Alex's red Mk1 Fabia vRS BMN/BLT 16v hybrid - GTBvklr

[alex_e3]

Things have been slow lately. Had other cars and motorbikes to sort out and sell! Will post an update soon, but it's more destruction than reconstruction at the minute. Having to get stuff re-powdercoated again, after a mere 3 months out in winter. Pretty miffed off!

 

Also had to send the block back to be re-coated, as the rust started to come back through. Will update soon!! It's definitely still happening, but taking a bit longer than initially thought. Life gets in the way!

[alex_e3]

On 2017-2-6 at 06:50, stevobeavo said:

Very nice up dates. The taroxs should clear fine. Compared to the brembo there's quite slim, do you know which model you've gone for? 

 

If only I wasn't planning for a wedding I'd have had the brembos off you for my car if you were selling them. 

 

I've also been running the NS-2R's for about a year now, there not bad wet but do need a bit of heat in them to really feel the grip benefits, some I found quite hard to do on the road. 

  

And in regards to the wheel blades if it's the type I'm thinking of that hammer in between the wheel and tyre then make sure it correctly installed. A girl at work had them for a few months then one detached itself and destroyed the door and wing.

 

Sorry pal, only just realised this was here!

 

The Tarox's are the ones off Kev's (coskev) old motor. They're the B30 caliper. I did a swap with my Brembo's and some cash for them.

 

Never planning on using the car in the rain again if I can help it to be honest (as the next post will explain why!). So hopefully the NS-2R's will be great for what I'll use the car for.

 

The Rimblades are a stick on variant. Hopefully shouldn't have any issues. I'll make sure they're stuck on alright!!

[alex_e3]

Bugger it... might as well give a quick update!...

 

Not much time spent on the car at all over the colder months. Been on with other things instead. Plus work is tough this year, which has been sapping my energy!

 

I set about stripping the suspension off the car again. What i found really depressed me to be honest. The car was on the road for a maximum of 3 months before the engine went, but it was in not great weather mostly. This has pretty much destroyed most of the work I put in for the calipers, RARB, hubs etc...  As can be seen below...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be honest, I was majorly de-motivated and p***ed off when I saw the state of it all. I've now decided that the car will be used as a second car and never again as a daily. As I'm not doing all this again to have it go like this quickly again. It's just not possible to have an immaculate daily!!

 

Once I got over that, I stripped down all the calipers, including the Tarox. Kev had previously done a stonking job of rebuilding these, but as with mine, having used it as a daily the finish wasn't great in places. So, I've decided to get them all re-done again...

 

 

 

 

 

 

So... with everything stripped back down, I'll be sending all the green bits back to the powdercoaters again. I did want them ceramic anodised at first, but the guy has rightly informed me that the finish will look poor due to them being castings and not machined billet.

 

I made another trip to see Nick at Camcoat again today. Top guy! I had a boot load of parts which he's getting coated now. I've sent parts such as my oil housing, standard oil cooler, custom aux bracket, both engine mounting brackets, and the bottom pulley - all to be coated in gloss black. He's also doing the bolts in gloss black too, so they don't look out of place. My fuel pipes and both cam pulleys are also with him to be coated in red. I'm planning on having a perspex section of my timing belt cover to see these. He's also re-coating the block for free. As unfortunately the rust must have run really deep, and my soaking in Deox-C and the extra blasting did not get rid of it enough. He's going to apply an undercoat of some specific rust treatment or something like that!

 

On a different aspect, I've made a pretty big decision about the interior. With the dash flocked fully and the car only going to be used in nice weather and on track occasionally, I really wanted some decent seats. Hence, I've now stripped the Audi S-Line half-leathers out (currently for sale). Interior looks pretty bare now...

 

 

Plan moving forward is to fit 2 buckets and harnesses. I've also got a local fabricator (amazing work!) to price up a PROPER half roll cage, complete with welded in box section mounts and harness bars built in. I don't want a full cage, as I'd have to cut the dash and make getting in and out even worse for the road. Once the car is at the stage where it needs custom boost pipework making and the exhaust modifying, I'll be taking the whole car to him to get it all done in one hit.

 

So, not much progress, but that's where I'm at!

Edited 4 November, 2017 by alex_e3

[alex_e3]

Got my next batch of parts back from the ceramic coaters a couple of days ago. The block has been re-done again - hopefully no further issues with that (Nick @ Camcoat was extremely helpful I might add!). Some examples of what's been coated, and a big box full to show there's more!...

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you can see, I've also chosen to have the ends of some of the bolts coated. The coatings are very thin, so don't affect me being able to fit the fastener. These are some of the fasteners that are on show. So I didn't want them to let the car down. I will be sending more in the near future!

 

 

All the brakes and RARB have once again been sent off to the powdercoaters. I was originally going to get them ceramic coated, but I was informed that they would look rubbish due to them being castings and not machined material. As the ceramic coatings are only thin. I'll be getting some more parts off to the powdercoaters soon, such as the rear beam.

 

 

OK, so I decided to start on the engine today. I have other stuff I really should have done before working on the car, but I wanted to see some positive progress for once, just to keep me motivated! So, I cleaned the block up after its trip to get ceramic coated. Spent a while cleaning the bores and all the castings, just to make sure it was all free of any contaminants. I then very lightly re-honed the bores again, as there was some surface rust due to it being standing. Some pics of the block and freshly re-honed bores...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next up was to check the piston ring end gaps. In first were the top rings. Carefully put them into the bores and pushed them down slightly with the piston...

