Blue met grey today for the first time - first nice dry day for a good while! Really enjoyed doing some miles in both cars.

The grey g40 must have been one of the last ones sold and in the best colour - super nice.

The grey g40 must have been one of the last ones sold and in the best colour - super nice.

Cheers! Grey one registered 30.03.94

Done some digging and found a you've been spotted post on page 262 for a T reg G40 in black. Looks like there could well have been 4 cars registered in '99.

No way! Just seen it on polo3 - a guy from Mansfield area has it. T263 KHB although is now wearing the plate G40 BP. Looks to be in reasonable nick too!

Work has started on the only shitty part of the car - the battery tray.

Bugger - wont let me add pics

Edited 23 December, 201411 yr by sleag40

Now it'll let me ^^^

This is the underside of the poorly "repaired" battery tray

Edited 23 December, 201411 yr by sleag40

This is what greeted me on viewing the car and removing the battery.

Other than this it was in pretty fine condition - the sills and arches totally rust free and very little in the way of dents, just a couple of tiny dings in the doors.

One fine day in May 2014 I decided to get stuck into fettling it. I'd done a thousand miles or so since buying it and with the better weather came a bit of enthusiasm!

Got to work stripping out the interior.

Chiselled out the fibreglass/sheet steel/seam sealer "repair" and was left with a proper hole!

I reckon it spent a long time sat outside with the passenger side lower down so the water couldn't drain out.

Moved the car to my unit so rain wouldn't stop play.

Then bought a cheap donor car with a good battery tray to harvest.

Started stripping prior to chopping.

Choppy chop chop chop

Left an even bigger hole in the donor car!

This was what we wanted -

Started unpicking all the spot welds holding it together -

And was finally left with this piece to go into the blue one -

Removing what was left of the original battery tray - just the back wall left to come out here.

And donor piece welded in -

And a small repair to the slightly shitty drain hole -

Once POR15'd and seam sealed should be a good bodge free repair - and the battery'll fit too!

The next round of fettling was a tedious one - all rubber sealant on the inner wings was scraped off -

Followed by getting engine ready for removal -

And a bit more stripping -

Sills were ground back to bare metal and hit with POR15 -

As was the battery tray -

Then inner wings -

There were a few spots of surface rust in the engine bay - some from under the seam sealer - so it all came off (sucker for punishment)

Then it was hit with the grey stuff -

Cleaned up the wings and treated a little bit of surface rust on the edges that bolt to the a-pillars -

Then replaced all the seam sealer I removed looking for car pox -

Slam panel next up for treatment - dirt, wax and shite removed and any rusty bits ground back before POR15 application -

Engine bay was painted next -

did you manage to get your log book corrected my g40 has 1 letter wrong on chassis aswell

did you manage to get your log book corrected my g40 has 1 letter wrong on chassis aswell

Not tried yet chief - hopefully I'll get round to it soon!

Cleaned and painted legs,ARB,driveshafts,brake servo,steering arms etc -

Inner wings and sills stone chipped -

Its rolling again -

Edited 23 December, 201411 yr by sleag40

Started reorganising all my stuff to get started on the engine.

One filthy gearbox - check out the little reduction gear that makes the factory fitted metric speedo read as mph.

One filthy charger - this was supposed to have been rebuilt in 2010 with a receipt too - its never been off the car though!

Got stuck into the engine next - its only got 54k on it with no issues so it was just a partial strip and tart-up job -

Cleaned and degreased it all then painted the block, water pipe and charger/engine mount with engine enamel. Changed cambelt and waterpump whilst we were in there too. (these were also supposed to have been done in 2010 - pump was definately the original!)

Cleaned and painted inlet manifold -

Ready to go on-

Charger rebuilt -

Gearbox cleaned and selector shaft seal changed -

Engine reassembled -

Engine loom stripped, repaired and re-wrapped -

Intercooler cleaned -