1998 SEAT Ibiza mk2 GTi 1.8T Track Project

[betenoir]

I have a thread for this project on SEATCupra.net, but most members on there are more interested in the newer models. Having seen the variety of machinery on here, and at the Retro Rides meets I have been to, I hope this is of more interest on here.

I bought this in 2009, with a view to making it into a track toy. It is a SEAT Ibiza mk2 GTi 16v, with just over 100k on the clock, and when I got it it looked like this:




I very nearly bought one of these when they were new, but my children were young at the time, so we decided a Toledo Sport would be more practical, but I had wanted a Green Meanie ever since.

The first mod was to remove the South African flag sticker from the back, then I had to take a picture in decent light to show that the Kiwi paintwork has lost none of its impact.


A few weeks after buying the car, I was having fun splashing through puddles on a country lane, when my fun came to an abrupt halt.


I didn't like those nasty wheels anyway, so it was a good reason to swap for a set of OZ Superleggeras . Round about the same time I bought a set of Mattig mirrors, which I was tempted to fit while still painted orange, but I sprayed them Kiwi in a moment of weakness.

[mr2fc]

Love these, keep it coming!

[betenoir]

The interior was in pretty good condition, except for the gear knob which was a gnarly plastic job.


It did not take long to start stripping things out, and to fit a SEAT Sport gearknob and an OMP steering wheel.


The electric windows were replaced with keep fit windows, and all the other wiring from the doors was removed, as was the central locking and the rear screen wiper. The seats were replaced with a pair of OMP buckets.


The exhaust system was supposed to be a Magnex, but it turned-out to be a Magnex backbox welded to a standard centre section, so that went in the bin, to be replaced with a Milltek cat-back system which looks and sounds lovely

[miniman31]

Love these, never seen one is this colour though. Good engine the ABF (would love one in my mk2 golf)

[betenoir]

Nov 4, 2020 12:29:59 GMT miniman31 said:

Love these, never seen one is this colour though. Good engine the ABF (would love one in my mk2 golf)

SEAT rallied them in this colour (Kiwi Yellow) for a few years before they adopted the actual yellow. If you are an ABF fan you may not like some of my subsequent updates 

[stealthstylz]

These are proper cool cars, not seen one for years though think a lot got broken for the engines as they always seemed to be cheaper than a ABF VW.

[awoo]

these things are great, apparently bullet proof. my driving instructor taught me to drive in a black one of these in 2000, I think he still has it, it was on around 200k miles even back then. understated (when not kiwi green) and nice bit of poke to them too

[miniman31]

Nov 4, 2020 12:41:32 GMT betenoir said:

Nov 4, 2020 12:29:59 GMT miniman31 said:

Love these, never seen one is this colour though. Good engine the ABF (would love one in my mk2 golf)

SEAT rallied them in this colour (Kiwi Yellow) for a few years before they adopted the actual yellow. If you are an ABF fan you may not like some of my subsequent updates 

That's rather cool!
Haha, my guess is 20VT.
Maybe you have a spare ABF sitting around to sell me cheaply lol.
I need one on twin 45s for the sound more than anything:

[mr2fc]

I remember being sad we didn't get this shape two door Cordoba

[betenoir]

Nov 4, 2020 16:01:20 GMT mr2fc said:

I remember being sad we didn't get this shape two door Cordoba

I take it you mean the mk1 Cordoba GTi, which I think existed elsewhere? We did get the Cordoba SX, which had the same mechanicals and a 3-door body. You could even buy them in Kiwi. I would have liked to have seen the mk2 Cordoba Cupra 1.8T, which was available in LHD at the same time as the mk3 Ibiza Cupra 1.8T.

[qwerty]

Nov 4, 2020 16:01:20 GMT mr2fc said:

I remember being sad we didn't get this shape two door Cordoba

We did

Tom

[betenoir]

Nov 4, 2020 17:25:10 GMT qwerty said:

Nov 4, 2020 16:01:20 GMT mr2fc said:

I remember being sad we didn't get this shape two door Cordoba

We did

Tom

You certainly put that more succinctly than I managed! 

