Well just about given up on swapping the firewalls over.

After breaking lots of tools and barely making a dent in it that is.

I'm now intent on just making a hole in the one in the sdi.

Put some dubshed stickers to good use.

Good for hiding windscreen cracks.

Cleaned up the subframe and Arb off the vrs, they were rough.

Coated them in Kurust and then some hammered black same as before. Noticed one of the arb collars are missing, I'll just find something to wrap around it for now.

Lot better than the scratched up, rusty subframe it was a few hours before. Using this subframe as it still has the dogbone nut intact.

Had some hammerite left so wirewheeled and Cleaned off the knuckles and painted them in situ.

Bit more presentable. Cleaned up the bores where the shocks go into and coated them in copper grease. They were a bit rusty inside but Cleaned up well.

Went to paint the carriers and found out my tub of pantone 348 had gone off, so sulked and painted them silver instead.

So subframe is assembled ready to go back on.

Had to cut a notch to make the non vrs passengers console work. I'll never be a surgeon but its good enough for this. Especially since the cut won't be seen.

Reused the drivers console too. Suspected I somehow stripped the threads but chased them out in the vice and they seem fine. Have the vrs one spare just in case anyhow.

Built up with all the poly stuff from the sdi. And the psb arb bushes I took out of the Monte. They'll do for now. Mondeo links from the sdi too.

Used the vrs arb of course. Sdi one is 17mm and the vrs is 19mm. Not really noticeable in a photo.

Turbos back on too. Hopefully no more leaks. Hopefully.

Made some progress making the hole for the a/c. Didn't have anything on hand to make a nice neat cut, so I improvised. Used the rubber gasket as a template for the sdi.

Drilled some small holes just inside the template. Figure I can enlarge the holes until they all go together. Far from the best way to go about it, but once I get the hole finished I can clean up the edges and make it look like less of a hack job.

 

Re that notch you've cut in the console I'd seriously suggest you smooth it out and radius the corners, otherwise you've created the ideal conditions for a fracture starting and propogating through it, potentially with a fast fracture failure (I'm dredging my memory re materials and failure modes here from years ago but...) 

Fuel cap assembly arrived yesterday. Thanks, DM.

25 minutes ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

Fuel cap assembly arrived yesterday. Thanks, DM.

Is that everything you needed? Any other bits just shout.

36 minutes ago, DieselMonte said:

Is that everything you needed? Any other bits just shout.

 

Aye, looks to be everything as far as I can tell. Will let you know if I need anything else.

Progress since

Interior loom In

Abs pump swapped over and front lines ready to run

Rear axle is out.

Brake lines were horrid to remove.

Disc rear axle been removed ready to be cleaned up. After this, more or less its all reassembly into the sdi.

More time to work on this (and funds slowly rising) now since the justy is roadworthy, and "finished" as it were.

Few other bits stripped and swapped but the axles the main thing.

19 hours ago, DieselMonte said:

Disc rear axle been removed ready to be cleaned up. After this, more or less its all reassembly into the sdi.

 

How long did fitting the Mr Fusion unit take:  

More fooling around with this axle.

Wire brushed it and soaked it in rust remover gel, which didn't really work. In fairness its rougher than the axle i put in the monte. Used the dregs of a tin of silver hammerite to see what that'd look like. 

Looks ok, but I think hammered black will look better and won't be so obvious when rust starts popping through.

Tried to use a tool from work to swap the bushes but didn't get a chance. So did it myself. Pain.

Used a makeshift puller tool consisting of some nuts, a threaded bar, a pipe and a wheel bearing to try pull the bushes but it only removed the centre part. 

So did what I done last time and drilled the nylon part of the bush out to try get it to collapse. Took ages, made a mess.

But eventually got there.

New bushes I have are Lemforder ones with a 6R0 part number which matches the number on etka for the vrs. If I destroy these I'll get poly bushes again but I'd much rather these. Seemingly the standard bushes allow for a bit of (passive) rear steer. Although the part number matches on etka, these bushes don't have the black end caps the bushes in the vrs axle had.

Etka had 2 bushes for it, the other being 1k0, which was greyed out indicating its not for the vrs.  

Stripped down and hanging up. Will order heatshields and replace them on the car so they aren't damaged. These ones aren't great.

