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I own a 2000 Passat and I'm trying to figure out how to change the front brake pads. I'll admit that I'm new to this and I'm trying to do it on my own and I'm having trouble figuring out how to get to the actual pad. Any obvious way that I've overlooked. Also, is there a Chilton or Hanes out on the 2000? I have an automatic w/tiptronic.
Thanks ahead of time for any help.
go2grl
The cost may be somewhat more than doing it yourself, but these are BRAKES -- I wouldn't mess with them unless you are a VW certified technician.
Check out the rotors too -- VW Audi had issues with warped rotors during the 2000 - 2002 years. And, also, check the rear.
I've seen step-by-step instructions with pictures on another Passat specific forum, but rules here prohibit me from posting a link. Frankly, the job looks pretty straight forward and appears to be slightly easier than doing the rear pads. Your e-mail address is private, so I can't e-mail the links, either.
The suggestion of replacing the front rotors is a good one. Internet pricing for Brembo rotors for my model year (2003) run between $41 and $44 each, with free shipping (for purchases over $50). PBR deluxe pads are about $45 to $50. You could get all replacement parts for less than $130 for the front brakes.
Check out getcoolparts.com and stopshopanddrive.com.
go2grl
go2grl
Color me impressed -- and perhaps a bit curious. Besides saving money is this an enjoyable experience (to work on your car?) I know how good it feels to give my car a hand wash and dry, to shine the tires and vacuum it out.
But what you are talking about is a far cry from appearance maintenance.
"Zen and the Art of VW Maintenance" -- has a certain nice ring to it.
If you think tackling the brakes is an impressive feat, what would you say about the owners doing their own timing belts? On the Passat, you have to move the front bumper and associated pieces into the "service position." It's a pretty awesome feat, in my view.
Anyway, I can understand the sense of satisfaction of performing your own maintenance.
(Gee - seems a shame not to be able to simply Point to it!)
Will also suggest you get a Caliper (Piston) Retracting Tool - and not just the cheap little "cube," but a Real tool. Look up "Great Neck 11 Piece Caliper Tool Set" - or something similar. Can be had as a Loaner Tool at AutoZone. Vital for the rear, and extremely helpful for front. Article includes other tools & materials you should have on hand, including a decent jack stand....
Oh yeah: the job is a LOT easier if you have a 2nd pair of hands, esp for co-ordinating the piston retraction / bleeding process.
Good luck with the job! Did the rears on my '99 (rotors and pads) last weekend, and also disassembled the fronts just to ensure their condition: will be putting new pads and rotors on this week, perhaps tomorrow if weather breaks (HOT in SE MI!)
They mention that sludge buildup is due to the oil oxidizing due to prolonged exposures to high temperatures. I'm assuming that this is b/c of the turbo. They suggest using a high grade synthetic oil on oil changes and keep a record of your maintenance.
Thought the group would like to know...
This is old news that has been out for almost 2 years now... VW has the 502.00 specification list of motor oils posted at their dealerships. The TSB on this came out around the beginning of the second quarter of 2004.
1) If you do a lot of stop-and-go driving, change the oil every 3500-4000 miles. If you do a lot of highway driving, change it every 5000 miles.
2) Use VW 502.00 specification motor oils. The service department at the dealership should have a readily available list of motor oils (synthetic only) that meet the spec. The motor oils on that list are available at your local auto parts store (Auto Zone, Pep Boys, Western Auto, etc.).
3) Purchase the oil filter at the dealer. The VW OEM oil filters are of much better construction than the aftermarket filters - containing a steel ball-type check valve (to aid in regulating the engine's oil pressure) and a steel ball-bearing anti-drainback valve (to keep dirty oil from flowing back into the engine after you shut it off. Most importantly, there is a TSB for your Passat that calls for using the larger VW OEM oil filter to compensate for the smaller engine sump (due to the longitudinal position of the engine) and increase the engine oil capacity from 3.9 quarts to 4.2 quarts (same as the transverse-mounted 1.8T engine in my 2003 Wolfsburg Jetta).
4) As far as fuel requirements for the 1.8T, use the good stuff (91 octane or better) to get the best performance out of the engine.
At 49000 miles, you'll have a ways to go before the next major maintenance item - the timing belt and water pump at the 80,000 - 90,000 mile interval (just to be on the safe side).
These are the reasons why I won't be buying VW again and advice other people to stay away from VW products.
