I think I paid the going rate really, £100 all in, tried to get the back bumper thrown in, but he wanted another £20 and I only had £100 to spend, to be fair I currently own 3 so didn't need it haha

thats not a bad price, considering when i was looking for the fog lights all i keep finding was like £35-£40 each on flea bay you got a bargain for £100. I Managed to get these instead http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/250774154216?ru=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fsch%2Fi.html%3F_from%3DR40%26_sacat%3D0%26_nkw%3D250774154216%26_rdc%3D1

Edited 16 December, 201510 yr by madnemo

so after a few weeks and the long drive last night, the car was in a state :(

didn't stop me swapping the bumper over though! so got on with that during my lunch, my work mate came down and started getting all artistic when I'd done it...

oooh arty, and mucky too, this pic shows the difference!

so I took her for a good long jetwash to blast out the cobwebs

slightly embarrassing when the adhesive I used to put the number plate on failed and the plate fell off, so had to nip to halfrauds which was just over the road to get some foam sticky pad things and they have held up well :)

Laughed hard at the star trek picture, just wasn't expecting it lol

Nice work adapting the 8v versions lol even though you got a 16v set soon after, you are a bit of a hoarder...3 bumpers!

yeah, 2 front bumpers, 3 rear bumpers, 2 sets of fog lights, 3 sets of grilles (2 fog, 1 non fog), 2 sets of rear lights, 3 boot lids, 2 left wings, 2 right wings, various interior parts not the biggest hoard but given the outhouse is full with that and 2 lawnmowers, 2 lawnmower engines and a lawn mower chassis, Kids bikes, Kids massive ride on 12v Tractor, and all my tools and other electronic and gardening equipment, its a struggle!

Hence the idea of a shed purely for car related things! Kicker is Kim (fiance) won't let me store it in the house, because it "gets in her way and looks a mess"...

oh look a pretty picture

^^^^^^^ looks mint :wub: nice picture . Not tempted to tint the fogs yellow ?

Edited 18 December, 201510 yr by madnemo

Thanks Mate! dont want to tint them, love them as they are, and wouldnt be in theme with where its headed :)

if it was tinted it would have been classed as euro/ scene look.lol . i like how your taking it with the oem'nes, i wouldnt say rare but finding valvers in 3 door in mint condition that isnt chaved or a rotbox/sheds is really hard to find these days

yeah I fell lucky with this, really really lucky

I woke up this morning and the sky was blue and the sun was shining, perfect!

checked the weather, no rain until 3pm... perfect!

so cracked on with the boot, here's how it was

snipped off the wires to use as pull throughs for the ones currently on the replacement boot, which was complete with connectors etc, literally a bolt in job

boot removed

something which I've just picked up on is the corrosion forming at the top there, I couldnt address it today, so will have to get back to that when I have the tools and equipment, it shouldnt be too serious, just surface rust from damp primer as the paint has been rubbed away, or painted incorrectly?

new boot lid put on and lined up as best I could, with a fully working wiper and rear washer jet, something which I have said before, is important to me!

number plate swapped over and applied the decal for the place I got it and other parts from, can't stress how much of a decent guy Phil at retro-performance is, if your in the north east he's worth checking out if you see something you need :)

here's a comparison shot of old and new

later tonight I stripped the old boot lid down to retrieve the carpeted plastic, boot lock and spoiler and strut joints. You can see the scabs of rust there but when I opened her up is was just rotten beyond belief, I have my own theories as to how this was caused but it doesn't matter now. turns out the lock on the old boot doesnt match the key so unsure if the handle has been replaced at some point or if it wasnt the original boot?

spoiler came off without too much hassle, so I'll got pick up some no nails or something and stick that on after a good scrub, and move over the boot trim too.

I have two spare struts now, so going to put them on the bonnets. Kind of conflicted with that as it's not original, but makes a very useful and tasteful addition that doesnt stand out like a sore thumb. Fairly sure it's been done before so I'll have a dig on here to find the thread

I think the black VW bandge maybe going, unsure on that front, but I need to get the Polo and 16v badges to put on the boot, does anyone (looking at you nige) know the exact measurements for location of them?

also on the cards now is rubbing down the best of my my rear bumpers, priming and getting it painted along with a front wing, but that'll be new year now.

