Opel Kadett group A

[Qatatonic]

Originally posted in Migweb so apologies for any of you who have seen this there.

Greetings from the savannah everyone. Just an Opel fan here from Kenya. Looking to help a friend restore a group A Kadett. We have partial history on the car. We suspect it rallied in South Africa and Kenya in the late 90s. We know it was run in the Safari Rally in 1997 as a rebadged Daewoo Cielo by the local Daewoo franchise, finishing 13th out of a total field of 61 (only 19 finished)! Cannot definitively confirm if it is the same car that won the SA rally in '97 as pics and info are hard to come by but still looking. The car has a ton of parts missing (including the engine) but there's enough of it left that we feel it would be a great rebuild project. There is a reg plate with it, (UK perhaps? see photos) and a strange chassis number RK29/6.89.

Anyway, we are hoping to restore it to rally condition. Pics below. At the moment, we have stripped out most of what was left to assess condition and identify spares.

RallyMarshal has already helped by pointing out that it looks like it is a LHD to RHD conversion with the original car possibly having been built by Rennsport Kissling.

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[Vinci]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

This should be fun to follow! You would do good to use a photo hosting service instead the forum attachement system, since there is a bug that erases them in a week or two.

[Qatatonic]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

Many thanks and duly noted. I'll definitely do that for the follow-up posts.

[RallyMarshal]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

Welcome :-)

[Qatatonic]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

This should be fun to follow! You would do good to use a photo hosting service instead the forum attachement system, since there is a bug that erases them in a week or two.

Let's try this again. I hope the pictures come out larger this time.

[Qatatonic]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

Just an update. No luck as yet tracing the true origins of the shell. Proceeding with repairs / restoration though. We're busy trying to identify the frankenstein parts we have on it. No idea yet on the drive shafts. Gearbox has been suggested to be an X-trac unit while the numbers on the CV joints trace back to a Porsche (968 I think?) parts list. Any of you experienced restorers out there know if these were the correct rally upgrades for the GTE Group A? The Group A prep guide I've found so far seems to cover the older Astra and has been of limited help so far. Pics below.

[DarrenH]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

welcome

16v group A did use a 6 speed x-trac gearbox so if you have one of them with your deal i'd be very pleased, magnesium casings

they had x-trac plate type diff and x-trac driveshafts with Lobro CV joints. i dont know the vehicle origin of the cv joints though.

[Qatatonic]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

welcome

16v group A did use a 6 speed x-trac gearbox so if you have one of them with your deal i'd be very pleased, magnesium casings

they had x-trac plate type diff and x-trac driveshafts with Lobro CV joints. i dont know the vehicle origin of the cv joints though.

Thanks DarrenH. The CV joints are indeed Lobro. When searching by the numbers on them, it comes up as a Porsche replacement part. Will continue to hunt down the drive shafts.

[DarrenH]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

forgot to mention, most of the GM europsort group A cars were re-badged left hand drive opel kadetts, which gives your shell a bit more provenance maybe

[DarrenH]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

this is the biggest resolution picture i have which is malcom wilson "works" group A 16v rally car (1990). i arrowed some of the gearbox features which kind of match yours.

you can also see the induction system and shows what the hole is on your windscreen drain channel which would have had the air filter. the alloy tank on left side of engine bay is same, same brackets on strut towers

rally cars used bosch motronic 1.2MS, engines built by swindow race engines, standard crank and rods, modified pistons, cylinder head/cams heavity modified. 220bhp@8000rpm. in the UK the shells were prepared by Dave Cook racing services for tarmac touring cars, and matter in germany for the rally cars.

[DarrenH]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

the chassis number is actually quite exciting because its the convention used by "MATTER" of france who basically prepared all the opel works rally cars for the 80s and early 90s.

RK prefix stands for "RACING KADETT" matter used this format through all of their rally shell preparation, for instance RA for rally Ascona, or RM for rally Manta. then a two digit build number, then the manufacture date.

hope this helps

[Roger]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

this will be interesting to follow!

[Qatatonic]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

the chassis number is actually quite exciting because its the convention used by "MATTER" of france who basically prepared all the opel works rally cars for the 80s and early 90s.

RK prefix stands for "RACING KADETT" matter used this format through all of their rally shell preparation, for instance RA for rally Ascona, or RM for rally Manta. then a two digit build number, then the manufacture date.

hope this helps

I've found their website. Looks like I will have to dust of the French phrase book:-) . Thanks again DarrenH, brilliant help as always. I'll get in touch with them and see if they can help with the history of the car / shell.

[DarrenH]

Re: Opel Kadett group A

hmm it says the shells were made by matter motorsport gmbh in germany. it looks from google searching the company moved to china in the millennium! but as you say there is an active business in france making motorsport products with the same company name and logo

bit confusing !

[Qatatonic]

Apologies for not updating this in ages. Life put the project on the back burner for some time. For starters, let me update on the gearbox. We were eventually able to identify it as an X-trac TXVT 010. Sadly, very few or no parts available for it as it had been out of production for quite a while. I was directed to some very helpful folks at Weverssport in the Netherlands who can rebuild. We hope to still do that at some point. Currently however, we will be looking for an alternative to get it going. Suggestions anyone? Sequential boxes are likely to be ruled out for the moment, purely on cost considerations, but anything else should be worth considering I think. Feel free to advise otherwise though.