Just really want to do the headliner to cover the mouldstains. Figure in this case black dye is the easiest way to do it.

Ideally I'd get a rotten vRS out of The north or the UK and swap bits over. A fine idea but then you run into trouble with shipping one over or flying over and driving back with it.  For now atleast a can of dye will do and if not, I'll just do without a headliner as I have done for the last few years, no harm done.

2 minutes ago, DieselMonte said:

Just really want to do the headliner to cover the mouldstains. Figure in this case black dye is the easiest way to do it.

Ideally I'd get a rotten vRS out of The north or the UK and swap bits over. A fine idea but then you run into trouble with shipping one over or flying over and driving back with it.  For now atleast a can of dye will do and if not, I'll just do without a headliner as I have done for the last few years, no harm done.

 

Och you've no long missed a vRS that was up for sale in NI that cropped up on the AutoTrader for me. Something like 190k miles and a grand, no MOT and a touch of rust IIRC.

 

Again, getting it to ROI is easier said than done.

Edited 11 November, 20214 yr by AnnoyingPentium

14 hours ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

 

Och you've no long missed a vRS that was up for sale in NI that cropped up on the AutoTrader for me. Something like 190k miles and a grand, no MOT and a touch of rust IIRC.

 

Again, getting it to ROI is easier said than done.

 

Getting any car from "The North" or UK is no longer an option here unfortunately - I have been driving my vRS for nearly 3 years now and never met another one yet. In fact the Mk1 Fabia is notable by its absence here ! 

 

I got a few bits from a 01 1.2 that a breaker has in Tuam. The only reason the car is being broken is nobody wanted it... She has all her glass and doors so interior si dry - I didnt look up to see the headliner but the interior is grey ! I cant recall if it has a sunroof ...!

 

I'll drop by there and let you know Monday DM....!  If there's anything you can think of you need Im only too happy to give them a shout ! 

 

I will 

I'll have a think of what I might need and get back to you.

Getting a northern one or a uk one isn't as big of a problem for me, what I would do is register it in the north, strip it and scrap it and put all into my car. Genuinely would work out much much cheaper reshelling a vrs from the north than buying one of the very very few southern vRS', or importing one.

Never seem to find any running fabias of any sort around here anyhow. 

 

EvryMod was done this evening, while I'm still fine tuning it theres definately a noticeable power bump from it. Pulls much better now and especially I've noticed it making more power at the top end. 

Don't worry this is only temporary, I plan on putting the potentiometer into one of the blanks to make it a little neater. I'll add a switch to the ""circuit"" too to turn it completely on or off at will.

 

 

Pic of my horrid wiring, When I was stripping one of the wires it broke so I had to put a connection on it to join it back up.

 

With this mod you join the potentiometer to the wires to pinout 2 and 3, there are proper connectors you can get to do this properly but I didn't have any handy so...

I'll tape these up and "weatherproof" them a bit better next day. 

 

First video I took a while back of this car idling away normally.

Then, with the EvryMod installed but set to the higher end of the potentiometer.

And then with it set way down, running very rich.

 

Took it out for a bit of "fine tuning" and testing. Was an absolute riot, car pulled very well, cornered well with the coilovers, seats did a great job holding me in and all. 

2 minutes ago, DieselMonte said:

I'll add a switch to the ""circuit"" too to turn it completely on or off at will.

 

 

Should get one of those switches with the covers over them like on jets and stuff.

 

2 minutes ago, DieselMonte said:

Took it out for a bit of "fine tuning" and testing. Was an absolute riot, car pulled very well, cornered well with the coilovers, seats did a great job holding me in and all. 

 

This is what I wanted to hear. I keep seeing this local (well, local enough) red SDI estate that is a tempting beast...

More tidying up on the EvryMod front:

 

It has a switch now, was turning it on and off doing pulls and its amazing how much of a difference it makes even on an sdi.

Must make an insane difference on a tdi.

Even still driving this and then getting into my mk2 makes that feel much faster in comparison.

 

Just now, DieselMonte said:

 

196k?! 

Break in miles

 

No Its been hovering near it for months now i've just not been out driving it enough to get it over.

 

Chassis still feels stiffer than the montes before it got the brace and i'm not sure how. 

Box of goodies came in for the mk1

Set of Mondeo Drop links

ARB Bushes (18mm)

Facelift bumper clips

Rear shoes

Rear wheel cylinder 

Coolant temp sensor

Cabin air filter

License plate lights.

