Grahams81-Leon 4wd, Big Turbo - Back in the saddle :-)

[Ronin225]

Looking forward to the weekeds updates but weather doesnt look brilliant so dont know how you'll fair
Also on a side note checked vagcat and both BAM and AEB are 10mm headstuds but the BAM are 15mm longer (m10x80 whereas AEB m10x65)
So is a BAM head physically deeper or the studs engage deeper in block and head??

 

[grahams81]

Looking forward to the weekeds updates but weather doesnt look brilliant so dont know how you'll fair
Also on a side note checked vagcat and both BAM and AEB are 10mm headstuds but the BAM are 15mm longer (m10x80 whereas AEB m10x65)
So is a BAM head physically deeper or the studs engage deeper in block and head??

Hi Ronin,
Not too sure about the headstuds being different, if your gonna buy the AEB head just measure it up against the BAM one.

Anyhow back on topic -

I faired alright today, the rain held off all day.
Quite happy as i managed to get quite a bit of welding done, started off by welding a couple of tacks round the wheel arch so there was minimal distortion.
I then welded sections about 1" at a time this allowed it to cool to reduce the chance of burning through.
There was a spot at the bottom of the wheel arch that i managed to burn through - i just built it up with weld (its not pretty but my friend the seam sealer will hide it nicely)

Couple of pics -

This one shows the inside - i've welded in the old spot weld holes

Managed to use up all my argon gas so i've got to pop upto Newcastle in the morning to get it refilled.

Just got to weld the passenger side wheelarch inside & out then i can get the rear axle back on.
I was planning to get the car watertight before winter but i'm sick off the weather so now my new plan is to get the car off the axle stands and in the garage.
I've got to do some serious tidying / sorting to get the car in the garage but the thought of being able to work under cover is too tempting.
My dads been after our lasses VFR400 for a while so i am gonna let him have it, put my unfinished GSXR in my shed.....might be able to just squeeze it in then.

Will update again tomorrow, so long folks.

 

[grahams81]

Well i've done alright this weekend, all the welding is done

The only thing i've left to do now is build a back panel to mate the boot floor to the back of the shell.

So next weekends job is going to be removing the main carpet / centre console and start cleaning the inside up, i need to wirebrush all the welds and paint / seal them all.
I will paint the inside up once i have welded in the rollcage mountings in place.
Might try and get the car back on 4 wheels too.

 

[cupra-barn]

Great to see it all coming together.

A roof over it is unbeatable, weather means nothing then, get a nice little heater on the go and wolla!

 

[grahams81]

Great to see it all coming together.

A roof over it is unbeatable, weather means nothing then, get a nice little heater on the go and wolla!

Cheers mate, eye a roof will be nice, already got a heater in and a big ass mecury vapour light i "borrowed" from work - its like working 6" away from the sun

 

[grahams81]

Update time, Really happy with todays progress -

The aim was to get the front hubs stripped so i could get them powder coated. I tried ages to get the driveshafts out of the hubs but the cap head screw was tight as hell - even my windy gun wouldn't shift the screw.
Then i had a look on VAGCAT to have a see if i had missed something, found out the audi tt front end i bought off ebay must be from a 3.2 version (3.2 ones use a large cap screw to bolt the wheel bearing in - 1.8T ones use a nut).... so this means the drive shafts probably arn't gonna fit... arse !

I wire brushed all the welds in the wheel arches, i then gave them a lick of etching primer. to protect them untill it's sealed.. Still have to seam seal them up but didn't have a brush and i couldn't be arsed to pop out.

I then split the rear axle assembly into 3. I disconnected the tie bars from the hubs and then disconnected the driveshafts. This was done to lighten it so i could get it installed on my own in bits.

Used my handy ratchet straps and a trolley jack to get the diff assembly lifted up into place -

Bolted it down and then started installing the hubs.

Feeling rather happy myself to get this far i dug the rear wheels out of the shed and cut one of the original rear coil springs in half to use on the rear as i don't have any 4wd coilsprings yet. (don't worry i not planning on running the springs - there just there so i can move the car around / get it in the garage)

Can't believe i am this far now and got the car back on all 4's -

Couple of shots of the underneath -

Gonna start clearing the garage out tomoro

 

[James23Parkin]

As always Graham, in complete admiration of your commitment and progress.

