[trackday_prep] My 205 Xt Trackcar Project

[swordfish210 20]

Hi all, this is my 205 XT:

 

 

I've had it since Febuary 2006 and i've been modifying it since then. I bought it for the princely sum of £275 with MOT, tax and 3/4 tank of fuel. However it was very very standard and a bit broken.

 

 

I cant begin to list what i've done to it up til now because it would take ages but i've basically had it all in pieces and put it all back togeather again. Anyway every now and again i have a big jaunt where i do a load of work at once and now is one of those times so i thought i'd start a thread here as i was tired of just reading these rebuild blogs, expect to see this one being posted on far in to the future as i've got loads of plans for this car.

 

I'll post some pics up of the stuff that i've done to the car tomorrow but for now i'm going to bore you with what i've been up to in the past week. Ever since i rebuilt/ruined the engine it's be slowly degrading due to; bent inlet valves, warped block, knackered headgasket and only having 9 headbolts out of a possible 10. this hasnt stopped me tracking it though :wink: So now that i have my 405 Mi16 on the road i decided to whip the engine out of the car and give it a rebuild/reblock with some shiny new parts .

 

I started last week with this:

 

 

which soon became this:

 

 

 

I then took the engine to Uni and mounted it on a stand ready to be worked on. I just have to wait until theres someone around to let me in I also took the gearbox to Miles and he's going to give it a rebuild and he's also fitting a Tran-X plate diff for some real grip

 

Once the engine was out i started work on tidying the engine bay. First i removed a load of unessacary wiring:

 

 

And i moved the washer bottle to under the slam panel. I just had to cut a hole in the panel in that pic:

 

Edited July 23, 2009 by swordfish210

[swordfish210 20]

I then started giving the engine bay a good clean as it was a real mess, covered in dirt, oil and some rust. I sanded down the rust with some aluminum oxide paper and found that most of it was just surface rust, so a bit of Kurust and I primered over it. I also cleaned the bay out with some engine degreasant. There was some rust on the passengerside inner wing that I really wan tto cut out and replace with some fresh metal but since I don't have a welder, a grinder or any metal working equipment at home it just going to be some rust remover, underseal and paint for now untill I can do it properly Anyway i'll put some pics up of the engine bay when i've finished painting it as it looks a right mess at the moment

 

I also wanted to move the oil cooler as I wasnt happy with where it was (in front of the radiator) so I mounted it alongside the radiator. I just set some rivnuts in the front pannel and bolted it in:

 

 

 

mmmmmmm unrestricted airflow

 

This morning my springs and springcups arrived from Skip Brown. The springs are 225lb ones (i wanted 200's but they were adamant i'd prefer the 225's) Unfourtanatly the spring cups they sent didnt sleve in to the Compbrake topmounts I allready had so I took them in to uni to give them a seeing to with the lathe. This was the problem, the nose of the springcup should look like the spacer pictured on top:

 

 

So I set them up in the lathe:

 

 

and took them down by this much:

 

 

perfect :

 

 

I then built the coilovers up, removed the old struts and fitted the new ones. The coilovers are a little shorter than the old struts so the rideheight should be ok and they're a fair bit lighter I also reconnected the ARB as it's been off since the Retro action day at Combe :shock:

 

 

 

It's now a load stiffer than it was before so it should handle a bit nicer on track as it was a bit on the boggy side when I was at Llandow. The eccentric topmounts do make the engine bay look a little nicer as well:

 

 

Thats all for now but expect regular updates throughout the summer as I want to get it done asap so I can get back out on track.

 

If you want to read a bit more about the car (allbeit just a small percentage of what i've actually done) the you can read it here:

 

http://www.talk-torque.com/forums/viewtopi...f=16&t=2689

[EdCherry 34 1 Cars]

Nice to see the struts are finally on the car!

 

You can borrow my grinder and the bells and whistles that go with it to get rid of that rust, wilts meet this sunday isnt it? You know you want to do it now rather than let it spread.

