Cheers JV!!
Well now, where do I start?? At the beginning I suppose. I fell in love with dubs at an early age and bought my first (1988 Scirocco GT) way back in 1993. Loved and drove it to death. Then I got my first MK2 Gti. It was a black 3 door small bumper Digifant. Great car, but my ham fisted ownership saw to it's demise
. Since then I've discovered the joys of vehicle maintenance!! After that one I didn't have a car for some years due to living abroad, but on my return I decided to relive my youth and purchased this!
Ran this for a while and tidied it up a LOT!
I then sold it to fund the purchase of a 944 S2. Sadly the wife went F@#king mental and demanded that I sell it immediately
It was advertised and purchased by a nice chap who gave me this as a part ex!!
Effectively cost me only £50!!! It only had 49k miles and was the nicest MK2 I'd ever seen!!
Then the wife demanded that we go on a day trip and this happened. See the Mitsy Warrior in the background? I didn't!
Gutted to say the least. Spent ages trying to find another one to replace it, but was ultimately dissapointed with everything I looked at. So I bought this instead...
A genuine 1987 325i Sport. My god it was good, but extremely thirsty and had a nasty habit of rusting. BADLY!
I then bought a MK3 Gti, but was really not impressed with the performance. So I sold that and decided to hunt for THE mk2 I'd been craving for years. After a long search I found this one. With my neighbour!!!!!
My neighbour works a panel beater and sprayer, so this car has recently benefited from a bare metal respray in it's original Royal Blue metalic!! Sadly that is as far as he got. The interior is well and truly goosed!!
Also the car had overheated BADLY and blew the head gasket. So he had the head skimmed and a new gasket fitted. Sadly this job was properly bodged!! When I got the car it ran like a bag of nails. Some investigating revealed that the cam timing was 5 teeth out
. Using Rubjonny's excellent guide and some advice via email the poor running was quickly rectfied. Cheers John!
Then I set about sorting out the cooling system. I replaced the thermostat, well I say replaced, but when I opened her up there was no thermostat!! There were also numerous coolant leaks. Bloody bodgers!!! I also replaced the thermo fan switch as this was knackered. Probably why the thing over heated in the first place!
Upon purchase I was pleased to discover the car had just been given a full 12 months MOT. Bonus I thought. However, then I drove the car and can only assume that Mr Magoo is alive and well and working at my local testing centre. Both rear wheel bearings were well and truly shot and 3 of the wheels were buckled and sitting on perished tyres
. A quick wanted add on this site produced a set of BBS RA's from Rob (cheers fella!!). One early morning trip to Rickmansworth and I was sorted.
I then replaced the steering column and top and bottom bearings. What an absolute pig of job that was!!
That pretty much brings us up to date. I didn't have a camera over the weekend as the wife had buggered off to Ireland to visit her folks. She's back now so the following work will be accompanied by lots of lovely pics....
The never ending list of things to do so far is at.
N/S rear wheel bearing.
Cambelt and tensioner. (previous owner claims it was done recently, but given the standard of the work already done I don't think I'll chance it!)
Sort out the mess that is the radio wiring.
Source and fit a new/better interior (including dashboard).
Fit 16v front engine mount
Sort the oil leak (new sump, gasket and drain plug should do it).
Replace knock sensor.
Replace temp sensor.
Replace broken dipstick shroud.
Replace camshaft and crankshaft oil seals.
Fit my Nakamichi CD400 amps and JL speakers.
A bloody good valet.
Eventually the engine will be replaced with the 2 litre agg lump from the Tornado Red MK2
Oh and replace the woefully under powered battery!
I'm attacking the wheel bearings tomorrow so will update then.
