Lay-Flat Vent Conversion (Jetta to Golf)

[KrashDH]

Well I've been after this the last couple days and decided to stop by the local Pick-n-Pull to see if there were any worthwhile parts. There were about 6 Jettas to choose from so that was a good thing.

The Golf GLI came with these vents, but none were lighted. I didn't care which version came off the Jetta since none of mine on the Golf are lit anyway. There's enough lit up buttons on the center and driver side vent area to fumble my way around, and my passenger, well, they're on their own.

Most have removed their vents but I took some photos just so everything is in a condensed thread.

So obviously you will need the driver, center, and passenger vents. If you purchase or go pull your parts, if you're a Golf, you will need a couple pieces for the driver side vent as well as the center vent. I'll call these extra pieces the "cradles" for the vent. They get bolted in the dashboard first, then the vent snaps or gets bolted into them. Unlike the swivel vents (OEM Golf) where you remove the swivel part then un-bolt the rest of the vent housing.

The passenger side, only the vent is needed, there is no cradle.

Here's what I'm talking about, these are the center vents. On the left is the swivel style, on the right is the lay flat style:

This image is just the lay flat, with the cradle behind it:

I started with the easiest, the passenger.

You're going to wedge your thin object between the vent housing and the dash on the passenger side of the vent. It should pop out. Then you can wedge you thin object on the passenger side, and the other side should pop out. Easy.

Those of us with the non lighted version, if you buy the lighted version, you will need to punch out this square (I used a flathead screwdriver) so you can fish the wires back through there:

After that, feed your new lay-flat vent wire through your new hole, and with even pressure, press your vent in. It will lock in with tabs:

I moved on to the driver side after that. There is a lot of documentation on how to remove the headlight switch, but the non-parking light crew (me currently) needs to push the switch in, turn clockwise, and it will stop between the off and on setting:

That will expose the lower torx head screw behind the switch. Remove it.

Whatever thin object you have, get it behind the flange of the dimmer switch. It will pop out. Give yourself enough slack to remove the plugs from both the switches.

Next, remove the vent. You can see where I placed my plastic trim tool:

Popping the swivel piece out will expose the upper torx head bolt. Remove that now. Everything should just be a-danglin':

8 photos, onto next post

 

[KrashDH]

Next will be to screw in your cradle into the dash. Note: do not put in both screws at this time...just the upper left one:

You then want to install the vent assy, and screw in the lower screw after you have done that. Ensure your wiring goes through the appropriate slots:

Once that cradle is bolted in, you can snap the vent into the cradle and re-install both of the switches:

Now, the one everyone hates, including myself.

I started by just removing the swivel vent portion. You can pry wherever gains you the most flex to remove them:

Once both are out, you need to remove the 2x torx screws in the upper corners:

The next part you can go about 2 ways...either remove all your switches and remove the vent housing assembly, or leave them in and gently pry around the bottom to release everything together...it does work:

Once it's released, you should have enough slack to un-plug your center switches without too much trouble. They're tight though:

Now would be the time to swap your switches over to the new vent if you want to do it that way, if not, you can wait until the vent is installed to do it.

 

[KrashDH]

First thing you will need is to bolt the center vent assy cradle into place using the 2 torx screws that were removed earlier:

Note there is a square cutout in the cradle that you will fish the center LED wiring through and on-top/to the side of the head unit you have. If you didn't get the LED kind, dont' worry about it.

With everything hooked up (or not if your waiting, just make sure you can get to your wires through the switch slots), slide the assembly into place. It will basically self-align into the cradle:

Then with even but firm pressure, you'll need to snap the assembly into place. The bottom section as you can see when you have the unit in hand has little "hooks" that will hook around the back edge of the dash and hold the bottom in place. You may need to flex the bottom a bit to get them up and over. The top will kind of align with 2 tabs in the cradle. It doesn't feel like it will go in but it will eventually. Just even pressure in the areas you're pushing in.

Final product:

Opened:

Closed:

That's all there is to it. If you want to wire in the LED's, you can snip the ends of the other side of the harness at the junk yard, but I have no need really. Or you can tie into the dimmer switch and make your own harness. It wouldn't be hard.

