Orwell gets boosted (another 1.8t 20v swap) by mk1vDUBtec

4 minute(s) of a 91 minute read

and trevor,
here is the car:

My friend says it's always parked at the robburitos in York. He thinks its someones that works there.

I started tearing into my 020 FN last night.

I first removed the detents and flanges:

I couldn't find a 27mm hex key for the life of me at any local hardware stores, so I cut a piece of bar stock and welded it back together. It wasn't ideal, but it worked out.

After removing the selector shaft, I opened the 5th gear cover.

I've been using brokevw.com as a reference. His stuff is awesome, but he doesn't have too much about my style of 5th gear selector fork. Mine has a peened tube instead of the splined shaft. I cut away the peens in order to screw the fork off of the shaft:

Question:
When I rebuild this, is that peened tube necessary? Theres no way I can reuse the original. Do I have to buy another? Or will it be fine without the tube? I'd also hate to have to source the other type of splined shaft and install that instead.

Moving on, I was able to split the case, when I immediately noticed that the rivets were of much better quality than the ones I read about/see when people install the bolt kit:

Question:
Will the bolt kit still benefit me even with these rivets? Are these rivets prone to failure as well? Or are they strong enough to hold the power as well as the bolts?

I also noticed that the diff bearing had some play in it.
Visuals:

Question:
How much play should the diff bearings have? I noticed that the one that is currently visible has some play in it. It's still pressed onto the shaft, but the outer ring of the bearing can be tilted and whatnot. Is this bearing alright or do I need to replace it?

Look at how much ish the magnet has on it:

I plan on removing the shaft and install the diff bolt kit on Thursday.
Thanks in advance for the help guys! (even though Cris is probablly the only one that reads this )