[car_overhaul] Project Jalopy

[Anthony 1,003]

With a day off work and the rain holding off, I fitted the diff-less gearbox and dropped the engine into the car to see what clearance was like so that I could sort that while I waited for the final bits to arrive - including amongst other things that reangled exhaust manifold which needs to be in place before final fitting of the engine.

 

 

After a bit of a struggle shoehorning it in place (too used to doing 8v's recently!) it turns out that this shell isn't too bad and should just need slight trimming of the cambelt cover (which is jammed hard against the master cylinder even with the engine levered right over - hence struggling to shoehorn it in!) and a touch off the corner of the spark plug cover, plus of course the usual modifications to the slam panel to clear the breather, PAS pipes and to give a little extra clearance to the inlet manifold.

 

 

There's certainly plenty of vertical clearance on the MC and it's a fair distance from the exhaust cam cover, so doesn't look like I'll need to space the pedal box out to give extra clearance - kind of glad about that, as that's always been one of those bits of a GTi-6 conversion that I've never been particularly keen on. Clearly I'd rather not have to cut the cambelt cover either, but it doesn't look like I've got much choice in the matter given that there's no clearance between MC and cambelt cover on the horizontal axis despite the engine being levered right over - unless I'm lucky and there's a bit of movement if I loosen all the nuts holding the pedal box to the bulkhead, but I very much doubt it.

 

Despite having done numerous 16v engine swaps and conversions over the years, it still never fails to amaze me just how different each 205 shell is to the next and how it's a complete lottery as to how well it's going to fit. I think I mentioned it further back in the thread somewhere, but I still remember swapping the engine from one 205 into another and finding well over an inch difference between the exhaust tunnels in them - the manifold sat centrally in one, and on the other was all but touching even after levering the engine over for maximum clearance. I realise that this is basically a 30 odd year old design, but even so - an inch difference is massive in automotive tolerance terms and I've no idea how it was ever deemed acceptable.

 

It's no wonder that every 205 seems to drive differently when there's variations between shells that large coupled with 20+ years of wear, neglect and accident damage.

[feb 47]

I remember this being empty when you showed it to me last week, you have been busy

I can't wait to see the finished product!

Good that the engine fits well without many modifications.

Edited November 10, 2011 by feb

[j_turnell 137 3 Cars]

Excellent work as always Anthony, im at a similar stage with my Xsara lump.

[Baz 421]

Gay engine choice, gayer diff choice. Wimp.

 

Making good progress as usual though!

[Anthony 1,003]

Taking advantage of another dry day, I set about sorting out the clearance issues with the radiator and slam panel.

 

 

Sorting out the radiator was straight forward enough, as it just needs tilting forward slightly to clear the inlet manifold, much as you need to do on 1.9 Mi16 conversions. I chose to modify the standard radiator cowling, the red lines in the picture showing where it needed to be trimmed to allow sufficent movement - turned out not to need much removing at all, and certainly far less than I've had to chop out when doing Mi16 conversions in the past.

 

 

The modified cowling in place, and as you can see, there's plenty of clearance between the radiator and inlet manifold. I've even managed to retain the original spring clips and rubber blocks for securing the radiator in place, thus not needing to resort to cable ties or any of the other usual bodges you normally see.

 

 

The slam panel needed a bit more chopping out, but it's pretty obvious and straight forward where it needs to be cut. The breather pipe that's connected to the throttle body needs a cut out, as does the PAS low-pressure feed pipe. The drivers side of the inlet manifold and the high-pressure PAS pipe needed the lip on the back of the slam panel to be cut and bent out of the way to give clearance, but that's about it.

 

Looks a bit amaturish at the moment, but once I've cleaned it up and given it a lick of paint it should fine.

 

Most important bit is that the bonnet shuts fine and the latch works too - the radiator is still far enough back that there isn't the problems you get with the latch fouling the radiator as you typically used to get on Mi16 conversions - a fair few bonnets have been destroyed over the years from people lazily removing the latches on 205 Mi16's to get around that issue!

 

 

Ride height looks pretty much spot on too with the engine, gearbox and battery in place

[Anthony 1,003]

Finished off the wiring this evening too.

