205GTI rally car barn find

[Richard309Sri XU5JA 205GTi 8]

that all sounds ok - actually really good, better than just ok - to me;

yeah agreed, with that info the servo sounds good/working fine.

[28hodge 22]

sooo, I’ve just driven it to the MOT garage ready for tomorrow. See how it gets on.

 

Taken way longer to sort the final little snags out than I wanted, and that’s partly down to a handbrake cable that I ordered 2 weeks ago and have been waiting for it to land till yesterday. I ordered 2 online via eBay at the same time one turned up and one didn’t, after being ignored for a couple days they eventually sent me another out but on the slowest parcel delivery available.

 

On the brakes front I took the compensator out of the system and re-bled it all just so I could satisfy myself that all the air was out and they were working, with a pedal feel I was happy with, this done I still didn’t like the feel with little resistance in the top 1/3 of the pedal stroke with the drum correctly adjusted up etc. so as a double check I ordered a new M/C as having checked it appeared I had been sent a 19mm M/C when I bought one at the start of the year and either hadn’t realised it was 19mm or didn’t at the time realise that it needed/should have a 21mm M/C. Whilst I was waiting for that to turn up with the handbrake cable I plumbed the compensator back in and did loads of little snagging jobs, assuming that the new 21mm M/C would solve all my worldly problems!!

 

It didn’t, I still don’t like the feel of the pedal in the first 1/3 of the pedal stroke, it is moving the calipers and slaves and the drum are scraping with no brake applied so correctly adjusted, I cleaned all the slide/retainer wedges on the Bendix calipers and I get a little improvement but not what I want.

 

That said on an extended test drive off the highway (it is fully insured but not MOT’d taxed) it’ll lock up all 4 wheels, that said the rears lock a little too easily for my liking so I think I’ll also plumb in a bias valve I have sat on the shelf and reduce them again after the compensator.

 

So snagging wise I wanted to look at the following as I had time –

Fan surround and fan wiring surround was broken and repaired but rubbed and the fan wiring was via a switch and no off the temp sensor. Replacement fan and surround along with the diesel relays bought and wiring amended and that was sorted, I haven’t wired the relays in as it hasn’t got a thermostat in it and it seems to not get overly hot fast.

Rally mudflaps fitted to protect the inner arches etc, I also need to have a look at the fuel hose protective plate yet.

Began cleaning up the sumpguard and fuel tank guards.

Dash binnacle out and bulbs changed and 25years worth of farm muck and dust cleaned out. The brake light warning wasn’t working as the bulb was dead.

Fresh set of pads and I put a poly strip wheel to the discs just to give them a clean.

Schultz underneath it and the inner arches and went crazy with the tiger seal.

Tried in vain the get the interior light to work off the door switched but I don’t seem to have a permanent live up to the light only a switched live for the map light, as an aside I only have the map light in my interior light housing as the interior light has been cut off as the roll bar interferes  with it, but I was going to leave the map light pointing one way and use that as my interior as I need to wire in the Avanti map light and the Poti light plus trip anyway.

Changed the wheels from the ones I was using complete with 25year old Michelin gravel forest tyres to the uniroyals that the other 205 has been sat on.

I doubt it’ll fail on anything major but I do think its developing a little bit of a grumble from a bearing but all the wheels seem quiet when jacked up but when driving along I feel like there is a grumbling noise, however as I have no rear seatbelts all the rear seats are out so that the MOT wont fail on them. So it may just be the lack of sound deadening that making it sound a little grumbly.

Also lets say, hypothetically, if I nail it on my extended off the public highway test drive in second to fourth it is keen on backfiring and popping when I come off the throttle and it also does on a heel and toe downshift. So the emissions may be off, it runs a straight through Exhaust with only a back box which I would image has little silencing in it anymore. I have had a check for a leak on the manifold and there is nothing obvious.

 

See what tomorrow brings but it’s nice enough to drive with no big bangs or knocks so it should only fail on something small if anything, well at least I hope so!

 

[28hodge 22]

Happy days - it Passed! 

 

Still wants some fettling so that I am happy and I need to wire the trip in etc.

[28hodge 22]

I have been searching the forum a lot. I have rebuilt  and have the 205 on the road now and have put a few miles on it to see what now needs sorting. It seems to run well but isn't too keen on running well in the higher RPM range, checking the plugs it would appear to be running lean. it also pops on the over run when you press the clutch to change gear which having read some posts this could be a symptom of lean running.

