Happy to help Guys. Nice to meet you too. Only just seen this thread and have to saw, WOW!!!!! That is one nice looking mk1. Looks very clean and original. Best of luck. Gurds
you've done better than we have in the engine removal/fitting side of things, gave up in the rain yesterday.
So the project has moved on, the weather has gotten the best of us lately but there is allways work to be done as i found out the hard way; me " 0730, it's raining, ill have a lie in and then a quick hour on the PS3" the GF "OH but i really want my car finished, there is plenty you can be getting on with - what about the wiring?"[/I] That was me told then [:^(] well we spent the weekend away with family and got back home midday tuesday and started to prep getting the engine back in. We had to change the steering rack, i did this by making accurate measurements and then taking the track rod arms of the steering rack removing just the rack, the LHD 5 speed manual rack was bolted into place, the GF fitted the manual shifter tower, and bits and bobs. I set about replacing the TPS and closed throttle wires that had melted from the fury of the ABF, new wire was soldered in with new terminals added, and all sleeved in high temp cable sleeving. Bolted the flywheel on and hung the engine on the crane whilst we fitted the newly painted box - it was the GF's first major attempt at spraying - not a bad job at all. we then spent a good hour lowering the engine into the car, bit tricky as the way the engine was hung ment it was slanted right and hung backwards - next time i do this ill attached some more ropes add level the engine out. (thats a top tip for anyone attempting this) Box in, it was a case of bolting things back on, routed the engine loom across the bay in a not to bad way and then split it open to help get it around the bay a little better. Mounted the ECU in the scuttle and then cracked on with the wiring as told. Here are a few pics of the uprated front lighting loom. Tools of the trade Printed out the very usefull electrical FAQ - cheers John this is my bible. Taking apart the old MK3 lighting/horn loom. New wiring and terminals - as i allways say, if you are go to do anywiring use new wire and terminals as it saves so much time and hassle plus it makes for much neater and better wiring. I have started to knock up a quick carbon mount for the relays, here it is cut so size and with the holes drilled to mount it - needs a good coat of laquer to bring it out. The MK3 loom connection and the final lighting/horn loom completed. I will get some more pics of the engine in place, ECU mounting etc once the rain has gone away.
she is coming on a dream, and thank you very very much smudge for all your hard work!! its great fun and she will be a beauty once finished!!!
I couldn't sleep yesturday, had to much on my mind so i was up at 05:30 having a brew waiting for it to get light enough for me to work. Started by building up the lighing loom fuse/relay box. Could do with another layer of laquar to really bring it to a shine, but this is not a cosmetic part - where it is going it want really be seen. Built up and mounted to the horn bracket. Engine is in, the wiring and placing of parts has become the focus of the day. The wiring loom comes out on the opisite side in the mk1 compared to the mk3, it needed splitting and re-routing/re-grouping. I moved onto the radiator, i chopped the MK3 carrier down to justs its core components of fan and cowling. Radiator in and it is a tight squeeze, would you beleive that the MK1 had the correct dipps in the chassis to locate the MK3 radiators feet? It fits hight and width ways perfectly matting up to the hoses, but it is slanted back with not much room. I trimmed a small strip of the slam panel to allow the rad to sit under it a bit more. Then mounted the fuel filter here, i bought two different diesel air filter boxes and have tried to fit them, 1. there is not enough room and would require a good bit of buchury to get them in and 2. the bore on the diesel airbox is so much smaller than the ABF. So instead of chocking the engine i decided to buy a K&N 57i filter and ill make up a heat sheild sometime in the future. ECU mounted in the scuttle tray, bolted the bracket in through the car. nice and solid and is covered buy the rain cover. got rid of the massive 5L headlight washer bottle and replaced with this rad fan control unit. Car has been stripped like this for nearly two weeks as i have replaced all the looms. I then cracked on with the fuel tank - been dreading this job! i jack the car up, put it on axel stands at the rear, dropped the rear beam on a jack by unbolting where the bushes mount to the chassis, took the plastic cover off from under the OSR wheel well that covers the tank lines, and then droppped the tank straps. After figthing with the tank for some time it was evident that both the handbrake cables need removing, so i did this by undoing them from inside the car. So that is what you need todo to remove a MK1 tank. And then eventually got the tank out. fitted the new tank, that was a mission of wiggling and jiggling, and found the best way was to use a jack to put pressure onit whilst i levered it over the studs for the tank straps - proper mission. Anyway all in and dropped back down, was a very long day but did make the most of the wheather
We have been wairting for parts to arrive this last week, things have been taking longer than they should but by friday all had arrived, only to our horror that the driveshafts sent are 90mm ones not the 100mm we need - and can we find any anywhere else? - No. So we are at a standstill, the car is not going to be finished this weekend as planned, so on that not we cracked on with a few more things, we decided for simplicity to run the MK3 clocks, plus the fact they look better than the MK1/mk2. So i set about fitting them to the MK1 dash. First up i had to chop a bit of the inner dash moulding to make room for the larger MK3 clocks. then i had to modify the right hand supporting bracket, this tab needed bending 180deg in the oppisite direction and then a new hole was drilled for the screw. back in place and the clocks mounted, also i had to move the mounting piont of the top of bracket over to the right. - interestingly enough the lower part matches an existing hole on the dash The clocks do not fit very well with the MK1 surround, the MK3 clocks are bigger so the fuel guage is half in view, ill make a new dash surround sometime in the future to neaten up the install but for the time being it will be fine. I then moved onto making up some new 8mm fuel lines. I poped down to the local plumb centre and picked up some 8mm copper pipe 10m for 8 - bingo and then a pair of tools from the bay for 12 delivered so i bent the pipes to shape and fitted. and the bending and cutting tools... As seen as the car is not going to driveable for a while i decided to take of the inlet manifold and rocker cover for some TLC - the plan was to get her up and running and then in the future paint up the spare manifold and rocker cover i have at my parents. The cam cover was leaking anyway so it was a job for the near future. Cam cover off and treated to some wire brush action, ready for painting. and the inlet manifold again treated with the same wire wheels and elbo grease. So if you have any 100mm MK1 drive shafts then ill be really happy to hear from you, cheers Tom.
