Onto Wicklow then

Up Wicklow Gap

Then Down it

 

Then Down a "Shortcut" which didn't end well

Did well to get this far, 4 up and all.

Should say, it didn't get stuck I just reversed it up a bit until I could get turned to go back the way we came.

After that it was onto the Lake drive around Blessington Lake.

Edited 18 July, 20223 yr by DieselMonte

And then Up to Sally gap to see how the car fares now compared to last time I went up it.

Felt really good compared to last year, didn't bottom out at all and the exhaust didn't hit the ground once the whole trip. Would have been constant on the short springs.

Lastly down to Courttown.

Won a dog in an arcade which was fun trying to find a spot for it in the car.

Last photo of the trip.

Did well the whole weekend, intercooler did a fantastic job keeping heatsoak at bay. Shame the Air con is still broken (even after replacing the pressure switch) but it was bearable.

Is due a service now though.

May as well list what parts I have ready to go on when I have the time:

-Inner and Outer Track Rods

-Superpro Caster Increase Bush

-Superpro Steering Rack bush

Not much of a list but will make a difference once on the car. 

Might (Emphasis here) have a lead on a part I've been mad after for this car, but I'm not sure if it'll work out as I hope.

 

Not much done to this

Had another steering rack bush got for this after I used the first one on the mk1.

Figured out how to swap it without dropping the subframe, bit of a faff but doable. Forgive the comically bad pictures, not great access.

Old vs New

As perfectly aligned as I could reasonably get, superpro ones a fair bit tighter.

In the car can just make out the purple colour of the new one.

Managed to do this on the pit, still took just over an hour. If its possible to do on a "big engined" 1.6 diesel, I'd imagine its a piece of cake on the 1.2l petrol cars 

When I had the tools out and was using the pit I did a bolt check front and back, considering I changed the drop link and rear springs end of last week.

Bit of Copper spray to stop bolts rusting

Got the parts for this sitting on a piece of wood.

It's due a service so I'll probably have the track rods done then, and the caster increase bushes I want to do myself.

I have another thing coming. Bought and all, probably the last thing bought for this car for a while it seems. 

I have all of this stuff got already so it will be put on, but that's it for now.

Got some sound deadening pads from halfords, only a little bit but they did work quite well. 15 euro for 2 little sheets though, not cheap.

So, went down to kilkenny the other day to get two things, a lot of sound deadening and some spare boot trims.

Why spare trims?

Well I'll be putting a brace in the boot again, this time though I don't want to run it stripped out like before. I want to keep the original trims in one piece hence buying another set.

Will either be the brace I had before or a k brace. 

4 sheets of sound deadener ,4 sheets of felt and a roller tool came up to 60 euro. I've only used half it so far.

Wasn't going for full coverage, but most of the sheets went around the wheel Wells.

Put felt mat behind the plastic trims instead of the arches.

Back together, a bit tougher than before. Don't think you'd be able to use thicker stuff as the trim might not fit at all over it.

Looks no different than a standard car but it is much quieter. 

Have enough to do the doors which I do want to do.

 

Edited 5 August, 20223 yr by DieselMonte

Got a pot of Pantone 348 mixed up to paint the calipers, fronts were looking shabby.

Deep clean and sanded

Then paint

Other side.

Did the rears again also, no pictures though.

Small updates:

Took apart some of the EGR/Intake system for a clean. This was last off December of last year, and it's done plenty of miles since.

First thing I noticed was oil under this pipe, I think one or both gaskets are needing replacing.

Restrictor plate is doing its job

Rest of the system was very clean, mostly oil vapour instead of built up gunk like before.

Gave this a good clean before reassembling.

Anti shudder valve had basically no buildup, wiped off.

I did end up making a bit of a mod to the intake, never occurred to me how much the egr piece in the intake obstructs the air coming in.

So I decided to take it out and chop a lump off.

End Result:

While I highly doubt this'll make any noticeable impact, I hope it'll make the engine breath a bit easier

Do want to clean the intake manifold properly if I get the chance.

I was a bit worried about those superpro bushes, didn't want to gamble on taking the car apart only to find they needed to be pressed into my old bushes.

So I bought new Wishbones.

Approx £25 each, including bushes and ball joints.

Used a vice to press the old bushes out, and the superpro ones in.

These bushes being offset need to be clocked so the hole is near the inside of the car.

Fully assembled.

Painted them hammered black, ready to go into the car next day.

Choosing to keep the front wishbone rubber, as its a solid bush it doesn't make a bit of difference if I keep it rubber or switch to Poly.

 

Also, Made a start on some new engine mounts. This time however I'm using proper polyurethane instead of tigerseal.

Gutted an old engine side Hydroil mount, gave it a deep clean and paint ready to be filled next day.

Also did a dogbone mount, came off the 1.2l petrol fabia I got the subframe for the mk1 from a while back.

Filled this with 70 shore hardness stuff, spilled quite a bit because I hadn't sealed it properly to the cardboard.

Debating whether or not to use 60 shore stuff on the hydroil mount.

This dogbone will go onto the Monte, I have a powerflex bush in it now, but it is a 65 shore one and I want one that's just a bit firmer.

Made a bit of a mess but otherwise went OK.

You've reminded me that I've still a Febi dogbone mount in the boot of mine I need to fit... and some PSB polybushes. Will do both eventually.

11 minutes ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

You've reminded me that I've still a Febi dogbone mount in the boot of mine I need to fit... and some PSB polybushes. Will do both eventually.

Dogbone is a piece of **** on these

If it took you a half hour to do I'd be surprised.

Other fabias driving fantastic with the new front suspension, PS Bushes included. Had it out today and the horn has decided to come on itself lol.