So ordered a few bits for a service, pollen filter, Oil, spark plugs etc..

had a few hours to myself so naturally I went to play with my car

First off, changed the pollen filter out, and cleaned all the surrounding area, the filter doesnt look too old but it's pennies to replace it so thought why not.

full of crud and dry leaves

Then replaced the boot trim with the carpeted item I have, here's a shot of the difference

surprising makes a big difference to the noise level at the back, as well as having the boot liner trimmed, I run without a parcel shelf for pram reasons.

next I removed the airfilter and housing to inspect a fuel smell, I get now and again, think I have found the source and shouldn't be a big problem to fix, no pics of that though, put the housing back on and just studied it for a minute or two, I didn't get an airfilter because I'm gonna pick up a pipercross one soon, but thought to myself, what does the trumpet like thing do?

Decided it must be for noise purposes, but it also seems to restrict the air and the way it flows....

so I removed it :D

on that topic, it is amazing how much the intake system before the TB reduces noise, gave the throttle a few blips while investigating the fuel issue and by god it sounds amazing!! I can only imagine what it would sound like on carbs :crazy:

Oil will be getting dropped later this week, when I have a flat ground to play with, and just retrieved the spark plug socket from a friend so that'll get done at the same time

I had a BMC carbon airbox thing on mine. The induction note was fantastic.

Good to see a car being tidied up nicely :) Love the carpeted boot trim too :)

I thought about getting one of those, but decided in the end to go the panel filter route, I was choosing between the K&N or the pipercross filters and decided on the pipercross one as it's a lot easier to maintain and looks pretty cool too, even if it will never get seen haha.

I am working around the car slowly, keeping a note of areas that need heavier attention and whatnot, sometimes I want to rush and get parts on it, well, most of the time, but I know I need to identify future problems.

The boot trim comes from when the car was owned and re-trimmed at a spot called MJ interiors in Bradford they got some Mk3 Recaros and retrimmed them in custom colours, along with the gearknob gaitor and such, obviously they were not a part of the deal when I got it, but the boot trim got left in, which I'm pleased about

A friend of mine bought me a 4-2-1 manifold and gifted me a 1.8T downpipe and cat, its a side project of mine to mate the two and get the finished piece on the car, tonight, I made a start, using only a tiny hacksaw. reason for using a 1.8T cat is it should allow much better flow over a standard one and the pipe dimensions are similiar physically.

here we go!

5 minutes in, getting tired

10 minutes in, FML

ahhhhh relief

not much land here, and I plan on affixing some flexi to this

It's important to know which direction the Cat flows, in this case, bendy part comes from the turbo, so it flows top to bottom

removing a bracket with a chisel, yeah thats not good, but nothing a welder won't fix

Ok, now I feel like a teen left alone with the internet for a week, arms are wrecked

Everyone loves a kitchen floor mockup!

apart from Kim, she wasn't best pleased

Mani Out - 50mm OD, 46mm ID

Cat In - 48mm OD, 43mm ID

Cat Out - 54mm OD, 50mm ID

it's not perfect, but workable, need to get some flexi ordered!

So today I decided to do the oil and plugs, unfortunately it didn't get off to a great start, decided to do the plugs before the oil so the engine could get warm with the new plugs in.

parked up on my mates drive and lifted the car up, removed HT lead #1 got the 10mm Plug socket ready and pushed it onto the plug, seemed awfully stiff, but the socket is quite new so thought the rubber grommet inside must be quite tight, began to unscrew it and there was no initial break, it just span but there was quite a bit of resistance, more than there should be. I tried rmeoving the socket from the plug and it was stuck fast. :help:

spent a good 30 mins wiggling it around, eventually had to pour some oil in there to help slip it about, and finally managed to get it out, turns out the bore at the very bottom is slightly smaller than the Halfords Advanced 10mm Spark Plug socket I was using, and had bound up as I was turning it.

I figured I'd sort it later, and at least change the oil.

Oil of choice? Castrol Magnatec 10W40, I've had good experience with this oil in the past, and its well priced. Filter was an OEM unit supplied by Richard when I bought the car, the Oil change is actually well overdue but other things have postponed it, IIRC this is the first change since the head rebuild, and the next picture may well justify that, it is also a lightly worrying one, so those of a nervous disposition look away now....

Now I want to believe that this is crud that has fallen off the outside of the Oil filter as I took it off, at worst it was inside the Oil filter and came out as I drained it, which is what filters are supposed to do I guess. The good news is that whatever it is, it isn't magnetic, but that doesn't mean I'm home safe.

