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Help: How is 'Floor Pan Reinforcement' pipe fixed to the VW car body?

19th December 2022, 16:24 by Dev Shah

Folks at VW service centre do not seem to have clear idea on how to fix the part back and they are trying to avoid working on it.

BHPian Guna recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

My car's (Tiguan Allspace) underbelly scrapped against something hard and a rod/pipe-like piece which is located under the exhaust pipe got dislocated.

This piece s called 'Floor Pan Reinforcement' or 'Tunnel cross-piece' (part no. 5QA802117A).

Folks at VW service centre do not seem to have clear idea on how to fix it back and they are trying to avoid working on it. Before insisting further, I wanted to know if anyone on the forum knows how it is fixed to the body.

My question:

This piece is fixed with the help of 4 bolts. If you notice, the bolts appear as if they are cut rather than broken. Are these bolts fixed to the body with some kind of fusing/welding, which would have given up upon the impact?

Service center folks tell me that the bolts need to be put from inside (which means stripping the carpet, seats etc). Another thing to be noted is, 'shouldered hex nuts' are also involved.

This is where the piece sits:

The piece:

Broken bolts on the piece

Other side of the piece:

Holes on the body:

Here's what BHPian Kosfactor had to say on the matter:

Looks they can make a small cut in the carpeting, drill out the broken fastener and replace with one of suitable size. The bracket can be reused as its not mangled out of shape anyways.

Here's what BHPian Sran had to say on the matter:

How about welding from outside using some sort of fire blanket/sheet metal? There are also metal glues but how successful they might be, I have no idea.
If in any case a work is done, why not fix a metal plate instead of bracket.

Here's what BHPian crdi had to say on the matter:

If VW is not giving a better repair option; maybe drill out the bolt remnants from under the car, and fix the part with an over-sized self-tapping bolt? The part doesn't appear to be needing frequent removal or sustain too much flex.

Here's what BHPian rpunwani had to say on the matter:

As the name suggests it is a floor pan reinforcement in the transverse direction. The primary function of the reinforcement is to maintain the shape of the tunnel under transverse loads.
The impact has probably sheared the bolts - can happen if the impact has occurred at a high speed. You can see that the cross piece has twisted a bit. The twist can be straightened.
The bolts should be extracted using a bolt extractor and renewed. If the carpet / seats / plastic moulding has to be removed for access please have it done. I would not recommend any kind of welding. If a spare piece is available at reasonable cost, renew it.

Here's what BHPian Vid6639 had to say on the matter:

Very tricky to remove the bolt left in the body shell. They need a bolt extractor or drill with a small bit into the left over bolt then take the old sheared bolts out. After that fix the new beam and bolt it back on.
Hopefully the threading on the body is not damaged.

Here's what BHPian AJITHAAA had to say on the matter:

Usually there are no loose bolts inserted from the inside of the car body shell. These should be studs welded on the outside of the car body. The entire stud seems to have been dislodged from the body. Looking at the parts catalog on Boodmo/Oriparts the part is a cross member reinforcement for the tunnel. The nuts used are M8, Item No.22 in the first image and by all probability the weld stud is Item No. 13 in the second image. If this is indeed the part, then its welded from outside. The fuel tank might have to be dismounted before welding if its deemed a fire risk.