Jump to content

The definitive Pedal Box Thread


Recommended Posts

From the above "The VW website says that recalls are forever. The recall is listed on the recall list and my chassis number is in the range listed. "

Do you have a chassis number range as that would help some people out knowing about this fault. My black 1.0se had the issue and i got it repaired (at the time not knowing the about bIg F comment above). Whereas the GTi i have (2005) is still on its orignal (car on close to 70k).

Also to note Vw was supposed to transfer the parts to hertiage. The part number is not listed here, i will see if i can find it so i can cross reference it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sorry for the late reply on this, but a lot has happened.

Cant find the website that showed my chassis number being in the range of the recall, it was on my Wife's iPad, and we can't find it even though the history is not wiped for the browser.

However, this site seems to have some information that VW seem to have conveniently lost. https://car-recalls.co.uk/recall/vw-polo-clutch-operation-may-be-affected/

Also, here is VW UK's own site proclaiming that recalls are forever. https://www.vw.com/en/recalls/recall-faq.html

This is their own VIN look up for recalls, which apparently, my car does not exist as my VIN is invalid.  https://www.vw.com/en/recalls.html

I contacted VW UK to investigate the requirement to have to bring the car in to the dealers to have it investigated.  They replied with a very badly written replies, now I am no punctuation god, but even I know that sentences work better when you use all the words needed to make one, missing out words like "and" or "the" or just connective words that help make it legible really help.

The emails received all read like they were thrown into Google translator twice.

Essentially, VW see no fault of their own and think it is perfectly reasonable to make me pay £150 to have the car trailered to the dealers to then have them investigate with "diagnostic systems" that only VW have, to find the fault.

I as a Mechanical engineer with quite a few decades of experience, diagnosed the fault, to be fair it's fairly obvious the part was not actually made correctly.  The dealers agreed with me when I took the clutch ear in to show them, as it was completely separated from the rest of the assembly.

In a nutshell, the weld that is supposed to be the main structural point is not welded, and the two parts were only held by the paint filling the gap in the weld and two very under performing spot welds that were not full thickness.

The only good news so far is the dealers think the £90 investigation fee won't apply.

 

I pointed out to VAG UK that they are still bound by the UK Sales of Goods Act, where in an item must be   1. As described.  2. Fit for purpose. 3. Of reasonable Quality.

This part fails two points. I advised the approach from them seemed silly, due to the costs involved being higher than just buying another part and fitting it. Their whole sales point seems to be that the dealers will fit it for free...........

So where we stand now is, the dealers want the car and don't care that it costs more than the part to get it there, or they'll sell me another part at cost and say goodbye to the issue.

Not a great set of options.

So I fitted my own take on the Bulkhead adaptor and now have a working clutch with silky smooth changes and no notchy grinding gear changes, all with the added bonus of no slippy clutch.

The car will be driven to the dealers on Monday, I conveniently work 400 m away from it. The Dealers are then going to fit a new box and let me have the car back.

They seem to have forgotten that there is one part that VAG no longer stock, namely the brake pedal clip thing that you have to sacrifice to remove the pedal box.

I am kind of thinking that they'll try and find something that needs fixing to try and off set things still, but as the car has done a fair few miles with my modification, I can't see that they really find anything mission ending.

The Killer thing is VAG UK want me to complete a Customer Satisfaction Survey............ I'm putting that off as they probably won't like it.   My previous contact with VAG was utterly flawless, although that was with VAG Germany, so maybe next time I will contact the mother ship instead.

 

Anyways   on to the pictures which should help you guys.

1.thumb.JPG.98577685bd960d9b5a0bfc5d2b165da7.JPG

Showing the original 1999 pedal box viewed from above, looking thorough the dash, you can see the Clutch ear is not really attached any more.

 

2.thumb.JPG.b197cf053e018cd2f0c6c6ae28798dd7.JPG

A more close up view of the break, seen from above position.

 

3.thumb.JPG.17a4c70f0aaf0e25b42ce9c4da89f92e.JPG

Close up, you can see the rust build up from years of wet shoes and the fresh tear in the metal when it finally gave up.

4.thumb.JPG.fe4784a591b70defb09d11974e24e20e.JPG

The hole pulled from the ear when the main weld gave up (the bang noise)

 

5.JPG.b21b919634f6a557cf2bc365be478faa.JPG

The view from the other side, showing the hole in the Box and the spot welds still fastened and the metal around them having failed

All exactly what you would expect from the failure.

 

Now on to the new part.

6.JPG.fdfd49ac34c7a6cf205dcf70dbd8ea65.JPG

The clutch ear when I removed the clutch cable, it simply fell into the footwell.

You can see the spot welds are smooth indicating they did not fully penetrate both parts, this could be due to time on place or current, either way it shouldn't have happened.

You can also see the slight texture to the paint on the right where the weld is supposed to be.

