bought the car in may last year, it stayed standard until january with just a service being done on it. it was fairly clean, 2 lady owners, full service history and a fresh mot. i paid over the odds from a local dealer but purely just so i could chop in the corsa i was driving at the time as i couldnt be arsed selling it privately. i serviced it the day i got it and ended up snapping off one of the lugs on the inlet holding the engine cover on, trying to remove a cross threaded and rounded bolt! ended up with a fuck off great big hole in the inlet :x great start!
in january after a few weeks of the road, i got back in the car and the brakes were shocking, long story short it had pagid discs, ebc pads and some race fluid, and while the calipers were off i stripped, cleaned and regreased them. shortly after i fitted some apex lowering springs and a set of T1Rs. i intended on leaving it like that but the modifying bug was definitely back and now its all snowballing out of control
few weeks ago i picked up a set of knackered H&R coilovers. they were alot worse than advertised and ended up needing a complete refurb. most of the seat platforms were oxidised and seized on, and the two rear top cups were crumbling to bits. bizarrely the fronts were fine though
removing the collars left me with loooaads of shit stuck in the threads, plus loads of road grim and rust built up in any exposed threads. a few hours with a fine centre punch and some swearing and the threads were cleaned up, a minute or two on the bench grinders wire wheel and they were good as new and clean ready for paint and rebuilding. combination of wire wheel, nitromors and elbow grease saw the somewhat grotty springs clean and also ready for a new coat of paint.
got a mate of mine to knock up a set of new collars, gave the struts and springs a coat of zinc primer and plasticote paint and they were good as new.
only issue i now had was they were fork fitment and the car was running the later rear beam with the eye fitment, so a new beam was liberated from a scrap mk4 fiesta, bushes removed, rust and shit removed, hammerited and polybushes fitted. had lots of fun removing the old bushes
along with the new rear beam i fitted 20mm axle spacers from a streetka, new top mounts alround and new front lower arms. the difference was awesome! the rear bushes were mega shagged and i think changing them alone wouldve made a difference, but the whole package together has transformed the car.
before:
after:
im now looking at modifying the rear beam after seeing how much flex there is in it, and possibly adjusting the geometry at the front by opening up the wishbone mounting holes and fitting eccentric spacers to push the lower arms out by a few mm to give slightly wider track and a touch more camber.
aswell as that theres some engine mods in the pipeline
this arrived at my mates this morning
its off a 2009 mercedes e200/c180 will be next weekend before i can even get my hands on it and really start faffing about with it but the plan thus far is to remove the aircon, fit a rad from something like a civic/crx as theyre much smaller, along with a kenlowe fan. fueling wise im going to go for either an auxillary FPR or a home made 5th injector setup to begin with. want to try and do it on the standard management initially mainly just because i fancy the challenge. potentially i might look at something like a dreamscience remap on the standard ecu or aftermarket management sometime in the future. for now it will be mickeymouse and cheap and cheerful
ive started acruing parts for the conversion already, got a recirculating dumpvalve on the way, a couple of T pieces, boost hoses from a mates old mx5 turbo, a couple of intercoolers. im hoping to have most of the bits ready for a long weekend ive got off work at the end of the month and aim to have it all mocked up and have the supercharger ready to be sent away for some welding. ive also bought a new gearbox as mines definitely on its last legs, some 90 spec escort rst recaros and a few other minor bits, and im sorely tempted to strip it out and go as light as possible.
couple of random pics from rockingham trackday at the end of last month, this was pre suspension work but still performed really well and didnt skip a beat all day!
i know there will be alot of negaticity about the fueling side of things but i just dont fancy doing the predictable megasquirt or omex route and fancy the challenge. any input would be appreciated though!