My Track Toy

[Cossie1]

Love that look

 

I have acquired a full Octy WRC kit that I was going to fit on my Silver VRS but not sure I have the b***s to do in on the road

 

now on your car...............hmmm  

 

maybe someone might be interested.. 

 

Oh no, sounds expensive...

 

Do you have any pics of what you have, and a price in mind ?

 

lol

[VRSchrisphebe]

I have just been reading this, and its AWESOME, great looking car and it must be loads of fun on the track.

 

also, what don't you like about the 18's Rs4.

 

Defo going to follow this!!!

[Cossie1]

I have just been reading this, and its AWESOME, great looking car and it must be loads of fun on the track.

 

also, what don't you like about the 18's Rs4.

 

Defo going to follow this!!!

 

Thanks, it is great fun (when it drives in a straight line).

 

The RS4's I just don't like the style of them, and the car doesn't seem to drive as nicely on 18's either.

[VRSchrisphebe]

fair enough, any more plans for it?

[Cossie1]

fair enough, any more plans for it?

 

Need to sort out whatever is causing it to pull hard left under acceleration, fit my 28mm Neuspeed RARB, and then i'll look at removing the sound deadening from the floorpan as it's starting to look a bit nasty in the drivers footwell, after that I will hopefully sort some graphics for it.

 

Not too sure beyond that tbh.

[TERKIN]

 

 

Not too sure beyond that tbh.

VTEC

 

or maybe a hybrid :think:

[Cossie1]

VTEC

 

or maybe a hybrid :think:

 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

 

and nah

[TERKIN]

ok what a bore

[Cossie1]

Ok so I haven't updated this for a while now.

 

The reason being, I had lost all interest in the car after the Forge Summer Action day drama's.

 

I have only just managed to sort the car out :think:

 

Basically one of the wishbone bolts came loose on track, which was causing the clonking that I could feel and hear.

 

After it was tightened up the noise went away, but the car remained pretty much un-driveable, as it was trying to drag me off the road (to the left) every time I put my foot down.

 

I replaced the front wishbone bush (the one that the bolt came loose on) with another new Powerflex Black Series bush, along with a new bolt and also new subframe bolts, but nothing changed, the car was still the same.

 

I then fitted the Silver Project top mounts and had the wheel alignment done, -1.5° per side, equal caster and toe set to 0.00 but the car still drove the same.

 

I then was told that 1 of the bolt holes for the rear bush on the subframe was slightly ovaled, and that might be causing a problem.

So I replaced the subframe, and fitted some 034 Motorsport solid bushes at the same time, but still nothing changed, when you drove it hard the car would pull hard left, and on changing gear it would dive right, and under braking, well I couldn't tell if the front and rear of the car were attached, it was THAT bad , it was also wheel spinning on cold / damp days but only the n/s wheel was loosing traction (even on the motorway, I thought the clutch was slipping at first until I loaded it up in 5th gear at 3500rpm and the rev's didn't shoot round even at 1.5bar boost).

 

Anyhow I spoke to a few people and everyone agreed that the Wavetrac had to be faulty, so I emailed Wavetrac to see if they could give me any idea's of what to check, they suggested I check the stub axles were tight in the gearbox and also said to pop them out and check for any obvous signs of damage inside. I did this, but found nothing wrong, even the pressure springs on the stub axles seemed to be in good condition.

 

I emailed Wavetrac back again and they suggested that I contacted Regal Autosport as they are there uk distributor and all warranty claims should go via them.

 

So I fired an email over to Regal at the beginning of December (I bought the diff from them anyway at Inters in July), explaining the problem, and that pretty much everything had been removed, checked and / or replaced.

 

They said they would like me to take the car to them, so they could check it over, I replied saying no problem, but as they are over 100 miles away, i'd like to know if there was a charge, they replied very quickly to tell me it would normally cost £380 but in this instance they would check the car over for just £72.

