Hello all,

I Have recently acquired an original Works Spec Skoda Challenge Felicia and I have a couple of wee niggles with the car that need sortign before taking it off for an MOT and out for its first event with me at the wheel, the main one being the Indicators/Hazards are failing to work, having looked at the Fusebox layout found on here there is only a HAZARDS relay is this a dual purpose relay????

The other thign is I could really do with finding a better gearbox for the car rather than the standard 1. gearbox as 3rd to 4th is just far too long for a rally car that is built for Acceleration nto top end! Any suggestions greatfully read and used for the best results

Phil C.

hi there that is the one for them both i do have one off them relys or it could be the hazzards switch mate

Cheers For that will get the sponsors to throw me a new Relay to try tomorrow and if that doesn't work will look at Switching but suspect it is the relay my self!

Theres the car btw!

What's the registration?

Gearbox-wise you will be lucky to find anything secondhand in this country - I did a LOT of looking, and found nothing. You'll really need to get something from CZ to rid yourself of the problem as there just aren't many over here and of course the challenge cars used the standard box. A C/R box will transform any rally car completely, but a gear kit will probably cost you the best part of half what the car has set you back (depending on what you paid, of course), getting on for £1000, I'd think.

Car is N918 TBD originally run By Jonathon Atack of Ripon. Have found info on Line that he won the skoda challenge class with the car in either '97 or '98 the car was run most recently by Greg Williams and I beleive the last event he did in the car was Rockingham stages in december 2009.

we are looking at a few options for the gear box we have been told the polo diesel and Ibzia Diesel gearbox should be able to fit if we get of the right age with it being a VW based plant in the challenge cars. now I have yet tpo confirm this myself thats just something I have been told.

I see you run your car with quite some success DJ so any tips would be greatly received, we have a spare engine that is getting stripped and rebuilt hopefully with a few more Horses I see you have yours runnign at 99BHP any hints there would be taken straight on board.

Phil C.

Hi Phil

It's not a VW engine! It's a Skoda one - through and through - basically the same engine as the last RWD Skodas. I don't think either Diesel box will fit physically, and they'd be geared higher than the standard Fel one - when I got my second (ex-challenge) rally car, it had a Diesel box in it (from a Felicia) and it was crap - it was the same ratios but with a really high final drive. I've not found any economical way of getting a C/R gearset, and believe me I did a LOT of looking! I have a broken gear kit here (which could be sorted if you know someone with a machine shop) and indeed the same for an LSD - a new housing would see it working again, I think it was a ZF one, proper plate diff job.

I'll write some more later, just trying to resurrect my Mum's diesel Felicia that won't start!

I am only runnign the Car as a Tarmac car and 2 of the guys who I knwo have run Felicia's on Tar said they both ran the Diesel box on tar for better ratios hence why I was looking at that option! As current 0-60 on a 500 straight is bascially on the breaking Zone. normally coming out of a Square L or R on to a 500 where I have been testing I am hitting the braking zone at the same time as I should be going into 4th thign is on a 500 straight in the 1.5 Diesel Corsa I am up inot 5th and passing the 75 mark way ebfore the rally car. yes I know the diesel corsa is running slightly more horseys but only baout 10. as I sy we are looking at the issues and trying to find some more torque better acceleration and keep teh realiability of the car Oh whilst also this seaosn runnign to a rather Low budget due to purchase costs of the car for this season and BARS Course etc.

A normal diesel box will give you waay longer overall ratios (typically 1.25 to 1.5 x depending on car) than a similarly powerful petrol engine car normally runs.

If the Felly D has better ratio spacing, using a diesel cluster and a 1.3 petrol CWP might do what you want. (presumes tyre rolling radius remains about constant).

The Felicia Diesel has the same ratios as the Petrol, it's just the final drive is different. The guy who was running my first Fel said the same thing - he liked it because you were either in 2nd or 3rd all the time. But it was S-L-O-W compared to the petrol box, and changing it over made the car far better. The petrol gearbox is way overgeared anyway (140mph at 7000rpm), the diesel even more so.

Ok Thank you for that info, It may just be that when we get a sponsor on board who can afford a bit more than a couple of Humdred we look to purchase an after Market Box of some sort.

I bought some parts from Ivan Sixta in Czech - a 4.24 final drive and lower ratio pairs of cogs for gears 3, 4 and 5 for my Felicia rally car. They are from the Fabia Challenge specification gearkit, apparently...

Sixta was helpful - he doesn't speak English, but he will reply to an email in English eventually - his son speaks English, but doesn't live with him, so it takes a little while before he replies!

Clicky 1...

However, I'm pretty think they are all standard skoda parts from the Fabia 1.4 MPI gearbox and (if you can find them) Fabia 1.0 gearbox (not sold in the UK, but had a 4.86:1 final drive).

I believe that the standard ratios are 3.308, 1.913, 1.267, 0.927, 0.717 and the lowest final drive in the Felicia box is 4.118:1

Mine are now 3.308, 1.913, 1.357, 0.975, 0.795 and 4.24:1. A useful improvement without going the whole hog and fitting one of these (which would be much better, undoubtedly)...

Clicky 2...

Cheers

James

That's interesting - having translated it, the full set of straight cut Grp A gears (not sure what ratios as they homologated loads) is £622. The lower final drive (straight cut) - CWP is 293. So, about a grand, but it'd transform the car, and as it's synchro it's not like entering the wallet-deflating dog box club.

I've heard varying things about the 6-speed boxes, mostly that they don't last long and the bits are hideously expensive!

James: Did you have to get the input shaft pressed apart to change 3 and 4?

