Kenny's Tornado Red GTi Build Thread

Discussion in 'Members Gallery' started by kenny-, Oct 26, 2016.

  1. kenny- New Member

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    Hello guys and girls.
    After joining yesterday I thought it would be a good time to start my build thread, partly to keep a diary for myself on the progress of my car, but also to show you guys what i've been up to.
    This is going to span out over a few months as i'm building the car myself and have a full time job, which unfortunatley i have to attend :thumbd: .

    So the car is a 1990 spec 8V GTI in Tornado Red (or pink as it was when I first got it). It was pretty minging, but having been a valeter in my younger years, I could see past the faded paint and fungus growing from most orifices and snapped the car up for a steal price at 250.
    It had been sat for over a year but after a new battery fired straight up.
    Here are a few photos of when I first bought the car. The photos don't do the car any justice, as they say. Believe me it was worse looking in real life than the photos show.

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    As you can see the wheels were terrible, the paint was faded and the plastic trims were neglected and full of chalky polish. On top of this some dope had fitted a towbar, which included cutting a huge hole in the rear bumper :clap: and also had odd rear lights and the boot vinyl was completley shot.


    After I got the car back home I decided to give it a bit of a clean to see what I was working with. To be fair it came up remarkably well after a quick going over. Huge shout to my Dad who is in some of these pics who has helped me throughout this build.

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    Over the next few days I did a bit of work on the car, giving it a major service and new timing belt and water pump. It was also struggling to rev above 3k so a quick adjustment on the dizzy and it was bob on. I dont have any photos of the service part of the build but im sure you all know what an oil filter and spark plugs look like lol

    After this was done I bought a cheap set of rear lights off ebay as the mis-matched pair were driving me crazy. I also machine polished the car and dressed the exterior trims. Its a very straight car for its year and i'm very impressed with the outcome of the original paint after machining considering its nearly 27 years old. I also replaced the front grille from the quad grille to a single light grille. I personally prefer the look but i'm sure the originality squad will be cursing :p

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    Next on my list was to remove that towbar. I dont have any pictures of removing the towbar but have some photos of the bumper after I had fibreglassed the hole and smoothed it to shape and painted it. I have never painted with 2k paint before, however it turns out im not too bad at it lol

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    The next part was wheels. I looked for ages for a decent set of wheels but nothing took my fancy. Then a set of WSL wheels came up on ebay quite local to me. They had previously been powdercoated and the lad I bought them off had said he had used paint stripper and a wallpaper scraper to try and get the powdercoat off. The picture of the wheels before I refurbed them doesn't show the depth of the marks left by the scraper. Take my word for it they were bad. Every single one of them was kerbed badly but they were cheap so I took the risk and bought them and refurbed them in a satin black finish and put a brand new set of Uniroyal Rain Sport 3 195/50-15 tyres on them. I'm quite impressed with the outcome.

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    The reason I bought this car in the first place is to start getting into track days so the logical thing to do next was to start doing the suspension and poly bushes. I went for the Prothane Poly Kit as sold by VW-Heritage as they had good reviews and went for the Bilstein dampers and Eibach spring combo, again with good writeups from members with this kit.

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    So apart from new brakes, braided lines etc its pretty much as it stands at this point today. I tinted the headlights with light smoke window film and pinstriped the grille with the GTI red stripe and this is how it now looks.

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    Stay tuned to my build thread as this happened the other week so a lot more updates to come as I start to build my AUM 20VT [:D]

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  2. Break Forum Member

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    Apr 6, 2015
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    nice work! what a bargain
     
  3. Coakers

    Coakers Forum Member

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    All looking good and methodical, already looking forward to updates on this one

    Sent from my D6503 using Tapatalk
     
  4. fasteddie

    fasteddie Banned

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    Up the Red build threads :thumbup:
     
  5. sports racer Forum Member

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    Australia
    Of course it was cheep, it's a red one.

    Looking good despite that. :thumbup:
     
  6. kenny- New Member

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    Oct 25, 2016
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    Cheers guys. No real updates as of yet. Im just waiting for the AUM cylinder head to come back from the machine shop and waiting for various parts to arrive then ill make some progress with the updates [:D]
     
  7. Savagesam

    Savagesam Moderator Staff Member Moderator

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    She's pretty, looking forward to updates!
     
  8. kenny- New Member

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    Oct 25, 2016
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    Well talk about a thread revival!!!
    Im sorry to say that I am no further on with this build. It is currently sat on my trailer in the garage with no engine in. I have the built engine back from the builders so hopefully some progress to make this year.
    I changed jobs since the last updates also which has given me even less time to work on the car. Couple that with the fact I moved house and am tly in rented accommodation with no means to work on the car if i wanted to.
    I have however, just bought a house with my partner which has a nice sized garage, so hoping some more thread updates will be coming this way soon.

    Thanks to those that showed interest initially and the lovely comments.

    Please bear with me and stay tuned for further updates.
     
    Savagesam likes this.

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