 

So I then asked what they would be checking for my £72, the reply was that they would check over my suspension for me, I replied back to them and said thats fine, but as it has been done by 2 garages and also myself and most items replaced already I wasn't happy to pay them £72 to do the same thing again.

 

I then asked them that if I paid the £72 and they agreed that the diff was at fault, would they be covering the labour charges or is that down to me, they very quickly replied with a link to the Wavetrac warranty info which states that only the diff is covered, and no labour, and therefore they would charge there normal labour rates.

 

I explained that in that case i'd rather put the £72 towards the labour costs of removing the gearbox, and stripping it down to remove the diff, and with the petrol money i'd save, I would send them the diff in the post.

 

They wanted to know how soon this would happen, so I explained it would be next year now.

 

Anyhow I sold my daily runabout a few days later, and as I was down to just 1 car again, and with xmas coming, I felt that it made sense to get the wheel alignment done again, as I didn't want to ruin a set of tyres for no reason as I was going to have to drive the car for now.

 

So I took it in to get the alignment done again, however this time, the camber was all over the place, the top mounts were still set as before (max camber), but I had pushed both ball joints fully in (min camber) after the subframe was swapped over as I felt this would be best to keep everything equal.

 

Anyway everything was way out, but the car still drove in a straight line on light throttle for some reason.

 

The camber on the n/s was -2° but only -0.5° on the o/s, the toe was way out also but the caster was still pretty equal.

 

Anyhow after lots of messing about, including moving the subframe over, the best that could be achieved was -1° 18 minutes per side, with the toe set to 0.00, to get this the n/s ball joint was fully in (min camber) and the n/s top mount set to fully out (min camber), and the o/s ball joint fully out (max camber) and o/s top mount fully in (max camber).

 

Needless to say I was very confused, and a little annoyed that I can't get -1.5° of camber again.

 

BUT....

 

On the way home the car was FAR more stable, it was still drifting left under throttle, but it was very gentle and wasn't trying to drag me off the road anymore, it also wasn't diving right when changing gear and the rear is now connected to the car even under heavy braking again.

 

Very very odd and bizarre as the wheel alignment has always been done at the same place, with the same equipment but with very different results.

Still today I got a chance to take the car on a drive and i've managed over 100 miles today without it trying to kill me once

 

So now I'm feeling much happier with the car, and over the next couple of months I now plan to finally get the rear arb's swapped over, remove the sound deadening from the floor, and also findout where it's letting water in as a few days ago the passenger footwell in the rear was full of water but it was against the transmission tunnel where the water had collected, the area by the doors was dry lol.

 

This is how bad the old subframe hole was ovaled.

 

 

[TERKIN]

woohoo on the right track then! pleased your getting interested again,all you need now is an awesome 400bhp+ setup

[Cossie1]

woohoo on the right track then! pleased your getting interested again,all you need now is an awesome 400bhp+ setup

 

Afraid not mate, i'm sticking with the stock engine and turbo

 

Unless your making a donation that is

[James I]

Will we see you at Oulton Park in Feb Cossie?   

 

 Sounds like your car is really trying your patience, I am sure you will fettle it in the near future.  Good luck.

[Cossie1]

Will we see you at Oulton Park in Feb Cossie?   

 

 Sounds like your car is really trying your patience, I am sure you will fettle it in the near future.  Good luck.

 

It is something I am now giving some consideration too

 

Yes it really has been testing my patience, and there has been more than 1 occasion when I thought a gallon of petrol and a box of swan would be the fix.

[James I]

Paraffin rag and match does cure a multitude of sins  

[Cossie1]

Oh i'm also thinking I need an LCR (225) steering wheel as the vrs one feels too thin now after owning an LCR, and I wouldn't mind a set of LCR dials for it too

[skud vrs]

Glad its finally feeling better, would be good if you went to Oulton Park.

[Cossie1]

Ok so i've done a few more miles in the car now, and happy to report it seems to be behaving itself now

 

So as it's been good, I booked for Oulton Park on 21st Feb, Castle Combe Action Day 26th April and going to Nurburgring on 2nd - 5th May now too (assuming I don't kill the car on the first 2 trackdays).

