DIY: Transverse Timing Belt, water pump, thermostat...

[zeusenergy]

New Beetle 1.8T Timing Belt DIY (Although you can use this for your MK4/TT as well...)

After reading all the DIY/FAQ info on the 1.8T timing belt stuff, and putting it off for a while, I've finally dug in. I've got all the important info for you, except what's already been covered at the Ultimate TB DIY (UTBDIY) here:
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=2840728

Not only am I tackling the TB, but also the thermostat and housing plus the fuel filter. I got the super-duper kit from MJM Autohaus and it came in quick time, as described. Check out the stuff I got:

This thread will continue as I update the pix and finish the work. Right now the car is set with the new belt, everything reconnected except a few minor things. I will be changing up the steps slightly from the UTBDIY as there are some things that can be changed (or in the case of the NB application may be different) and this may interest even those who have already done their MK4 belt.

It was supposed to rain the day I started, so I put up a canopy made in china. That took like 2 hours to assemble! With duct tape!!! And of course, it didn't rain at all. You can see it lean like a famous tower below.

1) Jack car, remove wheel on passenger side. Lower car onto at least passenger side subframe location with a jackstand. You can do both sides as you wish. Use the jack as a safety or add another jackstand below the marked jacking point on the passenger side behind the front wheel. Depends on if you have two jacks... you'll need one later for the motor. Pull the engine covers if any.

2) Remove the wheelwell liner on the passenger side. It's about 5000 torx screws.... Once that's done, remove the underbelly splash shield for the entire lower portion, plus the side one behind the pancake pipe. It's only a few torx screws and some clips.

3) See that silly little pancake pipe? Loosen the two hose clamps closest to the pipe at both ends. Pull the clip on the pipe bracket (or nut... mine wasn't there) and pull the pipe out of the intercooler hose. Watch out for any oil dripping out! If you find a LOT, your PCV system is on the fritz or your turbo bearing is beginning to see the grave. Now pull the pipe out of the charge pipe hose, and set it aside. Stuff rags into the open IC and charge pipe hose. Do the same with the pancake pipe if you wish. Set the clamps aside.

4) Loosen the clamp for the upper IC to throttle body. Pull the hose away from the throttle body, carefully making sure the clamp doesn't fall all the way down to the IC like mine did! Set the clamp aside. This will make room for the serpentine belt tensioner removal plus give more room for the TBelt job. Also, remove the small line going to the throttle body as well. Put some rags in the TB and also the hose.

5) DRAIN YOUR RADIATOR into a drain pan. It will make the job less messy for you, since you will be under the car sometimes! The drain **** is on the driver side at the very bottom of the radiator. Twist it, and pull it out. Remove the cap on your overflow tank to assist its draining.

6) Disconnect the hoses going to the fuel system at the fuel rail and also at the fender location. The ones in back near the overflow tank are simple- just push in the colored clip, and pull the line off. Don't force them! Your finger should work, or a flathead screwdriver. There isn't too much pressure, but expect some fuel to drain out and be careful. Tape over ALL the open ports. The vacuum line from the throttle is in this cluster of hoses. You will have to disconnect all of them, but I left the one going into the fender (N80) attached and just pulled them out of the way. There is also another line at the back of the engine, right above the timing belt cover. Remove that connection too. Any other hose going to the top of the overflow tank or those clustered hoses should also be disconnected. Take note of ALL the hoses and where they go!!!! In the end, you will have a much larger space to work.

7) Take out the overflow tank. There is a hose down at the bottom, disconnect it and unclip the hose from the bracket attached to the serpentine belt bolts. You can tuck the end of the hose out of the way in the fuel rail or manifold area for now. Disconnect the wiring connector at the overflow. Pull the small nut off the overflow under the fender area, and remove the phillips screw that you CAN see. Now the overflow should pull right out, and you have full access to the engine mount and more room to work and see.

8) Using a 16mm wrench, pull the serpentine tensioner to the front of the car until the holes line up for the 3 mm allen wrench as the UTBDIY talks about. Works like a charm! The serpentine belt should now come right off. I will post pix later on the routing of the belt at the end of the job. Now take the three clustered bolts off the tensioner, noting the orientation of the bracket that held the overflow hose in place... mine went back in backwards even though it's on the outside of the tensioner like it's supposed to be- and I'll have to flip it tomorrow. The tensioner should come right out, as well as the bracket.

