1981 Golf GTi and 1986 Escort RST projects

[bodgemonkey]

Hey guys, new to the forum so i'll start this thread off with an introduction. I'm Ahmet, 17 from London, and obviously love a nice classic car ;D .
I've been fortunate in that my old man used to be a mechanic, loved his classics too, and was also a hoarder, and he's been kind enough to give me a few of his old beaters.

First up is a 1981 VW Golf GTi, which was standard except for the fitment of early mk2 golf p-solts (which have since been taken off), was parked up in his old garage in 2000 when he bought a mk2 16 valver (which is also now in "long term storage") and has sat there ever since.

Fast forward 12 years and it was wedged between a half stripped mk4 escort and an astra estate with no engine


For some reason, someone decided it would be a good idea to light a newspaper and stick it through the letterbox, next to a nice diesel and oil covered floor. Thankfully nothing ignited, but it was decided (mostly by me) to get the astra scrapped and start cleaning the garage.
So out it came and off it went


Leaving this


Rear lights and bumper were removed to check for rust, nothing but a minor paint scab, plus that section under the rear light were it has been repaired. While the lights were out i tinted them red just to have a looksee.



Gave the badges and front grill strips a lick of paint.....



...then busted out the Mer


A set of 14" ATS Cups from an Oettinger GTi 16S were purchased and refurbed by me (and by hand!) and VW Scala centre caps were modified to fit.


Some fresh rubber was fitted on and i test fitted them onto the mk2


Then fitted onto the mk1




With the exception of the repairs to the rear panel, front wing and sunroof, car still has all original paint, plans are to fit coil overs with a mild drop (-50mm or so, don't plan on slamming it) maybe spacing the wheels out an inch or so as 6J's don't really fill up the arches.

I'll get a post up on the RS in an hour or so

Cheers!

[bodgemonkey]

Part 2 - the Turdo ;D

I've got a lot of family over in Cyprus, so every year I go once or twice for around 8 weeks. Over there, vehicle tax and insurance is based on engine capacity and vehicle weight. Anything under a 1.6 cars that weigh less than a tonne are silly cheap to be on the road, works out to around £80 a year for both road tax and insurance.

With that in mind, dad settled on getting a cheap mk4 Xr3i (they're everywhere in N. Cyprus), however a friend's brother was selling his RS Turbo (one of 2 registered over there) so after a bit of haggling it was ours. For the next 3 years it was an old RS, by which it was rusty, crinkly, and broke down. A lot.

Then I slid into a tree
Dad had it sent of to be repaired and resprayed, the resultant work was pretty horrendous, car was painted in about 3 shades of red as they didnt have enough of one colour for the whole car. Instead of sourcing bodykit parts they simply fibreglassed up the old one and then cut grooves into the resultant bodge so that it looked like there was a jack cover.

Oh, and the rust had just been painted over...

So out came the grinder and many trips to the scrapyards. Lying underneath a car in 40 degree ambient temps is not a nice feeling....

Rust was cut out and decent steel welded in its place, boot and bonnet replaced and the replaced areas were primered until paint time



The old bonnet that was also supposed to have been replaced.....


And the top notch masking job they did too


Anyways, i was entrusted with the job of painting, no proper spray booth within a short distance so had to make do with a dusty garage, used some 2pk Rosso Red



After the first coat

And then out of the garage


After a quick buff, didnt use any lacquer with the 2pk. Parts fitted on including the spotlights, spoiler and random bits of glass.





Stripped for good measure


And as it was at the end of 2011.


Turbo was disassembled


And back in blighty the parts hunt began, just a few trivial bits to help her out looks-wise


Black bumpstrips and mudflaps fitted (check out the front racing slicks!)





And that's how she stands right now. However, got a nice box of parts to be shipped over, including
- Stage 1 T3 turbo
- Ahmed Bayjoo chip
- Lockwood dials
- Bailey Motorsport PRV
- Carello chrome top headlights
- 15" RS7 Softlines with fresh 205/50/15 rubber (getting rid of them horrid XR3 clover's!!)
- New interior door pulls
- New interior door cards
- New recaros
- TIM boost gauge and boost controller
- Samco boost hoses
- Magnex 2 1/2" turbo back exhaust with 4" pipe
- Stainless Steel turbo elbow with external wastegate takeoff
- Tial style 38mm External wastegate with screamer pipe

That's all for now folks

[slammage]

good work, lucky man being having both gti and an rs at your age and more so an rs out in sunny cyprus!

[bodgemonkey]

Cheers fella, once the mk1 is sorted there are a few more projects in the queue....