 

Got all pretty cheap, obviously not the best stuff but more than good enough for now.

 

I wanted to get the bumper clips done first, and of course it turns out they've sent me one prefacelift and one facelift one, so the vRS bumpers only half properly attached.

 

Then I tackled the arb and drop links

Happily that all went on as it should, no drama there. Should tighten up the front of the car and stop the arb rubbing on the driveshaft too.

 

The old d bushes were far too big for the arb guessing they're for a vRS and someone assumed this would have the same size ARB.

Have the brakes to tackle next and i'm sure that will be great fun.

Atleast I have an eezibleed to bleed it properly when its done, should be braking better than ever hopefully.

I love it when a box of goodies comes. Could be like a kid at Christmas!

Few bits done on the mk1 today, changed the coolant temp sensor out, 5 minute job max and hopefully should make the temp read properly for once. 

I wonder if I could tap into the wiring for this sensor to go to the water temp gauge I got for it? 

Then I moved on to tackling the rear brakes, got so far and stopped because I noticed something.

To me this looks like a disc axle has found its way under it. 

Especially compared to the mk2

Have made a thread in the mk1 forum so hopefully someone can 100% for sure tell me whether or not it is a disc axle. I've definately thought about putting a disc axle in the mk2 so what might happen is that I take the axle off the mk1, strip it down and freshen it up, get rear discs and swap it into the mk2. Then the mk2s axle can find its way into the mk1, ideally.

I'll have this car 5 years come february and I've only noticed this tonight, I hope I'm right and this is a disc axle and I'm not getting excited over nothing.

Out today and I got the one side nearly done. Absolutely horrible job by far and away one of if not the worst job I've ever done on this car.

Left this side here for today, not even going to touch the other side just get this side put back together. When the mk2 needs shoes putting on I'll get a disc axle for it. Honestly it cant be any harder to just swap the whole axle than it is to do these brakes.

 

Painted the drums with some leftover paint to freshen them up too.

I really hope atleast the handbrake will work again when these are done.

Had to get new a new spring kit to finish the drums properly, about 12 euro for the whole kit so hardly the end of the world.

Brakes were almost done and I broke a bleed nipple clean off the drivers side caliper.

Some reason its not leaking out so I put some stuff over it to seal it off. I'll have to get another caliper, atleast fsiii calipers are easy found and cheap. I'll drive on this caliper for now, obviously nowhere near a road.

Cars very close to being back on all four again, just have to refit a spring I took off of the other drum for the mk2.

Had a go at reinforcing some more engine mounts, this time I did a spare engine and  gearbox mount.

I decided this time to reinforce the mounts before sealing them up. Used whatever I could find that I thought would work so for the gearbox mount I used a flat piece of metal on the top of the mount and a nylon bolt wedged into the bottom to fill some of the bigger gaps. 

Then I used some bolts of all things to fill up some of the smaller gaps on the sides.

Filled the rest up with tigerseal, shoved as much as I could into every crevice I could.

Then I moved onto the engine mount, for this I cut up one of the old top mounts off the mk2 and used it as a spacer of sorts for this mount.

Put the engine mount in the vice like the other mount.

Filled up the edges with some sealant first before putting in my mock up spacers.

Also ended up putting a large brass nut with a washer over the middle part of the mount to fill up the space further.

Shed was very cold when I was doing this, about 2° so I took them home where its warm. Might give them a bake in the oven to help them cure quicker.

For the cost of a tube of tiger seal, and some odd scrap lying around I think this will be a worthwhile mod. Not sure whether these will go on the mk1 or the mk2, either way the mk1 will get a pair of tigersealed mounts, eventually.

Might make a guide on how to tigerseal mounts for the fun of it.

Well its been a while but I have it moving under its own power again, used an eezibleed to bleed the brakes, still took a while to do.

Massive amount of air came out of the front brake. Old fluid didn't look terrible even though its atleast 5 years old now.

Had to bleed the coolant too as I changed the coolant temp sensor and disconnected the coolant bottle to make it easy to fit one of the tigersealed engine mounts.

Got it out and running, brakes work good but, for some reason the hand brake is seized solid. I also tried to adjust the shifter linkages and its made the engagement for first and reverse pretty poor, first and reverse now share the same position which is interesting. Otherwise, its driving really well, new drop links and arb bushes have tightened up the front and its no longer rubbing on full lock. No knocks or rattles from the suspension, even though I know full well the console bushes are past it. Had it "driving" in place on jack stands when I was trying to bleed the coolant, and while I knew the drivers side wheel bearing was bad, when the wheels were spinning the drivers side was wobbling around like it was barely on. Fine for running around the farm yard but not ideal for an NCT.