[swordfish210 20]

I would but unless it's petrol powered it wont be much good as my garage doesnt even have power I hate being poor

[swordfish210 20]

I managed a bit more work on the car today. First i finished sanding down the rust in the engine bay and covered it in primer. While i was waitng for that to dry i painted the other side and washed the oil and grease out of the rest of the bay. I then sanded down the primer on the otherside and painted it. I'm not too happy with the job as the paint allready in the bay is a sort of mouldy offwhite and the fresh paint is quite bright so it's about 3 different shades in there now, better than it was though.

 

 

 

 

I then plugged the wiring back in and refted the headlamp. To finish it off i'm going to have the battery tray and the slam panel shotbalsted and then spray the tray white and the slam panel black just to make it look a bit neater in there.

 

I also took the rear dampers off and stiffened them up by 2 clicks to comply with the stiffer front suspension, it's not much of a difference and i could really do with some 21mm bars in there. I also reconnected the ARB as it too had been disconnected since the Retro action day.

 

 

I'm also going to take the coolant hoses to Merlin Motorsport to see about getting the system made up in Samco hose, should make the engine bay look a little nicer.

[pugpete1108 62 1 Cars]

I like the idea of moving the washer bottle under the windscreen

does it all fit in nicely?

I was going to put mine back in the original position but you made me change my mind

 

and I know what you mean about having a garage with no power it's a right pain in the ar#e

Edited July 24, 2009 by pugpete1108

[swordfish210 20]

Unfourtanatly i can't claim to be the inovator of the washer bottle relocation as i stole in from a mate (Dazza 4 on here) The +ve cable reaches but you'll need to earth it back there and obviously just cut the pipe shorter. The bottle does fit in there nicely and i'm thinking just a few cable-ties to mount it bt i'll get to that at a later stage.

 

I could have lived with no power today as what i really wanted was some running water to wash the engine bay out but i had to settle for a bucket and cloth

[swordfish210 20]

I was going to ask what do you guys think of where i've mounted the top mounts? I just went for maximum castor with a tad more camber. Does anything else work better.

[swordfish210 20]

I didnt get as much work done today as i was hoping to as i spent half of the day at work and the rest catching up on some much needed sleep I did get the car out of the garage for a bit though and do some work on it. First thing was the slam panel. As you guys know they come from the factory in this horrible beige colour and it makes the whole engine bay look shoddy, plus mine was all chipped and looked even crapper than normal.

 

I started out with this:

 

 

I then sanded it down with some 60grit aluminum oxide paper and then gave it a few coats of grey primer:

 

 

When that was dry i gave it a going over with some 1200grit wet and dry, cleaned it off and sprayed it with some satin black:

 

 

Soooooo much nicer

 

While the paint was drying i decided to mount my ECU:

 

 

I just need a loom for it now :wink:

Edited July 25, 2009 by swordfish210

[swordfish210 20]

Just a few pics of what i've been up to in the past few months as well:

 

Poly windows:

 

 

266mm 306 XSI brakes:

 

 

Passenger footrest:

 

 

Dash:

 

 

Lowered radiator and new cooling fan:

 

 

12.9 Grade front suspension bolts:

 

 

Poly exhaust rubbers (loads better than the original rubbers):

 

[EdCherry 34 1 Cars]

I reckon you put that passenger footrest in so you never have to give me a passenger ride, I will never fit in it now.

 

Looking good, but why did you spray the garage floor grey too?

[swordfish210 20]

I could take the footrest out, but i reckon you'll jam your foot in to my ECU then

 

I sprayed the garage floor because i didnt have any newspaper and it's just a council garage so i dont really care about it.

[swordfish210 20]

Only did a tiny bit on the car today. I wanted to spray the battery tray as well as the rest of the engine bay but it was covered in rust so i had to get it shotblasted first. I started with this:

 

 

Then i took it to MDN Powder Coating just outside of Devizes and got it blasted:

 

 

Then when i got home i primered it and gave it a couple of coats of satin black:

 

 

I think it looks quite nice in the white engine bay. Spose i'll have to put the battery in the back now as the tray looks too nice to be covered with battery :wink:

[welshpug 1,661]

bit different from when I gave you a hand with that beam, nice to see some progress and something different to all the Mi16's and gti6's

[swordfish210 20]

Yeah it's come along way since then. I should be starting work on the engine on Wednesday so i can get some real work done

[Miles 331 1 Cars]

Your box is in a million parts at the moment, But everything is off to be replaced/fixed at the moment.

