Scirocco Track Car Development...X-Flow Conversion preparation

Put an 2.0 16v in it. You'll be amazed and the difference once it's set up properly In the meantime, it might be worth investigating if the KR is really 100% right.

 

Easier said than done infortunatly. Plus im skint so havnt got the money to have the KR fine tuned. And im npt buying another one of them gunson afr gauges, rubbish they are!

 

So... today I finished the seam welding under the passenger's wheel arch... most of the time was taken up with burning, electric-scraping, digging and grinding (with wire brush) through the huge wads of sealant under the arch. You have to admire VW's commitment to rustproofing on cars of this era - it's the reason why so many of them are still around, compared to cars from other manufacturers - but it's a real PITA to get off when you want to get in there to do some work.

Anyway... my arms were just about ready to fall off from wrestling the angle grinder, and my lungs are full of foul smoke from blowtorching the sealant, but I got there.

Next... Point of no return - *gulp!* Front X-member with engine mounting points.. needs to be 'adjusted' to lower the radiator mounting point, and move it forward. It's quite a clever little bit of box section, with extra reinforcing pieces and captive nuts for the front mount. All those little formed holes and ridges make it pretty stiff when you try to start bending it around, compared to a flat panel. I'll take a few more pics of the bits tomorrow.

Before:


After:


I've now run out of cutting discs - managed to shatter a couple for good measure - and the shops are shut tomorrow, but I've got some other things I can do. In the meantime I'll fabricate the revised front X-member, and figure out if I want to keep the front mount.... instinct says keep my options open, for now, which means keep the mount.

 

You need a wideband really, for a proper setup, to make sure the mixture is right further up the rev range. Cheaper to borrow than buy one

 

Yeah i know a bloke who has one and is mobile so he could come to me, but i dont have the money to spend.

 

Might be worth a little bit of checking spark plugs and gentle tweaking to see if that helps. I'd make a note of where you start from. TBH if you're running on normal unleaded for cost reasons that won't help, but sometimes there's more to worry about than performance.

 

Im not sticking with the engine for much longer now. Its ok if you drive gently, but if you wanna put your foot down it does seem a bit slow to react.

 

Meanwhile... I've been back on the tools again today - mainly welder and grinder! I was wearing earplugs most of the day, but my ears are still ringing a bit.

So, I finished seam welding the front end... put more effort into removing the sealer (blowtorch to heat the seams beforehand) and the results seem to be better.




Reinforced the master cylinder mounting point and enlarged the hole a little, for the polo master cylinder.


Test Fit


GSF Part Number


Grinding and tidying up in progress





Did some more work on dropping the front X-member, originally welded in a flat sheet to get the level, then chopped part of that and put in the original bits of the rad support panel, but cut down to the lower level.

Flat sheet


Original bits let back in


... and re-attaching the front engine mount (position was marked beforehand, and compared to other cars for position). I chopped the top part off to lower it, but there should be enough left to attach the engine to.





With the bigger radiator offered up in place. Not sure if I need this one, and don't like the fans on it (big and heavy) but the top hose is on the right end for the X-flow install.



Still need to box-in the front mount, and might look at putting a reinforcing bar across to help support it... maybe bolt-in to use the bumper mounts.

 

Front X-member / Radiator Mount panel is now finished in etch primer and seam sealer. It's in no way pro quality, but it'll do the job


Onto the strut brace, which will be made from 1.5" chrome-moly tube - reinforcing plates welded to the inside of the turrets


Needs to miss the master cylinder!! There's clearance but not a huge amount. The reservoir will be remote mounted behind the scuttle panel.


Centre part of scuttle panel removed. Will be put back once the brace is welded in, as I still want a firewall in there, so I'll cut it round the strut brace tube once that's mounted.


The plan is to bend the tube and weld it to the top of the bulkhead, as well as to the struts. This should provide plenty of strength and stop things from moving around in there. I'll also be mounting an upper rear engine mount to it - suspension bush, bit of tube, fabricated mounting brackets... that sort of thing.

 

Spot on thinking, this is how the Safety Devices one worked to help pin the towers together. We left the fire wall out as at the time of the build it gave the carbs some more space.

It it coming on well.

 

So whats the crack with not having a brake servo? Obviously it saves weight but how do you compensate for it not being there in terms of braking?

 

17mm master cylinder and no servo will be just fine. Should give a slightly firmer pedal and better feel. Servos are for ladies and big heavy cars

 

I see.....

 

Also interested in the M/C setup. How would that work with say a pair of wilwood 4 pots?

Cheers,
Bruce.

 

That's what's going on this, and is currently on the Mk1 Rally Golf I bought from Jon Olds on here.

 

So... update from yesterday and today...

Bought some high tensile tube to make an upper strut brace - 1.5"x 16SWG (38mm x 1.5mm) Chrome Moly tube. Borrowed a tube bender from the very handy and helpful neighbours.



Unfortunately the 38mm former die had been broken and welded before... and broke again before I could do the bending I needed. It's now at a specialist welding shop, hopefully for a better fix.

Having been thwarted on the upper brace and welding job, for now I moved on to painting the engine block... much angle grinder wire brushing, die grinding and scrubbing later, I wiped the block down with thinners and it was ready to paint... Halfords red high temp engine paint. Compared to the car plan stuff I've used before, I wasn't all that impressed with it. Doesn't go on all that well, but after 2 coats it looks fairly red and shiny.

At least the sun came out to make the whole day a lot more pleasant.


There are a few runs in the paint, but it'll look ok once all the bits are bolted on.



I also primed the engine bay and under the arches where I'd been seam welding before, with zinc182 primer, on top of acid etch on the bare metal. The brush-on zinc182 is fairly thick, so will hopefully provide a decent protection, and base for the top coat.... forgot to take any pics of that though

Thinking of doing the engine bay in white 2-pack as it should stand up to the heat and be fairly hard wearing.

 

Tube bender forming die still not fixed, so the tame welder and I had a go at bending the tube inside a 45mm slave tube. It didn't give a perfect bend - there's a slight kink in the tube - and wouldn't do for a roll cage, but it's good enough for my purposes. One of the slave pipes is cut off, but the other is going to be trimmed down and left as reinforcement for the extra engine mounting that's going to tie into it.

Two slave tubes


One cut off, the other trimmed down


Next job is to trim down the ends and fit to the turrets, then weld it all in. I need to curb my natural instincts to rush on with this, to do it slowly, carefully, and accurately. I don't want to mess up the tube and leave it too short, or the wrong profile on the ends!!

I've also sourced the missing valvegear bits from Mr Brown that I need (decided to go for uprated valve springs), so I can crack on and hopefully get the head cleaned, built and mounted to the engine this weekend. Now we're cookin'!

 

Good news, I like hearing about the progress.

 

Did a couple of hours tonight and got the brace bar trimmed to fit. Had to make a few minor mods to get it to fit properly with the heater back in place, but it's all ready to weld up and assemble tomorrow



It just about fits around the master cylinder too... reservoir will be remote mounted as mentioned a few posts ago.

 

Brace now welded in - not sure if it was the weld-through primer or if I was just having an off day with the welder, but it wasn't really as tidy as I'd like. What are other folks experiences with weld-through primer?



It's welded to the bulkhead as well as the turrets. Feels nice and solid. hopefully it'll stiffen up the front end.



I've started welding the scuttle panel back in, and bought a set of poly mounts from the neighbours, that fit inside the chrome moly tube and will form the basis of the rear upper engine mount. Pics to follow, but I can't do that until the engine's back in. Tomorrow will hopefully see the engine bay painted... Ford Transit Diamond White 2-pack.