[qwerty]

Nov 4, 2020 19:31:56 GMT betenoir said:

Nov 4, 2020 17:25:10 GMT qwerty said:

We did

Tom

You certainly put that more succinctly than I managed! 

You were a lot more informative though haha.

[betenoir]

At this point I used the Ibiza on the road for a few months. I had a pretty good idea what needed sorting on it, but I wanted to work-out what I should simply repair, and what I should modify or upgrade. As it turned-out, the "repair" list was short, and the "modify or upgrade" list was long. That probably should not have come as a surprise.

Now I had realised what I had let myself in for, once the MOT expired I parked it up on the driveway and made a start. In retrospect, the order in which I did things was all over the place, but I will try to write it up so it sounds at least half sensible.

The clutch pedal had been making plenty of noise for a while, and it had got to the point that it felt like much of the movement of the pedal was doing nothing to actually operate the clutch. Clearly I had encountered the common issue with failure of the pedal box. I did a bit of research, which told me that a) it was not a fun job, and b) the steering column needed to come out to do it. I can agree with the former, but I did manage it with the column in place.

The best picture I found to show the parts of the pedal box which benefit from reinforcing was this one.


I cannot remember where I found this, so if the person who took this picture spots this and objects to me using it then just let me know. I gave this picture to a welder and he did the business with my pedal box so that hopefully I should not have to worry about it failing again.

I found a couple of pictures of the pedal box out of the car, but as it is not possible to tell whether they were taken before or after it had been repaired, I will not bother to add them to this thread. Getting the pedal box re-fitted (still with the steering column in situ) was a bit of a faff, but improved the feel (and sound) of the clutch hugely.

[jmsheahan]

Awesome car, a pretty rare beast these days especially in ABF form.

I had a yellow one of these briefly but it was so rotten it ended up having its engine transplanted into my Mk2 Golf. Not before the pedal box (same issue as yours) and steering column bracket snapped on an enthusiastic spin around a roundabout

Keep the updates coming

[betenoir]

I found a company near me (sadly long since defunct) advertising Ibiza carbon fibre door cards for a reasonable price, so I treated myself. When I went to collect them, I picked-up some carbon fibre off-cuts, of which more later.

When I tried the (flat) carbon door cards against the (not flat) doors, it was pretty obvious that some metal fettling was required. To make this a bit easier, I decided to take the doors off the car. With each of the doors laid flat, it was obvious which bit had to go, as shown by the hatched section in the photo.


This photo shows the same door after I tickled it with the angle grinder.


Apparently I failed to take any photos of the carbon door cards fitted at the time, so this shot was taken more recently.

[betenoir]

Nov 5, 2020 9:59:17 GMT jmsheahan said:

Awesome car, a pretty rare beast these days especially in ABF form.

I had a yellow one of these briefly but it was so rotten it ended up having its engine transplanted into my Mk2 Golf. Not before the pedal box (same issue as yours) and steering column bracket snapped on an enthusiastic spin around a roundabout

Keep the updates coming

I may be in the minority, but I didn't much like the 16v engine. By the time I bought the Ibiza I had been driving around in turbo cars (SEAT Leon Cupra, Skoda Octavia RS, Mitsubishi Evo VIII) for almost ten years, and the ABF was very different from what I had got used to. Maybe if I had given it more time I would have changed my mind. Currently I have two mk2 Ibizas that came out of the factory with 16v power, and neither of them have the ABF now.

[betenoir]

The ABF engine came out, and was sold. Strip-down continued with the front suspension, front sub-frame, and the crossmember. The sub-frame and crossmember went off to be shot blasted and powder coated, along with a pair of new wishbones.


All the bits were resplendent in gloss black when I collected them.

[mrbounce]

Ooooh this is going to look spectacular

[betenoir]

Nov 7, 2020 11:32:48 GMT mrbounce said:

Ooooh this is going to look spectacular

I hope I can live-up to these expectations.