Can I ask, is the idea with the project to be 'function over fashion' - track day car as apposed to a show ground car? Or something in the middle? I should imagine that mechanically it is demanding enough but to refurb/refinish every part will be a labour intensive and time consuming process.

Most of us have had this dream idea for our cars, and for me, with a frustrating eye for detail, it would probably take me an age to 'finish' the project, with me steering it towards show and shine standards...

Hats off to you buddy! Please keep us updated!

James

 

[grahams81]

As always Graham, in complete admiration of your commitment and progress.

Can I ask, is the idea with the project to be 'function over fashion' - track day car as apposed to a show ground car? Or something in the middle? I should imagine that mechanically it is demanding enough but to refurb/refinish every part will be a labour intensive and time consuming process.

Most of us have had this dream idea for our cars, and for me, with a frustrating eye for detail, it would probably take me an age to 'finish' the project, with me steering it towards show and shine standards...

Hats off to you buddy! Please keep us updated!

James

Hi James, thanks for your comments mate. As the project has evolved my plans have changed a bit - originally it was gonna be a road legal track car, totally stripped and basically bare.....
Now i'm planning on basically rebuilding the car, i want to powder coat all the wishbones / hubs etc and fitting poly bushes to it all. New wheel bearings...etc etc.
I too have an anoying eye for detail....bordering on ocd !
I have really had to rain myself in on this project as i could have been welding / grinding for the rest of my life even though i was sure i had good penetration but it wasn't pretty enough (even though you could'nt see any of it !!!)

So with my ocd it will never be a true function over form, everything must fit perfect or it will bother me, its not gonna be a fashion slag either just something inbetween.
I would like to show the car but it'll never be a true show car, it will having a fairly hard second life on the road and track.

Inside will be two buckets or really good recliners, cage and im thinking door cards as they look a bit naff without them and there not that heavy really.
May even put some thin carpet down inside just to cover the metal but i'll decide later on.
Gonna go with the LCR bumpers / side skirts as i love the look... The only difference will be supercopa wings on.
Think with a nice set of wheels and cooilovers it will look nice... Oh and a full respray

 

[Ronin225]

Looking good graham, making headway
You can get 1 piece carbon fibre door cards for the leon if you wanted it to keep it clean looking
Will you be running the stock size rear ARB you have or will you be looking at an enlarged one?

 

[grahams81]

Looking good graham, making headway
You can get 1 piece carbon fibre door cards for the leon if you wanted it to keep it clean looking
Will you be running the stock size rear ARB you have or will you be looking at an enlarged one?

Hi Ronin, Feel like ive reached a real milestone, i'm really excited and its really spurring me on for more......must admit a couple of weeks ago i was feeling down on the project, just with the amount of work still to do.

Mmmm carbon door cards sound good, will have a look for them. Im gonna stick with the standard ARB's for a while... Will change them in time but got too much to buy at the moment

 

[m0rk]

You might find you don't need or want to change the arb with the weight reduction, and ability to adjust the rear suspension a little

 

[tyrer]

Impressive mate, would be lovely just mint I reckon so much 1off bits you don't need much exterior wise just really clean I reckon.

What you have planned?

 

[grahams81]

Impressive mate, would be lovely just mint I reckon so much 1off bits you don't need much exterior wise just really clean I reckon.

What you have planned?

Cheers, Tyrer.. i'm thinking the same keeping it OEM looking LCR with a nice set of rims and lowered.
On the wheel front i'm thinking BBS's - loved the Sport Classics 2's on my old 911, may go that way or maybe CM's......

Still got to buy the LCR bumpers / skirts yet.
I'm not gonna use the rear arch extensions i bought, don't think they will work with the Supercopa wings.
Depending on how the project goes over the winter i may cut the rear arches just where they start to flare out from the main body, pull them out a bit and weld back in fillets....but kinda just want it finished now.