 

When driving it feels strangled at 4500rpm but not all the time, it drives nicely anywhere below that range and will go above 4500, but if you tried to redline it through 2nd to 5th its hitting this soft limiter almost at 4500ish.

 

also meant to say, its got a fresh fuel filter fresh 98ron fuel spark plugs were new, however I haven't changed the HT leads dizzy rotor arm or cap. I need to check the valve clearances but it isn't tappety, however the injectors are pretty noisy. I have used the screwdriver in the ear method to figure out that it is them making the noise.

 

As the issue is revving beyond 4500ish could it be a failing AMP? I have a couple others I could try on it and have some transfer paste I could put on at the same time?

 

Car is a stock 1.6gti, This is the best looking plug which is from the timing belt end - cylinder 4

 

Cylinder 3

 

Cylinder 2

 

 I think they look lean but appreciate the color will be mostly from idle as these pics weren't following a plug chop.

 

I have read and think I understand the AFM and to richen up rotate it 1-2 teeth at a time anti clockwise. I'll mark the position prior to moving anything so can always revert back.

 

The Injectors were sent away and cleaned so they should be fine, I do not have a fuel pressure regulator so can't check that. I have got it booked to go on a rolling road with a guy that has built plenty of hillclimb 205's etc. But he can't do that till back end of next week so just looking for a fix that sees the engine safe till then. I don't need to use the car as it is not my daily but I'd like to get some miles on it to see what else is in need of sorting out, it just needs some test miles putting on it.

 

Happy its not the head gasket and it is purely a AFM issue, not using water and the oil appears A OK, but have only done maybe 1-200 miles in it  the MOT CO reading was 0.39 which seems very low with Hydrocarbons at 160ppm, the tick over is quite high though at around 1600rpm, I have no real history as to what's been changed and played with previously, but the AFM does look like it may have been opened in the past.

 

Really just looking for a little advice on the plugs color (I know its not ideal as it'll mainly show idle running) but also the pops I get when I come off the throttle and the stunted acceleration around 4500 and above rpm I think are lean running symptoms?

 

Thanks

Kurt

[28hodge 22]

Solved the above, turned out the snorkel on the car wasn't a gti snorkel that's made of hard plastic, but a base model snorkel that was made out of very soft plastic that collapsed and starved the engine of air at higher RPM. Snorkel removed and will rev right through to 6k rpm.

 

I have also whipped the hubs off and took them plus the new bearings to a guy with a press and had them fitted, £20 and a couple hours later all fit back up and thankfully the annoying rumble that was just noticeable has disappeared, I was starting to think it was a gearbox or diff bearing as when jacked up the wheel bearing seemed quiet and good and was never picked up on the mot.

 

Good job too as we have a 12 car on the 27th, going with my brother who hasn't done any rally nav before so we will see how we get on, anything beyond a finish I'll take as a result.

[28hodge 22]

12 wasn't great, actually I'll correct that, the 12 car was great, but we weren't particularly great. Took my brother as Nav who announced 2 days before the 12 car that he hasn't looked at an O.S Map since he did his Duke of Edinburgh!!

 

So I hastily plotted a route on some back lanes I know and put him in the car with the potty to practice. he struggled but managed a bit. but I was less than confident, I don't expect to win these as to be honest I've never done a night rally or 12 car all the stuff I have done previous is HRCR daytime events, but I'd like to be competitive.

 

Anyway we were in Novice so got the route 30min prior to our start and managed to plot (well I did) the first 5 but short on time to get to MTC1 we had to leave the last section and at the time I was hoping he'd have gotten the hang of things and we could plot and bash it. Wishful thinking!!

 

So the first section went well, right up to the 3rd instruction where he found himself lost, from here on out I gave up on being anything approaching competitive and used it purely as a shakedown and test of the car. He found his way again and he actually did pretty well on the rest of the first selective into MTC2. he managed to get lost instantly leaving MTC2 and took us on a loop which saw us coming back to MTC2 again a couple minutes later. Anyway second attempt he found his way and with a few errors we got round to the end of section 2.

 

Although one of his errors was not telling me that over a brow was a sharp downhill 90 right into 90left chicane!! squeaky bum time.

 

But to be honest, after scrubbing off as much speed as I could, in the space I had, I came off the brakes, slung it into the right and the thing went round nicely. I did think we were in for a shunt though when I came over the brow!! 

