Model: 1985 Polo GL

Engine: 16v AFH on CBR 600 carbs, 4 branch manifold, 2" Stainless exhaust

Suspension: Front and rear coilovers, AVO Springs and Dampers, PPS Subframe, Nylon rear beam mounts, GT beam, Poly bushed front bushes

Brakes: Nitrac front discs, Black diamond predator pads, rear discs

Wheels and Tyres: 13x6 'Melba' cross spokes with Yokohama A539 185/60/13

Exterior Styling: Kamei front grille, debadged

Interior Styling: Fully stripped, OMP wheel and seat, Evo6 recaro, custom dash panel

ICE and Security: Fuel cut off, electric cut-off.

Right, i've been meaning to do a build thread on this for ages so here it is; a friend of mine commented on facebook the other day about this...

If you look at what you've done to it in reverse order. It's like you took a shit run down car that was falling to bits, and put it back together until it was clean, in one piece and working!

And that kind of gives you an idea of what is about to happen!

She's a 1985 Polo breadvan. Rolled out of the factory as the top-spec GL 1.3, complete with sweet wheel trims and banging tape player with 2 rear speakers. Luxury.

Anyway, it had been owned all its life by old people, the lady i bought it off had owned it to 10 years or so after she bought it from her friend who had died and then she was selling it as she could no longer drive. As it had lived in a small village and had only ever been to the shops and back, when I bought her in 2008, she had only done 16,500 miles! I can't imagine there are many/any MK2s left with that few miles!

Here is how she looked:

Really clean, really tidy. Not a spot of rust ANYWHERE underneath or on the body. It had been sat for a bit so I changed the water pump, did usual servicing kind of things and she was all very nice, if not a bit dull.

Next thing was, turning her into a van for lolz.

Which was fun for a bit. Also added some wheels

Got a G40 interior, even though the old one was MINT

But they didn't really fit due to ghey arches

So anyway, drove it around for a bit, had fun and stuff

Which was fun but again, i got bored, so took it off the road at the end of summer 2008. Initial plans were to tear everything out and make it into some sort of race car track weapon with a Turbo PY engine and all the nice bits that go with it. Stripped it all out, cut the panels out and stuff.

^Shittest job ever.

Now, this was at the end of 2008. Somehwere between the end of 2009, was spent fannying around, getting parts from here and there, Picked up (both halves) of a crashed G40 for the engine and a few bits

Then in October 2008, took her down to Cotsweld for a custom made 8 point roll cage.

Cage cost around £1700 quid but it was totally worth it, the workmanship is fantastic and it is so tight to the body.

Anyway, so this was the end of 2009 when the cage was made and between then and the start of 2011, nothing much happened. Swapped units a few times, bought a house, owned a Sierra,

MR2,

another Mk2 Polo,

a 6N Polo (hateful!)

and Subaru XT.

Life kind of got in the way. Anyway, so bought loads more shiny bits then

^Nitrac discs

Then shit got real and i had to give up my unit due to having to live on my own and run a house and stuff, i couldn't justify it. We painted her white again to tidy up and stuck it under cover outside my house and there she stayed doing nothing until early 2012 when i started working on her again...

So the main reason for the kick in progress was due to me wanting to drive her to Le Mans classic in July 2012. I had just sold the XT and was determined to get her done. I decided around 3 months ago that I would have her finished for Le Mans!

I started by starting to rewire the car from scratch, make some sort of dash and fit seats and stuff.

Like I said, life got in the way so I had already sold all my G40 parts last year, which means i had no engine so i went and bought a 1.4 16v from PhilJ with bike carb setup and nice manifold and stuff.

And yes, this is my front room!

Fitted!

Unfortunately after fitting the engine it turned out to be totally ceased due to rusted bores due to having been sat. Bummer but shit happens! So back out it came and another bottom end back in! Engine was refitted about 4 weeks away from having drive to Le Mans

I'm probably starting to miss loads of bits out as its all a bit of a blur, but its roughly 2 and a half weeks until i have to drive to france now!

Stuff left to do is;

- Bleed brakes

- Fit ignition amp and get it running

- Get MOT

So having been off the road for a few years I've pretty much got her on the road in a couple of months. I have been well lazy until now!

Edited 16 June, 201214 yr by Nev

I want/don't that grille. It doesn't look great but I still really want it

I want/don't that grille. It doesn't look great but I still really want it

Its so bad its good. It looks awful but also brilliant in a 1980s tacky kind of way!

Its so bad its good. It looks awful but also brilliant in a 1980s tacky kind of way!

Exactly!

Very nice work

now THAT is fooken cool. just what i wanted to do to my old one!

epic breadbin man! cant wait to see some videos of it up and running! take a look at my 82' for some encouragement :)

Woah! incredible layout with the interior

Hahaha I love your living room and how fancy bits is "I got this..and stuff" crack on! :)

FIRST SIGNS OF LIFE!

http://www.facebook.com/v/10151823445735276

I think you'll need to make that video public for us to see it!

Done

Haha fastest build thread ever .. Close thread FInished . safe lol

lol at the guy holding his ears, and then its nice and quiet

I think my neighbours might be getting annoyed with it now!

Exhaust ETA is saturday.

had the pleasure of seeing this last year, it really is bloody epic with that cage in! it really does look the bollox and those photos do not do it justice!

if anyone wondered how my car went turbo virtually overnight- that photo above with the turbo in - now sits in my engine bay!

i like the grill- will make it different and make you look at the rest of the car, + you will probably only ever see the arse of it anyway!!!!!! hahahaha

Pretty much finished... MOT booked Tuesday, Ferry booked Thursday!

3 months and a fuck load of effort/money, looks like we might be going to Le Mans! Main issue is an oil leak so i'll be topping it up as we go. Also, if anyone has some breadvan rear arch trims kicking about let me know.

ace

Looking like a lot of fun that!

Should that battery be in a box of some kind?

Hows this going now mate?

Updates plzzz

Yeah, i'm pretty lazy with all this now-a-days.

It never made it to france unfortunately and I ended up taking a (Much much more sensible) Merc estate, even if it did have no MOT!

So when i got back, i took the engine out, rebuilt it with new rings and new crank and cam seals

put it all back together...

Hey preto it worked! Carbs were (and still are ) way out of tune but i'm a lazy bastard sometimes.

Flew through the worlds greatest MOT ever with no advisories or owt!

Since then, bit of this, bit of that, couple of teething problems that sort of thing. Turns out cars with rollcages are shit at carrying stuff.

Oh and the other day i plumbed in and fitted a heater so i could see where I am going when it's raining. Its the single greatest thing ever- having driven for 5 months not being able to see where i was going!

So what next? I need to get my carbs sorted bad-style. Really badly. Then probably some new tyres cos i destroyed a set by having awful tracking which i've duly fixed. Then- who knows? I'm going travelling round europe for 5 months next year so she'll probably be laid up for a bit somewhere.

I'll look after the grille while your away

That dash centre panel is beautiful. Really nice solution to that. I love the interior.