Laser Green gti6 engine bay tidy .. or thats how it started ...

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Id posted a thread about this when i first bought her in 2018 down near Stonehenge, had been after a laser green gti since id seen one as an 18 year old apprentice but never had the chance of one. 

This came up by chance in the exact spec i was after, a few weeks after viewing she was mine !

 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

So skip forward a few years and the engine bay was beginning to not look its best. A few issues were beginning to crop up and id also began to wonder just how long it had been since the cambelt and water pump had been changed ... time to get the engine out ! 

 

Didn't look too bad with everything in place .. 

 

Bumper & radiator off soon showed the areas that needed a good respray as they had lost a lot of paint over the years 

 

 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

The full front end was stripped down by the end of September last year ... but then as usual life got in the way and progress slowed for a few months until ( of course ) December when it was freezing.... what better time to carry on .

 

By this point id booked a local spray guy who id used for along time to sort the bay out ... and ofc managed to start a list of random stuff that had broken along the way or i now suddenly also decided to replace.

 

Engine now finally out 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Bay now almost ready for painting, a shutdown at work followed by several weekends of unplanned overtime led to a massive rush at the end to have her ready for taking to be painting. 

Id initially just thought of masking off the brake lines etc ... but a fellow members bad influence led to a significant run out to Mr Bakers with a lot of  205 goodies returning with us ... so the rest of the bay was completely stripped.

If its worth doing once its worth doing right, and i don't plan on ever doing this again  

 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Checking out the random concoction of hoses whoever had put the engine in had used ! 

 

Engine out and ready on the stand for painting 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Dropping off day came for painting, luckily wasn't a bad day for it, once again with thanks for the help to @Richie-Van-GTi for the trailer useage and general helping to move it 

Bay as you can see was fully stripped as much as possible. Looking forward to seeing it done.

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

That was two weeks ago .... while ive been waiting a few bits have been sent off to the powder coaters from a spare beam i obtained ... ( still waiting on bits in the blue basket to return ).

 

The bottom arm issues in the other thread haven't helped but surprisingly these arms were too bad in terms of wear ... still ended up buying a new set of 309 gti ones to fit though to the powder coated subframe when back.

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Managed a sneak peek a few days ago to see how she's getting on ... due to pick up this saturday 

[Richie-Van-GTi 71 2 Cars]

Not sure who this bad influence fellow member is, although rumour has it you are the bad influence on him. 

[Gaz D 6]

Awesome work mate. Something special about the laser greens 

[Leslie green 109]

Nice one Chris I do love a laser , just wish mine was done as fed up waiting on it now and its me is the hold up lol 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

On 3/28/2024 at 10:55 PM, Leslie green said:

Nice one Chris I do love a laser , just wish mine was done as fed up waiting on it now and its me is the hold up lol 

Hopefully this thread might give you the motivation , yours so far did for me 

Edited March 31 by chris 417 mi

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

So Saturday came …. 
 

 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Having to unload one at a time from my phone >,<

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Bit more progress over the last few weekends 

 

Started the job i was dreading the most , the removal and replacement of the fuel pipes and brake lines under the car.

As it turned out it was far easier than imagined and they just literally  fell off, glad  i was talked into replacing them whilst doing the bay as they were well past their best ( as expected for being the original units ).

Work took longer than expected due to the visit by a queen bee looking for a new hive location as i was half under the car .

Very impressed with the new lines from Bakers fit a treat ! 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

With the lines now in it was time to start adding the parts back into the bay, the washer bottle was looking very very old and dirty.

Soon sorted with a cup of rice, vinegar and some bleach filled up and left in a carrier bag for 30 mins, came out far better than expected ! Painted the bracket black for good measure while it was apart too. 

This in hindsight has turned into a bigger job as now i've had to paint every bracket black  otherwise they will stand out in the clean bay. 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Wiper motor assembly back in ( after disassembling to also paint the plated and arms black ), all the parts able to be cleaned have been ( removing 30+years worth of grime and oil).

One kitchen sink and lots of washing up liquid did a far better job than i expected on most of the bits ( perks of living alone with no one to have a winge at me ).

Made a start on the wiring loom aswell, cleaning connections as its dressed in and taping up the corrugated copex loom protector neatens it up a lot  ( Sparky by trade so this is readily available). 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Few more, loom is pretty much in now but needs the plug ends taking apart and contacts cleaning as some look like they've been at the bottom of the sea and haven't a hope in hell of giving a good connection. 

Hopefully this weekend will get the headlights fitted and possibly the subframe swapped over for the powder coated one, may have made a mistake with that as i chose dark grey rather than black ( Which now in hindsight clearly looks far better) 

[Leslie green 109]

Its coming together nicely now Chris ,good work  The baker brake  lines are nice and straight , I just bought the fuel lines for mine .

Edited April 18 by Leslie green

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

On 4/18/2024 at 9:50 AM, Leslie green said:

Its coming together nicely now Chris ,good work  The baker brake  lines are nice and straight , I just bought the fuel lines for mine .

Cheers  taking slightly longer than expected but want to get it right and not have to do it again.

I've seen the comments on yours about the vapor blasted box ... just had mine done aswell and very pleased with the results.

Before and after .. even got in the advert 

[Leslie green 109]

Makes a huge difference,mine looked brown with rust , shame only the motman will see it lol  Thats the sort of pic made me mad to get a laser they just suit the colour so well.

Edited April 19 by Leslie green

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Few more things happened this weekend, i had planned on getting the subframe off after doing the water pump and cambelt and cleaning all the electrical connectors on the lighting plugs ... but amazon said no you can wait till monday for the connector cleaners. 

The subframe got looked at too late in the day but al least the cambelt and water pump got changed ! 

Getting the engine off the stand onto the crane was skittish on my own ... it wanted to fall to the left more than once .

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Didn't actually get a photo of the cambelt after fitting .

 

Waterways didn't look too bad at all !  Good chance to clean the cambelt cover before refitting ... fairy liquid works wonders .

 

So im at the stage now of fitting the Bakers thermostat housing and new stat and awaiting the arrival back of the vts box ! 

 

The plan now will be deciding what to do with the power steering pump and rack i've bought .... still need the hoses and brackets to fit and ofc a new alternator belt etc if i do go that route. 

 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

On 4/19/2024 at 2:39 PM, Leslie green said:

Makes a huge difference,mine looked brown with rust , shame only the motman will see it lol  Thats the sort of pic made me mad to get a laser they just suit the colour so well.

Yeah it does , this is true but .... at least you know its looking its best .

It did with me, the one that was at ICI when i was 18 with my graphite grey 1.6 made me want to swap right then, didn't see another that colour for 2-3 years after.

This and the miami blue suits these cars so well. 

[chris 417 mi 34 2 Cars]

Gearbox is back from the rebuilders, new bearings and seals should be good for a looong time ( hopefully) the clutch arm pin is still to fit yet.

After the vapour blasting its insane how much info the dirt hides ...