Ben's Black Mk2 2.0 16v Project

[Judderi]

As far as engine work goes i have a little planned.

It has already got a 9A 2 litre bottom end combined with the manifold, exhaust and K&N so has got plenty of power and torque bottom end. Hower due to a bad design in the LPG conversion is very restricted at the top end of the revs. This is due to the reduced diameter (aprox half of normal size) of the T piece that interupts the intake hose which feeds the LPG. I plan to bin this once i fit the twin take off power rhor using the extra take of for the LPG feed.

I also plan to change the rocker cover and intake manifold for the polished items i bought. While im there i need to sort out the noisy tappets and timing chain.

Once all this is done i will be off to the nearest respectable tuning garage with a rolling road. While its there i will get them to squeeze the most bhp out of it as possible! Its already really fast, im guessing or hoping about 170bhp but i want more as you always do!

Im a sucker for a race so most nights on the way home have a bit of roundabout to roundabout tag going on. My last vicim was a toyota celica gt 2.0 16v, he had no chance! I kept letting him past just so i could fly past him laughing again. He took it well and gave the old hazards good bye as he took his turning of the dual carrigeway. Just for legal reasons i must say that i never exceeded the speed limit and manouvered in a very respectable manner. 

[Judderi]

21/02/05

Disaster strikes!

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I put ?40 of optimax in to find that i had a hole in a fuel line and lost the lot! So i ordered a replacement fuel line and thought i may as well get a new filter too as it probably has had the same one all its life! So i rushed home friday night to get started to find i had the wrong fuel line! So i rushed back down to VW and paid an extra ?5 for special next morning delivery on the correct line. In all i paid about ?75 for 2 lines and a filter.
I Picked this up sat morning and got straight to work before the snow came! It was a bit tricky as everything was rusted to hell and seized but i got it done in the end.

The car started instantly and run great. This was obviously the reason for the bad starting lately.

I was now in the mood for more challenges so decided to install my strut brace. It was a bit fiddly getting a socket inside the wheel arch to tighten the bolts as my fingers were frozen and i was now working in the snow but altogether straight forward. After a test drive i was very happy with the feel of the car now that it has all braces fitted. Rear - Front lower - Front upper. It feels much squarer on the road and tight round corners.

So as i was now frozen i decided to fit my rear silver indicator bulbs and clear side repeaters then call it a day.

Sunday

Popped into town sunday morning then on the night went to my parents for tea. On the way home i noticed the battery light was on. NOT GOOD! I almost got home before all power died then the engine cut out. So it looks like either the battery or alternator has given up. Instead of more money more problems it should be more problems less money!

[Judderi]

24/02/05

Well my design 90's arrived last night. I was a little disapointed as they were advertised with legal tyres but they were clearly not legal or even roadworthy! I was hoping i could put them on the car while it was getting re sprayed but i cant afford a full set of new tyres as well as the respray, hell i cant even afford the respray but dont tell the bodyshop that! Im yet to work out how im gonna pay. So i will just have to wait till next month to put the wheels on.

The wheels were also advertised as polished but needing a little elbow grease to get them gleaming again. This was true! So i got straight to work on one of them. It took about 3 hours of polishing with some autosolve but i must say am impressed with the result. It came up very nice and shiney!  So now i just have the other 3 to do!

Well this is one of them before

And this is the result after polishing!

[Judderi]

At a rate of one a night i only have one left to do. They should look well nice one i can afford to wrap them in some very thin rubber. Its a shame i cant put them on ready for the car to roll out of the body shop in all its glory. Here is a few more pics. The quality isnt great because they were taken with my phone.

Before

And After Plenty of elbow grease[/b]

















So far there has only been pictures of the car, if your wondering what i look like then its something like this only a little less scary. Im kinda camera shy, in fact i hate them so this is as good as you gonna get.

Seriously though this is what i look like. Me my wife all poshed up.

[Judderi]

01/03/05

Well at the weekend i needed to get the alternator fixed ready to take the car to the bodyshop that afternoon. So i took it off the car which is real easy to do, just three bolts and a couple of nuts holding the wires on, then took it to my local starter motor/alternator repair guy. Only to find when i got there his shop all boarded up! So i rang a mechanic friend who was not answering his phone, then a mates dad who is into cars. It turns out the guy died last year sometime! Mind you he looked dead a long time before he was. Anyway my mates dad recomended a guy who used to work with the dead guy who had set up his own place. So after hunting round a local trading estate i found him. It took about 10 mins to fix and only cost ?18! Well chuffed!  It turns out the voltage regulator was shafted.
So i got home fitted the alternator even faster than it took to remove and went to start her. The only problem is my jump leads are the worst ever and hardly work, i think i could get more power jumping from a AA battery! I thought at one point that i must have shafted my battery at the same time but much to my joy in the pouring rain she fired up! Plus she ran great and my battery seems fine.

I had a few more hours to spare so decided i would attack my dash and replace all the blown bulbs in my clocks etc. I found it pretty easy to get the clocks out. I think this was only because somebody had been there before me and loosened everything. The speedo cable pretty much fell out by itself which was a releif. The clocks had a set of badly fitted white dials which ive never really been a fan of. So i stripped the dials completely and peeled of the white dials leaving the origional black clocks. Much nicer! I needed two new bulbs for the top of the clocks so i went to chavfords. What a rip off! ?1.90 each for 1 tiny bulb and they didnt even fit! I had to strip the working bulb from the holder and press it into the older holder in order to make it fit. It was very fiddly but i got there in the end. So after testing them in the house i went back out to refit them. Re fitting was a little trickier but not too much of a problem. I bought a new heater pannel with working light weeks ago so now was the time to fit it and throw the old tatty one with a blown bulb. I managed to get it all back together without too much fuss just in time to take it to the bodyshop. I was a bit worried at one point because id got the clocks back in and decided to test everything before i went any further. All worked except the indicators, you got a permanent light on the clocks but the indicators didnt light up at all! I was very releived to find that when i plugged the hazard warning light switch back in the problem disapeared. Makes sense i suppose.

