Brett's GTE 16v - Project Pineapple

[Brett]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

centre rub strips - Im reusing the splitter Gary had on it for the lower part, with fiesta Mk3 Si foglights as indicators to compliment with the quads.

I should be able to order the pipe kit for the brakes tomorrow, so I'll refit the servo and start working that out at the weekend. Want to get the ARB on and the steering rack - RSC dependent. Harvey tells me there is life up there, albeit a little shy of some customers!! I'll fit the rear of the cage too hopefully.

after all thats done I'll finish the loom and then, I can seeing about getting this engine in......

[astrasteve23]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

popped in craigs and seen it earlier, coming on nicely. trevor is re opening in a couple of weeks at new place so we should hear somethinh soon!

[Brett]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

Slight change of plan, its become obvious it would be far better to fit the engine, then finish the wiring for a tidy job.

So, Im going to get a few days of next week and turn my attention to the engine, get it painted, timing belt kit and water pump done. Further maintenance will be best done when the engine's in the car I think.

last night I rewired the heater motor, wiper motor and winscreen washer pump. I filled some holes up that Ive found or realised I wont use, a bit annoying considering the paint but it will tidy up fine. I put the final coat of gloss black on the cage and fitted the correct window screws, the cage can go in thursday night now after the sunroof goes back in.

still nothing on the quikraks

[Brett]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

didnt spent too much time on it this weekend, I put in a few hours cleaning the steering rack up with the wire brush and other bits and bobs.

I couldnt find the steering rack that came with the car anywhere, I wanted this as Gary had made some clever steering arms I want to re-use. After going between my garage and craigs garage twice, I came to the conclusion it had been scrapped by accident. I was seriously miffed as theres no way I myself would have binned it. Then my brother came back from my mates garden centre where he had been stripping the heated seat loom from my Calibra Turbo shell for his Astra GSi. It hit me, and half an hour later I was re-united with the rack, which I'd put out of the way in the Calibra after removing the engine!! I also realised the front wings from the astra are still in it, which I wasnt aware off! all that cost me the afternoon!

yesetrday I went to Steves and we stripped down the Astra front legs and hammerited the Calibra Turbo legs ready for having the new bearings pressed in. After that we swapped the front legs on his van as hes got some starnge handling issues.

next update should be thursday, I've got the day of work and stt is coming up to help out. My mate craig has the day off too, so we should get shed loads done!

[Brett]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

Front ARB is on at last, along with the correct washers for the wishbones.

Ive given all the front inner wings and arches a 2nd layer of underseal to stop it rusting where we've welded it.

Went to fit the cage the other night, then discovered one of the seatbelts has jammed so thats still not done. Its so frustrating that silly things like seatbelts can hold me up, It'll be the weekend before I get time to find one of those again.

Ive painted the steering rack and modified the damper on the manual racks so i can retain it and use the special steering arms gary made. This involved making the bracket that the steering arm bolts go through flat and slotting one of the holes slightly. Thats all ready to go on now, along with the servo and brake line which are being done tomrrow.

Would love to show you all some pictures, but I have none, digi cam is still away being fixed!

[BazW]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

how much is left to do?

[Brett]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

antiroll bar was the first thing Ive bolted back onto the front of the car except for the wishbones LOL! pretty much everything is still to be done!

lots still to do, its re-wired now thats the main thing!

[DarrenH]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

the thing you mention with the rack, is that the bump steer mod ?

[stt]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

Do you want me to bring my Digicam tomorrow?

[_SBD16v]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

the thing you mention with the rack, is that the bump steer mod ?

yes i am going to be doing somethign very simular to mine once the suspenison have all been set up properly

[Harvey]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

What is the bump steer mod and has anyone got any pictures?

[DarrenH]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

like this...



it moves the inboard mounting points for the track rods up an inch or two on the rack, back to factory positioning. counteracting the nasty track rod angles caused by lowering the car.

[Gander]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

Didn't Dr Strickland do the BSM on his 8v and remove it again citing no improvement?

[Brett]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

yeah, the arms I refer to are the ones gary made up to counter bump steer. Its got a mounting bracket aexactly loke what odders shows there. the arms also have been 'bent' I dont know why Gary did this, but he says it all worked well. I'll try it and see what happens.

As for progress, at last there is some serious progress to report!!