Bad VW your QC checks didn't see this.  Cant believe that I would be the only person experiencing this. If they follow standard QC of at least ISO9001 then they will have missed quite a few potentially, unless the operator noticed, beforehand.

 

On to my Fix.

7.thumb.JPG.a6f01cf72cb64e08b6656a232a31350c.JPG

The bulkhead with the clutch cable removed and the excess body panel sealer removed and sound deadening pulled back.

 

8.JPG.ef7054cbdcc140cecc63e5517b39f981.JPG

The yellow marks indicate a recessed part of the pressing that makes this section of the bulkhead, its not visible in the picture as the light is crap and you cant get a decent angle with all the other stuff in the way.

 

9.JPG.e314e67476ddd5bd312f76543e845117.JPG

My Part made from 5 mm steel plate. The yellow lines are where I cut it to fit finally after the first cuts were made using Cardboard Aided Design.

The cable on the Polo is non-self adjusting on the UK Polo. Once the 5 mm adaptor and the extra distance required to connect to the pedal is added there is not enough room to get the gear box end fitted, so a little change is required. 

10.JPG.3fb4b565b19ea9dbeae240a766c5bf4f.JPG

Not my picture, as mine didn’t come out that well.  The area circled in yellow is the gear box end adjuster it needs to be slid down to the end of the cable to reveal the outer cable where you need to remove 1 cm of the outer to give the cable enough length to attach to the gearbox.

 

11.JPG.478d7ba82fd333a9a64821482d3e1299.JPG

Not actually the correct cable but for illustration purposes the metal nut looking part in the yellow circle, which is plastic on VW Polo factory cables, needs sliding off.

Once off, you can trim with a knife 1 cm of the plastic outer to reveal the inner metal bit. Then you need to cut it off.  Pop the cable in a Vice with enough of the sliver metal coil that makes the inner above the top of the vice jaws then, using a metal file, file the area flat.  The metal is not that hard, so very quickly you'll end up with a gap and then you can remove the little "c's" of metal easily with a screwdriver pushed into the gaps, giving them a little twist.  Then it's just a matter of pushing the end back on, and you have 10 mm extra on your cable.

Pop the end through the adaptor plate and hook it on the pedal, then attach at the gear box and set the clutch. Just for good measures, pop some exterior grade mastic or car body seal on to the adaptor to stop it wandering and or water finding it's way in.

I fully expect this mod to continue to work for the life of the car and was expecting to refit it once the car is back with me as quite frankly I don't trust the replacement parts from VW.

It's a shame that VW Heritage are not making these as I know the company they would be using to make them and their work is top-notch. There would be a very good chance they would have advised better/more welds as part of the evaluation and test manufacture stage of building a production run for the part.

I will post again once VW have either fixed the car or not, as it may be.

 

 

Edited by bIg F
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 months later...

Its been a while,  the car is one the road and I have put 4 tanks of fuel through it since the fix.

The Dealers were able to get the part fitted and give me a working car again.

it was how ever a bit of a saga.

Firstly,  VW have as we know delisted the sacrificial plastic part that fits on the brake pedal.  So they tried to get one and couldn't… VAG  UK searched all the UK dealerships and didnt find one. They were looking at having one shipped from the states as there is a fair few over there due to them being fitted to the VR6 and it being popular over there. But postage was apparently a no-no.  Eventually at the 11 hour VAG found one in the Swindon dealership, you know the one next door to the actual VW HQ.  

Prior to that VAG categorically would not buy one off the internet from one of the sites that has stock of the NOS  parts, as they said why would we pay inflated prices for something we made and sold to the third party. I even suggested that I buy one and accidentally leave it on the parts counter where they might find it, this was also not something they wanted to do. 

 

The new pedal box is obviously better made and the welded parts are, well more welded.  Again reinforcing the theory that the replacement was old stock that should have been junked, after the remake and improvements.

 

When I got the car back initially the clutch felt high and wasn't great to drive on long journeys, when you are tall and the seat is already as far back as it will go.  That soon changed once it bedded in and I now have the familiar slack before the cable starts pulling the clutch.

Still get the  very occasional crunch when putting it in reverse but thats more down to me than the car I think.  The pedal still makes the same squeak sound, that the old box did ,which does concern me, so my fix it part is a permanent resident in the glove box just in case.

The Dealers did state that if VW had not been able to find the plastic part , that under their own rules they would have to find a replacement car  for me, probably something from the trade in pool that was similar.   And I would still legally own my existing car so that would be mine also. 

That said I  was told by the dealers that the pedal box was also due to be delisted, essentially making every Lupo or Polo with a pedal box failure potential scrap.

So this got me thinking about the future of these cars.  

 

I have been playing with a design of part that will remove the need to take the pedal box out and will give the OEM feel back to a broken pedal box. As my plate fix was great but the pedal position was not  right.

The idea of the part is that someone can make or cheaply have made the part and with minimal tools or knowledge just pop it in and get back to driving.

 

I will post the plans here once I am happy with it and then others can use them to fix their cars.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.