9) Go back to the wheelwell, and use the 6mm allen socket with a ratchet, as well as the 19mm socket and another ratchet in the UTBDIY to remove the four allen bolts holding the crank pulley in place. Set the two ratchets to opposite directions and line them up so you can get leverage. I put the large ratchet against the frame of the car. I marked my pulley where the hole is, even though I didn't notice it can only go on one way- the four bolts are offset slightly. Make SURE you keep the allen socket STRAIGHT when removing those bolts- they can strip easily. One the four bolts are out, the pulley will come right off. Remember, the 19mm bolt in the middle does NOT come off.

9) How about removing those timing belt covers to see what you are working with? The top one is clipped in, just push the clips off and it will pull out. I left this step until now because with all the hoses in plce it's much harder to remove. The bottom ones can be accessed from the wheelwell with a 10mm socket. There are 5 of them, and the two lower covers will come right out. Here's a pic that I haven't seen yet:

10) Now you are ready for the big one. It's time to mark your original belt with some paint or white-out in my case. I did a few teeth apart and also marked the original belt at the top with "cam" to be sure I got it right. I also spaced the marks differently from top to bottom to be sure it was right. If you do this step, the whole job just became much easier. You do not need to check the original marks or put the engine to top dead center (TDC) as long as the ENGINE WORKS FINE and NO CELs EXIST FOR CAM POSITION! MAKE SURE!!!! do NOT remove any tensioner parts yet and make sure the belt cogs have corresponding marks where the belt teeth are marked. Only do two marks for the cam and crank pulleys, so you don't make it more confusing. The same exact number of teeth need to exist between the cam and crank on the right side of the belt, the water pump side. The other side is insignificant as that's the tension side. The motor turns clockwise under power, and the crank pulls down on the belt. This is why the right side is critical. Do NOT use the left side of the belt to line anything up.

11)Now comes a special step. It's not too hard, and you will thank me for it later. REMOVE THE CHARGE PIPE clamps behind the motor. There are two clamps with two 10mm bolts each. One is up top and easy to see. The other is down halfway behind the motor. Be careful not to drop the two clamp halves or bolts. Now the charge pipe can be freed up enough at the bottom for a following step. I actually removed the whole charge pipe and set it aside at the back of the engine bay. But you don't need to....
Remove the coolant hose to metal pipe connection near where the power charge pipe bracket is, and pull the hose off. You will get coolant here and there from this part... now take that pipe that follows the frame rail forward to the turbo aftercool pump attached to the cooling fan shroud, and unclip the pipe from the plastic holders. Feed the pipe out of the way by pulling the free end down, catch the coolant if you can!

12) Ready to pull the motor mount? Have a drink now. You will need it. For all those DIY'ers out there that couldn't get the motor mount out, or back in, Step 11 basically gave you all the room you need to remove it ENTIRELY. I'm pretty sure jacking the CRAP out of the motor after removing the frame part of the mount might help too, but I refused to go any higher and noticed the motor side of the mount was easy to work toward the rear of the engine bay. I also tried LOWERING the motor too, and this had a negative effect on the turbo oil return line, something I'm not happy about. It's okay, but got crimped a bit and if I hadn't noticed, may have detroyed the turbo over time. I just used some pliers to straighten it out.
Now the 18mm bolts straight down need to be removed. These will need a little help with a pipe over a 1/2" drive ratchet or large breaker bar. You also need a 8" or more extension to clear the fender and get a good leverage on it. They are TIGHT. These were the only real trouble bolts I had. Once you are ready to pull those bolts, toss a jack under the oil pan, and put some wood between it and the pan. Jack SLOWLY until you have the wood in place, and be sure the jcak is perfect. If you have any doubts, reset the jack or wood and try again. You really don't want the motor to fall on you or wreck your lines and pan. Put just enough pressure to seat the wood on the pan, no more. Now begin unscrewing the bolts, and jack a little more when you have them broken free. If the bolts remain stubborn, go up or down very carefully with the jack until you have an easier time. After those two bolts are removed, you are now only supporting the motor with the jack. Lower it just enough so the frame side of the mount goes slack (where the bolt heads were attached)
Now remove the small bracket with 13mm bolts that's under the fender and holds on to the top of the frame side mount. Remove the two bolts that hold the frame side of the mount in place, and twist it free of the engine bay.

