Engine bay seal

[CovKid]

http://www.sealsdirect.co.uk/bbCMS/shop ... ntId=68#23" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Last one on the page should be perfect I'd say. ETS1395

Around a tenner and some left over if you buy two metres. Tell those sharks what they can do with their £100 seal

[A KIRK]

What a great find cheers chaps, I;ve just ordered 2m of the bottom seal so hopefully that will do the job £16 something inc VAt and postage bargain

[CovKid]

Photos please then we can WIKI it for posterity.

[A KIRK]

Will do once it turns up and I get round to fitting it, probably over the weekend

[A KIRK]

Well it arrived today and looks great, just perfect, but 2m is nowhere near enough, your going to need at least 3m if not 4. if it stops raining later i'll go have a play with it, but i'll probably just use some of the old seal thats in good condition to make up the length I need

[CovKid]

Do a pic tho and I'll WIKI it. Saved a fortune there!

Its my £1 shop innovative head don't ya know

[A KIRK]

Right as promised pics

You will need to buy 4m to go round the Aircooled tinware. This is the seal:



As you can see it is different to the original seal, but its actually slightly taller, but should be more than good for the job.

Pics of it in place:



Now I made the mistake of only buying 2m of it, but luckily I used some of the old seal which was still in good condition.

So in a nut shell buy 4m which will give you a little spare
Cost £24.40 inc VAT + £3.95 postage so compared to the £100 from other places its a huge saving.

As mentioned above its the bottom seal on this page:
http://www.sealsdirect.co.uk/bbCMS/shop ... ntId=68#23

[CovKid]

Grateful you took time to take the photos. To be honest I think it looks better than the original seal and should save a few quid for others. Can't for the life of me see why that seal should cost £100 odd. Must be a lot of people in the supply chain to warrant that amount of money. However, like most things on a T25 if you look at something long enough you can often find a better or cheaper way to do a job.

For me it was all born out of neccessity but its become a habit and lead on to an even worse habit of skip-watching. When i got my first bug i didn't have two 5p's to rub together and kept it going on almost nothing. So far on the T25 I've hardwired my dashpod with stuff salvaged from a desktop PC, theres at least one panel repair that was originally a PC case. Various additional switches came from recycled electronic gadgets, my buddy seat was made out of hardboard and pine, stained to keep the weight down, and the rock n roll seat was an inspirational afternoon with a pile of steel donated by my neighbour, and the only seat I felt confident enough to put kids on. The tow bar also materialised in the same way. Then theres rollering.....

The moral is, if its expensive, consider if you can adapt something else or actually make it. Even if its not expensive to buy, sometimes theres just the thing you need lurking in yours or someone elses shed. Fortunately the type 1 & 2 lend themselves very well to innovative thinking (unlike modern cars) and really, its just an extension of what VW did in the design process.

Another that springs to mind, is the small scoop on the back of the tinware (facing gearbox) on a 1600 bug engine. Sometimes these are missing and a large rectangular tobacco tin does the job very well. Whats REALLY scary is when you read the fortune some owners pay for parts rather than really think a problem through.

[BOXY]

Just did mine today. Had about half a metre left over from the 4 mtrs I ordered. Total price including VAT and carriage £32.71. It's a bit of a struggle to get it snug around the corners but a million times better than the perished, rusty VW original.

[CovKid]

There are a few bits/parts that are horrendous prices on the T25. My view is the same as it was 20 years ago. Its often a better and cheaper bet to modify whatever the part is connected to so you can fit something more readily available. With a few exceptions, the meccano construction of v-dubs gives you quite a few options and whilst those with seemingly limitless bank balances will just cough up, going away and thinking about the problem sometimes results in a eureka moment. In fact all my WIKI contributions are on that basis, assuming there are limited funds available and only limited knowledge on the part of the reader. Besides solving the problem theres real satisfaction to be had in knowing you've avoided the supplier who might otherwise be rubbing his hands together in glee.

ie, rather than forking out over a £100 for a new beetle wiper motor, nipping down to the lawnmower shop to find some new motor brushes that were 'close' and only needed a little sandpaper to make them fit - 15p. Case of lateral thinking. Granted not everyone can be bothered to work like that but no way can that seal POSSIBLY be worth the money being asked for it. Thats the point where you seriously have to question the sanity of others. Its not about being a cheapskate (although necessity is the mother of invention) but about being savvy I think.

[folkers]

Cheers for this, mine has a tiny but missing so didn't want to buy a whole seal! Only need about 8 inches of seal. Don't suppose you have an offcut I could buy from you?

Thanks

[golfingtam]

Thanks. Fantastic info. will be buying this seal when the stupid site lets me buy the quantity I need. Trying to buy 4m. Need to contact comp. direct.

Will let you know how it goes.

[toolsntat]

Mmmm, could do with some myself wonder if they would do a special price for 80-90 recommendations

Have all the A/C engines got the same length/ size?

Andy

[CovKid]

Yes same length on the T25 (shorter on a T2)

All added to WIKI this evening

https://club8090.co.uk/wiki/Al ... _Aircooled" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Cruz]

Engine bay seal a bit cheaper on ebay

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Engine-bay-seal-V ... 3f09285289" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;