[Vern]

Nice cars mate, good work too.

Why is the RS turbo badge curse word though lol take your time with the detail.

Also needs some propper RS alloys but I'm sure you know this.

[bodgemonkey]

Badge was in fact the only thing that i didn't put on if you believe me !! Uncle decided to put it on for me,now that the bodywork is rust and rot free now i'll pay some attention to it.

Tried looking for a decent set of S2 wheels for a reasonable price but they were either too far away and didnt want to post, or nearby but looking for silly money, in the end i settled for some 15" softlines which i'll be getting powdercoated in diamond white just as a stop gap, ideally on the hunt for some Compomotive MO5's.

Getting parts through cypriot customs is also a pain, will get taxed to death on some parts (Would be looking at £250 or so tax on 4 decent tyres) so might do what i did last year and send my clothes and whatnot along with a relative who is going a few weeks before me, then just fill my suitcase up with car parts ;D

[rodney]

excellent , where in n london are ya?? I'm a north boy myself lol , was also in north cyprus last year in july on holiday , loved it cant wait to go back

[bodgemonkey]

Palmers Greek fella, you?

I'll be off there in late june until the end of august, can take you for a spin haha, some nice motors in our village, mk1 golf gti 20vt, couple of mk1 and mk2 escorts and the like.

[rodney]

ha haa I'm 5 mins from you lol , I'm near arnos grove when I'm in london ,

[bodgemonkey]

Not too far at all, There's a white 5 door mk4 i'm breaking (you can see in the golf pics), if you're interested in any bits?

[rodney]

well mines for sale at the mo , if it don't go soon then ill keep it and see what else i can do to it,.

[bodgemonkey]

Been a while since i've attacked any rust on cars, (since I cleaned up the escort in fact), so I decided to have a go on the mk2 16v which will be up for sale soon hopefully!

Luckily it was only a bit of surface rust, didn't even bother with the grinder, my ever trust Dremel and emery sander made short work
A light skim of filler then going through with 240-600 grit sorted it, along with a bit of knifing putty (first time i've used the stuff. Went through it with 400-800 then got the Tornado red down

i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc281/nosbanger/55FF3029-D9FC-4F72-9C59-4B892D31BE0B-4094-000009793788E9E6_zpsf184061b.jpg

Done!
i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc281/nosbanger/27A49869-CDA9-4F84-93E2-BAD12CAA26C5-4094-000009794077E9AF_zpsa6916ecd.jpg

It's not 100% perfect but considering the paint was only a rattle can the colour has matched quite well

EDIT: Photobucket is being a right pain so I've had to link the piccies

[bodgemonkey]

Started to clean up the wheels I have for the escort, not going for anything fancy or diamond cut as it'll just get fubared on dirt roads near the sea, bought some 15" softlines for pennies off eBay and set about repairing the worst of them first.
Blowtorch, wooden block and a panel hammer soon saw that any flat spots that weren't supposed to be flat were sorted.

Then out came the knifing putty

One of the worst gouges before



Then the finished wheel, rattle can diamond white (still got the centre cap badge to glue on....obviously)


Total cost is about £45 for the wheels and paint, just need to find some rubber to go on!

[bodgemonkey]

Finished porting and polishing the inlet side of the RS cylinder head.
New gaskets and stem seals on the way

[bodgemonkey]

My new badges arrived from the states, less than a fortnight
For replicas they seem great quality and have proper fixings identical to proper VW ones, brushed aluminium GTI logo just like the standard one too, anyways i've got a spare one if anybody wants one for a decent price .

Now, badged or badgeless? Valver is going in there sooner or later so i'm swaying towards leaving it on.

[bodgemonkey]

Another day at the garage today, had a bit of spare time so set about on the golf.

This was the bonnet before



After a very quick clean it came out like this




As you can see the leading edge of the bonnet and the area under the vents are pretty badly scabbed, but in all honesty it looks pretty solid for 32 year old paint!

Some minor scabs under the side decal



to with one of her descendants



Started to clear out the interior too, needs a damn good clean!


P-slots have now found a new home too


Started cleaning up the brightwork on the 3.0CS but ended up leaving it all for another day

[DanMateX]

sickness

[bodgemonkey]

Sickness of the good kind I imagine haha

[Bioshock]

Damn,wish I had a dad like yours! All I got off my old man, was a beaten up Transit...

[bodgemonkey]

Got some proper S2 RS alloys, badly in need of a refurb, made a start on two of them, this is the first one sorted


Going for polished face with black inserts, got some MiM deep dish 5 spokes too, my wheel refurb corner in the garage is looking shiny!