[Judderi]

03/03/05

Got a call from the bodyshop today.They were asking if they could have the wheels so that they could do any needed archwork to make them fit as the car is very low on coilovers. I explained that they needed tyres and i do not have the money to pay for tyres and pay them for their work. They were very understanding and agreed that i could pay what i could afford this month and the rest at the end of the month. Which was very nice of them and made me very happy because now the car can roll out of the shop in all its glory! So its a rush home from work at 4, fall/carry 2 heavy boxes down 3 flights of obstructed stairs and stumble into the back of the van im borrowing off my grandar (buddy nice bloke!) buddy horrible van, its well scary in the snow. Hell its scary in the dry!

 

Anyway it will be a mad rush to get the wheels to them before they close but at least i can just leave the wheels with them to get the tyres sorted as the tyre place is just next door. Hopefully i will get some decent pictures soon as my dad is back off holiday and i can steal his digi camera. I will take some tonight if possible with my phone. I was gonna yesterday but i forgot my phone. Dur!

[Judderi]

04/03/05

True to my form i c*cked up again and left my lights on for the second time in one month and could not get the van started. There goes my plan for rushing home and getting the wheels to the bodyshop!  I was sooooo p*ssed off! Plus in true style my battery was dying on my phone and nobody at home was answering! So i thought i would get the bus or train home, but only had ?2.50 plus i could not work out the train timetable and didnt know where the bus stop was. So i thought i would try and get a lift of a work collegue who lived half of my way home and get the buss the rest of the way. Then i remembered that my grandad is a total perfectionist old well prepared type of bloke. So i hunted around in the van much to my delight to find a set of jump leads! Then the guy who i was gonna blag a lift of turned up, so he gave me a jump off his car. So 45 mins later i was on my way home. When i got home i thought i would call the bodyshop just in case they were working late and youl never belive it they were! So after nearly killing myself carrying the wheels downstairs i took them to the shop. Its the 1st time ive seen the car in progress and so far so good. They have replaced both wings, got the bonnet off and all windows out. They are gonna cut out the uneeded excess of the arch so that the wheels fit without scrubbage which is nice. I also asked them to do a few other bits and pieces like smooth over the un-needed wiper hole on the front. So far so good, i also got shown round their paint room where they mix the paint and also the spray bays and i must say was impressed. However i forgot my phone and did not get any pictures again! But ive got the camera now and am planning a trip over tonight for some photies. Ive also just ordered the rear spoiler i wanted and an eybrow spoiler. So sorry for the lack of pictures on the progress so far but as you can tell im a little forgetfull to say the least! Repeat after me "lights lights lights i must remember my lights!"

P.S I ordered these to make me feel better.

Rear spoler




Grill Spoiler

[Judderi]

07/03/05

Well i eventually got some pics from the bodyshop. So far it doesent look like much has been done but im not really bothered as long as it gets done right. The car looks like a total mess at the moment! The new wings are on, all the side windows have been removed, so have the mirrors and some of the plastic trim. The new wheels have been test fitted with the old tyres on to get an idea of how much archwork is needed. On the rear there is going to be a serious amout of arch cutting going on! I didnt have much room to take the photos so some are a bit close.

Thats the new bonnet in the backgroung being prepped.







Its still got the chunky tyres on but check out the lack of clearance! In fact the car is sat on the tyre.



Ive also asked them to smooth over them flappy things on the side skirts as they are no use really and just end up falling off.



Not much going on here yet.









This is the back window that had the rust in the corner. Its not really that bad now the window is out not that y can tell cos the picture is poo!
Sorry

My next visit will be on tuesday morning as im on late starts at work this week and finish at 6. So if there is any more changes i will have more pics. Over and out!

[Judderi]

08/03/04

Well i visited this morning but dont really have much to report. Nothing more has been done. Towards the end of the week one of the guys will be devoting all his time to it and getting cracked on as he said. I mentioned to them last week that i would be entering it into competitions when done and now they are totaly promising a perfect job not just a rush job and get it out the door. Thus the guy is gonna devote his time only to the golf and not all the other jobs they have waiting in the shop. When talking to him he said hes sick of doing boring everyday jobs like spraying taxis and is looking forward to doing mine. They have got the new tyres on the porsche wheels ready to start cutting the arches to fit later in the week. Other than that nothing new to report.

As it looks like it wont be finished till the end of the month i have a little more money to play with so I decided i may as well buy everything that i want in order to complete the stying ready for it to roll out of the shop complete, rather than have to wait for the finishing touches. So i ordered the final 2 items to complete the clean and clear look. Im spending a bloody fortune on this project! Dare i add it all up? Nope

[Judderi]

11/03/05

Well i popped in today to drop off the new rear spoiler and front grill eyebrow. I was hoping to see some more progress but it hadnt been touched and the guy was working on a taxi.  He said it was getting started on monday. Buddy hope so! The rear spoiler is pretty good with an led brake light, he said he would even run the cable through the boot lid for me ready to be wired up. I wasnt that impressed with the grill spoiler though, it was very cheapy nasty plastic with rough edges. I might splash out and buy one of the SWG ones. Will see what it looks like before he bonds it on then decide.