 

 

First up, a relay controlled radiator cooling fan loom, effectively a much simplified version of the setup used on 205 diesel models and similar to what is found on later (non-aircon) Peugeot models.

 

I've never been a fan of the standard 205 GTi cooling fan setup where it runs full current through the thermoswitch, as that's never really struck me as a good idea and the sheer number of 205's you see with cooling fan problems or nasty dash switches to manually control the fan confirms my theory that it's flawed.

 

The relay setup found on the diesel models is far more reliable in my experience, not seeming to suffer anything like the number of dead thermoswitches or bad connections. There are two downsides to it though, namely that it needs twin-fans to work, and that it you end up with a big chunk of wiring and a relay box in the area behind the passenger side headlight, where space is already at a premium.

 

That's why I like to make a simplfied version of it that uses a single fan and is high-speed only, rather than the standard setup where you initial get low-speed followed by high speed if the temperature continues to climb. High-speed only is fine with me though, as my attitude is that if the temperature has risen sufficiently for the fan to kick in, I'd rather it cools it down as quickly as possible.

 

Difference that I've done this time compared to previous versions is that I've extended the wiring sufficiently to put the relay inside the relay box on top of the nearside strut top that Phase 2 models have (where the dim-dip and, if fitted, air horn relays are located). Reasoning is to de-clutter the engine bay further, but more importantly, to keep the relay protected from the elements and reduce the chances of it failing.

 

 

Engine loom is ready to go as well, together with a modified rev counter to allow it to work without resorting to the diode method (so called "tacho converters") that I'm not at all keen on, both for the inaccuracy that it can introduce into the tacho reading, and the risk of misfire if any of the diodes begin to break down.

 

I've chosen to make a link-loom to go from the 23-pin circular plug on the VTS engine loom to the two 205 underdash brown plugs, making it long enough to route it through the bulkhead underneath the expansion tank to keep the loom well away from the heat of the GTi-6 exhaust manifold. Some people aren't keen on link-looms, but it does make it quick and easy to disconnect the engine loom and given that it's a proper sealled connector, should be reliable.

 

It also means that I can easily swap the engine loom out if there's any problem with it in the future, as I've wired it so that I can use a completely standard VTS loom if needs be - a few dash gauges won't work, but for diagnostics or to quickly get me running again, it'll work perfectly.

 

On the engine bay loom, I've stripped it down to remove the unused wiring and connections, such as the aircondition and fuel inertia switch. The oil temperature gauge wiring that used to run through the smaller circular plug has been rerouted to go through the larger 23-pin plug, which meant that I could completely remove the smaller plug to further simplify the loom.

 

The VTS loom doesn't have an oil pressure gauge or coolant temperature warning light as standard, so I've reused wiring from the oil level sensor and Bitron sensor for these given that neither is required on a 205 installation. The check engine light is wired up too - not quite sure why most people don't bother wiring this in when the wiring is already in place on later cars.

 

Mind you, it never fails to amaze me the number of things people don't wire up on engine conversions - tacho, oil pressure gauge, half the warning lights... maybe it's just me, but not having everything on the dashboard working bugs the hell out of me. That said, if I'm being honest even one of the dash illumination bulbs not working irritates me...

[damien 22 1 Cars]

just had a read of the full thread, as always with the project threads on here it is a great read.

regarding the 6 converstion have you kept the 205 speedo cable, if so how close is it to the manifold as im still toying with going with a 405 one.

when fitting the engine did you leave the battery tray and and the upper engine mount (cambelt side) on or did you remove them to help with space in the engine bay?

[Anthony 1,003]

just had a read of the full thread, as always with the project threads on here it is a great read.

regarding the 6 converstion have you kept the 205 speedo cable, if so how close is it to the manifold as im still toying with going with a 405 one.

when fitting the engine did you leave the battery tray and and the upper engine mount (cambelt side) on or did you remove them to help with space in the engine bay?

I haven't received the exhaust manifold back from re-angling yet so I can't be absolutely sure on the speedo cable, but certainly from what I've seen on other conversions the 205 cable is a little short and ends up sitting very close to the exhaust manifold. I was planning on using a 106 or 405 cable and seeing what fits - I've got a spare 106 cable and it's certainly a reasonable amount longer than the 205 one.