 

[grahams81]

Well started to clear the garage out today, managed to get my bike into the shed and start clearing up.
The urge to work on the car got the better of me though, i thought i will just try the roll cage in so i wheeled the car down to the bottom of the drive and what was going to be 10min job turned into me working on the biggest jigsaw puzzle without a picture.

I tried several times to get the cage in but from the drivers / back door then the boot but everytime it was just a little bit out... spent about 2hr p*ssing about then removed the centre console.
I started thinking maybe it wasn't gonna fit because of the higher boot floor of the s3... but just before i gave in i tried the other side and managed to get it in the passenger front door.

Wiggled it nearly into place and took some piccys -

I then removed the carpets / sound deadening from the floor.
Once the heavens opened i got back to clearing the garage, hopefully get it finished next weekend and get on with the build.
So long for now.

 

[thePHILosipher]

i have to say kudos to you sir, just read from 1-12 and it was a great read, looking forward to the first time you fire her up - you must get a video of the moment

 

[grahams81]

i have to say kudos to you sir, just read from 1-12 and it was a great read, looking forward to the first time you fire her up - you must get a video of the moment

Cheers bud, i will make sure i get some vids up when she's running / powersliding round local round abouts !!!

 

[grahams81]

Thought i better update the thread, don't have to much to write about as i've been clearing the garage out.
My mate give me a hand to take all the scrap from the back garden that i cut out off the s3 shell & cupra shell to a local scrap metal yard.
I was pleasantly suprised when we weighed it all in and got 87 quid.

Anyway i have heard from John @ Treadstone Performance that they have had confirmation from Borg Warner that the EFR turbos will be delivered in a couple of weeks, so it should be in my grubby mits by Mid October.

Finished clearing the garage out today and rolled the car in -

Really pleased with getting the car in the garage for the winter, i am now no longer at the mercy of the crap british weather.

Gonna start stripping out the headlining and trim tomorrow then try and get the front part of the rollcage in.
Thanks for reading,
Graham.

 

[INA]

Anyway i have heard from John @ Treadstone Performance that they have had confirmation from Borg Warner that the EFR turbos will be delivered in a couple of weeks, so it should be in my grubby mits by Mid October.

Good luck...
We have had (10) 7670's on order since September 2010. No way anyone who placed an order between July and now will get one before all the back dated orders are fill filled....

 

[Damoegan]

Thats not good news

 

[grahams81]

Good luck...
We have had (10) 7670's on order since September 2010. No way anyone who placed an order between July and now will get one before all the back dated orders are fill filled....

Hopefully Treadstone ordered them a long time ago, i'm sure they'll be worth the wait though, plus there not holding my project back at the moment far too much to do.

Thats not good news

Not good news at all, but if the turbo turns up this side of christmas i will be happy... still got quite a bit of fabricating to do, plus car needs painting and all the bodywork sorting, so i won't be getting bored for a while

Just a small update before i go away on holiday to spain for a week, did a couple of hours on the car today.
I put the front half of the rollcage in, lined it up best i could...the back wasn't sitting right, its almost like the dimensions are all wrong.
The front part of the cage follows the shape of the dash, after i got the front in position i had a sit in and really wasn't happy with the position of the bars, they really block visability and i think they would be a pain to live with.

So after a rethink i have decided to have the car more civilised and run the back half of the cage with doorcards and full carpets.

I removed the cage (managed to smash the windscreen in the process ) and cut the parts off that the front cage connects to.

To get the angle of the cage right i had to also cut 2" off the back legs. I will have to make a new set of plates to bolt the legs to the arches. Gonna also put a bar between the rear points to hang some harneses off.

I wanted to mount the cage further back so there was plenty of room for the seats plus it looks a bit better.
I started to make the rollcage mounts, i used the mounts that were designed for the front.
Had to grind in a radius and fit them to the corners, i then tacked them in place and marked the hole positions.

Drilled and tapped the holes so there would be studs sticking through, i TIG welded the heads of the bolts to stop them from turning and welded up the seams -

Pics of the blocks tacked in place -

Took some measurments and the cage is sitting nice and square in the back.

Anyhow got a full week on the car when i get back from spain so should get plenty done.
Ta tar.