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PostPosted: Tue Nov 04, 2014 5:09 pm 
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I thought I would share some activity that's going on in my workshop at the moment, although it's my friends work on a car they bought from me.

I rescued this car from scrap about 5 years ago, bought as a rolling shell with a load of spares from another 185 the guy broke. It was in very good condition and seemed a shame to just break so I rescued it and stuck it at the back of the workshop to gather dust until the a-a versions became rare - all the collectors buy the CS/RC version. Separately, I also bought a complete standard 185 engine with all ancillaries to go with it. This had come out of a lightweight that had been vandalised and broken for it's gearbox.

Fast forward a few years, and I could use the space plus the car isn't quite as good as I first thought, it's had a scrape down the drivers side in the past, door and front wing paint have micro bubbles and turns out not original, and small dents and cracked filler on the rear arch. Add a friend who's just had his RC resprayed and doesn't want to go chucking it round on gravel and is looking for another car and bingo. This is a joint venture between Lewis and his brother, Alex They are not frequent posters on here, but some of you will know them from meets.

The initial planned usage is autotests (gravel / mud and tarmac) & autosolos plus the odd track day and possibly sprint. The emphasis is on making it reliable and resistant to damage from stones and mud off the wheels.

The plan is therefore to keep it largely standard mechanically, but with a front mount intercooler with it's own fans. Autotesting is high power, low speed so very little natural airflow. I have been running a 185 with water chargecooling but charge temperatures have been a constant problem so we're looking at going front mount.

I have some special plans for intercooling, inspired by a small turbo shopping car I saw many years ago, and largely replicated by Edd (treacle) with the RS500 setup on his 205 build.

While the car was semi-stripped and up in the air (this allowed me to use the area underneath for storage) it seemed sensible to de-rust the underside and give it a good coat of underseal to give it the best possible chance of surviving a blasting from gravel and mud.

The propshaft, tank and rear subframe were removed, and the struts undone and dropped to allow full access to all areas, particularly inside the arches which will take the brunt of the blasting.

The covers for the brake / fuel lines were removed and the brake lines had a couple of patches of deep surface rust. Knowing the proposed usage and consequence of brake failure, we decided these would be replaced. We therefore removed these at this stage to allow better access to the body behind.

All brown patches (very very few) were attacked with drill + cup brush, and the remainder was cleaned and wire brushed thoroughly.

All areas that were brown were treated with rust killer, then the whole lot was painted with red oxide anti rust primer.

I'll post some piccies up later.

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PostPosted: Tue Nov 04, 2014 6:12 pm 
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Looking forward to seeing this :-)


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PostPosted: Tue Nov 04, 2014 10:54 pm 
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While waiting for the lads to email piccies prior to undersealing, I'll fast forward a few days to the current state of play.



Sunday was the big day for the undersealing. Starting with masking off the external paintwork to avoid overspray, plus the bolts & studs sticking out of the body and the suspension hanging down. As stated before, the emphasis is on a reliable and functional build rather than perfection, otherwise all parts would have been stripped.

First off, all 4 arches and along next to the sills were sprayed with a coat of stonechip. This will provide a hard wearing layer in the areas most affected by gravel blasting.

A teabreak followed while this layer dried, then the whole underside and all 4 arches were sprayed with undrseal.

The masking was then removed ASAP. Masking tape glue goes off fairly quickly and becomes difficult to remove so it's always best to mask, spray and remove in the same day.



We will still need to go over the areas obscured by the stand rails once the car has been moved on to the ramp, and touch up any bits that were missed.



Anyway, on to the pictures. 1 bottle of rust treatment, 2 tins of oxide primer, 2 tins of smootherite, 2 tins of stonechip, 5 tins of shultz later.



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(This one was taken before the front panel had a second coat of smootherite)

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PostPosted: Wed Nov 05, 2014 12:12 am 
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Good write-up Chris on a different type of project from the usual fast road and track builds. Just thinking about the gravel protection it might be worth considering fitting those sort of flexible plastic sheets you see protecting the subframes and rear suspensions/driveshafts on rally cars. Most seem to just seem to be cable tied on making them simple to remove for cleaning and accessing the chassis. The lower sills and front of the wheel arches are often protected by Kevlar/GRP matting as is the complete underside of the engine bay. Seems like a good idea for off-road autotests and similar events.