 

Over the last few days, I have been slowly removing the sound deadening from the passenger footwells as since christmas whenever it rains heavy the car has been filling up with water, I was removing 2+ litres every day as it's been raining that bad around here.

 

Anyway after making up some new rear door membranes, that didn't change anything, I removed and inspected the door rubbers, but they seem to be ok (although they were wet inside at the bottom).

 

I also removed the scuttle panel and as I thought, both drains were clear, however behind the pollen filter there was a small amount of wet leaves and other muck, that was stuck there, which I have now removed, and I also noticed the rubber grommet which I had used to put the boost gauge vac line through, was missing. So I borrowed 1 from the boot area, and used some duct tape to make sure it's held in place now.

 

The frame that the pollen filter sits in, was also wet around the bottom of it, so I don't know if water was getting in through the heater blower box.

 

Anyhow this morning the car was nice and dry inside (although it did rain last night, it wasn't really very heavy so don't know if anything has been fixed yet).

 

I also finally got around to fitting my Verdict Shift Bracket Bushings (at long last) and today I managed to remove my old 24mm Adjustable HD RARB and fit the 28mm Neuspeed 1 that I have had for about 6 months waiting to go on

[Cossie1]

So it seems the water leak hasn't been fixed (although it was better), but then again over the last week or so, it hasn't rained as heavy, but there has still been water getting in, so it doesn't seem to be the scuttle panel area at fault (although still not 100% convinced that some water isn't coming in through the heater blower box).

 

On friday I went out for a drive for a few miles and on the dual carridgeway on the way home, it started to rain pretty heavy.

 

Sure enough when I got home, there was a small amount of water in the passenger footwell again.

 

So yesterday morning as it was dry, I had another look and again there is a little water in the footwell as it rained the night before.

 

The only place I hadn't looked so far was the passenger door.

So I pulled the door card off, and first thing I notice, the previous owner has fitted some Alpine speakers

 

However the way he fitted them meant the membrain was ripped in a few places, I checked the drain holes in the bottom of the door and they are all clear, so I was a bit confused, but then I looked at the back of the door card and it was soaked, at the bottom of the speaker area.

 

Looking closer the speak grille was also wet and the clip under the speaker was wet too.

 

So it seems because of the way the speakers were fitted any water running inside the door, was running around the speaker and then coming in from the doorcard (as this goes past the door seal), and in really bad rain, I guess it was also coming in from the speaker grille.

 

Anyway I chucked some duct tape around the membrain and tried to make it as tight a seal as I can.

 

It rained last night and it was bloody cold this morning too (-1.5° at 8.30am) but the inside of the car was dry and it wasn't like and ice rink either

 

I guess i'll just have to see how it goes now.

 

But in the mean time.

 

FOR SALE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Only kidding, but I do keep wondering what it's worth as it is lol (dangerous game I know).

[James I]

My Golf lets water in too, but only since I stripped the carpets and things out, all of those were bone dry.

 

 Now with no carpets etc the water runs in, I did try and locate the leak but failed, so I cured the issue by pushing the rubber floor grommets out, nw the water gets in and out of the car.  Result 

[Cossie1]

My Golf lets water in too, but only since I stripped the carpets and things out, all of those were bone dry.

 

 Now with no carpets etc the water runs in, I did try and locate the leak but failed, so I cured the issue by pushing the rubber floor grommets out, nw the water gets in and out of the car.  Result 

 

Thats alright unless your driving it in the wet, then all the crap comes into the car :(

[James I]

Only the ones in the rear foot well mate, don't fancy a draft up my trouser leg 

 

 I will eventually find the leak and glue it up, probably the same as you, door seals and the speakers or even the pollen filter could be to blame, one morning when I parked it on a slope, there was a foot of water against the trans tunnel in the passenger foot well. Could have kept fish in it 

[Cossie1]

Yep sounds very familiar lol

[Cossie1]

Ok water has still been getting in, and the weather has been C R A P around here for the last week or 2, but today it was dry (and even a little sunshine too).