13) Jack the motor up enough to access the two bolts that are recessed into the engine mount itself, they need a 16mm deep socket. Then loosen the lower one. The bolt won't come out yet. Lower the engine just enough to pull that lower bolt. Now jack the motor as far up as you can, without lifting the whole car. The motor will begin poking out from the open hood. Now take the free motor mount and get the tab that's inside the timing belt out of the belt, twisting the whole mount rearward towards all that open space we made. Push the charge pipe out of the way if needed, it should move easily. The mount will come out under the wheelwell area. Take note of the exact way you turn the mount as you remove it. If you have problems, just jack or lower the motor until you get the mount free.
I ask: "WHAT F'N MOUNT??????"

More to come....

[LightSwitch]

sweet, thanks for this man! im looking forward to the rest as i will be doing it this weekend. and the more references the better!

[themachasy]

Great DIY!

[zeusenergy]

Today I got the fuel filter out... after spraying my eyes with fuel from the rear connection Fuel in the eyes SUX!

I'll be updating tonight or tomorrow morning with the rest, including t-stat details.

[zeusenergy]

Now for the thermostat. This job can be done with just a 1/4" drive 10mm 8mm and 13mm sockets, swivel adapter, 10" extension, 1/4" ratchet, and the thermostat plus o-ring. I installed a new tstat housing as well. The 8mm socket is for the harness clamp at the bottom of the alternator backside, red arrow in pic. The 13mm is for the alternator hot wire under the plastic cap marked in orange. You will also have to remove the harness plug at the top of the alternator and move the harness out of the way. Have the swivel and 10mm ready, place the ratchet onto it once the extension is under the hoses at the back of the radiator. Both bolts can be done this way, very easily. It took me about 10 minutes to do this. Make sure you place the thermostat in the block first, THEN put the o-ring on top of it to hold it in place. Get the housing in place and carefully begin installing the top bolt first, use the extension to hand thread it. For the bottom one, you may need a magnetic tool to get the bolt down there. Try to keep both bolts even in tightening so you don't compress one side of the o-ring- it may creep out on you and get pinched at the bottom. You can also feel inside the block before reinstallation to see if your impeller is broken on the waterpump.




Modified by zeusenergy at 4:30 PM 8-26-2008

[zeusenergy]

Here's a pic of the motor mount with the frame side removed.

And here's the engine side out of the car, this is the side of the mount that meets the motor.

This is the two belts with the marks I made. I used each tooth as a guide making DANG SURE the marks are exactly the same amount of teeth apart.

This is a pic of the motor without any of the tensioner stuff or water pump attached.

This is the two pumps for comparison. The plastic one was fine and it looked like the parts had been recently replaced (less than 20k ago...)

And the mount back in the car, new bolts and all......

Total time for the water pump, TB, and tensioner plus tstat: 10 hours. I would do it again, and prolly will
I did all this while taking pix and breaks often!

[natsilver]

Another awesome writeup from zeusenergy! I am going to be doing this same thing in the very near future. Its been knocking on my door for little while now..

[es6501]

great write up! I'm def gonna see if I can do mine this weekend.

[zeusenergy]

Quote, originally posted by es6501 »

great write up! I'm def gonna see if I can do mine this weekend.

Thanx!

[zeusenergy]

BTW, if you are pulling the main cable off the alternator and don't disconnect the battery, make sure you don't ground that cable... I should have listed "disconnect battery negative cable" in the tstat portion

[Biloo2U]

So I guess it went pretty well, although I haven't heard it was back together. Nice write-up.

So how long does as in the eyes burn?? Did Mo help you out or just mock you??

I need to get your number, give me a call or PM me here. NIN sounds great in my car Thanks

[zeusenergy]

Nah mo wasn't there. Stayed home with the kids. The fuel felt like having acid tossed into your face. Except you can't see so well, and the sun beaming into the gassed eyes tends to evaporate it faster, which makes it burn more. I got over it, but OMFG!

[OLD GHOST]

holy sh*t was just coming to look for "issues" and this came up. great timing, no pun intended.

[zeusenergy]

"Time" for yours too, huh?

[OLD GHOST]

Quote, originally posted by zeusenergy »

"Time" for yours too, huh?

actually my first waterpump went out a 40k. i think its a thermostat issue now.

does anyone know the exact working order of the cooling system? between all the sensors, the thermostat then the pump... like what order does the CU read it in and tell the pump to kick on.. or the fans..? make sense?

I'm not getting any overheating CEL's but I know my engine is running hotter than norm. I havent plugged the VAG-COM up but need to.