 

You fitting a WC in there too?😂

On 02/07/2023 at 15:56, HeavyMetalRich said:

You fitting a WC in there too?😂

Aye for the passengers

Axles now painted, stonechip first then 2 coats of glorious hammered black. Nitromors stuff cause the shop didn't have hammerite, and I wasn't bothered going anywhere else.

Looking real sharp. Bit left over for touch up once it's in too.

Also sealed up the firewall from the time I tried chopping it out for the vrs one. 

Feels like I'm getting to the point where Everything's lining up, and I'll just be able to bang everything in like that.

Tried getting the bushes in but could not for the life of me get them in straight. 

Back to the drawing board.

Axle is in! I got some psb axle bushes as I've given up on the oem ones. They've been fine in the monte, easy to install and reasonably priced so in they went 

It sucked.

Fuel tank is in too.

Don't know if I posted this but the steering rack is swapped over too.

It is festy and all this gunk under the bellows. But, it doesnt seem to be psf.

it's like water got in and stayed there. All wiped off fine. Can't recall it leaking in the vrs. I'll run with it for now. Swapped track rods over and the superpro rack bush too.

Have this week off work so was hoping to get the engine into its new home.

The justy shouldn't need anything else done to it, and I can't really spare any funds for the Monte before going away so may as well work on this.

 

So gone from this.

To this

To this.

Everything sort of loose in place nothing in its final resting place, yet. Trying to get things connected and work from there.

Won't be started until I'm back but, that's fine with me.

Right so got 12 volts to it for the first time in a long time. Engines not fully plugged in, nor is most of the interior so id say I've just logged 110 faults doing this. Good job I have vcds.

Plugged gauges in and they read fine. Engines not plugged in enough to crank but its a good sign.

Rear lights sort of working.

Long way to go but we'll get there.

Lift pump swapped in and plumbed in.

Lot of the interior wiring is plugged in now, wires for the doors, etc. Can close the doors again now.

Dash top is in, plugging bits in as I go.

Still a mess but plugging away at it anyway.

Kept working away and...

 

And with some brake cleaner down the intake...

It's definitely airlocked, might bring the laptop out next day and see if i can prime the system that way like you can on the common rails. 

 

 

It lives! Smoked out the place but it is going.

Don't know if I said this before but I've had both gauges plugged in and while both work, the sdi cluster sets off the immobiliser, obviously.

Not sure which gauge set I prefer. Either way I'd like to set the miles to be accurate to the chassis. So the 196xxx the sdi gauges read instead of the 216xxx on the vRS gauges.

Rear suspension in fully now and rear lines connected. Don't particularly trust 20 year old fittings even though the lines themselves don't look their age.

Using VanhireBoys rear springs as they're perfect for this. 

Very noticeable difference in these springs vs the ones that came on the vRS. Fk ones with adjusters.

They'll be perfect for what I want. I don't like low cars and the height it was at before was perfect for me. It will definitely be lower now with all the extra weight on the nose but hopefully not too much.

Front and rear brakes aren't installed as of yet but I may try get it on the ground for the first time in a while next day.

Radio and climate control is in.

Forgot the vrs suffers from the common fan resistor problem so need to do that eventually.

Thankfully the sdi had an adapter loom for the Sony head unit. Happy to run it instead of that godawful touchscreen unit in the vRS. Wirings pretty chopped up but it works.

Desperately needs new speakers, and the vrs ones are as bad.

 

Sitting on its wheels for the first time in a long long time.

Started it to feel how my """"custom"""" mounts felt.

Pretty good actually.

 

More Wiring and Plumbing stuff in.

Think it's time I get the carpet and headlining in it. I do want to Sound deaden it, but I've got bigger issues at the minute. Can always do it later.

May put sills on it because of how dented they are.

Really curious to see what it'll weigh when it's "done" I know it was roughly 1160-1180 when it still had the sdi lump and was mostly complete. Tough to say but I'm guessing it'd be 1280-1300 in one piece. Most of that weight being on the front axle because of A/C, the turbo, big intercooler etc.

Although I'm not chasing lightness, I'd like to know.

 

Carpet in.

And made my way down the country to get some bits off of this.

Namely...

Full 312mm 256mm setup off of it. And the front lines to boot as they're nearly new. Better than what I have. Did try getting braided lines but mtec had em on backorder, so cancelled it.

Was going to paint them silver. But they were mostly green, and I had the correct green so.

Quick hit of green. Also got 256mm rear heatshields to go on too.

Getting there.