Hi volks, I’m in the process of cutting out small sections of my ‘84 2-door GTI rear arches in the fight against rust. At the front and the rear of the arch they’ve succumbed and the lips just snapped off in my fingers. Got genuine arch replacements from heritage from which I cut the left patch I needed ready to weld in. However, to weld the patch in bang on I’m using some measurements but they just don’t add up. So I checked on ETKA and up to ‘87 the part number (191 809 605 C) differs from the one post ‘87 which I think ended with a D. So the question is did the flaring of the arch change slightly at that time and my replacement arch is based of the later design? Another question for any body work gurus is would a good panel man cut out the whole arch and weld in the whole new one to be certain of keeping the flow of the arch perfect. Just that the top third of mine was fine and wanted to cut the front in rear sections in to really minimise the amount of original arch metal I removed? Thanks guys.
probblem will be they're pattern, never quite match up. the quarter panel did change in 87 but the only difference is holes were added for the rubbing strip and the topmost hole used for the small early quarter flares was deleted
