The move from the barn to the garage

So, we get the weather for a few days that means the ground outside the barn starts to dry out so we head up there with the truck, a strong rope and a bunch of bailer twine.

The plan is, drag the Golf out of the barn (backwards) and then ... well, that was pretty much the extent of the plan. I had no idea whether it would tow that far let alone what we would do next. We only had the truck and some rope so pushing was not an option - I could only pull.

We started by putting a loop of twine through the tow loop on the Golf so that we could get the rope through it, tied the other end of the rope to the truck tow hitch and drove off. The rope snapped after maybe 10'. The Golf had reached a pile of hay and rather than go up and over it stopped. We rolled the car forwards and clear some of the hay away. I tied the ends of the rope together and we set off again. Another car length and the rope snapped again. This time it was as the front wheels met the pile of hay. With some stearing lock applied as well as the rise in height was too much for the rope. This time we didnt clear any hay as that wasnt an option so we rolled forwards and took a run up at the pile. We rolled up and over quite neatly.

We now had to get around the tree outside the barn. This was causing me to have to tow from a slight angle and I was also having to steer to avoid other obstacles and try to find grip through some 6" of mud. After a few yards it became too close to keep going and we had to stop towing. It was now a case of manually pushing the car forwards to that we could get the steering lock on enough to avoid the tree. We managed maybe 2'-3' at best. The car was bogging down and we were slipping badly in the mud. I towed it forwards the 2'-3' and we 'reversed' it again. This time we got it clear enough to tow past the tree but it was still going over some of the roots and we managed to snap the rope, again. After this was retied we got all the way past the tree and were venturing into uncharted territory.

It was now necessary to get the truck on the other end of the Golf to head back towards the road, and the 1:8 hill that we had to descend. This was mostly a concrete section so was pretty easy going. I drove the truck and my wife was in charge of steering the Golf. Simples.

Going down the hill was the next hurdle, we had no idea if the brakes would work so I tied the tow–rope to the back of the Golf again and lowered it down the hill with the truck behind it. Piece of cake as it turned out – we didn't meet any traffic and coasted gently to the foot of the hill where I swapped the truck back to the front to tow it to the house and then into the garage.

-- NOTE-- This happened in March 2009 and I have only now (June 2010) re-started the project and found this update un-posted. Oops, must try harder.

Day one (ish)

Yesterday I spent the whole day clearing out the garage. It had been the default place to dump anything that didnt have a proper home for pretty much the last 18 months. It took all day and I had to be brutal about throwing stuff out. Why? Because today it was going to have a car put in it. As it happens it didnt but that gives me the chance to give you some of the back story and the reason for this blog.

I bought the car back in (ages ago, I cant remember when but probably 2003 or 2004). Its a Volkswagen Golf GTi Cabriolet - anyone from the US will know it as a VW Rabbit. We ran it for a year but it was getting vandalised and we decided to take it of the road. Luckily some friends of ours had a barn we could use to store it. well the time came to use the barn for barn like activities and we had to get the car moved. This coincided with us move house too so the car took up residence in another barn, just behind our horses stables. The car was not drivable at this point due to the battery going flat and the immobiliser , um , ... immobilising it. The brakes on one wheel had become seized too but that was sorted with a few swift swipes of a mallet.

this morning I went to the barn with the aim of towing it out with the pickup and then towing it into my newly empty (ish) garage. I got nowhere. 3 brakes are now seized so I am a bit stuck. I am going to look for advice from some local mechanics, the Haynes manual people and the Golf owners club. The barn isnt really big enough to renew the brakes where it is and I dont have all the tools to hand either.

I will try to post photos and keep things up to date here as I work on renovating the car and getting it back to the way it should be.