I have found a car I really like at a small dealership. The vehicle shows repossesion and an auction purchase on it's carfax report, however it appears to be in good condition. I visually inspected everything (including the CV boots) and test drove it favorably, the body is straght and the engine is clean. They said they only replace the belts if they are over 50% worn. Is that ok? Also, could not find the transmission fluid stick. I have read through several posts on this site, and now I am worried about the belts, oil, brakes etc. I have no idea, and the dealer does not know, the car's repair history. They are offering to split the cost of the warranty with me (it's through an external company and costs $1200) and he is willing to take my offer of $7400. I am hoping some of you can help me with this decision, as I don't want to buy a car that will need major repairs. (Who does? ; ) Is this a good price for a Passat with 100,000 miles? :confuse:
101,000 miles on a '00 Passat GLS
$1200 on an extended warranty ($600 paid by you)
Belt(I'm thinking timing belt here) never replaced
$7,400
No repair or maintenance history
Is this all accurate? I would completely avoid this car. First of all, VW's tend to be very problematic and especially this vintage. As you may have read, maintenance on VW's is VERY important and it appears that this car has no known history. Also, $7400 sounds VERY high.
Not sure this would be a good deal.
Good Luck!!
At 49000 miles, you'll have a ways to go before the next major maintenance item - the timing belt and water pump at the 80,000 - 90,000 mile interval (just to be on the safe side).
Personally, I wouldn't wait for that high of mileage before changing out the TB and water pump. The engine is an interference design - if the belt goes it will grenade the valvetrain.
If it were me, I'd be thinking about it any time after 60,000 miles, especially if the car is mostly city-driven.
Well, at least we both agree that the VW specified 105K timing belt change interval is like playing Russian Roulette without an empty chamber....
Based on my experience on 3 of the 4 VW's I've personally owned (Mk1 through Mk3), I've never had a timing belt failure on any of them - and I usually change them around the 80K - 90K mileage interval.
It also depends on driving style - the more a driver tends to drive the car hard on a regular basis, the greater the probability of timing belt failure (especially, as you mentioned, city driving - stop and go is always brutal on an engine)...
The only dealer maintenance was replacing the timing belt at 90K miles at $150. My Camry has a boring style, but it a great car. At 80-90mph, you hardly hear the engine. 2001-2005 Passat has a great styling, but is it worth it to drive a good looking car, and keep spending money on nagging problems? Don't answer that since I might end up buying a Passat anyway!!!
Joe
Paul
I am sometimes chastised for making such suggestions, but -- there ARE brand new (2005 and some 2006) model cars that can be leased for a number beginning with a "2" -- try $219.95 on for size. Even if you are "forced" to prepay sales tax (here in Ohio that is the way it is done on a lease) plus a security deposit plus the first month's lease payment -- you should be able to spend the same amount of money as you are talking on a BRAND NEW car with 100% new car warranty, new tires, new wiper blades, new brake pads -- etc etc etc and be able to drive this car for about 3 years.
Unless you are going to drive way over 15,000 miles per year -- at the end of 3 years in either case you would for all practical financial purposes "own" nothing.
I would submit, however, that the 101,000 used and suspicious VW would COST WAY MORE in total cash put out than a brand new leased car would cost.
Heck, chances are you could drive the new car and never swap out the tires in 3 years. Regular maintenance would be required -- but many new cars have very puny maintenance requirements until they pass 50,000 miles.
Here in River City the market is so competitive even the local Chevy dealers are including the maintenace in the asking price (limited to oil changes and other fairly low cost items -- in other words NOT the Audi advantage where you can get wiper blades and light bulbs, but still worth a couple hundred bucks over a 3 year time frame.)
The point is, this Passat could be a money pit and the price considering seems too high. Perhaps if the dealer would include the full amount of the add on warranty -- perhaps.
Sorry to rain on your idea.
If I had a sludge problem, I wonder how the warantee would apply if the dealer is negligent because they ignored VW's recommendations.
This would be fun to bring to the attention of VWoA. I'd love to hear their answer.
It was a $1,700 repair, but VW would cover it as long as we could prove we had oil changes at least every 6000 miles. It is a 2001 Passat 1.8T with 64K miles, that we bought at 32K. Luckily, the previous ownere kept all his receipts in the manual. Also, we happened to have all of ours. Total cost to us, $125 for the hotel room.
Keep all your oil change receipts!
Thanks,
Paul
VW recommends changes every 5000 miles, although oil change places and gas stations usually put 3000 on the sticker. Don't fall for changing every 3K. VW also gives an extra 1K miles buffer as far as the free repair. If you don't have all the receipts (as we weren't sure we had), we actually called as many places we could think of where we had our oil changed so they could fax invoices to the dealer to show when we had the oil changed.
One scary moment we had was that 1 of our local gas stations changed our oil, and had no records as old as we needed. We hoped it was in the car, but we were at the hotel at the time. The following oil change was at a VW dealer, and on their invoice they had writter "changed oil, 1000 miles over per sticker", so they were reluctant to fac that invoice, as it may have ruined everything for us. Luckily, the gas station we later determined put a 3000 mile sticker on the car, meaning our "1000 miles over" was still a change after 4000 miles, well under VW's need.