So, we were on the hunt big time for some 100mm drive shafts but could only get hold of the short shaft from crazyquifs. So we went with the one cabbie 100mm shaft and then used the mk1 original long shaft with a 100mm inner CV fitted - I had to moddify the CV by decking 4mm of the inner race so that the circlip would fit (the 100mm driveshafts are 4mm thicker) All in all the longer shaft is 8mm bigger than the cabbie 100mm shafts so fingers crossed it will work for now. I built the shafts up with new inner and outer seals and fitted to the car by removing the wishbone and pushing the upright out the way - simple and it gave me the opertunity to replace the rear brackets with some GTi ones with the anti-role bar attachments. Next problem was the 4 branch, it was catching on the steering rack mount. So i handed it over to a custom exhaust company (longlife) and asked them to add 25mm to the top of the runners. I am not impressed with the results, what do you guys think? Cost a lot of money and looks like a load of pigeon ****, i can weld better!! And then to really p1ss me off they welded the flange back on upside down!!! - i was quite p1ssed off to say the least as it took another week to get sorted so two weeks wasted in all. I got the dash back in and fitted everything back up at the weekend finished off the last of the wiring, fitted the exhuast but it does not mate up with the 4 branch, it is about 6inches of. Besides this i decided to start the car anyway, it worked but would not idle, i had to hold the throttle open or otherwise it would stall, after a quick bit of trouble shooting it was clear that the idle stab/engine compartment fuse had blown, replaced this and all worked OK - was bloody loud without the silencers connected. Going to take it down a garage and get it sorted out this week. Really happy that the thing has started, now we need to get her driving and then iron out all the problems that may occour before our trip to the ring 24hrs a week on saturday.
Pretty awful job for a 'professional welder' TBH. Rest of it seems to be coming on nicely though! Did you buy that car from Ian Carvell? I seem to remember him advertising one like that.
that is sh*t welding. the car is continueing to look great! what did you use to paint the inlet manifold?
Well I took it to the garage on tuesday morning to get the exhuast joined between the down pipe and silencers. On the way down (got stuck in bl00dy london traffic for over 30mins moving about 300m ) it started to get hot, water temp was rising and fans did not kick in so i pulled over just before it overheated and let it cool down - it took me another to more stops before i got to the garage (cheekily hoped in a bus lane for the last 200m - hopefully ill not get a ticket ) picked it up on tuesday evening and drove it home, standard new exhuast and it was lovely and quite but when you do drop the hammer the induction noise is just enough to put a big smile on your face plus the fact that the acceleration is quite comical - not far of my cars pace but so much more refined! anyway managed to fix the rad fans (needed a new fuse) then checked all the electrics lights were nice and bright all worked etc so really happy. Then on the way back from an evening test the exhuast started to get really loud!! Then there was the sound of some loose bolts dropping on the floor. DOH anyway checked under the car and the 3 bolts that hold the downpipee to the 4 branch collector have worked themselves loose. Why do i have so much proplems with garages!!!! obviously they forgot to tighten them back up... not impressed with exhust places but on the plus they did do a neat job this time. so need to sort out a few bits and bobs, connect up the front wiper wiring, finish off the light switch put the lower dash back on, yesturday i plumbed in and wired the windscreen wash, i used the one rear tank fitted to the MK1 and deleted the front tank, used the MK3 pump motor as it is two way so both the washer jets work great. Should be back up and running by saturday (waiting on some new stainless bolts) for some more testing and we will take her down to dubs in the park on sunday, then next week it's off to the ring Used Halfords own brand paint, it has a good spray pattern and finish.
We have been working on the car over the last few evenings to get her as close to finished and working as possiable, the aim being that today (sunday) we would be up early and taking the car to Dubs at the Park. So by friday night we had reconnected the exhuast with some stainless bolts and nylock nuts, fitted the lower dash, rear bench, moved over my spare 15inch wheel with new T1R etc etc. Surday morning we took the car to get the tracking done - but the man at the garage says the tierod and locking bolt are fused. Ill be having a look at this and getting the tracking done early this next. (have a spare tie rod at home if it is fused) We then washed the cars, polished the MK1 and then backed to black the bumpers and trim bits. Hovered the car out and then wired in the windscreen wipers (tho' my soldering iron is on the way out as it was only just able to melt the solder - so joints are not the best ill get a new one from work and finish them off properly. Finished of by fitting some plastic plate surrounds and headed of out to lunch. Sunday morning up early and set of to the show, decided to fill her up with fuel and then check the MPG - but the pump did not click off and the car p1ssed quite abit of fuel out of the overflow and all over the garage floor - [:^(] not what we were expecting this early in the morning (thinking one of the breather or overflow pipes is not connected up properly so ill investigate this later on) Glad that the wipers had been wired in as the weather had changed and the rain was pouring down by the time we met up with the other MK1 owners. After we had convoyed in, the clouds parted and the sun shone brightly - this lasted until about 1300 before the rain started again, but we had a really great day, there were lots of cars at the show, caught up with a few guys from last year and just enjoyed the atmosphere with a beer. Only got a couple of pics just before we left in the rain.
hey fella, saw your car at the show looked nice. You should have had the bonnet up though to show off the abf more that welding really is pants. Reckon I could do better and i have never done welding in my life haha. I may copy you and paint my manifold the same colour, how did you do the lettering?
