Model Year 21/22 Centre light bar replacement

[matko]

Hi, my centre light bar is cracked.
I was reversing in front of my house and hit a tree :/

I found that the part number is 5ff945307b, and ordered used one from one webshop.
It should arrive in a week.

I am trying to figure out if I could replace it by myself. Unfortunately I didn't find any guide to show me how to do. My assumption is that I only need to remove plastic trunk panels, disconnect the accumulator and that's it =D

Does anyone have experience with rear center LED strip replacement?

 

[cairus]

Why not invest about 10€ and download everything from Erwin?

 

[SRGTD]

It looks as if the body panel immediately above the light strip might also have taken a little knock when you hit the tree. The section of the body panel I‘ve marked in the picture below looks slightly raised compared to the panel on either side of the circled area.

If there is damage to that panel, you might be able to live with it as appears to be very minor.

 

[matko]

It looks as if the body panel immediately above the light strip might also have taken a little knock when you hit the tree. The section of the body panel I‘ve marked in the picture below looks slightly raised compared to the panel on either side of the circled area.

If there is damage to that panel, you might be able to live with it as appears to be very minor.

View attachment 45888

what do you think, is there a possiblility of water leaking inside the LED strip becuse of the section of the body panel might be slightly raised?

 

[matko]

Why not invest about 10€ and download everything from Erwin?

could you give me more detailed advice?

this is the first time I've heard oferWin

I visited their site https://volkswagen.erwin-store.com/erwin/showHome.do
and if I understand correctly, I need to register there and find a repair manual for my LED strip?

 

[SRGTD]

It looks as if the body panel immediately above the light strip might also have taken a little knock when you hit the tree. The section of the body panel I‘ve marked in the picture below looks slightly raised compared to the panel on either side of the circled area.

If there is damage to that panel, you might be able to live with it as appears to be very minor.

what do you think, is there a possiblility of water leaking inside the LED strip becuse of the section of the body panel might be slightly raised?

Sorry, I don’t know. Presumably it’ll depend on the design of both the rear side of the LED strip and the recess in the body panel that the LED strip fits into.

I’d personally get the body panel repaired, as even though damage appears to be minor, I’d not be able to ‘unsee’ the damage; I’d focus on it every time I approached the rear of the car and it would play havoc with my car-OCD!

 

[tracktoy]

could you give me more detailed advice?

this is the first time I've heard oferWin

I visited their site https://volkswagen.erwin-store.com/erwin/showHome.do
and if I understand correctly, I need to register there and find a repair manual for my LED strip?

you need to look at https://seat.erwin-store.com/erwin/showHome.do, last time I did Erwin it is free to register.

Then you have choices to pay for access (it used to be hours or days or more) for a small Eur cost.

Once you have access you can look at and download all the repair manuals (there are a few of them) and these will give a detailed picture of how things are put together (see attached example)

 

[matko]

thank you!

I downloaded all the manuals and I think I have found useful things

like:

 

[matko]

what should be security measeures?

I should probably start by disconnecting the negative terminal of the battery to avoid any electrical issues while working on the LED strip

also, the LED strip and surrounding trim can are probably fragile, so I need to be careful...

 

[cairus]

Disconnecting the battery causes more problems than leaving the ignition off

 

[lajchi]

I will hijack the topic a little bit, but it is similar.
Did anybody have issues with water coming into the rear light bar? I have quite a lot of water accumulated recently (after a 2000km road trip and heavy rain). There is no visible damage to the light bar, but water somehow managed to get it, and when the trunk lid is open, the water goes in, and flows behind the covers, into the trunk. I booked a checkup and replacement with the dealer already. It seems as a common issue, so I am hoping this will get solved under warranty. During the same trip, I also experienced issues with the side mirror projectors, which now have a distorted image.

 

[SRGTD]

I will hijack the topic a little bit, but it is similar.
Did anybody have issues with water coming into the rear light bar? I have quite a lot of water accumulated recently (after a 2000km road trip and heavy rain). There is no visible damage to the light bar, but water somehow managed to get it, and when the trunk lid is open, the water goes in, and flows behind the covers, into the trunk. I booked a checkup and replacement with the dealer already. It seems as a common issue, so I am hoping this will get solved under warranty. During the same trip, I also experienced issues with the side mirror projectors, which now have a distorted image.

The distorting image from the side mirror mounted puddle lamps is a fairly common issue on VW’s mk8 Golf. I’ve read of Golf owners having the lamps replaced under warranty. Seems a poor design and a case of form over function; is it really necessary to have a brand-specific logo projected onto the ground? I‘d much rather have a plain and simple lamp that wouldn’t suffer from this issue.

 

[matko]

just a small update - I changed the led bar and everything works as expected

also, local auto body repair specialist fixed the body panel immediately above the light strip - now you have to look very closely to notice that it was ever damaged

 

[matko]

I will hijack the topic a little bit, but it is similar.
Did anybody have issues with water coming into the rear light bar? I have quite a lot of water accumulated recently (after a 2000km road trip and heavy rain). There is no visible damage to the light bar, but water somehow managed to get it, and when the trunk lid is open, the water goes in, and flows behind the covers, into the trunk. I booked a checkup and replacement with the dealer already. It seems as a common issue, so I am hoping this will get solved under warranty. During the same trip, I also experienced issues with the side mirror projectors, which now have a distorted image.

please let us know the results of a checkup and replacement

also, my side mirror projections no longer appear as sharp – is there a way to disable them?

 

[cairus]

Gibt es eine Möglichkeit, sie zu deaktivieren?

Ja, STG 42&52
Lange Codierung, Byte 01 Bit 0 deaktivieren

 

[matko]

 

[SRGTD]

just a small update - I changed the led bar and everything works as expected

also, local auto body repair specialist fixed the body panel immediately above the light strip - now you have to look very closely to notice that it was ever damaged

It looks as if the body repair specialist has done an excellent job fixing the damage .

 

[lajchi]

I will hijack the topic a little bit, but it is similar.
Did anybody have issues with water coming into the rear light bar? I have quite a lot of water accumulated recently (after a 2000km road trip and heavy rain). There is no visible damage to the light bar, but water somehow managed to get it, and when the trunk lid is open, the water goes in, and flows behind the covers, into the trunk. I booked a checkup and replacement with the dealer already. It seems as a common issue, so I am hoping this will get solved under warranty. During the same trip, I also experienced issues with the side mirror projectors, which now have a distorted image.

An update to this as well. The rear light bar was replaced under warranty, since it was leaking, and the logo projectors will be replaced under warrant as well, once they get them on stock. In the meantime, the service discovered that the washer fluid for the rear wiper is leaking somewhere under the dashboard, and now the service booked 2 days to fix that issue.. (also under warranty).

 

[amarokjb]

please let us know the results of a checkup and replacement

also, my side mirror projections no longer appear as sharp – is there a way to disable them?

I have replace mirror projections on both side when car was 2 years old and after cca 2 years again have problems with both mirror projections, image was distorted. They change me first time with no cost. The image of projections are more and more worse with winter and rain, so I will wait some time and change both again in warranty before car had five years.