 

When I test fitted the engine, I removed both the battery tray and the upper engine mount arm. I'm guess that you could probably leave the battery tray in place if you really wanted as it would just mean tilting the engine more to drop it in from the top, but the upper arm I think you'd have to remove - certainly with the cambelt cover and MC fouling issues I had on my particular shell there is no way that I could have moved the offside of the engine back into position with the arm still attached.

[welshpug 1,661]

a ZX is ideal to nab the fan loom from, it looms very much like what you pictured there

[Anthony 1,003]

A little bit more done today, although I'm starting to run out of things that I can do until I get the reangled exhaust manifold back as I'll need to remove the engine again to fit that.

 

Fitted the new cooling fan and engine management link-loom, making it look as OE as possible.

 

 

The link-loom runs through the grommit that normally caries the bonnet release cable, with a hole saw making light work of enlarging the hole sufficiently to fit around the loom. The bulkhead hole is *just* big enough to pass the two brown multi-plugs through, almost as if Peugeot had a crystal ball and designed it that way knowing what people would be doing a couple of decades later - although I suspect the more boring truth is that on LHD cars that hole is used for far more than just the bonnet release cable.

 

Inside the car, the loom runs round the back of the fusebox, across the top of the heater box with the other wiring looms and down to join up with the two plugs in the drivers footwell. With none of the original wiring changed in any way, it would be a very quick and easy job to return the car back to standard as the 8v wiring loom will plug straight in as it did previously.

 

Indeed, other than the slam panel, I don't think that I've altered anything on the car that will prevent it being easily returned to standard in the future should I ever choose to. In my eyes that's the way to do things when modifying cars, although many don't follow the same train of thought - frequently I see cars where they've been converted by chopping the original fixings and wiring meaning that it's very hard to go back.

 

Throttle cable from a 405 diesel was fitted at the same time, as the original 205 GTi cable was far too short. The 405 cable is the correct fitment at both ends and pretty much bang-on length wise, although the outer was a little long and needed shortening by 50mm or so (total length was ~167cm for the inner, and ~152cm for the outer).

 

 

I'd bought a new Valeo (OE) heater matrix from EdCherry a couple of months ago as whilst the one on the car was showing no signs of failure when I MOT'd it back in the summer, I wanted to replace it as a precaution as most original ones are on their last legs now.

 

Imagine my surprise and frustration to find that someone had already replaced the matrix at some point in the last few years, and the Valeo unit fitted was basically as-new and the pipes in excellent condition. I considered refitting the old matrix given that there was no need to replace it, but I decided that seeing as I'm planning on hopefully keeping the car for many years I'd replace it regardless and keep the newish one as a spare.

 

 

Frustration was the story once again when I went to fit the Infinity speakers and discovered that the rear speaker cutouts are fractionally smaller than the fronts - 11.3cm vs 11.9cm - meaning that whilst the speakers fit snuggly in the front, they won't in the back as the speaker basket/cage was 11.6cm wide and thus wouldn't go through the hole

 

I knew that the rear speakers had to be fairly shallow in order to fit, and whilst it was going to be close depth-wise, the speakers should have fit - but I'd not counted on (or heard mentioned before) that the front and rear cutouts were physically different sizes despite nominally using the same size speakers. The screw holes are the same, just the cutout that differs, so I guess that I'll have to take the dremel to it and open them up slightly given there's no space behind the plastic trim for a spacer to get around the problem that way either.

 

Just annoying, as had I realised this I'd have done it before I fitted the interior and seatbelts

 

Obviously speakers aren't important at this stage of the build, but my thinking was that with the rear speakers in place I could then refit the remaining rear plastics and interior trim whilst waiting for the manifold, getting another job done and crossed off the list, and more to the point getting them out of my living room where they (and the speakers) have been sat for months.

 

Best laid plans once again thwarted by illogical French design - should have expected that really, shouldn't I?

