More Car Updates

Another busy week in the driveway. My son got his dream car this week. It took a lot of research and a lot of mediation, but we finally came to agreement and found the right car at a great price. We got him a 2004 Volkswagen GTI, 1.8L Turbo. It's red with black leather interior and a 5 speed manual transmission.

We traded in the Durango to buy the car. Once we found the GTI, Richard and I worked until after 11:00 pm finishing the installation of his old radio and speakers, pulling the wiring from the new stereo, and replacing all of the trim. It only took a couple of hours, but we were hoping it would improve the trade-in. We ended up getting the same amount CarMax offered, but at least we got the tax offset.

He has practiced dilligently since he got the car on Thursday and seems to have mastered driving the stick shift. I was even pleased that once he got past the first day, he now seems to be trying to drive the speed limit. That was my biggest concern because he likes to drive fast, and this car will go fast.

While we were waiting at the dealership for the boys to test drive the GTI, my daughter and I had time to kill.

She has been pestering me to get a perm. She finally broke me at the dealership while we were waiting. I made her sign a contract promising that she would not cry or complain when the perm turned out terrible. My sister also pointed out that this is perfect timing so she can start 8th grade and take her 8th grade pictures with a bad perm. But she'll still have time for it to grow out before high school. My daughter wasn't thrilled with these comments. She doesn't believe that everyone else could be right, or that everyone else went through this at about her age. We'll hope for the best, but I'm prepared for the worst.

I also ordered my new car on Tuesday. It's a red 2007 Mini Cooper S with a white top, white racing stripes and a moon roof. I drove the automatic also, but decided to go with the 6 speed manual transmission. I was originally going to buy the Cooper, but I made the mistake of driving the Cooper S while I was waiting to place my order. Once I drove it I was hooked. I guess after the Boxster, I needed the bigger engine.

I did drive some errands in my Beetle this weekend. Fortunately, it is still NOT popping out of first gear when I drive. So I'm hopeful it was just the shift plate, and not the transmission. I still need to replace the window tracks and fix the windshield wipers. But we're leaving for a week of vacation next Saturday so that will have to wait until we get back.

Non-Beetle Activities Lately

I haven't posted for a while because there hasn't been a lot of Bug related activity for the last week. I did manage to get my key blanks cut, so now I have 3 keys for the Bug. And, when we installed the carpet we obviously didn't get the stick shift aligned correctly because it started popping out of first gear. My son and I realigned the shift plate and stick shift, and the popping out of gear problem stopped.

This is what I have been doing . .

My son had his first fender bender this week. Dented up his front bumper. After the accident we heard a grinding sound when it turned. We thought it was the bearing, so we brought it to the local repair shop where we get our tires done. They replaced the bearing but the sound didn't go away. Turns out, the bumper was rubbing against the tire when we turned, and the bearing didn't need to be replaced. So now we are fighting with the repair place for fixing something that wasn't broken, and trying to find a new bumper.

I have been looking at cars, and I think I am going to trade in the Boxster for a car that has more storage room and gets better gas mileage. Since the car I want can drive on the snow, that now frees up my son to sell the Durango and get a car. So he and I have both been doing legwork getting ready to sell our cars, and buy new cars.

We both went to Car Max and got quotes to sell our cars. Rumor had it they would offer more than a regular dealer would offer on a trade-in. They low-balled both of us, so those rumors are not true. They undershot the trade-in on my Boxster by $3500.

Of course we had great fun at Car Max with my Boxster. A while back I hit a tire tread on the interstate, and dented the front of the car. My husband put a deflated basketball in the front, and inflated it to pop out the dent. Unfortunately, with the dent popped out, we couldn't remove the basketball and it has been there ever since. My son took some pictures as three of them looked at the front of my car trying to figure out what the heck was in there.

Since we don't want to let Car Max buy the Durango, we also have to re-install the original stereo system. So far we have completed the radio, amp, and speakers in 1 of 4 doors. My son had previously installed a really loud stereo, which promptly blew out all of his new speakers. So he hasn't had a radio that works for a while. At least for the short term he can listen to the radio at a reasonable volume until we sell the car. We also need to find a new bumper. Hopefully with these obvious issues fixed, we can get a reasonable price for the truck, and he can get a nice sedan that gets good gas mileage to use until he gets out of school.

Seats are Done

For a change of pace, I started my day with a trip to Lowes and AutoZone. The vent covers needed screws smaller than #8 so I purchased a small bag of #4's and #6's. I also stopped by AutoZone and picked up a small rubber mat for the battery.