James: Did you have to get the input shaft pressed apart to change 3 and 4?

I don't know. I had Steph at MST build it all up for me, service my gripper diff and build it all into a newly bead-blasted case all at the same time - he did an excellent job for not much money - one of the new gears needed some grinding (which Steph explained was not unusual) to make it fit.

Even though I've moved up to 14" wheels, the lower gearing is quite noticeably on the road - 4th and 5th are much more useable now.

Ah very intresting Ideas.

Well after an action packed day of Officially Launching our new team, plus doing some extra work on the car certain things have been discovered and will in the coming weeks before our first event at Crail in fife rectified. now need to source ARB's and a new Hazard wardnign switch or fablicate a new switch as it is that switch that is dragging down the Indicators!

As for the gearbox after some testing today I think we will do fine to start with by using the standard fitted box and nailing 1st through to at times 4th!

Phil C.

Ignore - posted in other thread now

Edited 5 June, 201115 yr by RainbowFore

Does anyone KNow if a Fabia 1.4 Will drop straight in with the engine mounts to a Felicia or si tehre lots of Fabrication required?

No, it won't. James has a 1.4 Fabia engine mated to the Felicia gearbox, there is info on it somewhere on here - IIRC it needed a new waterpump engine mounting made up (the Fel water pump doesn't work as the pulley offset is different), and the Fel flywheel mated to the fabia crank (redrilling needed for that), plus, of course management sorted out as well...

You can apparently fit a 1.4 Fabia crank to a 1.3 block (this is a homologated change which I'm looking into doing on my own car), but it's not straightforward - modification of block and/or crank is needed as I found out when I got a crank at long last!

Darren, When I say fiot a Fabia 1.4 I was thinking the full lot, Engine Gear Box and Water Pump basically empty the engine bay and fit a Fabia 1.4 in however if this will not go straight into the engine mountigs then ti starts to become a bigger task than I was thinking and something I need to speak to Cheif Mechanic about and his fabrication shop!

Car ready for its offical launch and the team launch last weekend! Still got a problem with the Hazards not working even after replacing the Hazard switch & relay so think that will mean we are going to sperate the Hazards from the Indicators circuit and wire in a seperate circuit!

Will that rear window pass scrutineering? It wouldn't pass an MOT in many places....

Fabia 1.4 box is totally different, it wouldn't fit without a lot of fab work including driveshafts. The 1.4 engine fits to the Fel box without too much issue, the way James fitted it is the path of least resistance and he's got excellent results from his setup.

Car ready for its offical launch and the team launch last weekend! Still got a problem with the Hazards not working even after replacing the Hazard switch & relay so think that will mean we are going to sperate the Hazards from the Indicators circuit and wire in a seperate circuit!

rather than trying to reinvent a new flasher system do you not think it would be simpler to fix the origional fault, is the fuse ok? is there power to it? etc? do the indicators work ok? it is a fairly complicated switch for the hazard lights so making one would not be simple at all.

good luck with the first event hope you have a good day and loads of fun.

Amen to that, Jim - the original way is often the best as you're not reinventing the wheel, and they usually last decades...

I take it you didn't headbutt any flying cars at Le Mans?

Amen to that, Jim - the original way is often the best as you're not reinventing the wheel, and they usually last decades...

I take it you didn't headbutt any flying cars at Le Mans?

Yea we were 50 feet from where McNish went in mate and I honestly do not know how nobody was injured I really don't the noise it made when it hit was undescrible and more like a plane crash with debris flying everywhere, fair play he got out AND walked away from the car on his own, Rockenfeller's off was at a massive speed (195ish MPH I believe was said on radio lemans at the time)and while he was trapped for a while and the car had broken into 2 parts he was ok but I bet both have some impressive bruises today.

I think rallying could take a small lesson from the build of these cars and how massivly strong they are where it matters.

Yea we were 50 feet from where McNish went in mate and I honestly do not know how nobody was injured I really don't the noise it made when it hit was undescrible and more like a plane crash with debris flying everywhere, fair play he got out AND walked away from the car on his own, Rockenfeller's off was at a massive speed (195ish MPH I believe was said on radio lemans at the time)and while he was trapped for a while and the car had broken into 2 parts he was ok but I bet both have some impressive bruises today.

I think rallying could take a small lesson from the build of these cars and how massivly strong they are where it matters.

I think you may have just re-invented "Group S" (a proposed 1980s rally formula using purpose-built chassis and silouette bbodywork rather than modified production cars).

I have checked, the earths, the fuses and changed the switching unit and relay. With the switch disconnected or de-selected the Indicators work correctly the only thing not working is the hazards. Hence why looking as just fitting a second Hazard toggle switch to the dash board to a seperate relay bascially running in parrallel rather than in series with the original system as clearly the original system run in series is dragging down the indicator systems! something we really dont need happening and hearing on here that this is a common fault it seems a Good Idea to seperate the systems anyway. thats exactly the same as we do with Systems on the Aircraft at work if one constantly drags another down in series we modify the systems powering to seperate the feeds so you dont loose both.

As for the rear window yes it should pass scrutineering as there is approx 50% of the rear window visable through. the blue Book asks only that there is 2 way vision through part of the rear screen and quarter/rear door windows. We used to when I co-drove have a permiatated full cover which from 10 meters back look solid but at 5 meters you could see into the car and although contraversial when we unvailed that pattern it passed scrutineering when I flashed the blue book!

CHeers for the advice on the Fabia 1.4 unit its just another option for getting even more out of the little car still ideas bouncing around including a full re-fabrication of the engine mounts and the likes!

Phil C.