[Paul_13 212 1 Cars]

Who did you get to reangle your exhuast manifold again mate? If it's Miles I'm going down to see him this week if your need anything couriering

Edited November 13, 2011 by Paul_13

[harryskid 193]

just had a read of the full thread, as always with the project threads on here it is a great read.

regarding the 6 converstion have you kept the 205 speedo cable, if so how close is it to the manifold as im still toying with going with a 405 one.

when fitting the engine did you leave the battery tray and and the upper engine mount (cambelt side) on or did you remove them to help with space in the engine bay?

 

I had this problem, my cable was starting to cook, so i've made a bracket from the cable to the bulkhead which keeps it away from the manifold. I have just completed 80 stages miles with it and its fine.

[2052006 10]

Nice write-ups as usual Anthony. Looking at that photo of the master cylinder/cambelt cover clearance, I'm wondering what sort of engine mounts you're planning on using?

[SurGie 54]

A good clear write up Anthony.

 

How have you wired up the rev counter to make it more precise ?

 

I like the link loom idea, my well converted loom has only just enough length to the cars inside brown plugs even though iv made a closer hole on the NS bulkhead, so the original seal can seal it up well. Do you have any links of a place that sells the other connection of the link loom, i see you have used the VTS wire loom link it came with ? I still have one side of that plug connection somewhere ?

 

As a tip, iv made the servo holes on mine drilled out more to the NS going up, so hopefully mine will fit well enough. My old MI16 engine was fine but you never know.

[EdCherry 34 1 Cars]

Looking good Ant.

 

Pretty sure his re-angled manifold was from Miles as I took it down there for him (or did it bring it back up?)...

[Anthony 1,003]

Who did you get to reangle your exhuast manifold again mate? If it's Miles I'm going down to see him this week if your need anything couriering

Thanks for the offer Paul, but it's not Miles otherwise I'd have collected it last week when I picked up the gearbox.

 

It's being done by the same welder that does Alastairh's for him as Al was getting a couple done himself, but it's sods law that for whatever reason the guy is taking his sweet time on getting them done - not Al's fault at all, but annoying nevertheless. Still, I'm sure that it'll be done soon.

 

I had this problem, my cable was starting to cook, so i've made a bracket from the cable to the bulkhead which keeps it away from the manifold. I have just completed 80 stages miles with it and its fine.

Interesting, so the 205 cable is just about long enough if you devise a method of keeping it clear of the manifold? Might give it a go with the existing cable after all then given that it's a really good, smooth OE cable that's on there at the moment (and most after market replacement cables don't seem to last)

 

Nice write-ups as usual Anthony. Looking at that photo of the master cylinder/cambelt cover clearance, I'm wondering what sort of engine mounts you're planning on using?

I suspect that I'll have no choice but to use full Group N mounts all round.

 

I didn't really want to, and certainly when I was still planning to run an 8v I was going to go Group N lower mount and all the others standard which keeps the engine from flapping around like a fish out of water but transmits pretty much no vibration through the cabin. Clearly with the lack of horizontal clearance I have with the MC that's not going to work unless I can magic up some additional room from somewhere, so Group N it'll have to be and the never ending game of chase the interior trim rattles...

 

Your 205 still going well? Not heard much from you since you moved

[Anthony 1,003]

A good clear write up Anthony.

 

How have you wired up the rev counter to make it more precise ?

 

I like the link loom idea, my well converted loom has only just enough length to the cars inside brown plugs even though iv made a closer hole on the NS bulkhead, so the original seal can seal it up well. Do you have any links of a place that sells the other connection of the link loom, i see you have used the VTS wire loom link it came with ? I still have one side of that plug connection somewhere ?

 

As a tip, iv made the servo holes on mine drilled out more to the NS going up, so hopefully mine will fit well enough. My old MI16 engine was fine but you never know.

The rev counter has been modified as per the so-called "Pin 1" method - effectively, it just bypasses the aggressive input filtering that is needed when you're driving the rev counter from the coil spike but prevents it working on a GTi-6 or other ECU's that drive the rev counter directly from the ECU.

 

The link loom uses the original plug that the loom plugged into and a length of wiring from the original donor 306 or Xsara, and then that wiring is extended to run through to the brown multiplugs on the 205 side. It's pretty simple to do providing that you've that plug and a length of wire coming out of it.

