My S2 coupe bit of a rebuild and repair thread.

[Tractor Dave]

I will check for you later

[steve briance]

The replacement copper pipe under your car looks like copper pipe. What is the preferred replacement is Kunifer pipe. Its an alloy of copper and Nickel which doesnt work harden and crack like plain copper might succumb to over years of vibrations.

Seeing how you have dealt with things so far, im sure you will but, you need to get it all off! 8mm inline compression joints will connect your newly laid kunifer pipe to the original steel pipes as they go up into tue engine bay. (as long as the steel pipe is clean and corrosion free there which is normally is)

[Tractor Dave]

Should be the same both sides.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[B5NUT]

Thanks, looks like I need to shape mine a little.

[B5NUT]

Few updates on the build.

Finally all the rear end parts have gone to the blasters, will collect them early next week.
1-blasting.jpg

All the rear end bolts have been either shot blasted or replaced and given a coat on 2k clear etch
2-bolts.jpg

Brakes shot blasted, painted and new seals fitted.
3-brakes.jpg

Pressed in the rear diff mount and then paint the alloy mounts in clear etch
4-mounts.jpg

Driveshafts blasted painted and rebuilt both ends
5-shaft.jpg

Brackets, washers and clamps all blasted and epoxy painted.
6-parts.jpg

Cleaned the plastic cover that covers the fuel filter, found it to be cracked and the holes that hold it in place to be damaged, it takes a special kind of cowboy garage to damage the cover like this as it's thick 5mm plastic.
7-cover.jpg

For the crack I've just used a hot knife to melt the two parts together again
8-cover.jpg

Next up is to clean & paint the prop and continue work on the underside of the car.

[B5NUT]

Cleaned the final suspension component of the underseal that had been sprayed on them. So after cleaning the track rods it would appear the rubbers are in need or replacement (if possible) so I'm looking around for replacement rubber components.

I do have a question. Should this joint move at all? both my track rod are solid.
1-track.jpg

[Jaswan]

Who did you use for the blasting?

Much appreciated

Jase

[B5NUT]

Company called Clear flow radiators in Darlington. Smaller parts I blasted myself.

[B5NUT]

So in respect to the tie rod joint, should it just rotate? As now that I've separated the two section they now start to rotate, but no side to side movement. Think I've also found a supplier for the rubber boots and I think I've found the bushes. I've got them on order and if they fit then I will post up the link to the parts I've used. If not the search will continue.

[jp_paul]

So in respect to the tie rod joint, should it just rotate? As now that I've separated the two section they now start to rotate, but no side to side movement.

yes, that's right. No movement unless you've loosened the nut and rotating enables adjustment of the tie bar length and hence rear track.

Will be good to know if your replacement boots and bushes do the trick. Are they rubber or poly bushes you've found?

[B5NUT]

They are rubber, trying to keep away from poly bushes.

[B5NUT]

So further updates on my rebuild. It mainly involves finding the the rust on the underside of the car and to be fair it's not that bad. However it also involves days and days of cleaning the rattle can schutz that has been pointlessly sprayed over the underside of the car, and the lower arms, brake lines, subframe, diff, heat shields, springs etc etc. Why you would ask a garage to do that sort of job with all the running gear on under the car I will never know, and even more so why a garage would agree to do such a piss poor job is completely beyond me!

So It's been almost a week on and off laid under the car with thinners cloths and various brushes to remove it all so I could find and treat all of the rust.

One of the only issues I found was a corroded bracket that holds a rubber stopper for the rear silencer, it was corroded away on one of the edges and snapped
1-bracket.jpg
So new bracket made & welded to the car
2-bracket.jpg

Few underside shots are after days of cleaning
3-underside.jpg
4-underside.jpg
5-underside.jpg
This was a before of the middle of the car, only just finished cleaning that today, and never got around to any pictures as yet.
6-tar.jpg

Over the last few days I've been looking at refurbishing the rear track rods. The bushes are not in the best of condition around the edges and the rubber covers are also starting to fail as the rubber is starting to crack. Could be due to the fact some idiot sprayed them with schutz and it's affected the rubber over the years!
7-bush.jpg
So for the replacement bushes I found that they are still used on the A8 D3 rear ARB coupling rods. The Lemforder part number is 2677601 or 2677701 comes in a handy twin bush pack You can also buy cheaper febi version, but at £21 for the OEM Lemforder version it was worth the extra few quid.
8-bush.jpg
For the dust covers I found this company and they sell as close as I could find the correct covers Vehicle Rubber Parts (ej-parts.co.uk) The item numbers are PL-2807& PL-2805.
9-cover.jpg
10-cover.jpg
Now just need to finish cleaning both track rods, get them painted and press the bushes in.

Received the rear parts back from the powder coaters.
11-powder.jpg
Coating has for the most covered my pot marked welding
12-powder.jpg

With the rear subframe comes another interesting issue, well it's interesting to me anyway! So we all know the bushes are NLA from Audi & other third party manufactures. So as Tractor Dave pointed out to me the subframe is the same as the front just with some extra bits welded to it! So why not use the front bushes for the rear. Now I know the fronts are M12 and the rear is M10 (answers on a post card as why the hell Audi did not use a M12 nuts of the rear of the chassis rather than M10) So I've had some sleeves made up which are pressed into the bushes to reduce them down to an M10. I'm at a loss as to why this would not work, if anyone knows of a reason then please let me know.

So these are the sleeves I had made up.
13-sleeve.jpg
One pressed into the bush
14-bush.jpg

Hoping they will do the job. Also keeps the costs down

Also been pressing the bushes into the arms, a sleeve kit and a 10ton press makes quick work of the job
15-press.jpg

Bearings get pressed in as well
16-press.jpg

At the moment I'm now working on the input seal for the diff, finally got a 36mm socket for the nut and came off easy with the impact gun.

Tried to wiggle the shaft off but no luck so pressed it off
17-press.jpg
Then using a couple of wood screws the old seal was pressed out. It had been leaking but not badly, but I think that was down to the fact 70% of the oil in the diff had already disappeared, so there was not much left to escape out of that seal.
18-press.jpg
19-press.jpg

Tomorrow I'll finally get to start painting the underside of the car, and I'll finish off the diff and get the struts rebuilt plus whatever else I can do while the epoxy paint dry's.

[B5NUT]

Also has anyone got a spare one of theses, it's the retainer for the handbrake cable, one of mine is missing.
1-missing.jpg

[steve briance]

Sorry can't help with cable clip but wanted to say what a cracking job is going on here and thanks for sharing the results of
the effort you've put in to find part numbers and source bits.

There are sadly many people who don't bother updating with the results of advice they've had with a fix which is a shame as thats the true value in forums - how owners manage to fix their cars that we share an enthusiasm for.

[B5NUT]

In respect to the clip does anyone have a picture of the underside of a coupe with the handbrake cables in the picture. Both Tractor Dave's & my car only have a single clip, and Etka states there should be 2 fitted to the car!

Finally finished cleaning the rust and removing all the schutz from the underside. It's had it first coat of epoxy and so have the arches.
4-underside.jpg

3-arch.jpg

Once the epoxy has had a couple of days to dry I'll apply the seam sealer followed by a further coat of epoxy and a coat of schutz for the underside, and for the arches it will be base coat followed by clearcoat.

Also got the rear subframe bushes in, they were pressed in without the reducer sleeve fitted along with the new diff mounts.
1-subframe.jpg
Once all the bushes were in the sleeves were pressed in.
2-bush.jpg