Finally it was time to put everything together. I was miraculously able to find the screw holes for the vent covers, they were definitely #6 screws. Still need to do some work on the driver's side vent, I think the carpet is keeping it from fitting all the way into the opening.

I laid the rubber mat over the battery and used the strap from the marine battery box to hold it in place. Dug through my big box of stuff and found the screws and rear seat belts. Those went in fairly easily.

Next the rear side panels. These don't appear to be too difficult, but it's very hard to get all 6 pegs lined up exactly right. After much trial and error, I was able to get them attached. Only broke one peg in the process (I had extras so I just replaced it).

Then I turned my attention to the rear seat. There is a metal bar that sits over the kick panels, and supports the back bench. First I dug out my new kick panels. You have to cut a hole in each for the rear heater ducts. After cutting the hole, the panels looked really bad. So I pulled out the old kick panels and realized there were plastic rings that fit in the holes. I switched them out and the panels looked good again.

I set the kick panels in place and started to attach the metal support bar. The screws have never really fit right. I dug through all of my stuff and couldn't find the right sized screws. So I grabbed my son and headed out for a second trip to Lowes to find smaller screws. The existing screws were 1/4", so we bought some #10's and #12's just to be sure. The 12's did the trick.

With the rear bar in, we installed the back rest, then popped in the bench. I think the bench is supposed to drop down behind the metal bar - but it didn't want to do that. So it's sitting very sungly on top of the metal bar. The front retractable seat belts hold it in pretty well, and I doubt we'll have many backseat passengers. So I'm happy with it.

With the back completed, I had to upholster the driver's side front seat. Same process as the other front seat, but at least none of the spikes broke this time. Seats are done, everything is installed. I held off on the door panels because I have new window tracks to install. No point going through the pain of lining up all those pegs twice. So next weekend will be the windows, and hopefully I can figure out what's going on with the windshield wipers.

Installing the Carpet

I put in the rest of the carpet today. My son helped a lot, which was great because some of the front pieces are fairly large. I started by installing the sound proofing kit. It's a black rubber-like material that is glued to the floor before the carpet is installed. It wasn't difficult to lay, but it was kind of messy. The black stuff got all over my brush, and all over my hands.

After that was complete, my son and I made our daily trip to Lowes to get more brushes and contact cement. We stopped by the locksmith to see if we could get the new keys cut, but they were closed this week. We also stopped by O'Reilly Auto Parts to see if we could get a rubber mat or something to cover the battery. They did have a marine battery box. My son said it was too big, but I bought it anyway to try it out. He was right, it was too big. So we'll be getting a rubber mat in the morning and using the strap from the box to hold it onto the battery.

With the errands done, I felt like the sound-proofing was dry enough for me to install the carpet. The first couple of pieces are the strips that go just inside the door sills. They are also the most difficult because there is a small rubber lip that has to slip onto the metal strip inside the door. After much maneuvering, I was able to get the strip attached. From there it was just a matter of glue, then carefully laying the carpet so it was smooth. I'm glad my son was there to help because it is hard to work with the larger pieces alone. We did have to pull up and move two pieces because I didn't have them placed exactly right, and there was a gap between pieces under the footwell. Otherwise, the carpet laying went great.

I still need to install the vent covers. I glued the first door sill piece down without marking the screw holes. I was smarter with the second one, but as we learned with the rear seat I'm not very good at finding holes with carpet over them. That will be a job for tomorrow.

Beetle seats - again

Fun July 4th with a lot of progress today. I decided to start in the back and work my way forward today. We stripped out the carpet from the cargo area, and put in the new carpet. This was my first adventure with the contact cement, and it works much better than I expected. However I am glad I started in the back. The carpet is a little wrinkly around the edges in some places. Once you make contact with the contact cement, you can't really slide the carpet around. After the first couple of pieces I think we've improved a lot, and the front will look much better than the back (although the back doesn't look bad).

After we finished the rear cargo area my son wanted to take the car for a drive, so we popped the newly upholstered passenger seat into the car. It made a nice picture showing the old vs new upholstery. He and his friend drove the car around all afternoon. I checked right after lunch, and found out one of the air hoses became detached and was causing problems with the car's acceleration. They had stopped and reattached the air hose and the car started driving correctly again. About an hour later he called again and the car was sputtering. He said there was oil all over the engine. I suggested he check for leaks, and check the oil bath air cleaner because I was worried it had been overfilled. When I got home, the car and my son were gone again. The old oil bath air cleaner was sitting in the driveway, the empty packaging for the regular air filter we had purchased was laying on the floor in the garage. So I figured he had installed the air filter and all was well again. Later reports confirmed this.

