Vw Mk2 Jetta Coupe 4motion Build. (Recent Photos Added)

Updated first photos that didn't work.!
Hi all, slow build all the way from a small Shire county in West England UK, did at 1 point have a detailed build thread on another site that closed down. Anyway here goes

A bare shell popped up on ebay and made an offer and the story of building one began, Started life as 1985 Type 19 in polar silver no holes in the doors and rear quarters, small glass and bumpers and the guy i bought it off had started to strip it down as he had plans of his own which fell through. How i picked it up, fortunately had all the panels doors, bonnet, boot and glass panels except the windscreen and some of the brown interior bits.





Once looked like this.


First thing i did when i got it back was have some posts made up so i could wheel it in and out the garage and also removed all the panels just needed the naked shell, first little bits included the custom westy grill which am still working on and the duck bill splitter which i've both almost finished but will review these later. Got a decent sized garage with access right out my front entrance door can work on the shell without the need to open the main garage door and have room for a small fridge, work bench an tool box which was one thing that sold me when i bought the place.







First thing was to get the interior cleaned up. With all the sound-deadening removed.






Also had a jig made up so i could work on the underside which has been a great help can't count how many times it been on its side.


And started on the removal of the underseal to reveal what i actually bought





Boot floor cut out ready for future project.



Getting there.



And most of it done just a fair few weeks spent to get to this point.



As you can tell underside horrors as expected thought it wasn't this bad when i bought it as the top and inside looked solid but no going back now, Welder and Grinder time even though i've never welded before but will give it a go.

 

At this point just had to cut out what anything that had really bad rust spots

 

New floor pans test fit


Both floors panels in.

 

Onto repair work. All inter seals were sealed with epoxy mastic

 

On to the fun stage

 

Finally starting to take shape and feel like more straight and rust free panels to actual rust panels. About 6months after buying the shell i also bought a 225 TT which i was going to use as a donor car, picked up for a steal the lady just wanted to get rid of it as a bin man drove in to the side of it damaging the wheel which was the only thing i needed to replace. total £500. Drove if for about 10months before stripping it down.





And off it went

 

Figured i would reuse the TT tunnel and bulkhead.






Little short but ideal,

 

Panel in and peddles in for test fit.


Heater matrix in and car is now right hand drive

 

Engine in to work on the propshaft




Diff in


Prop shaft actually fits with no need to shorten it but needs lengthing slightly it’s about 20-30mm short which isn’t too major as I can use a billet to make up the difference. Need to swap the steering rack for a TT and change the front engine bracket so the engine can sit better. Deeper tunnel has saved me a lot of hustle as i might be alright with the downpipe and exhaust also the tt bulkhead panel saved me a great deal as a lot bolts onto it.

 

Made a start on the dash and steering wheel today, TT dash might not be everyones cup of tea but didn't want the dash to go to waste









Mounted up to the original steering column holes.



Not fully mounted but close enough.





Along the course of the 2 years owning the shell i've also collected a few bits.

A Genuine brand new rear Jetta small bumper one of the last few in the Uk I’m told, was a lucky find as my original one the iron had gone plus had.







Pair of wings, the original ones all rusted on the bottom





Pair of doors converting to a full glass and also no holes for the door strips



Momo Street Racer GTs not the actual colour ones i've got as mine are red and in the attic don't have a photo , had a pair many years ago in a different car and so when these came up had to have them again, plan to get the interior recovered in black alcantara with tartan. The rear bench will be a combination of a scirocco top half and TTbottom





Wheel choice do want a set of BBS RS but ill have to hold for now till the shell is ready, but have these in storage.

G60 Lookalikes off a corrado 5x100 which will be the stud pattern I’m going to run due to the TT rear axle being 5x100 and using a VR6 subframe for wide track, will probably get these banded at some point or do a 3 piece steel wheel split.



Audi A8 always wanted a set but didn't have the right car to put them on.



And these rare beauties. Southern Ways Epsilon Mesh 15" came of a wide body 911 the rears are 10j which will need to be reduced as the TT rear subframe sits wide. I’m after Lips if anyone has some please!!! Swap willing for what I’ve currently got.

 

Westy prototypes, also have one on a 7slat base but not sure if i like them might just buy a genuine one if i can find one and stop being cheap







Got the engine sitting right finally, it was a little too far to the drivers side which was hitting the master cylinder had to shift it to the left by 10mm ish to clear, as i had to move the gearbox mount on the subframe due to running 02M i did the same for the rear engine mount and the results are a good clearance between master cylinder and cam cover. Running a TT servo and master as with everything so far just made it fit somehow.