Anyway I refilled it, turned it over, let it settle and measured it.. right on the money!

Noticed an instant difference in smoothness, although that could be my rose tinted spectacles.

Back to the spark plugs, I had to go out this afternoon, so nipped in Halfords while I was near and had a word with one of the folks there, very nice understanding chap, let me borrow one of these to see if it would fit, and it did!

I measured it up against a standard socket and it was maybe 0.5-1mm thinner on diameter, but you only need a tenth for a sloppy fit, £13 lighter I bought it and got home, set about swapping the plugs.

Plugs used - not strictly the ones I wanted - were BOSCH Super 4's, I did want the NGK's but nowhere near had stock of them

Pulled out the old plugs and inspected, all look good, number 2 looking like it got the most heat.

New plugs in and seems to pick up quicker at lower revs but not pushed it to see if they are the same higher up!

Edited 29 December, 201510 yr by R10tz0r

Nice work so far pal. Gonna keep my eye on this one!

I bought an Indigo blue one earlier in the year, 55k on the clock and it's been parked in a garage every night, not a single bit of rust!

Anyway, lovely car, look forward to watching it progress!

Thanks buddy, sounds like a good find you got there

Helped service a mates car today, was a laugh!

So today I took her for her first autotest, amazing how different this handles and pulls compared to the old 8v, had a lot of fun, times weren't consistent but learning the car and just having a laugh was the main point of today

made a little video of the day, unfortunately the rain stopped getting a load of footage at the autotest, but got what I could

worthy noting is it was Daz's first time ever driving his car like that and he did really well, beat me on the first course, I pipped him on the second course but he beat me overall haha

Edited 3 January, 201610 yr by R10tz0r

so the centre badges on the wheels are quite corroded and tired looking, so I did a quick little hack to make them look fresh, I removed them!

The paint in the middle hasn't seen sunlight since 1998 so very fresh haha

Edited 7 January, 201610 yr by R10tz0r

been a while since I posted in this thread, But I went to the Dyno Day today and things didn't go as I had hoped. Don't get me wrong, it could have been a lot lot worse, but I'm still unhappy, woe is me etc.

So, cut straight to the chase, here's the figures from today:

Car is on 125k, regularly serviced and well looked after, running on Texaco Surpreme 97 exclusively, I was hoping for a quite conservative 90 from the run as it is knocking on now as far is these engines go, quite shocked to see only 85!

for comparison, my mate Daz with the BMW E36 316i Coupe, his motor was sat still for 6 years, and last service was 2003 before he got it back on the road last november, they come with 101 from factory and he pushed out 96 on a 135k engine.

so while I wallow in my self pity I need to plan my attack.

I know the head was rebuilt 18 months prior to me purchasing it due to a dropped valve spring, I don't know how indepth the build was done, so going to get it compression tested and see if there's something amiss there.

When the car is cold and is under load it smells of petrol, but it goes when the it's warm, this could be the heat evaporating the vapor before it gets across the bay to the blower motor though, anyway that's a problem I think may be related.

with that in mind, it could be something daft like the intake manifold not bolted on properly. It could be the belt being a tooth out. It could be throttle body.

Something that the Dyno guy did say is that it didn't like going past 6k RPM, I have felt this too but was unsure if it was just me, but there does seem to be a distinct pitch change almost like its hitting a limiter before it actually does.

So as stated above, I have the following in mind;

Compression check and timing check

more in depth look at the fuel rail and fittings/hoses

throttle body and intake manifold.

Nige mentioned a slight acidic smell from it when it ran, I've no idea what that could be other than a self destructing cat or coolant but the power curve is quite nice and doesn't show a major flat spot and it never uses coolant.

any more experienced folks got a penneth to chip in?

A little update here, had a good check around the bay, cleaned up the throttle body (which to be fair wasn't that bad) and that opened up a can of worms, which I will dwell on in a little bit!

First things first, the fuel smell has been getting ever stronger, and the cause appears to be this hose end, as the smell is strongest there. it doesn't look in the best of health either,

can pick up used hoses for £15, but I quite fancy making some out of new hose which could end up cheaper, anyone ever made their own hoses? I know I'll need fuel grade hose, are they a standard off the shelf diameter?

onto the timing check, its 50% complete, I know the cams are in time together using a bit of maths and a gasket as a reference point haha, couldn't get the cams to line up just flicking the key and I had no real tools at work to turn the engine by hand. Got them as near as I could and counted the teeth from the dimple/white mark to the gasket line which is centre of the cam pulley, 7 teeth up on the inlet and 7 teeth down on the exhaust means theoretically they will line right up!

pictures aren't the greatest because of the engine mount getting in the way.