 

[KrashDH]

The other thing I scored is a back seat slide out cupholder. I've been in search of one for a while.

It took me 3 Jettas to piece together a good quality functional one though:

The one with the good sliding mechanism wouldn't stay closed, so I had to play the game of "where's the missing piece" until I figured out how it worked. Robbed that piece from another one that was in bad shape and missing parts.

Also, the good sliding mechanism part didn't have the cupholder wings, so I had to rob one from one of the cupholders, and the other from a different one.

End result:

Here's the kicker...I thought I was pretty cool reverse engineering and figuring out how this all worked in the rain and muddy parking lot. Until I got home and realized I needed one more piece. It's a pin or something that goes through the tiny hole to the right of my hand in the next photo. It basically ties the top linkage to the bottom support for the cups.

If anyone knows what type of pin normally goes in here, if it's press fit in or loose, I can probably figure out something to go in there:

I know it's not a super hard write up for the vents but figured I'd do it while I had the time!

 

[oilhammer]

Hehe, so you took out the vents that never break, and installed vents that always break.

Sorry, couldn't resist. But seriously, nice write up. I like the Golf vents myself, though... again just because of the durability. I had to warn my wife the day we brought our first 2004 Passat home about NOT messing with the vents, even though it "looks cool" to some people, and to discourage any front seat passengers from messing with them. Knock on wood, 16 years and 215k miles later, none of those are broken. But boy I get in a lot (and I mean a LOT) of B5 Passats and A4 Jettas that have broken dash vents! Can't say I have ever seen a Golf with any broken.

 

[Rrusse11]

Thanks Oilhammer for the sanity check. Never knew that the Jetta had
the "cooler" vents, albeit more fragile. I'll stick with my Golf vents thanks.
Nice writeup Krash!

The only complaint I have about mine is that the up/down swivel is worn.
Just need to figure out a way to tighten that up.

 

[oilhammer]

Despite being redesigned/updated three times, the dash mounted cup holders are also on the nearly always broken list too. The final, and unbreakable, upgrade was to make them part of the center console. I changed that in one of my Golfs, and deleted the dash mounted one in both of them. Downside to that of course is the parking brake lever is also different, and is angled ever so slightly to the left, and those of us with ample butts may notice this.

 

[Rrusse11]

My dash cupholder works just fine, I did remove it and greased it up,
it had trouble popping out. Lol, took me about 3-4 months before I
discovered I even had it.

 

[sriracha]

Nice write-up! This makes me want to go to the Pick-n-Pull for no particular reason.

 

[KrashDH]

I don't see how these are any less robust than the Golfs. It's a vent, treat it like a vent, not a hammer.

For the 6 Jettas I saw, ALL still has functioning vents that were not broken. I pulled a few extra pieces just in case. The only thing I noticed that was inferior was the coating on the lay flat vents. That coating seemed to be peeling on all the sets. Nothing a coat of plastic paint wouldn't solve.

As far as the Golf vents, mine were broken, and just flopped around. The broken part was my fault, trying to mount a cell phone holder, which those vents did a terrible job of.

They flop around because the end buttons on the swivel vent are supposed to have a mini rubber cap. For 95% of people that remove these the first time, that cap goes flying un noticed and lost in the depths of the floor mats.

To each their own though, I thought these vents look cleaner, like the functionality, as well I have backup vents for parts.

It was a fun trip admitidley. The other thing I was looking for was a center console with cupholders, but no luck. There's someone local with one I'm trying to get ahold of

 

[csstevej]

Nice write up !

 

[oilhammer]

I don't see how these are any less robust than the Golfs. It's a vent, treat it like a vent, not a hammer.
For the 6 Jettas I saw, ALL still has functioning vents that were not broken. I pulled a few extra pieces just in case. The only thing I noticed that was inferior was the coating on the lay flat vents. That coating seemed to be peeling on all the sets. Nothing a coat of plastic paint wouldn't solve.
As far as the Golf vents, mine were broken, and just flopped around. The broken part was my fault, trying to mount a cell phone holder, which those vents did a terrible job of.
They flop around because the end buttons on the swivel vent are supposed to have a mini rubber cap. For 95% of people that remove these the first time, that cap goes flying un noticed and lost in the depths of the floor mats.
To each their own though, I thought these vents look cleaner, like the functionality, as well I have backup vents for parts.
It was a fun trip admitidley. The other thing I was looking for was a center console with cupholders, but no luck. There's someone local with one I'm trying to get ahold of

I don't know "how" people break half the things they break, but when you service cars every day for decades, you see trends. *shrug*. I have a 2015 Passat here that is literally ready for the scrapper, it is SO tooefed. It barely has over 100k miles on it too. Amazing what people can do.