Should have mentioned

The 1.2l dogbone bush that I have is incredibly soft. I'm fairly sure the diesel ones made a bit firmer, so if someone was inclined that'd be a good way to stiffen that mount up without sacrificing NVH

22 minutes ago, DieselMonte said:

Dogbone is a piece of **** on these

If it took you a half hour to do I'd be surprised.

Other fabias driving fantastic with the new front suspension, PS Bushes included. Had it out today and the horn has decided to come on itself lol.

 

I'll do the dogbone myself, eventually. Going to be under the car as I'm not sure that's all that's knocking. There's definitely a knock when changing gear and there's a continuous one, so will prod everything.

 

The bushes can be a job for the garage in a few weeks time.

Rear doors done

New dogbones done and installed

Not the prettiest but anyway.

Only realised swapping them out that a Mk1 dogbones different to the one originally on the mk2

 

In the car, it's very firm at idle

Powerflex is a 65 shore  hardness and mine is a 70.

Think it'll need reliefs drilled into it just to take the edge off it. Off idle it is superb however.

Filled the hydroil mount with 60 shore stuff.

Should be a good balance I think.

Dyed black even though it'll never be seen.

 

Dropped subframe to do track rods and caster increase bushes.

Needed to reuse a jam nut off an old track rod, one of the new ones went missing.

New vs Old wishbones

Built all on the bench, keg even

Regreased ARB Bushes and Steering rack bush when I had access.

Back together.

Did my best to keep the length of the track rods the same as the old ones, but with the castor bushes it didn't really matter.

Drives straight enough for now, will be aligned ASAP

Have a printout of the alignment before, so should be able to see just what difference these bushes have done to castor.

First impressions are good, but I think I should wait until its aligned proper to say for sure just what difference these have made.

So done a few things since. Dogbone was too stiff at idle.

Removed it and drilled a few holes in the mount which has done the trick, no more vibrations than the powerflex but a bit nicer changing gears.

Also got this 

Painted it

And fitted it

Did a decent job trimming the boot trim, these are the spares I bought, originals are kept safe and sound.

Would have preferred if it was tighter to the back seats but it's fine. 

The way this fits is bolts going into rivnuts that need to be drilled into the car. 

I think I'll replace the bolts with studs in the future, make it easier to refit in the future.

 

Cars currently away for service and maybe getting the air con working again. And it's being tracked tomorrow.

Did go back and re re align it myself, it drives basically perfect now but still needs to be done properly.

Took the ferry over to Scotland early Friday. Spent the weekend.

Met up with some friends and spent the weekend there.

An eclectic mix of cars.

Went up around this castle, think it was culzean castle. Parked a way out and walked in.

Some sort of mini car show there

Big rocky beach near it.

Went up to Kames on the Sunday to see some Rally action. Different classes of cars going around from 1l citigos...

Evos

Escorts

And everything in between

Only a small track but was spectacular seeing all the cars go round.

Back on the ferry Sunday evening, have to say everyone was extremely nice, the food was lovely and cheap, the pints fantastic and far cheaper than what you'd get back home and aside from the average speed cameras, the roads are great too.

Even though it wasn't much of a driving trip, this drove fantastic the whole weekend, all the changes done to it in the past week made a noticeable difference. Thanks to the sound deadening (and probably the increase in caster) its far more comfortable cruising on the motorway, its a bit better at taking bumps in the road, the K brace tightened the car up that bit more. Its still pretty underpowered but the intercoolers helped stop it losing a lot of power from heat soak.

Wish the ferry was cheaper, its almost definitely the last time I'll be able to take the car over for a while.

Overall a great weekend and even better seeing the stuff I did to the car paid off. 

 

Kames is a great track. Used to live rather close to it too.

 

Glad you had a good time in my neck of the woods.

Just updating bits I've done here and there.

Front doors sound deadened

Managed to find a way to refit the undertray with a bit of wood.

I mean it works, will redo this to look a bit more proper, eventually.

Fitted the Filled Hydroil mount too.

60 shore is as stiff as it needs to be, its slightly firm at idle but perfectly liveable like this.

I’m thinking of increasing the sound deadening in my VRS soon. Has it been worth the hassle? Hopefully fix a few of the creaks whilst I’m at it! 

17 minutes ago, JPD89 said:

I’m thinking of increasing the sound deadening in my VRS soon. Has it been worth the hassle? Hopefully fix a few of the creaks whilst I’m at it! 

It wasn't hard to do at all and It is worth it to do. There's very little sound deadening on these anyway so any bit helps.

Even the little bit I did made a difference.

Not much done to this, done quite a lot of driving and I've had/have a few other projects to take care of too.

Picked up these 2 things recently. Snap Seal and naviwax.

Tested it out on this and got great results.

Have had a bit of bad luck since, gust of wind knocked a roadsign down onto the bonnet. Left a decent dent but no paint work needed seemingly.

Should be sorted next week hopefully.

Lastly wired the DRLs to come on with the sidelights, finally.

Very easy to do, used my own wiring with a relay, signal from the sidelights and a wire from the relay to one of the drls. For some reason once you get power to one, it sends power to both DRLs.

Pic of what no lights looks like

And just the DRLs on their own.

These can still be switched on and off as skoda intended too.

Helps light up the sides of the roads and all it cost me was the price of a relay.

Should have done it years ago.

Did a job on the intercooler to make it sit tighter.

And changed the spot lamps hopefully for the last time.

7 inch halogen lamps this time

Very very tight fit. But they do fit.

Will be changing the main lights back to halogen soon. LED bulbs were not the silver bullet for improving lighting I was led to believe 

Nice aggressive look going on there. I like it.

Dent fixed

Like it never happened. Extremely impressed.