on the boot. Below is an example of a black badge:


[Picture to come soon]

[Shady Pioneer]

First off:

1. Open the door

2. Remove door card

3. Remove the grey stuff covering the door

4. Re-connect the window switch, move the window down unit you can see two 10mm nuts through the gaps in the door skin. Once loosened this will allow you to feed the window out of the door (tilt it to one side and feed out)

5. Once the glass is out, remove the connector to the electric motor and then FIVE 10mm bolts holding the window regulator in. Oncve these five are out, the regulator can be fed out!

6. So now you have your regulator and glass out. Remove the loom completely.

Now you can get on to removing the door. They are heavy though, so removing this stuff will make it a bit easier!

If the door you have has the hinges on still, then leave the half on the door where it is. Minimal movement on a hinge make all the difference in the lining of the door!!



I - This is a small cap which when removed relealsa a 6mm bolt. Remove this on both hinges.

II- If you have the older hinges, then you will need to remove these torx bolts - 45 I think.

Before this though, you need to remove the stopper (III) using a 10mm spanner AND the loom. The loom twists to the left about 90 degrees and pulls out. Easy.

The door will just lift off once the 6mm bolt is out (if you have newer hinges)


A few notes

• The motor is on the regulator.
• The central locking feed to the lock will be tight (yes toit like a tiger) so you may have to heat it up to pull it off without breaking something.
• As for the lock, its easy enough. Make sure you have some good Torx keys/sockets.
• The rubber window seal just pulls off and can be pushed on other door.
• When putting the glass and reg back in, DO NOT tighten the five bolts holding the regulator in. Put the bolts in, but dodnt tighten them until the window will go up and down easily. If they are tightened and the window is not aligned correctly then the window will come down when you try and close it (because the window is not lined up with the rubber seal).