While my son was off enjoying the car, I decided to tackle the bench part of the rear seat, and apply the carpet to the backrest. Stripping the old upholstery was no problem, but once I got the frame cleaned off I found a cross-bar that had become detached and a broken spring. I called my ever dependable brother-in-law and asked him to weld the frame for me. He wasn't too busy so I put the frame in the back of the van and headed over to his house. The welding was done in short order. With a fixed frame in hand, the upholstery on the bench was completed with no problems.

Obviously I created bad karma by feeling too confident since things were going so well. All I had left was to apply the carpet to the back panel of the rear seat back-rest. I pulled out my carpet pieces to lay out on the back panel. That's when I realized I did not have the correct back panel for the seat. Time for my daily trip to Lowes. I bought a 4' x 2' piece of luaun and a small jigsaw. Figured, I didn't have any choice but to make a panel. I laid the carpet out on the wood and traced the outline in pencil. My husband came out while I was trying to cut with the jigsaw. Obviously I was doing something that made him nervous because he took over and cut out the pattern for me. He stayed out long enough for me to find the screw holes and mark the board. Then he took the drill and drilled the holes for me as well. I guess me and power tools are not a good combination. We attached the board to the seat just to make sure the holes lined up properly. A little glue and the carpet was attached. The only remaining problem was the small flap of carpet that gets attached at the bottom of the seat. A piece of the bottom frame was missing as well, so we contacted my brother-in-law again and borrowed his staple gun. And once again my husband did the actual stapling with the pneumatic tool. I hammered down the ends of the staples, attached the board to the seat, and I think we are ready to install the rear seat!

Headliner is done

We went to Pollard's Trim Shop to pick up my car today. The headliner looks great. They did a really nice job. They had some trouble with the weatherstipping on the windows. I had bought a new set made by Empi. The window guy said that the rubber was to soft and just shredded when he tried to install the windows. He was able to use the old rubber on the rear and side windows, but I had to order a new piece for the windshield.

You can see the old headliner on the right, the new one on the left. I'm hoping to start the carpeting today, then finish up the seat upholstery over the weekend.

On a side note, my son got a new queen sized bed today, he was too big for the double bed. He must like it because he made up his bed and cleaned his room for the first time ever.

Seat Upholstery - Finally

I purchased my seat upholstery first, because I really don't know what I'm doing and didn't realize how much other repair had to be done first. However, I finally got to start doing the seats today.

Shout out to my brother-in-law who brought over a work table this morning so I would have a good surface to work on.


I had blue vinyl seat covers that were in really bad shape, with black snap on covers that were also in really bad shape. I dutifully watched my "how to" video several times before I started. It certainly seemed easy enough. Remove the old upholstery, clean up the horsehair (yes, horsehair for the padding), bend up the spikes, apply new upholstery. It only took 15 minutes on the video. Not as easy in real life.

The first time I asked my husband for help was just taking the seat apart. The back is bolted to the bottom. The back frame slips over the two bolts. A normal female cannot pry the frame off of the bolts, so request number one for help. He took the seat apart, making me feel feeble, but grateful.

Next step was to strip the old upholstery and padding off of the bottom. The spikes do not just "bend up" like in the video. I had to get a flat head screwdriver to pry them up enough to get the needle nose pliers underneath to then bend them up. Three bandaids later, I had the seat bottom done. By the way, request for help number two from my husband was a band-aid on the skin between my thumb and index finger.

The horsehair is another adventure. The pad itself peels off fairly easily, but the stuff goes everywhere. And it is very strange but there were quite a few acorn shells that kept appearing in the mess. I don't know if it was a messy previous owner, or part of the seat padding. The shop vac got a lot of use during the cleanup phase.

I removed the upholstery and padding, and was left with a fairly good frame, with a lot of junk stuck in and around the springs. I used a bottle brush, scrub brush, and sponge to get as much as possible off the springs. In short order I was ready to start the upholstery process.

The process starts with a layer of burlap that is installed over the top of the springs to protect the foam and fabric from the springs. It is installed using hog-rings, little metal clips attached to the springs using a special set of pliers. Sounds hard, but it was probably the easiest thing I did all day.

After the burlap is attached, you apply foam. I purchased a foam set, but in addition I needed a section of 1" foam to put on top of the burlap, under the formed foam pad. Off to Wal-Mart, where I found a nice 1" foam package for $13.

I cut a section of foam to fit the top of the seat, and applied to the burlap with spray glue. The I added some additional spray glue on top and applied the foam pad. So far so good, I was ready to put on the upholstery.

