1979 VW B1 Passat Estate - Ready for MOT

Nice! Type 32 pre-facelift. I love the chrome bumper and rounded headlights on these. Might eventually look to doing that.



Ohh that's really nice too! I'm sure it would happily be a big bro. What wheels you got on there, really like them! Also deleted the map but someone else has hosted their own edited version of it. Nuts!



Cheers, didn't know I could do that! What exactly would I be buying if I were to by new points? Ha, this is how clueless I currently am!

Weather is rubbish tonight so couldn't get out and have a poke about.


Threw caution to the wind a bought a new timing belt anyway, never a bad thing to replace it. Also got a new air/oil/fuel, 4x sparks, and new dizzy cap. Picked up some external halogen worklights/extensions plus a handheld inspection light from B&Q too so hopefully tomorrow I can actually get going, weather permitting! If not, might well have to buy a roofed canopy/marquee!

'Buy a vw they said, it'll be fun they said!'

It'll turn into an addiction matey, hope you're ready

These old 8v engines are great, they've been used in the golfs from mk1 to mk3 so there's plenty of bits around for them, so you shouldn't have too much trouble finding stuff.

The brake lights will be down to the switch on the Master cylinder (the metal thing sticking out from the bulhead with all the brake lines coming out of it) and I'd say you brake fluid will have turned to sludge in the 20years of standing which is why you'll have feel but no brakes. A good clean out and replacement brake fluid should see success.

Looks like a peach. Please don't stick stickers on it or sand off the bonnet so it goes rusty!! Less is more and all that.

Good luck and I look forward to updates

A fellow dubbist with an addiction!

ATS classic wheels are awesome, I had some 13 inch classics on my old charade, they are really light weight too!

Yeah not a night for working outside !
Rotor arm and the cover should just pull off.
When you come to put the plug leads back on refer to your engine bay pic and follow each lead from dizzy to block so you get the right firing order again.
All the fixings should be metric and you maybe have inherited some old AF spanners and sockets.Some of these you can use,5/16 is virtually the same as 8mm for example in fact its often a better fit than an 8mm.

Halfords pro tools are good for the money,but if you buy a new set you get another load of AF stuff as well as metric.
Have a look on the bay,lots of guys on there seem to be buying up Halfords sets and splitting them for sale so you can buy a set of the metric sockets unboxed pretty cheap.Go for 3/8 drive stuff to start with,1/2 inch drive is a bit cumbersome for a lot of jobs and 1/4 won't take big torque.
You will probably want them all eventually but start with some 3/8 metric sockets and a decent quality 3/8 ratchet and breaker bar.I'm good at spending other peoples money !

have you check and changed the engine oil in the car? ive only seen this mentioned once but its important and shouldnt be over looked as it could cause damage to the engine. (if you have already done it and i missed read it i apologize).
the rotor arm should just pull off but if its been there a while you may want to try gently levering it of with a screwdriver.

nice looking car and prefect for someone to cut there teeth on. i hope you in enjoy it

Nice one thanks, had another crack late last night after it stopped raining (again) and got it off. The breaker points I've ordered look right but only time will tell.
I also picked up a 28 piece 3/8 metric set from the Halfords pro range last night. Given the weather, not had the time to check them out yet. Itching for the weekend with actual daylight!

scatman - nobody has mentioned too much about the oil, but I'm hoping to do an oil change this weekend before seeing if the engine wants to turn over/hand crank. Will 2 liters of cheap halfords stuff do just to flush the sediment out? Obviously will put in better stuff when up and running.

For this, I guess I just jack the vehicle (i have 2x axel stands), locate the oil plug, open and drain into a waste oil bucket. Also take old oil filter off and replace with a new one, but had read I can add a small amount of oil into the filter first to help it regain pressure? Wait for everything to stop dripping, the just replace the plug, screw new filter on, top the new oil and screw the cap back on? Obviously then check dipstick etc after a few hours of 'setting'.

Just hoping my stuff arrives by Saturday!

Once that's done I will have a crack at taking the timing belt cover off and hand cranking to make sure there is no seizure, then hopefully replacing dizzy points and cap, sparks and seeing if I have any spark action!

