Removed the engine.
Spent another full day with the car on Sunday (my better half is being very understanding!). Started off taking a closer look at the new engine & gearbox. The gear box only seems to have 4 positions that can be selected at the moment. I'm not sure if that is normal, or if you should be able to select all six directly at the box without the engine running.
We then took the gearbox off the engine and put them both safely to bed at the back of the garage.
Then it was time to remove the old 1.1 engine from the car. All in all this went pretty smoothly. The the 12 bolts holding on the driveshafts came off with minimal problems, the exhaust manifold was a bit a pain, but within 2 hours we had it out.
The suspension at the front of the car was high before, now its more like a caddy!
I've managed to arrange the garage so there is a reasonable amount of space around the whole car, and I don't expect it to come out again for some time now. Time to get it up on high axle stands and start sorting out the body work!
3 or 5 doors?For a while I was toying with the idea of welding up the back doors so I could remove the rear bench. I have since come to my senses and am definately going to keep it a 5 door. The question now is whether to shave/smooth all the doors, or to have audi 80 handles on all of them to get the smooth line look without having to have buttons under the wing mirrors for the door openers.
I need to look into wing mirrors to see if I can find one with enough space under for 2 buttons (should be possible). I think the smoothing would be easier than completely changing the mechanism...
Made an engine decision.
When I first started the project I wanted to put an 8valve 1.8 Digifant (PB) from a Golf Mk2 GTI in to replace the little 1.1 that the car came with (which must have got offended by its impending removal, as it now refuses to start!). I already have 16v in my Mk2 valver and I thought it would be nice to have one of each engine type.
As time as gone on though and I've been reading up on other peoples conversions I started to favour the 16v K-Jetronic from the Golf Mk2 GTI 16v instead. This option is more comfortable, as I already have a reference engine sitting in my daily driver and there are more examples of this conversion to be found online.
The idea of a G40 engine, which would have been lovely, was quickly dropped when I found out just how rare (read expensive) they are :( .
My mind was made up however when I learnt of a 8v Digifant being sold near to me. I decided to leave my comfort zone (as I am not at all familiar with this engine) and get it. Being local it only cost me £10 in petrol to go and collect. So I now have an engine, unfortunately the loom has been hacked up to remove it in a hurry and the Crankcase pressure regulator valve is missing (£31 + vat from
ECP).
The 8v produces 105BHP (I think) but as its an electronic fuel injection system it means that I have the option later of either chipping it to improve performance or fitting a custom ecu such as
megasquirt to release a few more beans. I also plan to put a decent exhaust and an induction kit on it to squeeze out a little more peformance.
Full steam ahead!
One thing that had been worrying me a bit was the cost of insuring this car once it was ready to go on the road. So I needed to find out if the project was even viable. I phone up
HIC insurance
and asked them for a prospective quote for the following:
- 1.8 16valve engine
- 5 speed box
- 256mm front discs
- 30-50mm drop on performance suspension
- Half Cage
- Custom body work
- Respray
- Alloy Wheels
- Stainless Exhaust
- Retrimmed Interior
- Sound installation
- Full Closure CAT1 alarm
- Estimated value £3000
Based on it being my second car with 5k/yr mileage they came back with a Classic Car quote of £313 fully comp! Needless to say I am very happy with this, considering the amount of mods that are going to be put on. Also he said that mods would be covered like for like. Also if your a member of the GTI owners club (which I will be by then) you get a 10% discount.
So with that hurdle well and truely jumped, I can start buying the bits I need to get it done!
I have a garage! (again)
Finally said farewell to the Capri that has been living in my garage for the last 8 months. It was bought by a friend as a project, but now that I have a project of my own the decision was made to get rid of it, as Golfs are much more fun :D, and I needed the space to work in. To be fair though, the garage was a complete tip and full of rubbish until my mate asked to put the capri in there, so it did me a favour, as otherwise it would still be full of rubbish.
So the car is now safely shut away from the elements (was having problems with the car cover blowing off with the weather we've been having recently). So now I can start taking the rest of it apart (when I get time).
Aims & Objectives
So what am I going to do with this car, well to be honest I havent really made my mind up yet but I do have some things in mind.
The overall aim of the project is to
create a car that feels new. Now I know thats a bit ambitious for an old car, particular when the manufacturer doesnt make parts for it any more. But I'm going to set the bar high and try not to fall too far short.
At this stage I can see it going one of three ways:
1) Remove the rear bench and put a cage in the back with a smoothed rear interior. Weld up the rear doors cause they're not needed and smooth them. Shave the front door handles with switches under the wing mirrors tvr style. This all depends on how a 5 door would look with the rear doors not there. It would effectively be a 3 door, with short doors.