The cut and sew upholstery came from TMI, via jbugs.com. I pulled the fabric over my foamed seat frame. I pulled, and pulled, and pulled. I have tweed seat covers, so they do not stretch like the vinyl in the video. The goal was to pull the front and back edges down over the bottom of the frame, and hook them onto the metal spikes on the bottom. I could get close, but finally I gave up and made my third request for help from my husband. He kindly came out and helped push down the springs so I could hook the fabric over the spikes. Another bandaid later, we had the seat upholstery done on the seat bottom.

I was feeling pretty good because the seat bottom looked very good. So I tackled the back rest. I went through the same fabric removal, cleaning, burlap and foam process. Unfortunately, when I pulled the fabric up and off of the spikes, one broke off. So I sent a call for help to the Yahoo message board, and asked my brother-in-law if we could weld the tiny spike back on. Welding was not an option. Thinking back to my trusty video, I remember some fabric is just held on with hog-rings. Looking at the seat back I figured maybe I could just hog ring it to the frame. So I continued.

When I tried to put the upholstery on the seat, it would not go on. Remembering a tip from the video, I pulled out an old dry cleaning bag and covered the foam with the plastic. The upholstery slipped right on. I called my husband out for a fourth time, and we proceeded to hook the fabric over the remaining spikes. That's when the second of the three spikes broke off, so now I only had the center spike. I tried using the hog rings to hook the sides to the frame, but it didn't do as well as I had hoped.

I guess I hadn't been to Lowe's yet this weekend, so it was about time. A very helpful woman walked through the store for a half hour helping me look at various options for attaching the seat upholstery. I don't think I ever gave her a good mental picture of how it worked, because she showed me lawn spikes and other non-workable options. Finally, we found the cotter pins. Simple, and only cost $0.60 for a whole pack. So I took my cotter pins and headed home.

I slipped a cotter pin upwards onto the frame, forced the ends through the fabric, and hammered the ends down. Perfect! My seat back is done! I will need my husband's help to put the back and bottom together, but we can do that later. I didn't want to waste my help time because I knew I still had the backrest for the rear seat to do.

I had stripped the rear seat back rest while I was pondering the broken spike problem. There are many spikes on the rear seats. Fortunately, none of them broke because there was not a good place to use a cotter pin on those. After the obligatory burlap and foam pad, I remembered to put the dry cleaner bag on the top of the foam. Then I slipped the seat upholstery over the foam and called my husband out for the fifth time. Thankfully, he doesn't seem to mind helping. But there were so many spikes we pulled out the gloves to do this one. After much pulling, and pushing on the springs, we managed to get everything attached to the spikes. There were a few places that I had to cut on the side to allow important hardware to poke out of the fabric. I'm not thrilled with the holes in the side of the seat, but hopefully it won't be visible when the seat is installed.

Next I need to install the carpet on the back of the back rest for the rear seat, then I'll have the driver's side seat and the bench for the rear seat left to finish. I'll get my car back Monday, and have Wednesday off for July 4th so hopefully I can be done this week.

Small fire in the rear

I have to relate this second hand because I didn't witness the incident. My son and husband were going to drive the Beetle to the parts store this afternoon. My husband, who is a large man, sat on the back bench seat on top of the battery. My son started driving toward the parts store. According to the son, my husband started "screaming like a girl that his butt hurt" and the car filled up with smoke. According to them, the seat pressed down onto the battery and the springs and material started burning. So I need to find out if there is a weight limit on the back seat, or if there is something I can use to protect the seat from the battery.

What great fun. Sorry I missed it.

Ready for the Headliner

I wasn't sure we could get it done, but all of our prep work is ready and we are good to go tomorrow night to the headliner shop.

First order of business this morning was to reattach the dashboard. I had a strip of the old ugly paint on the passenger side so I used paint thinner and sand paper to get the majority of it off. Then I tried to widen the openings for the hand bar so it would fit snugly. No such luck, there is a piece of metal running through the dash that is in the way, so it's still on my to-do list. But all of the lights and knobs (except the fresh air vents) are re-attached and in place.

Once I got everything connected, I turned on the power and none of my dash lights worked. Oh was I unhappy. After tracing all of the wires, I finally realized the painter's tape was still over the fuses. When I checked, sure enough the fuse was at the end and was painted over. I replaced the fuse, and my lights came right on!

With everything restored to it's former glory, I got my new door jamb light switches and dome light and installed them. First try, I had lights. And they also work with the door switches. When you open the door the light goes on, when you close it the light goes off. Most excellent.

