Pearl white coupe revival

[david1980]

Last paint job I heard about was in NY up near the PA border and that was $5k for outside, engine bay and underside.

[ottawa coupe]

Ya, it's friggin insane. He just did a pickup and his MATERIALS cost $6500..... and it wasn't a crazy colour or anything....

I priced pearl white. Just the paint was $3000. And that was back at the beginning of this ordeal, 3 years on i am sure it's another $1000.....

I'll never buy another car that needs bodywork or paint. Unless a rattlecan job suits it lol

Oh, and the bodyshop at the audi dealer here is widely considered the best in the area. They said at least 20k.... and they were booking 18 months in advance....

I have come to terms with it from tbe perspective that i am 3 years in to this, many tbousands of dollars. It would be a shame to finish it up with a crap paint job. And when even a crap job (diy in my garage) costs thousands in materials..... there's just no winning on this stuff now in these parts.

[struikie]

Five figures.... ouch...

JW

[ottawa coupe]

got a ballpark quote. it's painful. 5 figures is a certainty. but i gotta bear in mind that the cost of the materials here now is insane. The painter's schedule will fit in nicely with both my summer plans and small details i gotta work out yet. it'll go in sometime around mid september which means it'll be home in plenty of time before the snow comes and i'll be able to (finally) do the final assembly over the winter. next spring should be pretty good!

[ottawa coupe]

Still gotta wrap the corners but....

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I am sticking with my initial assessment: not awful, especially for a first attempt at this stuff. I have enough material to do the rear cards again if the little details bug me enough. Not convinced with the "carpet" for the seat delete cover. It seems more like black felt than carpet. I will keep looking before i glue that down.

Taking the first week of july off, i may try and get this down to a paint shop for a quote.

[ottawa coupe]

Not the worst first time doing upholstery.

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Gotta get more material for the main part of the cards. But so far so good.

[ottawa coupe]

Well, down to needing to only paint 2 pieces of blue plastic black, the rear speaker trays/parcel shelf trims....

The issue i had was the cabrio center console had holes in it for the roof control....and something else that i forget. Trimming the divider between the two would result in a hole too big for the diff lock button. I found that the button for a urs4 came in a larger assembly, found a cheap one on ebay, and voila, trimmed the hole about 5mm longer and now i can use the full cabrio console. Just gotta sort the button wiring now. Luckily the connector for the button is the same as the cruise control, which i'll never get working so sourcing that is done. Small wins.

20260619_170641.jpg gonna try and get this to the paint shop in a coupla weeks to see what they say regarding time and cost. Still need to deal with ac fabrication.

[ottawa coupe]

Welp, no turning back now..... the last of the blue upholstery is off....

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i've cut the plywood for the rear seat delete, in order to make access underneath (you know, the battery) easier, i think i'll need to cut it in half, so more attachment points will be needed now too.

in the interests of time, i will skip the houndstooth in the door cards. Mainly due to no time to go find it. I only need to fix the one insert on the front too.

[ottawa coupe]

This is gonna be a decent place to sit methinks

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[ottawa coupe]

And then there were 2 lol

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Now on to the door cards. I need to repair some cracks in the black cabrio cards as well as the insert is peeling away. The blue coupe cards are fine, except blue. I was thinking about getting some more houndstooth fabric for the inserts. But now the question is do i get synthetic leather too and redo the blue doorcards instead.... i have to get leather for the rear cards anyways as they are blue. Kinda wanna get the extra leather as i expect to screw up and may have to use a different doorcard anyways....

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[ottawa coupe]

Ifound a better how to video....

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[ottawa coupe]

Holy hell this is hard on the hands!!! Probably an hour and a half and i'm only 75% the first bottom cushion!

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I figure it's gonna take the whoooooole week to get these seats done lol

[ottawa coupe]

Soooo, i hate work schedules.... it meant i was up at 6am on a saturday.... and no one else in my hlusehold was up before 8

At any rate that meant that before 10 the rad fan was installed and wired and i managed to squeeze the engine covers on. I will need to trim the cover on the left head as it's wedged between the engine and abs bracket though. The best part though is that it does a GREAT job of hiding the majority of the wiring mess lol

i let it run for 20mins and it got nice n hot. Fan works. But it was only 20⁰ at the time (humid as hell though) and it was a solid 5min before it stopped. I think it's the usual problem v8 in a small chassis....airflow through the rad is fine but it just hits the front of a giant v8 4" later.....

I don't think this is gonna be a great commuter car lol. I can see the purchase of a double row core "racing" radiator in my future. This is just a cheapo aftermarket mk4 jetta rad with for the purposes of fitting. The core is a whopping 15mm thick.... i also definitely see some vents being trialed in my spare hood.

I need to trim a few mm of the mechanical fan blades as they juuuuuuat contact the shroud in places every now and again. I also think it will be prudent to add a couple more supports for the lower bumper surround. But after that, the ONLY fabrication is AC work?????

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[ottawa coupe]

I must be getting close to the end if i am throwing money away on engine covers... obviously not fit yet and i will need to trim to clear the master cylinder. Oh and youtube tells me i can mold the line off the expansion tank.... so that'll be an interesting experience to figure out lol

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Cooling fan FINALLY arrived today so this weekend will be dedicated to sorting the rad and fans for the LAST time.

[ottawa coupe]

Sigh, i was wrong about the new light switch. Down to 1.5ish volts. The solenoid almost lets go all the way. Gonna try an external relay next....