 

So I went out and removed the passenger door card again, and removed the Alpine speaker, cut up another thick rubble sack, and pushed it into the door, to fill the gap of where the speaker sits, as thats where the previous owner split the membrane.

 

I then put a small hole into new piece of membrane to allow the speaker wires to reach the speaker and screwed it back into place, and then cut and taped the section to the door.

 

I am hoping that when it rains new (probably tonight), the water will now run down the plastic and into the door, and drain out as normal, rather than finding it's way through the speaker and out via the speaker grille.

 

 

I have also been thinking of getting my track rims repainted, as the grey looks good but doesn't really stand out much.

 

Anyone have any suggestions of bright colours that will stand out but will also go well with the Silver of the car ???

[Cossie1]

Ok so took the car to Oulton Park last Friday (21st Feb).

 

On the drive up, I had noticed every now and then there was a squeal from the rear at low speed which I assumed was a rear caliper sticking slightly, but a quick nip of the handbrake sorted it out.

 

Got to Oulton, Signed on and did the briefing, then had to go out to do sighting laps.

 

As soon as I pulled onto the track, I felt some nasty steering wobble, by the end of the 3 sighting laps (all at slow speed) the car was almost undrivable, it felt like the n/s/f wheel was about to fall out.

 

Luckily I had my spare "get me home" driveshafts with me, so I started the day jacking the car up and swapping out the driveshaft.

 

Once finished I managed to get out on track, I didn't know the track as i've not driven there before, and it was still damp and I didn't know if the steering wobble had gone now either, so I took it easy and all seemed fine, until I could feel (and hear) the rear brakes start to bind again.

 

So back into the pits, and jack the car up again, tried messing with the handbrake cable, but it became obvious it wasn't a handbrake issue.

 

So I unbolted the o/s/r caliper and found 1 of the sliders was seized up, I managed to get it out with a bit of force and luckily managed to get hold of a bit of grease, so gave it a bit of a clean up and a nice thick coat of copper grease and refitted it. Problem solved

 

So I went back out on track, but only managed 1/2 a lap before it was red flagged as a car had gone into the barriers, and then the track was closed for lunch.

 

After lunch I got out there pretty quickly and had a good session, got a few good laps in, and started to get more confident with the track (and car), then it started to rain and quickly foundout that there wasn't much heat in the rear tyres (R888's) so had a few exciting moments

 

My 3rd session, I took Jason (Devonutopia) out as a passenger, sadly though just as I was getting into it, there were a few loud clonks from under the car (that we both felt in the floorpan), and whilst going through Island Bend the steering went tits up, and that was the end of the day for me.

 

The car still drove in the straight line, but the steering wheel was now a little more than 1/4 turn to the right.

 

Back in the pits we jacked the car up, but couldn't find anything obvious that was broken, so I called it a day.

 

I loaded the car up, and jumped in with Jason for a few laps, then decided to leave early incase I didn't get back home before something failed completely.

 

As I went to leave the pits, the n/s/f wheel started to judder badly when on lock, so I stopped and jacked it up again, but once again all seemed fine, so I think I managed to break my "get me home" driveshaft lol.

 

Anyway I managed to limp the car home, which was quite interesting, as when turning left, out of a junction, there would be 2 loud clunks and then the steering wheel would be back to the centre again, but once you turn right or if you went over a large bump, the steering wheel would jump to the right again (very un-nerving).

 

Anyway I managed to get home and over all I had a great day at Oulton Park.

 

Here are the vids:

 

1st Session

 

 

2nd Session

 

 

3rd and final session

 

 

All iPhone vid's linked together (2nd and 3rd sessions only)

 

[group1rs]

I wonder how many briskodians at £25 each it would take to enter Cossie1 in the 2015 BTCC ? Just a thought.