 

I had said that the only thing he needed to stay on top of was letting me know where steep descents were, or anything that looked sharp!! Then again, in hindsight, if you don't know where you are on the map most of the time, telling me what was coming up was always going to be tricky!!

 

We had a non competitive section to MTC4 then MTC5 which was the one I hadn't managed to get plotted! However he got us really lost! Coupled with a new rattle appearing and knowing we were well out the running and likely to be OTL to MTC5 at best, we headed back to the final MTC (A Pub) and handed in our timecard for what it was worth.

 

Now I can only assume others had problems and/or Stevie Wonder had come for a drive out, but we were neither last nor 2nd to last, in fact we were 9th.

 

The car ran fine, but had a hell of a clutch judder that I wasn't liking and also a really funny rattle at slow speeds in 1-3rd gears, nothing horrendous but a rattle all the same. the car is on the clutch it came with, which like the rest of it had sat for 25 years, so I decided to pull the gearbox off and have a look at the flywheel for hotspots that might be causing the judder and put a fresh clutch, clutch release bearing and pressure plate into it. Plus I could swap the driver side driveshaft at the same time as I have a good one sat on the shelf and see if that eliminated the rattle. The car at 50mph above so cruising speeds etc was fine and sounded 100%

 

Anyway couple hours had the clutch off and I found the cause of the judder...

 

 

4 Paddle SACHs clutch, nothing wrong with it or the flywheel etc, but if you don't know its there and try to drive the car as though it has a standard clutch then it'll judder like buggery!!

 

debating whether to put it back in or to put the std clutch back in. Car is pretty much bone stock so it hasn't got to handle massive power or torque, however this one will never get hot and slip if abused for 60-80 miles of an evening on a rally

Edited February 2, 2022 by 28hodge

[Tom Fenton 1,541]

Leave the paddle in. With tall gravel tyres and constant stop starts the 200mm GTI clutch isn't up to the job.

[28hodge 22]

44 minutes ago, Tom Fenton said:

Leave the paddle in. With tall gravel tyres and constant stop starts the 200mm GTI clutch isn't up to the job.

Glad you've said that, as last night I bench pressed and put the box back in on my own and have reinstalled the paddle clutch with the fresh pressure plate and release bearing. I wasn't keen on having to take it back out.

[SweetBadger 94]

2 hours ago, 28hodge said:

Glad you've said that, as last night I bench pressed and put the box back in on my own and have reinstalled the paddle clutch with the fresh pressure plate and release bearing. I wasn't keen on having to take it back out.

One of my most hated jobs! Handy tip, stick a ratchet-strap around the strut brace and under the box - you can use it to take the weight of the box and even hoist it up to the right height.

Edited February 3, 2022 by SweetBadger

[28hodge 22]

Sent the car away to a local Peugeot 205&106 specialist for him to stick on the rolling road & get it running bang on. Overall he was happy with it, initial run at 76bhp at the wheels and with a tweak of the fueling and timing he got it to 84bhp. He said std 1.6gtis never make more than 85bhp on his dyno. So it’s a good as it’s going to get.

 

I need to get it tracked really as it’s just off, but I set it by eye then finer adjusted using a tape. It pretty close but may as well be 100%. Also need to figure out how to set the grpA bottom arms without having to dismantle the entire hub. Might just get some adjustable top mounts been aiming at 1deg negative and got .8 one side and .95 the other, only way I can adjust is via the rose joint at the bottom in 180deg increments. Ie turn the rose joint half a turn out. But don’t want them wound out very far, currently they are only about 4 threads out. Not keen on having them any further out.

 

12car on the 24th and have an entry for the shaw trophy targa up in the Ottoburn plantation which is looking likely to be really good.

Edited February 20, 2022 by 28hodge

[28hodge 22]

We had the Shaw trophy rally on Sunday, it was a great event that was only let down by being set up a little to tight, and by the fact the land owner of the plantation it was in wanted to limit the amount of roads the organiser could use. This was because it was the first time they had used this land for a targa and the landowner didn't want excessive damage done to the smooth gravel tracks, as such this was a tester.

 

These two things combined to cause quite a lot of cutting up of the tracks, even though we were all limited to std road pattern tyres only.

 

Because of the limited mileage they had allowed to be used and the fact the club wanted to give tests of a decent length/time there was only 2 tests run 3 times in the morning each and then 3 times in the afternoon in reverse each, test one was circa 3min 30 to 4min 30 with test 2 circa 5min30 to 6min30 dependent on your ability.