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PostPosted: Wed Nov 05, 2014 10:07 am 
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Some good suggestions. The plan was to confine the gravel to the arches with big mudflaps. The front has arch liners. Undecided what to do with the rear.

I'm a bit worried about losing cooling if we cover the diff with a large skid plate. My thoughts are that the rear subframe is tough enough to take the beating. Sumpguard and tank guard are on the cards though.

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 06, 2014 7:20 am 
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Looking good Chris are you still at the same unit as the one in the pictures looks very clean :)


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PostPosted: Thu Nov 06, 2014 1:06 pm 
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To coin a journalistic phrase

It's hard to appreciate the sheer scale of the devastation from these pictures

:lol: :lol:


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PostPosted: Thu Nov 06, 2014 7:25 pm 
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Cheeky gits :lol:

As usual, I can't move because the place is full of other peoples cars.

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 06, 2014 10:24 pm 
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two_OH_five wrote:
To coin a journalistic phrase

It's hard to appreciate the sheer scale of the devastation from these pictures

:lol: :lol:
Black does make it hard to spot the detail!

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GT4DC Chairman
1994 Toyota Celica GT-Four ST205WRC JDM 269bhp @ 0.9bar
1994 Toyota Celica GT-Four Special GT 590bhp @ 1.8bar
1989 Van Diemen RF88/89 Formula Ford 1600
2008 Nissan Patrol GU 3.0L ZD30DDTi 154bhp


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PostPosted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 3:11 pm 
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looking good mate :)

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PostPosted: Sat Dec 20, 2014 8:35 pm 
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Progress has been slow the last few weeks. A combination of Holidays for the lads & hectic work schedules meaning not many days / evenings we were all free at the same time.

All the parts that came off were de-rusted and given the same rust killer - oxide primer treatment and then painted with black smootherite. Odly, the smootherite looks red under the light from the flash, not sure if it's the primer showing through or some strange effect of smootherite. The tank had particular attention paid to the pipe exits where they always rot.

On the rear struts, the bump stops were missing and the rubber dust gaitors were perished. New ones were sourced from TCB and fitted.

The covers from the brake & fuel lines came off for the undersealing and the pipes carefully inspected. There was some heavy surface rust in a couple of places so the brake lines were removed for replacement and further testing as an indication as to whether the fuel lines would also need doing. Brake lines are under far more pressure and to some extent more safety critical than fuel lines so we were taking no risks - especially considering the intended usage. As it turns out, there was plenty of meat left on even the rustiest part of the brake lines so the fuel lines have remained unchanged.

The scene last weekend. Tank back in (but not connected yet). Struts back on hanging from above. First new brake line provisionally run - I forgot to buy another roll of pipe so we haven't done the second one yet.

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The rear subframe has been treated / painted and is ready to go back in once brake lines have been finished. As stated at the start, this is a 'functional' build rather than a full restoration so it hasn't been fully stripped, only the exposed & rusty parts of the subframe have been done. The diff was left alone as it's far more likely to break than rust away !!! I was also concerned about possible thermal insulation of treated rust plus paint.

Image

Ditto front lower arms.

Image

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PostPosted: Sun Dec 21, 2014 12:25 am 
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Looking good Chris ;)


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 25, 2015 10:48 pm 
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Progress been non existant for a few weeks, first the Christmas break and then me going down with flu for a couple of weeks. Finally, some good progress this afternoon - Rear axle back in.



(Excuse the low quality smartphone snap of work in progress)

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Before the Christmas break, the brake lines had been finished and bolted back up, roughly in place. Final tweaking and fitting the covers back will take place once the car is off the current stand and access is easier.



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Finally, we were planning to get the engine on the stand ready for a partial strip & inspection. We were stopped by the flywheel bolts not yielding to breaker bar & hammer - the hits were getting big enough that we were in mortal danger from flying sockets :D. A trip to Machine Mart will see a 17mm impact socket for my impact wrench.



The engine is from a 185 lightweight - apparently the headgasket went, the engine was removed & a metal gasket fitted then the car was vandalised before the engine went back in. Bearing in mind that many people don't clean the mating faces well enough for a metal gasket we will be removing the head and ensuring all will be well. We will also whip the sump off and check bearing clearances and crank endfloat while we're at it. It would also seem daft not to lift the pistons out for a check over as well.



Image

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