 

[KrashDH]

Nice write up !

Thank you, not a hard job, but it seems people break these things when trying to install or remove

 

[KrashDH]

I don't know "how" people break half the things they break, but when you service cars every day for decades, you see trends. *shrug*. I have a 2015 Passat here that is literally ready for the scrapper, it is SO tooefed. It barely has over 100k miles on it too. Amazing what people can do.

This is a very true statement

 

[sriracha]

I’d be interested in seeing how to hook up the lights, actually.

 

[KrashDH]

I’d be interested in seeing how to hook up the lights, actually.

There's some pre made wiring kits from the UK I think, but it would be wicked easy. Just splice into the power wire for the dimmer light and supply 12V to each connection. Ground all 3. I'd personally use my own 2 prong waterproof plugs if you don't take the other end of the plug from the donor car.

The hard part would be fishing the wire behind the dash.

 

[IndigoBlueWagon]

Nice write up!

I frequently talk to customers and wonder "how did you break that?" Vents and cupholders on my Wagon are still fine after 18 years. And that's included driving a lot of kids around.

 

[wonneber]

Just need to figure out a way to tighten that up.

Small thin piece of foam rubber stuffed into both sides of the vents?

 

[FrankB]

Well I've been after this the last couple days and decided to stop by the local Pick-n-Pull to see if there were any worthwhile parts. There were about 6 Jettas to choose from so that was a good thing.

The Golf GLI came with these vents, but none were lighted. I didn't care which version came off the Jetta since none of mine on the Golf are lit anyway. There's enough lit up buttons on the center and driver side vent area to fumble my way around, and my passenger, well, they're on their own.

Most have removed their vents but I took some photos just so everything is in a condensed thread.

So obviously you will need the driver, center, and passenger vents. If you purchase or go pull your parts, if you're a Golf, you will need a couple pieces for the driver side vent as well as the center vent. I'll call these extra pieces the "cradles" for the vent. They get bolted in the dashboard first, then the vent snaps or gets bolted into them. Unlike the swivel vents (OEM Golf) where you remove the swivel part then un-bolt the rest of the vent housing.

The passenger side, only the vent is needed, there is no cradle.

Here's what I'm talking about, these are the center vents. On the left is the swivel style, on the right is the lay flat style:

This image is just the lay flat, with the cradle behind it:

I started with the easiest, the passenger.

You're going to wedge your thin object between the vent housing and the dash on the passenger side of the vent. It should pop out. Then you can wedge you thin object on the passenger side, and the other side should pop out. Easy.

Those of us with the non lighted version, if you buy the lighted version, you will need to punch out this square (I used a flathead screwdriver) so you can fish the wires back through there:

After that, feed your new lay-flat vent wire through your new hole, and with even pressure, press your vent in. It will lock in with tabs:

I moved on to the driver side after that. There is a lot of documentation on how to remove the headlight switch, but the non-parking light crew (me currently) needs to push the switch in, turn clockwise, and it will stop between the off and on setting:

That will expose the lower torx head screw behind the switch. Remove it.

Whatever thin object you have, get it behind the flange of the dimmer switch. It will pop out. Give yourself enough slack to remove the plugs from both the switches.

Next, remove the vent. You can see where I placed my plastic trim tool:

Popping the swivel piece out will expose the upper torx head bolt. Remove that now. Everything should just be a-danglin':

8 photos, onto next post

Where exactly would I find the “cradles”?

 

[Mozambiquer]

I had gotten the wiring kit from clusters by litke for the lay flat vents. I was going to put them in my golf but never did.