 

This meant each test would see approx 294 passes each all on gravel where the surface was dressed with maybe 20-30 mm sized stone with a sub-base below of 5-10mm gravel.

 

I think it was quite tight, as in the cones moved the apex of a nice open 90 right that would have been nice a flowing and somewhere near 30mph mid corner speed 2nd gear nicking 3rd on the exit (so rightly to stay in targa regs of an avg speed of 30) required slowing down with a cone. However I think the cone was pushed too far to the outside with them placed about 5-6ft from the outer edge of the track, as such this created the need to brake and handbrake round then hard accelerate away from a hairpin and this dug deep ruts on every corner, my 205 is set up reasonably high, the sump guard wash dragging in a lot of locations. in a few locations where there wasn't a cone on a corner or some sections that let us use a more sweeping line round a series of 3 cones through a bus stop type set up the degradation to the track was far less.

 

I really hope these two miscalculations by the landowner in not providing a little more mileage so limiting the number of passes and allowing a couple more test locations,. And then the organiser creating such a tight route hasn't put the landowner off allowing more events to be run in the plantation, as this was a test event really to see how things went.

 

Our day went well, to a point. My brother hasn't done much really, couple 12 cars with me as a shakedown for this car (they haven't gone well, car been fine navigator struggling on the maps) and one other targa, with his mate where i marshalled as I hadn't got the car complete.

 

Anyway the fact we were at car 38, it was all on gravel and the navigating was simple, as in 90 round a cone and there wasn't multiple cones close to each other, meant that we did correct tests all day, as I could see the route a lot of the time from the tracks in the gravel. The only dodgy moments we had was were we were on open track round sweeping bends so fir the later runs I put a pacenote, as in medium fast left, on them or a caution.

 

The final corner of test 2,4,6 was a open 180 wide downhill right, a lot of fun was had on this corner!

 

Up to lunch we were going well and despite it being rougher on each pass our times were coming down nicely, I was a bit annoyed with nudging 2 cones on the second loop, one in test 3 and another in test 4, both with the front inside corner as I nipped it to tight on the handbrake, I never ran them over just nudged them, and then got a bit greedy on the brakes for a stop astride and went past it by a metre so had to reverse, then to make it worse, sodding stalled and it wasn't keen on starting, not ideal! and actually was a foreshadowing of problems to come after lunch!!

 

unloaded and warming up for scruit

 

test 2 start

 

[28hodge 22]

Lunch after the first 3 loops of 2 tests each repeated meant we were halfway through. The sun was blazing and although the air temp it was cold outside  in the car with the sun coming through the windscreen it was lovely. I had been suffering with a cold and feeling cold for a couple days before so the warmth was very welcome. However I was feeling pretty rubbish at lunch as I hadn’t had a great nights sleep and as said was suffering from a cold. As such I maybe lacked a bit of enthusiasm to check the car over quite a thoroughly as I should.  

 

We gave the car a very quick once over, I checked and put a couple hundred ml of oil into it but other than that all was/or seemed to be ok. Lunch was meant to be an hour, but seemed to be nearer 2 to be honest. I Think they did a bit of grading of some of the more severe ruts but I am not sure.

 

We hadn’t  looked at the results during the morning so as to avoid getting sucked into trying to hard and doing something stupid. But a quick look at lunch and we were going OK, 3^rd in class and 25^th O/A. I was a little annoyed though, one for the 3 daft errors I had made with my driving, nudging 2 coneas and the stop astride and then stall and sturggle to restart. My errors, my faults, but cost us in total approx. 35secs.

 

The other annoyance was that somehow, Historic Novice cars, which was our class had gotten seeded at car 8&9. Not sure how thet got seeded that far up but they were benefitting from far smoother roads than us 30 cars further back!

 

You could tell it had benefitted them as on loops 1 & 2 they were a bit quicker than us, come loop 3 where it was rough for all we’d beaten them by a good few seconds!

 

Anyway all that was nearly irrelevant, as after sitting around for nigh on 2 hours enjoying the sun and warmth I fired the car up for loop 4 and the first of the tests in reverse, only it didn’t want to start, it turned over for quite a while but wouldn’t catch. The car has always had a little issue with the ignition, if you rotate the key all the way round, it’ll never start, you have to let it rotate anti clockwise a couple degrees and then it’ll catch, I’d always put this down to a quirk, more to come on this later!

