Shady Pioneer - "Meet Ruby. The MK3 Anni."

[jv]

[Shady Pioneer]

Cheers jv.

I'll start this thread by simply copying and pasting from my Dub Rides thread, then I'll update as I go along. I also have a To-Do list. 

To-Do List

   â€¢  Front left wheel bearing needs replacing
   â€¢  Repaint black roof
   â€¢  Repaint wing mirrors black
   â€¢  Sort out hole in driver's seat bolster
   â€¢  Replace shaft relay bush
   â€¢  Paint grill slats black
   •  Wheels
   â€¢  Ignition switch replaced


My Valver took a turn for the worse, and ended up as scrap metal last weekend. Sills were non-existant, and have deemed the car unusable due to it's lack of safety. A crash would mean no body to withstand any impact, and the driver (most likely me) would be killed.

So I exchanged my 16v engine and some notes to a friend, who helped me sort out this little number. It had a running issue where is would just cut out, my friend had replaced the common offenders but didn't get a chance to replace the crankshaft sensor. We took the old one off of the valver which was in great condition and replaced the 8v's one with it. The old one had exposed wires. Thankfully, the running issue has now been fixed and it is running smooth.

We replaced the suspension with my coilovers off the 16v seeing as the Anni's were shagged anyway, and also brought back my polished TT wheels seeing as the summer almost officially here.

The car is in VERY good condition and has no dents, slight few marks dotted about but nothing major, and overall the paintwork is superb. My friend is a welder and took this on as it was hopefully to be an easy fix, and it was very tidy and literally rust free. Cleaned it today with Chelsea (who has named her Ruby  ) and all is great, here are some snappy snaps.













Hope you all like. 

[Shady Pioneer]

So today I changed the ignition switch, all by myself. 

After input from another thread by members saying it could be a switch issue, I took it upon myself to try and correct the problem. Said problem was that when turning the key I had to lift it up slightly to get the engine to start. I had taken the ignition switch from my old valver when that was being broken so I used this as a replacement.



Here is the U-Joint, known for being a complete b!tch to get the nut and bolt to part from the main joint. This is what took up most of my time and it wasn't comfortable lying on my back trying to do so either:






Once this bolt was out, there is a allen bolt holding the column in place that's directly to the left of the ignition barrel location (other side of the steering wheel). I undid this and thankfully the steering rack just came straight out without much problem. DIYs I've read have suggested it might not always be that easy, sometimes involved having to chisel or knock the U-Joint with a flat-headed screwdriver, but this wasn't necessary in my case. Also note before pulling out the rack you need to disconnect all wires leading to the steering wheel.



I'm not 100% sure what this bit if but it was around my ignition barrel:




Steering rack out with everything still attached:




Old switch to the left, valver's one to the right. You can tell the different and why I had an issue:




The infamous small screw that holds the switch in, quite fiddly to get to but I found a cheap small Halfrauds screwdriver did the trick, other suggest a jeweler's screwdriver as they are very thin:




All I had to do was put it back together. The tricky part was the U-Joint and putting the steering rack back in, I found the part that connects to the U-Joint (in the spring area) was a pain to locate the right position, but I got there in the end, put the bolt back through and made sure everything was back the way it was meant to be. Took me about an hour.

So my problem regarding the switch is fine, but my barrel needs replacing at some point as the engine will still run if the key is taken out.