I'll get a long screwdriver and turn the engine by hand to measure the crank to cam timing but I'm fairly confident its right.

Now onto the throttle body, which has caused me no end of trouble since I touched it! I gave it a clean out, it wasn't too dirty but there was a thick ridge of sludge on the right hand side of the valve. it has had rev-hanging issues before and jerkiness at low rpm but it's never been much of a problem, since I cleaned it has lost it's mind! I knew it is always good to have a re-alignment done when it's been messed with, so took it to my mates after a drive home and rev's hunting between 1600-1900 RPM sometimes higher.

He plugged in VCDS and I got 01087 - Basic Setting Not Performed so I asked nige about it, he came back with some good info, as always! followed all the steps and no luck. spent 45 minutes cleaning, and fiddling but it would have none of it. Everytime we hit the button it would go to zero, then 100% and measure back down three points only it hung at the 3rd and wouldn't sit back at zero, you could hear the motor/actuator whining like it was trying to move but when you pushed it it had a fit and went back to position 3, so it wasn't like it couldn't move, it just wanted to stay there. All the data displayed on VCDS seemed to read right to my knowledge, all parameters were true it was a perfect scenario but it wouldn't adapt.

In my frustration I unplugged it, knowing I'd have to manually keep some throttle open to keep it idling (I'd already replaced the airbox before realising it would be better to adjust the throttle cable, and had to go back to work, I'm a simple man I admit it ), set off after work and boy was that hard work, cut out twice because I was on the brakes and clutch, the engine died naturally, then sat for 2-3 mins trying to crank it over at a busy junction at 5pm. not my greatest feat ever, dunno if its just mine but these have a real hard time starting after a stall/cutout I usually let it sit for 30 seconds before trying.

I soon pulled into a petrol station and plugged the bugger in, I'd rather sit at a junction looking like a idiot at 2k revs, then look like a idiot with a car that wont start hahaha.

strangely enough the past two days its come and gone, sometimes it revs constantly, sometimes only when I'm moving and stops as soon as I get 0 on the speedo, and sometimes behaves....normally

anyhow, I've decided I'm gonna get a replacement one, it'll either act as a put me on and I'll see if I can fix the old one if it is indeed wrong, or it'll lead me too other problems that may be affecting the idle if possible (fingers crossed)

In other postive performance news, I have got a Polo GTI inlet manifold which looks to have straighter, slighter larger radius runners, ill give it a bit of a polish inside as well and hopefully this will help top end power, although it'll probably reduce low end torque a bit. I believe I just need to drill and tap one hole in a prescribed and already machined area to mount a throttle cable bracket then it's good to go!

By any chance did you push the butterfly open by hand? If you have it's more than likely that the actuator is damaged and a replacement will be needed. I done it with mine (commented on mbusby993 with the same issue), it never settled down but I got rid of the car before I ever solved the issue.

If you ever need to clean the TB turn on the ignition and get someone to press the pedal so it opens the butterfly and then clean it carefully. Don't ever, ever push the butterfly open with your fingers.

Top Tip:

Sitting in traffic and the revs sit at 2k or just going up and down. Pull the handbrake up, and lift off the clutch a little and it should settle the revs back to normal. (Not that I recommend doing this all the time, it's just something I found when I had the issue and stopped me looking like a plank).

Thanks dean, the first time I cleaned it I got a mate to step on the pedal, admittedly the ignition was off, the second time we messed with it to be fair we poked it when it was on and off by hand.

oh well, now I know :) didn't think they would be that sensitive to be fair!

That's what I got told many moons ago, my 16v was fine until my mate decided to clean it and said it would help. So as I started the car I had the erratic idle and it never went.

I got so annoyed with my last AFH I took a spare, broken, throttle body and ripped all the gears out of it so the car couldn't adjust it itself. After that it worked absolutely fine, idled lovely and on the move it was perfect as it was still getting a reading from the TPS part. Never had an issue until it came to MOT time and the emissions were well out, whether it was related or not I don't know.

I wouldn't recommend you do that, but if you can get a broken one cheap then it might be worth a go to get you by.