 

 

 

Used a feeler gauge to check the end gap. All top rings were nicely in tolerance - which is 0.20 - 0.40mm. Mine were all 0.33mm...

 

 

Same again for middle ring (2nd compression)...

 

 

Results were virtually the same as the top ring, and hence were in tolerance.

 

Bottom rings were last. All of these were 0.31mm, which was well within the 0.25 - 0.50mm tolerance.

 

 

Next up I cleaned up all 4 pistons. In case anyone hasn't seen the 3 ceramic coatings up close, here they are...

 

Top coating is a thermal barrier (stops the piston taking in heat)...

 

 

Side coating is a lubricant (aids oil flow and hence promotes better oil pressure)...

 

 

Bottom coating is a thermal dispersant (takes heat out of the piston, which goes into the oil)...

 

 

 

That was it for this afternoon. I'm hoping tomorrow to get the pistons, rods and crank in place and tightened down to torque. I have to check the clearances for the mains first though. I'm fitting this stud and nut kit, so luckily the fasteners can be re-used...

 

 

 

That's all for now folks!

Edited 4 November, 2017 by alex_e3

[hutchysrs50]

Thought I'd never see any progress on this! 

Ready before the end of summer do you think?

 

Pistons look great though loads of effort into them!

[alex_e3]

Trust me it's not through not wanting to work on it!! Just had a lot of other stuff going on the last so many months - plus a big job change to boot. No excuse I know

 

End of summer is definitely going to be a tough target to hit, as much as I'd love to get it up and going by then. I think end of the year would be a more realistic guess, as there's bloody loads to do. That's under the assumption it all runs as expected too!!

 

Lads at Camcoat in Warrington shall take the credit for the pistons! Seems I started a trend with them in our little group chat - fitted them to Joe's first!

Edited 3 June, 2017 by alex_e3

[Lofty]

Can't rush a good job! Same moto as me lol

[alex_e3]

Had some problems today - no torque specs were in the box for the rods, and have a problem with the coating on the main & big end bearings. Pretty miffed, as was looking forward to building the bottom end up today. So... probably stopped in my tracks until at least next weekend now 

 

So whilst I was trying not to get more wound up, I stripped down the oil pump to check for wear. Few little marks in the gear, but nothing at all to be even remotely concerned with. Pumps on these engines age so well!

 

Pump stripped and cleaned...

 

 

All back together...

 

 

I'll be buying a new pickup pipe seal, chain and sprocket from TPS soon. I'll also be ordering a few other parts that I need to move things along. Couple of bits (and many fasteners!) will be off to the ceramic coaters too!

 

May get the rear beam off tomorrow if I'm feeling energetic...

Edited 4 November, 2017 by alex_e3

[alex_e3]

Managed to get the beam off today. Certainly going to be a 2-man job to get it back on with no marks to the powdercoat! It's in a bit of a state, having been on since 2006...

 

 

I need to get the new bearings back off and each stub axle before it goes off for powercoating. Also, the beam bushes have to come out. Can't say I'm looking forward to that, as they're solid! I think the blowtorch will be happening to help get them out.

 

I didn't get the beam off in the last big build a couple of years back, so may as well do this now. Fuel tank will be coming off so I can finish off the underseal that I didn't do all of last time.

Edited 4 November, 2017 by alex_e3

[alex_e3]

OK, so thanks to Photobucket for completely ruining my project thread (and many thousands of others on the internet...). I've spent quite a substantial amount of time going through each post and restoring the images but with Flickr instead. Hope to god they don't do the same nasty trick, as I'm not doing it a third time!! This thread should now be virtually identical to what it was before.

 

Update wise, pretty much zilch, other than the odd little thing which isn't worthy of a proper update. Lots been going on for months - mainly work being difficult, but I'm also just finalising a house purchase. Should be in very soon with any luck. It has a double-garage, so work will happen to make this a massively improved man-cave! I've also ordered a new Octy vRS 245 for delivery early next year - should be a nice daily

 

There will be updates at some point. Just to let everyone know that this build is still planned to happen... eventually!! 

[alex_e3]

Not a spectacular update by any means, but just to keep up-to-date!...

 

Car parts always come along at the wrong moment! These came up and couldn't leave them there...

 

 

 

Excuse the shaky handed poor 2nd picture!

 

They are GP Race Pro lightweight seats. Hadn't heard of the brand before, but did a bit of research on the net and they're not cheap. Got them and some TRS 4 point harnesses for an absolute steal! They're not very old and in excellent condition apart from needing a clean. They were local too, so snapped them up quickly! Need side-mounts, a single runner and base plates yet though. The guy who is doing my cage will also make some custom subframes at the same time. Once the car is back on its wheels, the shell will be trailed down there.

[Lofty]

Epic BUMP!! 

 

About time you got on with this Alex.....

[faboka vrs]

Should of kept the Clio Lol

[RobLarby]

Can't believe it's been this long without an update  I do hope this is still happening

[alex_e3]

Yes yes I know I know!! 

 

Still happening yes. Work and life generally sort of taken over a bit! Plus always other people's cars coming before my own!!

 

Hoping for some updates in a couple of.... months... 

[Yoh01]

Update ? How engine runing ?