I also found my proper selector arm's which should fit as a couple where the older metal type with plastic spacer's on them

I'll take some pic's soon

[swordfish210 20]

Your box is in a million parts at the moment, But everything is off to be replaced/fixed at the moment.

I also found my proper selector arm's which should fit as a couple where the older metal type with plastic spacer's on them

I'll take some pic's soon

 

LEGEND! I got paid today so let me know wneh you want paying for it all.

[EdCherry 34 1 Cars]

Moving along swiftly there mark, might bring in that engine ive got in pieces on wednesday and clean it up, see whats what.

[calvinhorse 870]

excellent project, keep the progress coming!

[swordfish210 20]

Thanks. I'm stripping the engine tomorrow so i should have some good pics of the many many many broken parts

[swordfish210 20]

I had the whole day in the engine shop at Uni today so i could get plenty of work done. I started in the morning with this:

 

 

 

FILTHY! I then started pulling it apart and found a casualty quite early on:

 

 

The vaccum on the distributor would have been working well then I soon had the cylinder head off:

 

 

and i was surprised at the condtion....reasonably good. I did find this spacer that spaces the rocker cover from the splash plate was broken:

 

 

and the other piece was here:

 

 

Could have been quite bad however i appear to have been lucky in this case. I then took a look at the valves (not bent as i was assuming they were) But the exhaust valves on No1 and No4 were quite white:

 

 

 

as opposed to No's 2 and 3 which were quite black:

 

 

I gave the rocker cover bolts a going over with the wire wheel. Before and after:

 

[swordfish210 20]

I then stripped the head down and gave it a clean in the washtank. I'm going to take it to Zebedee engineering tomorrow and have it skimmed. I then started work on the bottom end:

 

 

Flipped it over and took the sump off:

 

 

I then dropped the pistons and liners out:

 

 

and then i took the crankcase off and removed the crank. I'm taking the crank to Basset Down Balancing tomorrow to have another turn on the balancer. Once i had it all apart i labled everything and shelved it and went to mount the new block on the stand:

 

 

 

The block is from an XS engine that i bought last year and stripped for spares. It was filthy when i bought it so a mate of mine gave it a going over with a jet washer and one night (in the pub :wink: ) i mentioned to another mate this i had to clean an engine block and he proclaimed "oh, i've got some stuff at work i can give you to do that" He then turned up a few days later with an unlabled can of liquid and said "wear thick gloves, dont get it on your skin or clothes and wear a mask as the fumes give you liver cancer" Luckily i had some gloves and a gas mask:

 

 

Anyway the strange liquid did an awesome job, just a few coats and a wire brush got the block spotless. Heres a pic of the pistons that i'm going to be using as well:

 

 

XSI pistons for a bit more compression and they've got valve cutouts for some extra clearance. I then mounted the new block and called it a day:

 

 

I'll be taking various parts to places tomorrow for balancing, skinning, honing, powdercoating etc so once thats done i'll start working on it again.

[jimistdt 1]

Luckily I had a Gas Mask....wow....I don't think I have ever come across anyone making a statement like that before. Good work so far Mark, good facilities you're using.

[swordfish210 20]

It's probably the only time it's been said outside of a warzone...or Kurdistan. I do like having a nice clean-ish workshop to build engines in, makes the job so much easier.

[swordfish210 20]

Didnt do much today as i'm wating for various bits from various places before i can carry on with my engine build. I had decided to paint the exhaust manifold as it is only a mild steel item and it was turning a horribly rusty brown colour.

 

I started with this:

 

 

and after about an hour of sanding and cleaning i had it allmost back to bare metal so i gave it about 5 coats of Halfords VHT paint and it came up like this:

 

 

Much better. More updates on the engine build next week.