2) Keep the rear bench and the rear doors. Use audi 80 handles on all the doors to get a smooth profile (I wont be able to shave the rear doors as theres nowhere to put the door opening switch).
3) Its pretty clear from reading no. 1 that I really want a 3 door golf. However, this is the one that was available and it is it relatively good condition, certainly no project stopping issues. The third option is to get rid of this one, either make it road legal and sell it or break it, and wait until a suitable 3 door comes along. I'm already a bit attached to this one though, and at least I can get on with it now, and not spend ages waiting for the ideal car.
Option 1 is a bit silly. Why compromise what could be a nice 5 door. This is going to be a costly project and it would be silly to spend all that money on a concept that is fundamentally flawed. I'm going to do some photoshop work and just see what it might look like. Its just that I've always wanted a car with a cage in the back, but theres no point in making a mishmash of a car to force that.
Option 3 is a possibility, however solid shells are increasingly hard to come by and increasingly expensive. What I have is a pretty solid car, its not perfect, far from it, but its all doable, and I'm quite looking forward to turning my hand to some bodywork and learning some new skills along the way. At least with a car that didnt cost too much to start off with, it doesnt matter sooo much if make a complete mess of it.
So option 2 is looking like the favourite, and I can always squeeze a half cage in there, but I'd probably just be adding weight. The audi handles look really nice, bummer is tho that being a 5 door I have to do 4 of them!
EngineAt the moment its got a 1.1l, I intend to pull that out and put something a lot more interesting. The options at the moment are:
- A 1.8 8v digifant from a mk2 gti
- A 1.8 16v KJetronic from a valver
- G40 polo engine
I guess there are lots of other possibilities, but I dont want too many beans under my bonnet. The 8v is the fav at the moment, mostly because I already have a 16v in my mk2, although it would be useful to see what goes where when it comes to putting it in. The g40 would be lovelly, but I thinking its going to be expensive. I've never had an 8v before and it would be nice to have one of each, and I can always play with the ecu later to get a bit more peformance (or so I'm told).
Putting a big block into my car means I have to move one of the engine mounts, which is ok. I'm also going to have to uprate the brakes (16v conversion) though I'll probably leave the rear drums alone for now.
Other things that need to be changed include:
- gearbox (5 speed)
- driveshafts
- gear linkage
- steering rack (to accommodate the gear linkage)
- anti roll bars (doesnt have any at the mo)
- wishbones (for the anti roll bars)
- fueling system.
- speedo, clutch and throttle cable.
Thats what I've worked out so far, but I'm sure the list will grow.
I'm going to lower the car (obviously) not sure how extreme though. I can just imagine building it and then finding I cant get it out of the drive (top gear in paris style). I'm not sure about coilovers. I've never been in a car that has them, but I'm told the ride is pretty bumpy and I dont want to have to get my fillings reset everytime I drive somewhere. This is stuff that can be decided later of course.
Anyway, I've finished thinking with my fingers. I should get the car in the garage in the next few days and then the fun begins :)
Further investigation...
My friend and I took the front wings off today to have a peer inside and see whats going on inside. Mud was going on inside. All the bolts came undone easy and the passenger side wing came of easily. The other one was a bit of a struggle, but wasn't too bad after I took the last bolt out (oops). Within both wings was good thorough caking of dirt, soil and mud. Both wings are showing a bit of surface rust inside, the drivers side is worse and I now definately want to replace it. The inside wings are pretty sound, which is a relief.
I gave the inner wings a wash and put it all back together loosely and then shifted it to side to make room for the Capri to get out which should be leaving at some point this week! :) Then I can get the golf in the garage and get all the running gear out of it.
Getting deep down and dirty.
So the car is now running, useful as I need to be able to move it around a bit until I can put it in my garrage. At the moment there is a
Capri 1.6 Laser hogging all the room which belongs to a friend but hopefully that should be gone soon. Until I can put the golf away, safe from the elements there is a limit to how much body work I can do, so I've decided to strip out the insides and remove the exterior trim to get a good look at what I'm up against.
This car has been in a barn for a while... the tax disk expired in the year 2000... the guys I bought it from mentioned chickens... this car is pretty dirty. Realistically though its not as bad as it could have been. It has obviously been given a good wash because when you look in the places a sponge cannot reach there are feathers, bits of straw and some brown mud kinda stuff that I dont really want to think too much about. The stint in the barn has probably been a good thing though as it has been dry at least.
Nails??So, I've pretty much removed everything from the inside of the car. I started from the back with the abused parcel shelf that had two holes roughly cut in it, filled with some heavy but rubbish speakers which had caused it to sag significantly. All the seats came out (the driver's one has been replaced for obvious reasons). All of this was pretty simple, there is suprisingly little inside a car. The hardest part was the carpet, which was held in with nails! Little tacks all around the edge. I've since found out that that is how they were all done.