 

It eventually caught, but sounded like a tractor!! The exhaust had come apart at the joint under the car, Bother or summat like that was said! Anyway quickly put back together in the queue out of MTC2 and transport to T7 which was the longer test run in reverse, and all was fine, so off we went to see how we got on.

 

The test appeared to me to be a bit smoother and we went well, set a good time and a good 12 seconds quicker than 2^nd in class,

 

Now this is where our day started to go downhill and we ran into issues. Sat in the queue for T8 a car a couple ahead of us slid off in the test, we were next but one to go into the test, but turned the car off so as to avoid it getting hot. And the ignition and key felt really odd when I turned it.

 

I tried to turn the key to start the car, the ignition would come on but it would crank at all, I suspected that the ignition barrel had failed, the marshalls said they’d bump us into the test if needed so we weren’t screwed but something with the ignition barrel was causing problems. Low and behold just as the marshalls were about to bump us the the ignition worked and she started up.

 

T8 the reverse of the shorter test was very rough, especially in one spot where it was dragging the belly of the car and really we just went through that section sensible to make sure we didn’t completely belly out. Then we had our only nav issue on the tests all day, I heard head left we were flat in 3^rd at a guess and I was looking for a cone, couldn’t see one and had about 300yrds till the t junction at the top of the road where I presumed there was a cone to head left. Errr no

 

My error as there wasn’t a cone just a left dogleg into a bus stop type section. By the time I had realised that I wasn’t looking for a cone and just an oblique left, I was too fast and to committed to going straight, so anchored on, sailed past the left fully locked up. Banged it in reverse, got caught out by the paddle clutch and stalled, and guess what, the ignition barrel didn’t want to work.

 

About 20 attempts with the key and finally it worked and started us up, reversed and finished the test. However about 200yrds from the end the starter and ignition barrel all started to have a fit. The starter jammed on and smoke started to emerge from all over the place.

 

I am not the greatest electrician but I don know that when the smoke starts coming out of the wires then its very hard to get it back in again!!

 

We got to the stop astride at the finish, then knocked off the master switch and bailed out to shove it out the way of the test end. A quick look round, I had seen smoke out of the dash and binnacle and my brother had seen it from the bonnet. Having stopped for couple minutes nothing appeared to be on fire and the ignition was working but there was no getting the starter to turn.

 

Wanting to avoid a retirement, we managed to bump it and get it going so we want back to the MTC to see what we could do.

 

My brother was very keen on smashing bits of trim and hotwiring all sorts of things, however as the ignition itself was fine and the car seemed to be running fine once started, the problems appeared to be more the cranking phase of the ignition barrel and now thanks to the antics at the end of T8 likely the starter motor and wiring to it that seemed to have gone all “French” on us, I was more inclined to see if we could either just keep it running and hope the queues and waits for the tests weren’t too bad, or bump it if we need to.

 

So we handed the timecard in at the end of loop 4 having lost approx. 20seconds thanks to the stall and went round to the start of loop 5. The MTC out was on a hill handily.

 

T9 went fine and again another decent time but I was driving the car nicely now as I think the old girl really only wanted a half day out, up to lunch it had run great, after lunch, not so much!

 

T10 was a repeat of T8 and appeared to be where all our bad luck would occur as again we had an issue. The queue for the stage was big but on a hill so starting for the stage was not a problem. They had also cut out the really horrendously deep rough section so that was good. The car cutting out (I think the ignition got jolted by a bit bump and turned the key slightly knocking it off) was less good, and although we were rolling along and at a decent speed the ignition must have been in the wrong position as it wouldn’t bump. So we came to a stop just before a chicane round 2 cones after a downhill hairpin right.

 

We hopped out shoved it out the way then bumped it again, hopped back in, reversed back 20yrds to the cone went round the chicane as we should and then drove to the test end. We didn’t get penalised for a wrong test thankfully but did drop 1min.40secs to it.

 

Before the test we were told that they were only going to run the longer test on the last loop so that thankfully was the last run through T8-10 as T12 was cancelled. So as we only had one test left we decided to carry on and finish.

T11 was forgettable, the queue waiting for it was massive prob about 25 secs, and then we struggled bumping it and when we did, the exhaust came apart at the clamp again, so we just drove through the stage at a reasonable pace but were 25secs slower than our previous best!

 

Ah well we finished and got 3^rd in class. and spent 56mins on gravel tests.

 

Big thanks and all credits for the pics go to CWL Rally Pictures

Edited March 24, 2022 by 28hodge