Prawns A3 Track car

Discussion in 'Members Gallery' started by Prawn, Dec 17, 2013.

  1. Prawn Forum Member

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    Evening folks.

    I've been a member on here for years, but not really posted much until recently. As I've popped up and started posting, I guess it's about time I made a thread in here to show that I do at least own something valuely CGTI related, if a distant cousin perhaps!

    So, the A3 came into my owner ship around 7 1/2 years ago now.

    At the time, I was driving around in my Mini, which looked like this: (it still does, only it's sat in my garage exactly as above for 2 years whilst I bugger around with the Audi!)

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    Going into an industrial placement for my 3rd year at Uni, I needed something a little more smart, so the A3 was purchased:

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    What a smart and sensible daily driver I thought, keeping the Mini for fun....
     
  2. Nige

    Nige Paid Member Paid Member

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    Shed.
     
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  3. Prawn Forum Member

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    Fast forward a few years, and the A3 had changed, it now ran 230bhp from a ko3S conversion, some cheap coilovers, S3 brakes, and a set of eibach ARB's, and I thought it was great at the age of 21

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    It even went to the Ring a few times in that guise:

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    But as with all things, the mileage added up, and after 1 particularly harsh ring trip, it was feeling like it had reached it's natural end, with 200k on the clock, so it was parked up, and a replacement was bought:

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    The A3 sat for almost a year, until whilst enjoying a few bit burgers around the campfire with my old man in camping AM nurburg, we both finally admitted that the Mini would never be fast enough for us, and we wanted to build something quicker.

    And so it began!
     
  4. Prawn Forum Member

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    So, I'll keep this brief, but it's been an interesting journey!

    First off, seats and harnesses and a steering wheel:

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    Vented rear brakes and weitec coilovers:

    http://i1218.photobucket.com/albums/dd408/prawn16/A3%20DRT/e7bfa58c.jpg/[img]

    Brembo 4 pot brakes:

    [img]http://i1218.photobucket.com/albums/dd408/prawn16/A3%20DRT/252c25d2.jpg

    linkage moved inside and rebuild 02J with a quaife ATB fitted:

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    and some terribly poor taste - orange pintripes on the rims!

    Castle Combe Spring action day 2011:

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    And then to the Ring in that same spec:

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  5. Prawn Forum Member

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    With the speed building, we decided it needed a cage, so that was next up:

    Lots of effort, 3 weekends work, and some CAD (cardboard aided design) and it was in!


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    Front feet made:

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    Harness bar

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    Door bars:

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    Tied into the shell:

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    Painting

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    Primed:

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    ORANGE!

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  6. Prawn Forum Member

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    and soon after it was caged another Ring trip:

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    BigAl is my Dad, he comes with me on all my trackdays and also drives the car :)

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    After that and a good few UK trackdays, my little ko3S was dying. The housing was cracked to buggery, and power was down to just 200bhp from a previous 230.

    Time for one more blast at Audi Driver 2011 before a winter make over was due:

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  7. Prawn Forum Member

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    a ko4-023 hybrid was purchased to replace the ko3S:

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    And also a set of Rota Force rims, which we shod with Federal RS-R's

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    That little lot all went on in Jan 12, and a mapping session at R-tech in Hinckley saw it making 291bhp at 17psi on the original engine, at this point over 210k miles!
     
  8. sambo Paid Member Paid Member

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    Nice work!

    What is that front splitter?

    Who made the carbon bonnet?
     
  9. Prawn Forum Member

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    Fast forward 6 months, and we were getting ready for another Ring trip:

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    All loaded up ready to go:

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    Made it!

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    I had driven over with one of my best mates, and met my Mum and Dad out there who were travelling back from Europe.

    I'd taken my Mum and Dad out for laps, Dad had driven a few laps, and I stupidly decided to go for 'one last lap'.

    Mistake- that didn't end so well for me.

    I think this explains it well enough:

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    *******s. That hurt.

    Still, an extra 3 days in germany, lots of tape, screws, and zip ties, and it was almost passable as road worthy:

    So home it went!

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    A new door went on:

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    Followed by a rear beam:

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    And a new front subframe, wishbones etc etc, and all was straight and true again, even if it did look a mess.

    On track again at GoodWood 4 weeks after the crash:

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    Pretty rubbish on track that day, but it was good to get straight back on the horse, so to speak!
     
  10. Prawn Forum Member

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    Splitter in the pics to date is an LCR splitter Sambo, just bolted to the bumper with some M5 screws.

    Bonnet came from an ebay seller of all places about 6 years ago! Cost about 350 at the time, and is remarkably still really mint!
     
  11. Prawn Forum Member

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    Sadly, the day after goodwood, the car threw an inner CV joint (not the first by a LONG way!) and took the box casing with it, so I decided to pull the engine whilst it was coming out and build a new lump with rods.

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    I'll avoid rambling here, but basically, I spent a day with Bill and Tuffty at Badger 5, and together we built my new forged lump:

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    The engine went in, along with a newly rebuilt 02J (my 7th at this point I might add!) and a paddle clutch, and it went off for mapping again once run in.