Also managed to make the TT Steering rack fit on to the subframe, meant drilling new holes as it mounts up longer than the mk2 but the benefits of this rack is that its like a quick rack i believe its Lock-to-lock: 2:9. Rack meeting up well with the TT bulkhead panel so my setting out measurements worked out fine







Also decieded on running a torque mount at the back of the gearbox as the engine had quite a bit of movement on the 3 mounts, its a mixture of a TT rear box mount and seat ibiza.











Shafts should clear now that the mounts are pushed back









My front engine mount, care of dutch build will reinforce it at the top to make sure I’ve got all 4 bolts bolted up to the gearbox currently only have 3 on the engine bracket as you can see on the photo below top one isn’t bolted up.

 

Still have an issue as the brake fluid bottle is too close to the body, which I will relocate using a different one.



Got the dash near enough where i want it to be just need to make the mounts fit





Managed to get the dash properly mounted up and happy with how its turned out.





















Next up is to get the rear trailing arms fitted/ modified to mount up to the original axle mounting points, which will be a huge task to get right. cheers for all the comments hope some of the work will help others.

 

Another small update, one of the things i thought would give me a right ball ache was the downpipe and exhaust, the original TT downpipe comes off the turbo with too much of an angle which hits the rear engine mount so that was out of the question fortunately as i've used the TT tunnel means i can run the aftermarket downpipes for the TT and S3

3" from the turbo down,



Had to nudge the engine slightly to get it in but bolted on fine as you can see everything is tight in there but nothing too major to worry about. will make a bracket for the hanger fixed onto the subframe











Little tight to the body but i'll just make some room when the engine is out but clears the prop and steering rack just how it should

 

Other task is getting the rear arms to mount up to the body, i've seen how others tackle it with repositions the mounting points with quite a bit of cutting out of the body and the arms sit too close to the cill which is quite noticeable so going for a different approach.





The plan i've come up with is to marry up the TT rear arms to a standard rear beam bracket which i had spare, the arms are cast iron which means relying on the welds alone wont be a good idea but plan to use a box section sleeved over the cast arm and then bolted through and welded. Just have to make sure i get the hub dead centre with the body before,which i got a little idea how.













The other issue is that the control arm hits the body what i've seen people do is notch the body but i've done enough cutting on this shell want to keep some things original so the plan is to use a curved plate, guys in the U.S call this Z notching or something like that.





Will cut and re-weld the plate to the control arm, this is a control arm used on the Gen 2 Haldex system on Audi A3s / S3

 

After having the engine sitting better on all the mounts i wasn't happy with how the prop shaft mounted to the box was a little short, theres obviously a number of ways of lengthening the prop but decided on a much easier option. Bought another front half of the standard TT Prop shaft so that i could use the billet were the bearing sits in the middle join, which adds another 30mm to the length.





Billet and new longer bolts















Shaft now mounts up to both trans and the diff fine, got to relocate the mounting points on the tunnel then it should be all sorted.

Also sorted out the bracket for the down pipe hanger which i welded onto the subframe.











Next needed to mount the hubs so i can see how much i need to shorten the driveshafts so bought some tempro coilovers so i can have the car on its wheels soon, however i never like the plastic bearing used on the strut top mounts used a more robust approach, cheap mod for anyone interested bearings are about £3 delivered





This weekend will finish mocking up the rear trailing arms i've managed to get all the steel work and booked in to have them welded properly next week which means will have the shell rolling for the first time in 2 years. Appreciate all the comments and will try to update more regular.

 

As promised, managed to have a go at the rear trailing arms. Ive seen others cut and reposition the mounting point but thought i'd have a go at making the arms bolt up to the original axle bolts on the chassis. Photo below taken from another build on Vortex shows how far away it is from the original and sits inside the leg





The arm is quite curved but at one point it sort of straighten off mid way ish, this is what i've been able to do so far still need tp finish the ends off but i managed to sleeve a box section over the arm and welded it, will also and bolt through just for belt and braces.











Bolted up to the body





Next up was the control arms as these hit the body as you can see from the above photo and below, didn't want to notch the leg so decided to use the audi A3 control arm and merge the two together.



First up was to cut a section out of the tt control arm but still keeping a lot of the structure together that way don't loose any of the camber as stock.



Pieced together



End result which work well.

 

Also shortened the drivers side drive shaft, cut it to size then welded the join and sleeved another piece and welded again













Got a couple days off this week so plan to have the rear shocks bolted up and fabricated the brackets for them, and finish off the rear arms and should have the car rolling before i put it back on the spit so that i can start painting the underside. Need to also draw up a detail for the tank which will be made out of aluminum.

All caught up will update more tomorrow as i've got a few bits i've managed to do today.

 

Did a couple test fits on some wheels i got, safe to say the Epsilon's rears are not going to fit well on the 10s

 

What an incredible amount of work! Love it.

 

Outstanding.