 

What you could do as an alternative is to pull the brown multiplugs from the drivers footwell back across towards the fusebox and joining them to your converted loom there - should work fine so long as your loom comfortably stretches into the car, just means having to pull the wiring through.

 

Good idea on elongating the servo holes to give a bit of extra movement. When I pull the engine back out I'm going to look at ways to gain a little extra clearance around the MC, so I'll whip off the servo and pedal box and see how much movement I can make - I really only need an few millimetres so slightly elongating the holes might well work

 

Looking good Ant.

 

Pretty sure his re-angled manifold was from Miles as I took it down there for him (or did it bring it back up?)...

You're going back a bit now Ed! That manifold I sold with the previous GTi-6 engine package last year that allye bought off me and installed in his 205 Rallye

[EdCherry 34 1 Cars]

Oh... mistaken I am. Knew if I posted I would be wrong...

[welshpug 1,661]

Good idea on elongating the servo holes to give a bit of extra movement. When I pull the engine back out I'm going to look at ways to gain a little extra clearance around the MC, so I'll whip off the servo and pedal box and see how much movement I can make - I really only need an few millimetres so slightly elongating the holes might well work

 

That's what I did a few years ago fitting a 2.0 Mi16, there's only so much you can move it as the servo will hit the underside of the scuttle panel lip, but it was enough to clear the engine nicely, don't need much space at all tbh as the engine doesn't move in the planes that its close in.

[Fox 3]

It's really nice to see a GTI6 conversion done properly without cutting corners. I have to admit, mine was undertaken at a speed that always had me thinking I could have done better.

 

This is fast becoming one of my favourite project threads, I look forward to the next update!

 

I wish mine was coming together as quick!

[SurGie 54]

Yeah, i managed to elongate the holes at least 4mm at 2 o'clock direction and pre tested fitting the servo as far as it would go and had no problem with the scuttle panel area. My old MI and the MC looked the same as yours, right up against the cam plastic cover. I had GpN mounts, it was perfectly fine for up to 2 years of driving it before the conversion. As said though all 205's are different somewhere on the shell/chassis.

[2052006 10]

 

I suspect that I'll have no choice but to use full Group N mounts all round.

 

I didn't really want to, and certainly when I was still planning to run an 8v I was going to go Group N lower mount and all the others standard which keeps the engine from flapping around like a fish out of water but transmits pretty much no vibration through the cabin. Clearly with the lack of horizontal clearance I have with the MC that's not going to work unless I can magic up some additional room from somewhere, so Group N it'll have to be and the never ending game of chase the interior trim rattles...

 

Your 205 still going well? Not heard much from you since you moved

 

If you didn't want group N mounts all round, you could try a little bit of each method to gain clearance - it certainly does look quite tight! I took the approach of gaining the required clearance by tweaking it a small amount in all places, rather than a lot in one place, ie. spaced up the pedal box a little, spaced up the servo a little, spaced one of these (can't remember which), to the right a little (as you look at it), filed down a bit of the cambelt cover (not enough to go through) and also ground about 1-2mm off the side of the master cylinder. When I cut through an old m/c, the walls were about 5mm thick, so appeared to have some room for 'modification'.

 

This all gained me about 5mm from the cambelt cover which seems to be just about enough, considering I use standard O.E. box and top mounts.

 

Having said that, stiffer mounts all round might be better I suppose, I don't know.

 

My 205 is still going well thanks (that's done it!), used every day, never misses a beat and it's largely been ignored since I've moved as my projects seem to be house based since moving rather than car based .

[welshpug 1,661]

I didn't use any stiffer mounts, just new ones

[james_pug 26 1 Cars]

It's nice to see a project thread written up so well with alot of pictures. What are you planing to use it for after?

[Alastairh 47]

Looking good Ant.

 

As for the manifold, in all respect to my local manifold guy, it was a combination of my and his hectic work load that put a delay on things. Not to worry though, all has been sorted and a 205 16v will be laying 11's shortly in Wiltshire

 

James was tlking about knocking up a adaptor plate for the servo, so would be intresting to know your spacing distances.

 

Al