I am still so releived we didn't get stuck with that bill. And they need proof all the way back to mile zero, regardless of whenyou bought it (unless you bought it as a certified used vw from a dealer, then you only need to prove from the moment you bought it).
Thanks again,
Paul
As far as the big sludge fix, they didn't care what kind of oil was used for the changes. Only the miles. In fact, since we had 64K miles, all they really wanted was 10 oil changes for proof. It really seemed the number of oil changes was more important that the mileage between changes. I think by the time we found 9 invoices, that was good enough for them.
No need to be impressed
go2grl
Krzys
Thanks!
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First thing I would do is to make sure the car was properly maintained (check service records, etc) - i.e. the oil was changed at the proper intervals (every 3500 miles if the driving was mostly stop-and-go city driving, every 5000 miles if mostly highway driven),
and most importantly, if the proper motor oil was used according to the VW 502.00 specification (every oil on that specification is synthetic oil only) - you will find that list at the service department of your nearest VW dealership (if they don't have the list, I would take my car to another dealership that has that list). Make sure you run a Carfax on the VIN number to make sure it hasn't been in any accidents. Make sure you visually check the brake pads and rotors - that should give you a good indication of how the previous owner drove the car.
According to Consumer reports, the 2003 Passat's is on their recommended list with an overall reliability of average.
thanks again for your advice.
I went to get in the car, peeled back the paper mat and it was soaking wet. I immediately went to get the serviceman and showed him. Sure enough he popped the hood and pulled back the cover over the battery and said they need to check the "cowl" drains. What they suspected is exactly what you just explained.
It has not rained heavy enough for this to happen again-but I'm going to have that checked and keep a watch on it. Thanks!
I am struggling to get the rear calipers back onto this jetta and cannot figure out why I can't push the pistons back. At first I though i had a frozen caliper so i attempted the other side and came up with the same result. I find it highly unlikely that both rear calipers would be frozen. I do have what I would call exessive wear on the rear pad so maybe that's the case. Does anyone have any thoughts?
We used a "Great Neck 11 Piece Caliper Tool Kit" from AutoZone: Free "rental," as long as you bring the kit back ($35 deposit). This did a wonderful job on the rears of my Passat, and made working on the front much easier than would have been the case had we tried using the old "C-Clamp" approach.
If you look the tool kit up on Autozone's web site you can write the part number down - not all of their staff recognizes the description, but they can punch the Part No into their computer and tell you a) Whether or not their store has one, and b) Whether or not it is Available.
ALSO: open the bleed valves at the caliper you are working on as you retract the piston (Front or Rear). You will, of course, have a BLEED KIT attached before opening the valve - and keep an eye out for overfill if you have one with a small collector bottle...
The Haynes manual did a pretty good job of describing this process - although there was a series of pictures on-line of an Actual Job that showed the parts with greater clarity than the manual did.
Once we figured this all out - and assembled correct parts, tools, brake grease, cleaner & what not - job proved fairly easy & brakes certainly work a whole lot better than they did prior to putting the new pads & rotors on...
Good luck!
Reid / SE MI
Be careful not to pinch/crush rubber boot behind piston when using vise grip.
Brake fluid reservoir is vented so bleeding is not necessary, but monitor fluid level so you dont overflow reservoir and maybe just loosen cap a bit on the reservoir.
I used Mintex red box pads which are great - very low dusting if your concerned about that.
Can't recommend the tool highly enough.
Make sure you really dry out the car. There's too many electronic modules under the seats. You really don't want corrosion to get into them. I'd go so far as to use a wet vac to vacuum out as much as I could then even consider running a household dehumidifier in the car to really get all the moisture out (I actually saw a Passat wagon at my dealership with a running dehumidifier in the "way back." I asked about it and was told that they were drying it out from this very same problem).
I've been looking for a vehicle to take out west with me, either a used VW Passat glx 4 motion(2001) or a SUV, probably a Hyndai Santa Fe LX(2004). There both similar in price, and similarly equiped. I am trying to decide on one of them, based on how each would handle in snow. The passat would drive better normally, but I need some insight on how the 4 motion passat would handle in snowy conditions compared to the SUV. All help is appreciated, thanks...
Well long story short they don't have the same tools as AutoZone and they tried to sell me the cube thingy. Didn't buy it thanks to things i've read here. Stopped at Napa and they only had the cube thingy as well. So I came home a little ticked off that I was going to either have to do it the hard way or improvise.
Improvise is what i ended up doing. For anyone else whoever runs into the same predicament as me all you need is a standard caliper retracting tool and a 4" electric grinder. Well not the actual grinder but the tool used to change the grinding wheel. With the caliper retractor in place and snug (not tight) the grinder tool fits perfectly around the retractor and perfectly into the notches in the piston.
Well that's all I have to say about that. Thanks again for the help.