[zeusenergy]

Quote, originally posted by OLD GHOST »

does anyone know the exact working order of the cooling system? between all the sensors, the thermostat then the pump... like what order does the CU read it in and tell the pump to kick on.. or the fans..? make sense?

Did you replace the coolant temp sensor yet? You know, the "green top?" Might be the root of your issue. The pump is mechanical so it can't be started by the ECM. The fans can be activated by the A/C system, but the actual kick-on for that is another sensor in the radiator. The thermostat is also a mechanical device too. Replace the temp sensor in the upper hard pipe near the airbox first, even if you have already done so, it's a cheap $30 fix and even the green tops have been known to fail. If you try to do the thermostat and you don't have a plastic housing available then you may break it or it may not seat itself very well, allowing it to leak.

[zeusenergy]

BTW, I didn't post any pics of the fuel filter due to the burning in my eyes from fuel.

[OLD GHOST]

Quote, originally posted by zeusenergy »

Did you replace the coolant temp sensor yet? You know, the "green top?"

Ya "green" top is in. but agree it could be that. I wanted to start somewhere and travel towards the pump with new pieces. Fan switch, thermostat + housing, coolant temp sensor

I also have a powergasket to put on but wanted to fix this before that so i see proper results, if any

and while im at it may order some pulleys if i do have to do the pump.

thanks for the help and the DIY

[zeusenergy]

Quote, originally posted by OLD GHOST »

Ya "green" top is in. but agree it could be that. I wanted to start somewhere and travel towards the pump with new pieces. Fan switch, thermostat + housing, coolant temp sensor I also have a powergasket to put on but wanted to fix this before that so i see proper results, if any and while im at it may order some pulleys if i do have to do the pump. thanks for the help and the DIY

Oh boy the pulleys sound like fun. The powergasket will be easy. All the bolts on the 1.8T are SO easy to reach compared to the old 4cyl 8-valve or 5cyl 10-valve VAG motors!!!

[natsilver]

Have to say, great job with removal of the charge pipe. I finally got around to doing this (waterpump forced me to) and it was such a breeze the whole time. Straightforward and simple with that mount outta there. Thanks!

[thetwodubheads]

Wow. Thank you for that. I took 13hrs to do mine last time. I'll have to try the charge pipe removal next time I do it. No one else was willing to give up the secret, just 'I got it out with wiggling.' Well you know what, just wiggling it doesn't do crap

I had planned on pulling the motor for the next time I do it, but I may save myself the trouble now and just try this.

[natsilver]

This saves so much time. i can't imagine doing this with the mount there.

Once the charge pipe was out of the way, it took maybe 2-3 minutes total for me to get the mount out (time spent jacking the motor high enough to pivot the mount out). When it came time to put the mount back in (after everything was reinstalled/tensioned) it slid right in first try. You will be amazed how simple this job becomes with nothing in your way.

[skatepopwar182]

i plan on doing mine in the future thanks!!!

[bootymac]

Nice work! It took me about 10 hours as well on my GTI as it was my first time. Removing the motor mount definitely helps, but the actual removal of it is a pain in the ass!

[afmilboy02]

im about to do this too... any tips or advice? great write up btw this really helps

[Nightrider]

Nice write-up!!!

Hopefully more people see this and take care of the belt so there are less 'timing belt broke' threads.

[powdercrazy]

very helpful write-up

[amitesh]

This is what a broken water pump with plastic impeller blades (OEM) looks like.

[l88m22vette]

I'll be using this next weekend

[edaw104]

well just got done replacing the water pump. The impeller was cracked right down the middle like so many others i was reading about. (pos)
I forgot to order the new tensioner , so I reused the old one.
It came apart easy enough. I cleaned it out put some new light weight oil in and put it back together.
Wasn't to easy to put all the internals back together.
will see if it continues to work.
Thanks’ for the DIY.


Modified by edaw104 at 5:32 PM 2-8-2009

[zeusenergy]

NP dude. Looks like my DIY helped some of you texers......

[lonewolfe]

This is an awesome DIY write up. I will need to replace my T-Belt, W/P, T-stat in about 2000 miles since I will then have 60,000 miles on my car. I've been pricing getting this done and the range has been anywhere from $890 to $1500 at the dealer. I'm still considering doing this myself.

[pugi03]

[t_bag69]

thanks a lot man. there a lot of people that wouldnt take the time to take the pics and explain this kinda stuff you guys on this site are good people! thank you for taking the time to help out guys like me.

[clevebb]

I like your idea for the marks on the belts before installing them!!!