I did a 16 hour day working on it yesterday, arriving at 8am to paint under the scuttle panel, refit the heater motor, wiper motor and arms and the winscreen washer bottle which is re-located behind there. Ive modded the route the wires for these take so they are all hidden too, coming up through underneath the wiper motor. The original hole for this loom has been fillered and sprayed. I soldered all the connectors back on to the loom and plugged it all in.

Next up craig helped me fit the arb Links, I havent bothered with poly bushes, tbh I dont want a really harsh ride because Somerset have some of the most appaling roads in the country. I used all new links and new rubber bushes, then we torqued it all up to haynes manual recommendations and set the ARB link bushes to the 38mm setting.

Next up the manual rack (massive 4.2 turns lock to lock btw!) which Ive painted up got lobbed on so I could fit the servo. The one Ive used came from a GTE 5dr me stt and I broke about 18 months ago, so had the damper on there. I decided to leave this on as I hate the steering wheel dancing around over bumps and so on like manual racks are prone too, and this should eliminate that at least partially. We had to mod it a bit to make it work with the bump steer modded arms but it all lined up with a few adjustments. I did all that and painted it the other night and so all that was left to do to this was fit it all on, which which wasnt hard as I've taken the column back out. Im thinking about using a non adjustable one because its lighter

I took a break from the Astra at this point and helped craig remove the engine from his Corsa SRi, its spun a bottom end shell

Simon (stt on here) came over at lunch time to do the brake lines. He'd got all the unions and copper pipe for me as he knew exactly want was needed for it all which made my life much easier. We used bulkhead adapters where the pipes come into the car and also where they go back throught the floorpan at the rear. This took a fair old while, simon made templates to start with before going on and making the brake lines from scratch. I've never seen this done before and bloody hell, its clever stuff!! around the master cylinder looks fabulous with all those fresh copper pipes. Lets hope it works just as well! We used the normal clips for holding the brake lines to the underside of the car to do the same job inside, after craigs mum kindly cleaned them for me!! As you can see from the pics the lines run down the centre of the car, under the gearstick, up over the fuel tank and back underneath the car there. We ran outof copper to do the bottom of the car but Simon wants me to fit the Mk2 Cav Estate rear beam before we do that part. I'll be using goodridge braided hoses instaed of the rubber flexi hoses as per the norm.

Pics from the day... You can see here what else has been done, mainly the loom is nearly all back in now.












Last job of the day we attacked a noisey F20 steve had given me to get the speedo sender and ring out of for use in the F28. It didnt want to play ball, so in the ned craig and simon went at it with an angle grinder and got the diff out that way. Steve, I owe you an F20 mate!

I left at about 11.30 PM after tidying the garage!

Yesterday Craig and I went scrapyarding, I needed a seat belt before I could fit the cage. Allarmingly, there were only about 2 Mk2 Astra's accross all the 5 we visited, all said they just crush them now Simon had spotted an Renault 19 16v in one of them the day before so we returned and relived it of this...


..... an electric water pump. Pretty useful for a Turbo that will be used pretty hard. Not sure how best to activate it yet, be it tempreture or timer based, but I'll ask those in the know like most things with this car and them implement what I think is best!

After that we went down to Simons farm where he pressed in a new wheel bearing for me. We grabbed his sand blaster and headed back off home. Im going to sand blast me 17's before I spray them, and I like to try most things myself so it seemed like the ideal thing!

Today I was going to do that, but even though I wasnt driniking when I was out last night, Ive had the headache from hell all day and this is the first thing Ive really done all day. I get these quite a lot and its the 3rd consecutive saturday Ive lost to this, its really ****ing annoying but Ive been getting them since I was a kid and theres no simple cure

Anyway, this week our attention will turn to the C20LET and F28. Painting, converting and so on ready to fit as soon as we can. Im off to the VBOA sapres day in warwickshire tomorrow with Simon, armed with cash for anything that grabs my attention.

I owe major major thanks to Simon and craig for all their help over the past 2 days, cheers guys I appreciate it loads!

ps. sorry for the long reply. I accidentally deleted this reply once, as I was upploading the water pump picture, so Ive written it twice, you only have to read it once!!!

[rhydgte]

Re: Brett's Pineapple Yellow GTE 16v project

Good stuff