Help needed - is replacing front pipe on 1.4 easy?

[infiltrator]

It's my sons car, he's 200 miles away and has a 2nd hand frontpipe and cat for his 1.4 mk4. He's no diy expert and I'm trying to give advice over the phone.

Is it an easy job?

From pics I can see that the frontpipe connects to the manifold with a square 4 bolt flange - do you access the nuts/bolts from underneath or under bonnet?
Is the gasket reuseable with a clean/exhaust gum - metal gasket?
Does the rear of the front pipe just slip into the rear section with a clamp and exhaust gum?
Oxygen sensor is still fitted to the 2nd hand cat - I'm hoping they haven't just cut the wires, are there connectors near to the cat somewhere?
Any troublesome covers need removing to get access?
Any rusty exhaust hanger clamps or is it just a rubber hanger?

Anyone have any pics to help me talk him through it?

Thanks in advance, seems to be a very helpful forum and bunch over here

[polo-sib]

you have fairly easy access from under the bonnet, so all he has to do is take the heat shield/hot air feed off (4 bolts if I member rightly), this exposes the two part manifold. The manidols top part is held by M8 washers and nuts, easy access again. Taking the manifold would be easier I imagine for him to do things in parts, plus I imagine he has not got a pit otherwise it'd be alot easier, as ramps will not give you much room to work with if his unexperienced. He should get it all off in 10minutes easy. Gasket is recommended to be replaced, i got mine for £7 from a VW spares.

This leaves the downpipe and the manifold with a flange in between, thinks its 2 or 4 bolts easy to undo, the down pipe has the lambda on it which can stretch to under the engine, best to take it off with a wrench. after the manofolds diconnected as it's easier to reach, again replacing the flange is recommended.

Dont know how the cat's held. Also don't quote me on this, but I think the downpipe is held on by an exhuast clamp.

As for the actual exhuast its held in two parts the back box part hangs on a rubber hanger, but the pipe heading for the catalytic is a sleeve and clamp job.

So he can reuse his oxygen sensor on his downpipe if the other ones got its cables cut, prob be easier.

I'd say its pretty easy as its all abit like lego, you can tell whiich shape goes where, should take him an hour to two hours if his never done it. Also when I worked on it ages ago I found the nuts that nutted the manifolds came undone with the studs they were attatched to, so have some locktite handy incase any studs come undone.

Hope this helps, hopefully someone can fill in the blanks.