Next I reattached the door hardware so I could close and latch the doors. And I had the heater vent cables (cut when my brother-in-law welded the battery pan) so I installed those. Had to make a trip to Lowes for this one. I pulled out the vent flaps, and disconnected the wires. Then discovered those wires are important, you disconnect them at the small piece of hardware that requires a VERY tiny screwdriver. I now own one of those courtesy of Lowes. Of course there are two channels, one for each side. When I first ran the wires I switched them up - one was too short and one was too long. Didn't take a braniac to figure out I had them backwards. So I pulled them out and ran them through correctly. Then I attached the vent flaps. Once again, switched them and one wire was too long the other too short. You'd think on these 50/50 situations I'd be right half the time.

Next, I installed my new wiper motor. Of course another trip to Lowes. I needed e-clips to fasten the moving arm. Removed the old motor, attached the new motor. Then installed in the car. Also attached my new wiper blades that arrived this week. The motor works great if the arms are up, but they won't move at all if the wiper blades are in contact with the window. My on-line experts think either the nuts are not tight enough or I need to lubricate the moving parts. We can try both easily.

Once I got all the parts installed, I cleaned up the floor to get all of the sanding residue up. Then we went to re-attach the clutch cable. We hate doing that, but the clutch pedal fell forward while we were painting and the cable slipped off. My son was not in a good mood when this started. So I did all the pre-work and took out the pedal assembly. Richard came out to help push the cable through so I could reattach. He was grumbling a lot, so when he asked if he could try putting the bolts in I said "no you'll get mad and throw stuff". So he left and went inside. Unfortunately I was holding the clutch, and my ratchet was in the garage. So I was stuck. He waited almost 20 minutes to come back outside - and I was hot. I was cursing like a sailor and my arm hurt like crazy from holding the clutch. He did take the clutch back and help. But not before he got mad (like I expected) and threw a wrench across the yard. Like I said, we don't like doing the clutch cable.

Finally, all was done so we popped a seat in and took it for a drive. I drove out and my son drove home. Amazing how much he has improved since we replaced the shifter and put the shift plate in place. Being able to find the gears makes a big difference.

So Tuesday is the big day, and once the headliner is done, we'll start on carpet and upholstery.

Paint - 2nd Attempt

We have now painted the interior the same color we will eventually paint the exterior. I have to admit, my son was right. It looks good.

Of course our project started with a trip to Home Depot. In case I forget, Lowes is much better than Home Depot, I won't go back. My son had already called me twice on Friday to inform me there was no way we could get all of the sanding done and the car painted by Monday. So I went to Home Depot and bought a small orbital sander. What a great tool! We finished all of the sanding after I got off of work Friday. My husband and I went ahead and removed the dashboard completely. Don't be lazy when you paint, take the time up front to get as much out of the way as possible. You end up with a quicker paint job, and fewer mistakes.

Saturday morning I got up and double checked the sanding job. Then I taped up the doors and vinyl stuff that I wanted to protect. Plastic garbage bags are great for covering the big stuff. Seems like I just did this a couple of days ago. Yup, dejavu all over again.

After it was all taped up, I sprayed another coat of primer over all the metal. Interesting, as I was sanding and priming the car again, I found whole sections that we had missed painting the first time. So I guess we're getting better as we go.

Once it was primed, we had to mix the paint. The paint was purchased from O'Reilly Auto Parts, and is a really nice metallic green/blue. We also purchased a spray kit that has a glass jar for the paint with an aerosol pump that fits on the top. It worked suprisingly well. Two parts paint to one part thinner, shake well, and spray just like a spray paint can.

My son helped me paint this time. He said he didn't help the first time because the paint was ugly, but now that we have good paint it was worth his effort to help. I was quite thankful for his help, my index finger was still sore from the first paint job. And he has longer arms to reach under the dashboard. He only leaned up against the paint once, and that was early on in the process. He learns fast.

I asked him to take a picture of me painting too. I think he got my best side for sure.

I was amazed that we did the entire interior with less than one pint of paint. I guess the auto paints give a much better coverage than your standard spray paint. I was impressed. It's not perfect, but come on. The car is 35 years old and looks like it. There are some rough spots, and a few where the color is slightly uneven. But overall, in my humble opinion it looks very nice, and definitely better than before we painted. And absolutely better than the first paint job.

After we let the paint dry for an hour, we put four coats of clear coat over the paint. My son seemed disappointed that it didn't turn out shinier. Again, my expectations are much lower. I think it looks very nice. It's even, sort of shiny, and a very pretty color.

After an all-day project, we finally were able to remove the tape and painters paper and look at the finished product. Tomorrow I'll put the dashboard back in place. I can't wait until after the headliner is installed on Tuesday so we can start putting in carpet, door panels and seat upholstery.