Project Car: 1990 VW GTI

S

Slinky

New member
I posted in General, but I think this is going to be an on going project so i'll just do updates here...



I bought this car for $300 from a guy in Chico, CA

It has a blown headgasket and had been sitting for 4 months.

After digging through maintenance records I found out that he lived in San Francisco for awhile also (as if it couldn't get anyworse :D )



The body is surprisingly straight and for living in SF only has minimal dents/damage.



Anyways... here's the day after being towed home.

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Some of the damage...

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Interior is many many times worse...



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Garbage covered almost all of the carpeting, lots of stains in the mats, it was obvious the windows had been open a good portion of this sitting time.



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After... (dash has since been wiped down and cleaned up a bit)



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PAINT





Door jams all looked like this...

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and after..

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Dirt and grime stuck to any and all areas possible.

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after wash

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Clay after 1/4 of the hood:

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after clay/windows cleaned

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Obviously this task is far from done.

Questions I have for everyone,

How should I approach those steelies?



All of the glass is quite stained (chemical rain?) on the exterior, glass polish recommendations? (paint shows same symptons..)



Wash/clay still didn't remove a lot of the lower grime and some other areas, I suppose this is attributed to sitting and neglect. What is strong enough to remove this?



Thanks for looking!!

Any tips/criticism/comments are welcome! :thx
 
Clay really works wonders on these older cars that have been neglected. Just claying my 87 Cherokee make it 1000x better looking. Looks like a fun project...
 
Slinky said:
How should I approach those steelies?
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Pull them, scuff them, tape them & paint them!



Slinky said:
All of the glass is quite stained (chemical rain?) on the exterior, glass polish recommendations? (paint shows same symptons..)
Click to expand...



I would start with a magic eraser or some AIO first
 
Wow dude I have a 92 GTI and I have to say that is a sad sight to see. Very nice clean up. I would love to see some after interior pics once it' all dusted and clen.
 
What do you already have to attack the finish/glass?

If you've got/want to order Prime Strong, I'd highly recommend it for both the paint and your windows. I cleaned up my buddies white (severely neglected) Toyota Landcruiser. After an intensive claying the paint was still a dull yellow/brown color. Even by hand Prime Strong made the paint much brighter. Of course that only lasted so long, since I just wanted to see how strong it really was. I used a rotary on most of the vehicle with an EC/OP mix on an orange pad. Are your water spots etched into the paint? You'll probably need a polish or compound at some point if want to get decent gloss out of the paint.

Same problem as you have on the glass. Spots that wouldn't come out. Three glass cleaners and it still looked like crap. 4" Green cyclo pad on the PC with a bit of Prime Strong and they were crystal clear.

I have a white car, and can testify to the fact that getting the paint clean makes more of an overall difference than getting swirls out. 'course if you've got the tools and time to do both I think its worth the effort. Good luck and keep the pics coming!

- Andrew
 
This one is going to be interesting to see done. Just after the claying, the car looked a lot better! And I won't even go to the pass of SSR2.5! Please keep us updated as I'm eager to see the final result!



Joey



P.D. Are you going to resell this car or is it just a DD? I suggest somenew rims to make it look sporty...
 
bigfoot said:
P.D. Are you going to resell this car or is it just a DD? I suggest somenew rims to make it look sporty...
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No, no widen the steelies and drag it off the ground. It's painful to see a VW that high off the ground.



... sorry I've got too much Vwvortex in me...



Nice find, a 300 dollar MK2 (running or not) around here is going to look a loot worse. It will probably be a big pile of rust...
 
nice looking mk2 GTI!! 8v or 16v?
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8v :chuckle:



P.D. Are you going to resell this car or is it just a DD? I suggest somenew rims to make it look sporty...
Click to expand...



Plans to resell, but am probably going to fall for it and not be able to :D



nice work so far.. one question.. why did you buy it? did you fix it?
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Seemed like a fun project car! We are going to take the head off this weekend hopefully and see how it looks.



What do you already have to attack the finish/glass?

If you've got/want to order Prime Strong, I'd highly recommend it for both the paint and your windows. I cleaned up my buddies white (severely neglected) Toyota Landcruiser. After an intensive claying the paint was still a dull yellow/brown color. Even by hand Prime Strong made the paint much brighter. Of course that only lasted so long, since I just wanted to see how strong it really was. I used a rotary on most of the vehicle with an EC/OP mix on an orange pad. Are your water spots etched into the paint? You'll probably need a polish or compound at some point if want to get decent gloss out of the paint.

Same problem as you have on the glass. Spots that wouldn't come out. Three glass cleaners and it still looked like crap. 4" Green cyclo pad on the PC with a bit of Prime Strong and they were crystal clear.

I have a white car, and can testify to the fact that getting the paint clean makes more of an overall difference than getting swirls out. 'course if you've got the tools and time to do both I think its worth the effort. Good luck and keep the pics coming!

- Andrew
Click to expand...



Links to where I can obtain Prime Strong? OTC?



I have the SSR line btw.



Thanks for the support everyone!
 
Photos fixed.. :)



A little update, nothing really cosmetically.



Pulled the head off on Sunday, turns out the head wasn't torqued down enough/correctly the gasket was disgusting! Luckily it hadn't overheated/blown, the block is still good, showed no signs of damage. put it back on with a new head and valve cover gasket, fired right up! :)



changed the oil/coolant a few times looks better already, really fun to drive.



still needs a couple little things replaced before it's completely driveable.

i'm going to pull out the PC one of these days and give it a go! :)



pictures soon!
 
For the claying, I would probably recommend that you step up to a more aggressive clay. Since you mentioned the condition is very bad, I think an aggressive clay, even if it mars (you'll be polishing anyways), will do a good job at getting the contaminants off the paint.



Congrats on your purchase :)
 
the steelies just need to go theres no way around that. so does the 8v head! 300 is a great deal though, id pay it for any gti
 
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