2002 Opel Speedster 🦇 Spring is here.

[thebaron]

The paint was always atrocious on the car. My pics may disguise it but really it was shocking. That coupled with the fact that I have wanted to paint a car "Viper" green for a long time led me to this point.

The car was in my friends garage following the accident and he had the spray equipment so I used a little bit* of the insurance money to get it dipped and see if my vision would translate.


*I needed a little bit more to sort the Geo but thankfully nothing too major happened in the accident.

[thebaron]

Yeaaaaassss - My vision is finally realized

[thebaron]

We are up to March 1st 2021 now and with the accident and Winter the car had been at my friend's garage for 4.5 months so it was time to get out and drive.

Someone forgot to tell Winter I was coming to play






With a friend in his ND RF MX-5




At my office




With a colleague on a company away day - this one was too much for it and I was half way up a slope when I lost all forward momentum and was pinned in 3rd sitting still. My colleague in the C43 had to come and pick me up once I had reversed back down the road.

















With a friend I have made as a result of the car. This is a beast - Supercharged and I will come back to this and it's owner shortly

[thebaron]

Yes, I know I'm on the wrong tires but something was already itching at my brain

[thebaron]

Winter turned to spring and a friend at a Porsche dealership organized a drive for me in this

















A hell of a machine but the gearing is too tall to rev it out and not go to prison. However, I had organized to meet my friend with the supercharged Speedster on the same day and I drove my car, his car and the Spyder back to back over the same set of alpine passes and the thing that had been itching in my brain was confirmed

[thebaron]

I had gone down the route (well trodden it must be said) of getting track modifications for my car. My wheels were too wide and the tires too aggressive for the manner in which I use the car.

I'm up in the mountain passes and it pretty much always cold up there. These tires had little grip and I was getting tramlining which made the car very skittish. My friend had the narrower TDs on his car and more regular rubber and even though it has 100hp more than mine, it felt much steadier and easy to drive.

So, wheels need to be sorted.

Next up was the Larini. It sounded great but it was just too loud. The pops and bangs on the overrun were antisocial and I felt like a major tool. It also had the inverse effect of really making me drive more slowly.

Right then, the exhaust needs to go as well.

The final thing (leaving power aside for now) was that I always though the front end could be a little sharper and this was confirmed when I drove the silver car. I needed to work on that as well.

[thebaron]

Exhaust swapped back

















Larini sold. Much better.

[thebaron]

Front suspension mounts swapped for Elise items to bring the front down 10mm













You can't do the same with the rear as it's hard mounted

[thebaron]

So now for the wheels.

Well I had that itch in my brain from the time I put the ATS' on the car. I was also thinking of using the car in the Winter so I started to look out for an OEM set of 15 inch Winter Speedster alloys. These are very rare but my friend with the Silver car came up trumps again and found a set in Switzerland. I hopped on them. Essentially brand new and with the original 2002 manufactured tires. They had clearly never been on a car.

[thebaron]

So I test fit the set (this was before the front mounts so still a little high on the nose)




Also, weights. Front OEM - 17.5 KG, ATS 18.1 KG, OEM 15's 14.7 KG. This will work nicely

[thebaron]

Some new tires








Then it was just time to drive. Which I did, a lot, all over Switzerland and bits of France and Germany

[thebaron]

[thebaron]

Roll on November 2021 and the clock hits






Time for an assessment. The car is great, I really like my 15's. I need to get a little more negative camber dialled in on the front but generally I'm happy with the chassis. It could do with a little more power though and this dip has not aged well.

2.4 manifold from a Chevy Cobalt goes on




Dip comes off and a temp. nose spray can job is applied just to make it presentable as I have to go to Düsseldorf.












Manifold definitely helps. Revs higher and and indicated 220 kph vmaxx achieved

[thebaron]

I lost lights around 8.00 p.m. 50km North of Stuttgart on the return leg.

A friendly French trucker with a phase tester helped me and we figured out a dodgy relay. A little switcharoo and I was on my way.

1300km round trip in 36 hours

[thebaron]

We are almost up to date.

As soon as I came back from Germany (and recovered from Chickenpox!! That's right, of all the virus issues floating around right now it's Chickenpox that gets me as a 40 year old man FFS) my mate pops over on a Saturday and we do this

[mr2fc]

When I had mine I wanted a bit more noise than the OEM could provide, so I went for the Piper. My wife was worried it would be too loud for our quiet* cul-de-sac so while waiting for the exhaust to come I always reversed on to the drive and as soon as I had fitted it I began driving on to the drive so the exhaust was pointing away from our house!
She never noticed, although the Piper wasn't too loud anyway.

*quiet for Basiltown, I might add

[thebaron]

I pulled the clam off to do a number of things.




Exhaust manifold






Yep - it fits. Back off to heat wrap it as I won't put the heat shield back on














It's still in the footwell as I'm waiting for new manifold studs to arrive.

[thebaron]

Larger 65mm LE5 throttle body







Some other smaller new pieces











I do love the green so I'm going to wrap it myself in 3M Kelly Green Gloss





Finally I pulled the ECU as it's off to a specialist in the Netherlands to make the most of these changes. It also allows scope for reprogramming in future as I am close to purchasing a ported head with stiffer springs, 11.1 CR and stage 2 cams. That second step would happen mid-year as I want to experience the changes step by step. My target in the end is 200 bhp keeping it NA which would be a handy bump from the original 147 bhp.

[thebaron]

So we are all caught up. As of today January 12th 2022 the Speedster is in many pieces in the garage waiting for the ECU to return from the Netherlands and some manifold bolts to be delivered.

All going well I should have everything bolted back up by the end of February and we will get the clam back on.

[jasellan]

Jan 12, 2022 9:49:15 GMT thebaron said:

Revs higher and and indicated 220 kph vmaxx achieved

Is the gearing particularly short on these? I managed to get 220kmh GPS in my Fiesta ST150 (MP165 so 165bhp, similar power but more weight than your Speedster) on the Autobahn, and I always thought the gearing was fairly short in that.

The black looked good once you'd darkened the various bits, but have to say the green also works really well. Looking forward to reading through the rest of the thread!