    The result was ~350bhp and 345lbft. it felt brilliant!

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    And that's how it did Donington in Feb last year:

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  12. Prawn Forum Member

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    Bed time now, Will add more tomorrow :)
     
  13. Lewis583

    Lewis583 Forum Member

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    Good to see you over here Prawn :thumbup: Even better not to have to sift through 100+ pages of your other build thread lol
     
  14. Sam_gti Forum Member

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    Looking good mate :thumbup: we need to get on track soon :)
     
  15. Prawn Forum Member

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    Cheers lads, wouldn't try to re-post it all, but just thought I'd put a little bit of the last few years into a summary :)

    This popped up on ebay some time last year, and I decided I had to have it:

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    I used volvo S40 cables, and modified the sock shift levers and gearbox bracket:

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    This was soon followed by a centre panel to mount fire ext pull cords and the battery cut off:

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    Also that winter I fitted castor offset poly bushes into my early S3 30mm cast wishbones:

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    Difference between 45mm bushed wishbones and the early 30mm is clear here:

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    To compliment the wishbones, I also fitted some adjustable top mounts, supplied by Silver Project:

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    The car is running KW V3 suspension, which seems to suit my needs at the moment.

    I also poly filled a set of engine mounts as an experiement to see if I could avoid spending 300 on proper ones, it worked!

    I started off with some THS uprated mounts, and drilled the rubber to add voids whereever possible:

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    Before taping up the backs and filling them entirely with 85A poly resin:

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    They worked brilliantly, and are still doing so almost a year on :)
     
  16. vw_singh Events Team Paid Member

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    Awesome car and great folk too. Always nice to have a chat when I see you guys.

    P.S. Thanks for the help with the rose joints on the shifter. Ordered mine.

    Gurds
     
  17. sambo Paid Member Paid Member

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    Great stuff !

    Any chance for more info on Volvo bowden cables please? I also have Vw motorsport shifter to go in my A3 and will need cables

    I am on 6 speed 02Q box tho which is same as 02M
     
  18. Prawn Forum Member

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    Cheers Gurds, it's a shame we didn't get any laps in together at ADI before your issues, I'm really looking forward to a repeat of our laps at Rockingham last year now we've both upped the power stakes fairly evenly again!

    Cheers Sam, I'll dig up more info on the volvo cables. I'm also on an 02M box now also, after 7 dead 02J's i decided to sell my 8th (and best so far seemingly) before it blew up and lost all value. i went 02M back in September and I'm loving it so far!

    The missus is out this evening, so I'll sit down and add a good bit more info, car is massively different again now to how I ended things in the last post :)

    here's just one up to date picture to keep it current:

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  19. sambo Paid Member Paid Member

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    Thanks bud :)
     
  20. Prawn Forum Member

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    Just for Sambo, here's the complete post I wrote back when I fitted my VWMS shifter:

    Take several bottles of beer:

    [​IMG][img width=178 height=223]http://www.wellsandyoungs.co.uk/home/our-beers/ales/bombardier-burning-gold/burning-gold-group.jpg[/img]

    Add some ebay:

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    Throw in an auction that's listed in dollars instead of to add to the confusion, then wake up in the morning to find you've gone and bid far too much money on something you don't really need.

    Wait a week whilst pretending it never happened, then return from work to find this waiting for you in a box:

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    So, I appear to have bought a VW MotorSport type shifter from a man in Slovenia, whilst bidding against Americans!

    I best make it work then!

    A few more pictures:

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    Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. this will need cables. stock ones won't be long enough. D'OH

    back to ebay, random scanning for gear shifter cables, volvo ones look pretty long, I'll try some of them!

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    The ends were wrong, so I bought some of these:

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    M8 ball joints, and m6-M8 thread adapters.

    hI set about threading the ends of the volvo cables, by running an M6 dye down the end of the rod:

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    Then screwed on the M6-M8 adapter:

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    To which a ball joint fits nicely:
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    Sorted.

    Next up, cable stops:

    Bit of 3mm plate cut to shape:

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    And the volvo cable ends fit very nicely:

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    repeat:

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    I didn't like the lack of self centering on the shifter, so decided to add some using a massey fergusson tractor brake pedal return spring:

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    Which would sit in here:

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    Drilled the base plate to locate the spring:

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    Then fitted it in, and forgot to take pics. works well though :)

    Moving onto the tower, I wasn't so keen on the look of the welds on it, so decided to grind them back:

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    Then sanded it down and applied some primer:

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    it came out fairly good. Not perfect, but i'm not a paint man on the whole!

    I finished adding threads to all the cable ends:

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    Then found that the ball joint ends on an 2000 02J linkage were the same size as the ones I've bought. result!

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    Onto the cable stop bracket at the box end, I cut slots into it to allow the volvo outer ends to fit:

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    And that's the box end sorted:

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    Moving inside the car, here's the old shifter, mounted internally:
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    Removed, and the new tower placed into position:

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    Last edited: Dec 18, 2013

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