The exterior trim was fairly simple to remove, revealing more evidence of farmyard living. The only awkward bit was a few truly seized nuts, two of which had to be drill out and another that had to be sawn in two. For some unknown reason some previous owner has had a facination with the colour blue and various parts of the car have been repainted including the beading strip. It looked truly horrific and the car looks a damn site better without it.
With all but the upper dash out of the car it was time to take a closer look at what 23 years of life had done to this little car, or more to the point, what some over zealous mechanic with a big jack has done. On both sides at the front jacking points the car has been jacked at some point from the floor, rather than the sill. Bending the floor, damaging the metal and in the long run making a rusty hole. That is daylight coming through in the picture to the right. It's not really that bad as the sills require a bit of attention in these locations anyway and it should be a
relatively simple job to cut out the rotten metal and weld in some more.
The outer sills as mentioned above are rusty towards the front of the car and starting to rot. I'll have to either replace the rotten section or the whole sill, depending on what is easiest.
The front driver side wing appears to be very rusty under the paintwork. I suspect that it has been replaced at somepoint with a wing that hasnt been wax sealed (the rest of the car was from new). Its all surface rust, but I think it will be easier to replace it than repair it. Trouble with that is getting a wing that fits, as VW as stopped making them and the after market ones can be a bit hit and miss. I might try and source one from a breaker instead.
The rear passenger door has had a knock at somepoint, although you cant tell from the outside as its been filled really well.
The rear of the car has a dent that I already knew about, having removed the rear bumper though the damage is more extensive than I thought and as it has gone unseen to, so is the rust. I'm going to have to take the paint off to see what the real story is, but I am hoping not to have to replace this section of the car as that would be a major pain.
On the whole though things arent that bad. I've been told that if it were a Ford it would be like a Flintstone car by now. It seems like the wax oil seal has done its job and the only real rust is where there is obvious sign of damage. I still need to get the front wings off and have a look inside there to see whats going on, but I don't want to do that until I can get it in the garage, and at the moment there is a Capri in the way. Does anyone want to buy a
Capri?...
In 1982 a car was born...
On the 25th of June 1982, someone somewhere bought a brand spanking new Volkswagen Golf C Formel E in shiny eye-catching Mars Red. On the 19th December 2005 I bought a twenty three and a half year old 1.1litre car that had been living in a barn for the last god knows how many years. The paint work isn't too bad as at some point it as obviously had a new coat (although some of that seems to have been put on with a brush!). The new paint does serve to hide some of the rust however (not really a good thing) although to be fair, considering its age, the rust isn't that bad.
So how the hell did I end up with this old banger and what on earth am I going to do with it? The car appeared on ebay, and a friend of mine who keeps an eye on such things brought it to my attention. It was for sale in the same town as me (always a start when the buyer has to collect) and was up at the bargain price of 50 quid. I've always wanted a mark 1 golf. I have a mark 2 valver which I love but I need that on a day to day basis so I cant take it off the road to play about with it. Mark ones have a bit more retro charm and the prospect of taking one apart and putting it back together renewed and refined started to appeal to me.
In the end the car got pulled from ebay because it turns out it didnt start, so I got in touch with the buyer. The reserve had been set at £199 so I took it off their hands for £150 (notice how I've managed to spend £100 over the amount that originally got me so interested!). The sellers towed the car around to my house (thanks guys!) and the deal was done.
So the first thing I did with it, was forget to take any photographs! A mandatory step whenever you embark on any major appearance changing project (*sigh*). So these are the pics that were put up on ebay.
Shortly after that my friend and I spent a cold evening outside under the miracle that is halogen lighting and got the little 1.1 running again. Turns out all the HT Leads were in the wrong order and the plugs were wet and dirty, nothing a bit of sand paper and a slow bake at 80ºC couldn't sort out.
So with the car running (suprisingly well) its time to have a thorough look at what its 23 years have done to it, and then decide exactly what I am going to do with it. And I'll cover that next time.
Ok so here we go...
Buckle up, hold on tight and get ready for the read of a life time that is my blog. No seriously its going to be hard hitting, full of the latest news that Max Clifford would die for and will probably be featured on the BBC within days!
Who am I kidding? I've never really had much to say on blogs and that isnt about to change. I have however just embarked on a restoration (or renovation probably). My blog is a place for me to keep track of this project. Hopefukky writing it will also help my thinking process. It will also give me something project related to do when I cannot afford to work on it for a while (believe me, this could happen all too easily.)
If anyone does stumble across this site, I hope you enjoy it, or at least pretend to.
3 or 5 doors?