Forgot how nice these seats are.

 

Still a lot I want to do to it but its getting there, albeit slowly.

Think its 5 years now since I got it, and its still not roadworthy.

Back on the Spyders, first time since I "refurbed" them. Really liking the fat tyres on them.

 

Few pieces should be here soon, but I got some this evening, namely poly wishbone bushes.

Same brand I have on the monte (PSB), needed rear beam bushes and D bushes for the monte and it worked out to be not much more to get wishbone bushes for this on top.

I'll fit these when I can, Montes got priority but these will get done relatively soon.

Happy with the quality of these, got the whole kit for the same price as just the rear beam bushes from powerflex plus free shipping.

On a parts run I snagged a rear bumper for the Mk1, was meant to get two quarter panels but when I saw them up close they were as rough as mine so no point.

Also got a windscreen washer bottle and some rubber stops for the back seats.

Not much of an exhaust pipe to show, may have an idea for that.

Got a few odds and ends, not much left on the vRS I got it from, rear spoiler and exhaust was gone or I would have had them too.

Not the post I wanted to make, but i'm stuck at this point so may as well have this thread up to date. I hadn't had time lately to do much with this, I fitted the rear stops for the seats and the rear strut brace.

 

Took the chance this evening to do the console bushes finally.

Passengers side came out very easily, I'd sprayed all down the night before to hopefully help getting all off.

Drivers side however was fighting me the whole way, until

 

So I'm pretty well stuck at this point, wishbone won't come off as its catching on a bit of the bolt, don't think I have enough access to drill and tap either. 

Might be easiest to get another subframe than deal with this mess. 

I'll sleep on it before I do anything, but I'm fairly sure the vRS I got the bits off a while ago still had the entire front subframe assembly on it. 

Noticed the balljoints are pretty sloppy aswell, another thing to be done.

Sorry to hear about the bolt. Sounds like a hell of a job.

 

You've also bet me to doing the console bushes.

Jeez, things have not been easy on this motor of yours 🥴 

After scratching my head over what to do next, I figured out that the bit the bolt stuck into is actually the console that the wishbone attaches to, not the whole subframe, so I got to removing it.

Hoping unbolting the console would also get the wishbone out with it, and look like this

Shouldn't have been a big job but:

Bust one of the bolts holding it in, think it goes into the steering rack which is just wonderful.

Otherwise I got every other bolt out in one piece, wasn't easy.

The console is ready to fall out of the car EXCEPT for where the bolt I snapped earlier lies. Much like the wishbone, the bit of snapped bolt is holding the console into the subframe still.

Basically out now but I need to find something to drill the bolt out some.

Short update but this is how it's been sitting since I was last out. Spent an age drilling the broken bolt through and it still won't come out.

So next steps dropping the subframe.

On the brightside the bolts I have out were soaking in vinegar the whole time so they're much cleaner now.

Subframe is out

Had every other bolt out except for one of the bolts holding the steering rack to the subframe as it spun. Ended up just pulling it out and bending the clamp that holds the steering rack bush in.

Conveniently I have a superpro steering rack bush originally meant for the Monte to put into this, since I'm so far in.

Now looks like I actually need inner and outer track rods. Not a big issue.

Wishbone came out attached to the console:

Console bushes are out also.

One console is stuck into the subframe due to the aforementioned spun bolt. No spanner (or vice grip) will hold it so I'll probably just cut it off. One of the snapped bolts I'll try weld a nut onto and back it out that way. The other one will hopefully come out with an extractor bit.

How everything currently sits:

That subframe was a lot lighter than I thought. Could carry it with one hand.

Feel I should mention that if not for the broken bolts, this would have been unbelievably easy to do. 

I think I'll take the time and thoroughly clean everything before it goes back together. I got a cheap sandblaster  recently and I think this'll be a good way to try it out.

This'll be the most immaculate Mk1 one (besides @Lofty's one of course) by the time you're done!

 

As an aside, do you fancy doing my bushes?

24 minutes ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

This'll be the most immaculate Mk1 one (besides @Lofty's one of course) by the time you're done!

 

As an aside, do you fancy doing my bushes?

After the heartache doing these ones?

I'll pass. This should have been a piece of **** if the bolts didn't break.