Covered Cup Holder

How To Install A Covered Cup Holder

Courtesy of arlurt

The Scirocco centre console is listed as Titanium Black. You can replace it with the one from the Golf. It's in Satin Black, Art Grey and Anthracite Golf interior colours too.

The Part Number is 1K0 862 531 A, followed by a colour code, at a cost of £27.76

• Art Grey UJB
• Satin Black UBN
• Anthracite UJA

It's a lot more useful than the old open cup holder, a good sized rectangular space with the usual VW rubber mats in the bottom. The bottle openers in the bottom of the cup holder fits into a shaped cut-out in the rubber, or goes sideways in the two tracks at the top so that it can hold cups. It clicks backwards and forwards to take cups of different sizes. The bottle opener was a couple of quid on eBay.

DISCLAIMER: Only attempt this if you're confident to do so. Go carefully and read ALL of this before you get your tools out!

It screws in from the underside of the centre console, as does the existing cup holder, so you have to be able to get to those screws...

The armrest and centre console are two separate mouldings. I initially assumed that the armrest and hand brake cover would have to come out first, so that the centre console could be lifted up and out to get to the underside of it. Having failed to remove the armrest I found that the cup holder swap is actually possible without removing the armrest, so long as you have small-ish hands and don't mind a few cuts and scrapes.

First remove the gear lever gaiter and the cubby hole (or ashtray), as directed in this article.

Now for the new stuff...

I've generally taken pictures of one side of the car or the other. You must obviously carry out the steps at each side of the car, not just the side shown in the photo.

Lift the rubber mat out of the bottom of the rear cup holder. It's not glued in, just a good fit. You'll find a screw underneath the mat, remove the screw.

Now remove the "cheek pieces" either side of the centre console. You'll have to remove the single screw right in the front of the footwell, and the jiggle and ease the panel out of the snap fasteners that secure it down the length of the top edge.

You've now exposed two more screws that fasten the lower edge of the centre console at each side. Take these out, and then remove the trim pieces that snap in at each side of the centre console. Be careful you don't mark the soft textured plastic.

Now you can get to the two screws (each side) that go up and forward into the main part of the dash. Take these out, and the console will now be free to move about a bit.

Inside the recess that houses the cubby hole (or ashtray) you'll find two screws (each side) that go from the inside to the outside. Take these out and they'll release a hard-plastic moulding that stiffens up the side of the centre console and gives it some structure.

With these plates out of the way you now have enough movement to slide the console about enough to dis-engage it from the front of the armrest. Give the handbrake a good tug to give yourself a little more room, and BE CAREFUL NOT TO SCRATCH THE FRONT ON THE ARMREST as you ease the rear edge of the centre console out from under the armrest and up. Pad the rear edge of the console with something so it doesn't mark the armrest while you work at the other end.

At this point I decided I couldn't get the centre console out of the car and so stopped taking pictures... [see notes from Morrissey below]

What actually happened was that I found that by using a long extension on my Torx, from the drivers footwell up to the screw in the front end of the cup holder, I was able to get that screw out. The screw in the back edge of the cup holder was a little more tricky, but using the Torx straight into a ratchet, and working in the open gap between the armrest and the raised centre console, I got the rear screw out as well.

At this point the cup holder slides forward out of two rails on the underside of the centre console and can be removed into the drivers footwell.

Procedure from Morrissey on removing the armrest

1. Pull out the ipod container - this is by far the hardest step and caused me to bend one of the metal spring clips, which holds it in - I have since bent it back with a pair of pliers and all looks fine. (To extract it I just pulled and wiggled it til it came out.)

2. You can then depress the plastic connector clip and unplug the entire ipod container and remove it from the vehicle.

That's the hard bit over. Now there are just 5 screws to undo:

3. Remove the screw at the front of the arm rest, exposed by removing the ipod container.

4. Remove the 2 screws from the rear cubby holder and gently pull out the cubby holder.

5. Gently pull off the rear surround (was around the cubby holder) This comes off in one U shaped piece (or is that an n)

6. Now 2 screws are exposed at the rear base of the arm rest - remove these 2 and you have reached the magic number of 5.

7. With the hand brake in the up position the arm rest cover can be eased off over the hand brake, exposing the entire central console and so facilitating the cup holder swap. N.B. You must also unclip the 3.5 mm jack socket before completely removing the arm rest

Now for the bland statement from my Haynes manual, "...Installation is the reversal of this procedure..."

You'll have a few scrapes on your hands and forearms but I think it's worth it.