Cheers guys! Looking forward to the weekend!!

i thought it mention it as i've heard horror stories of people turning over engines by hand and snapping piston rings because there been no oil there. especially if the engine hasnt been turned in ages.

halfords oil is fine (especially if you have a trade card) as its what i use in my car. i don't no if 2 litres will be enough oil but the bigger bottles arent that expensive so i would just grab one of those.
if the oil hasnt been changed in years it will be worth changing the new oil again to flush the system as you said. if you can, get the sump off and see how much (if any) gunge is in there. but be warned, you will probably need a new sump gasket when you try and refit the sump.

yeah for changing the oil, thats how its done. simple as that, ive never heard of putting a small amount of oil in the filter, it kinda makes sense and at the very least wont damage anything. also make sure to put a small coating of oil on the O-ring on the filter as this stops catching when being done up and reduces the chance of tearing the O-ring as split O-rings are not you friends.

So if today has taught me anything, it's that I really don't know anything about engines!   I've added some questions in bold which are stumping me. Noob alert, sorry

I guess the oil change went ok - lots of old nasty black oil came out once I eventually found the sump plug. The filter was an absolute curse word to get off. Resorted to the screwdriver method mentioned by highvoltage, many thanks for that!!
It did give me the chance to have a good look at the underside, and I'm mighty impressed at the condition. Exhaust will need replacing, but there's not a hint of rust that I'm worried about. All cross-members, sills etc look great.

As for the engine...I managed to hand crank the crankshaft once I figured out how to get the cover off. At least the engine isn't seized! The timing belt also looks in amazing condition, probably almost new from when the car came off the road.
As I stupidly removed the dizzy cap plus all HT leads, I'm assuming I now need to find TDC on the crankshaft (checking the #1 piston for position) and set the dizzy rotor arm to be firing on HT lead 1? In addition to this, how can I find out which way the engine will turn over, so I can work out which cap will be next? I can't find it in the Haynes manual.

I also think I buggered the HT leads when trying to change the sparks - somehow managed to pull a main wire out the insulation when pulling a spark out. Buying a multimeter tomorrow to test them all after some fixing. Might have to buy some new ones! I attached a new plug to one HT lead that I hadn't destroyed and tried testing to see if it had a spark - nothing. Do I need all 4 sparks in each lead to test for a spark, or will just one work? I've also still not received my new contact points, so this might have been the issue anyway, although I did clean the old ones up and clean the residue off. Could it be my compressor that's gone instead? I'm also picking up a feeler gague tomorrow, so this should help with gapping the sparks and points. I heard all VW points should be 0.4mm, anyone know if this is true?

Also discovered a large amount of blue crystals around a few of the radiator hoses which doesn't look too good. Going to totally drain it tomorrow, pull hoses out and check them all, replace jubilee clips, plus flush the system and have a general wire-brushing! Will probably fill with just water and watch for any leaks before I put any coolant back in, just in case I need new hoses.


highvoltage - As far as I know, my great uncle just stopped driving it and used the 205 instead. He was 91 when he stopped driving the passat so that's fair enough I guess!

Also, sorry for the really long post. Just nice to recap to myself what I've done and what needs doing.

As ever highvoltage, a really helpful post Confirmed the sequence is 1-3-4-2, and yes I mean condenser Although this has now been ruled out below.

So today's efforts! I managed to get myself a decent multimeter so can finally confirm my HT leads are OK and tested a new spark plug on each one. I've gapped the (fixed) breaker points to 0.4mm and fitted all new sparks into the block (my gosh I had to use a 5ft breaker bar to remove the old ones!). Replaced the dizzy cap and connected leads in the right firing order (although need to check TCD on timing belt - but will do that once the engine gives me a sign of life). Glugged a small amount of fuel into the throttle on the carb and turned over. Still nothing. However, after a chat with a good friend, this could be due to a few things.
I lubricated the spark threads and block threads, maybe too liberally before I put the sparks in, so they might have gotten oil on the spark points leading to no spark once secured. I might also have used too much fuel, again making them damp and not fire. Lastly, the new battery might have lost some juice if it's sat on a shelf for a while, plus repeated spark tests where it would be trying to crank. 

Going to pull out each individual spark tomorrow and test them again, plus double check my TDC timing, plus hook the battery up to my fiesta while running. Also gonna give some starter fluid a go instead of petrol to avoid the above problems again.

Any other suggestions do let me know! Thanks for your continued reading and support!