Another Wreck, another Race Car.....

[Peter Jones]

Update as promised.

Finished off the front hubs and loaded the bearings.

You're looking at 16v MK2 Golf Hubs, ARP wheel studs, 19 mm ball joint & extender, MK2 rack arms.

I've got an old MK1 outer CV tightened up in there so I can roll the car around without damaging the bearing.

The MK2 steering arms are a little long, there's still some sorting out to be done there.





280mm Euro Spec discs.

Note the welding burn on the inner guard, I resprayed those bits today, it's from my pedal box adventures.



Girling 60 caliper fitted up. No pads yet I'm still trial fitting things at this stage.



I'm going to get these wheels widened now I know what offsets will work. I put these tyres on just for the moment.

Those calipers are a close fit but work well inside the wheel.





Here's what I did to the pedal box area. I just hacked out the tin and welded two diagonal brackets straight to the bulkhead.

The tin isn't structural it's mostly there to hold the carpet up and trap water so I'll just edge it with some pinchweld.







Back on the ground!



Minus the bracketry. Fitting up a couple of guards to check wheel/tyre clearances.

It's lower than it looks, the wheel arches have all been moved up which make it look high. Front valance has been cut off too.

Frame horns are about 6" off the ground with no motor fitted.



6 Inches is way too narrow. Plan is to go to 8" which is a CAMS/class thing and also about the widest tyre I can heat up properly in a car this light.

Final wheel size is 15 x 8 et 0 - et 10.







After modifying just about every part of the suspension and assembling by eyeball what are the odds that the top plate would read to the exact camber measurement?

-3° on top and -3° below. I was a bit nervous about the range of adjustment I'd have with this setup but it look like it's all worked out OK.

-3° seem to be about the max and I can get it as far back 0°. Pretty much the perfect range for me.





Caster measured at +4°. I need to do some research on the ideal figure but that seems in the ballpark.

[Stiggy_21]

Looking really good Pete!!
Those wheels are hilarious!!!

[Peter Jones]

Those wheels normally look big on a MK1, they're 15 x 6 with 195 / 50 rubber on them.

[Jarred]

Looks great back on the ground Pete!

makes it look a whole lot closer to completion!

Looks great with the big fat arches!

[GoLfMan]

awesome Pete! great to see it finally rolling! Really looking forward to seeing this completed!

[Peter Jones]

Back into it with some help from the overseeing wildlife.



Figured out the steering arms using some alignment jigs I made a few years back.

These are a bit flimsy and were only meant as a proof of concept but good enough for the task at hand.

I've got MK1 and MK2 rack ends to play with. After lot of measuring I've discovered that the MK1 arms are too short and the MK2 arms are too long.

I'll modify the MK2 ends by shortening them and extending the thread further back along the rod once the M13 die I've ordered arrives.

In the meantime the MK1 arms work for rolling the shell about the workshop.



Finished off the hatch today all up about 4 days of work in it.

Just putting the window in was an adventure.

Firstly the perspex window wasn't window shaped.

Secondly the fibreglass hatch wasn't hatch shaped.

Lots of cutting and sanding ensued until the two would marry up.

Then I had to fit up the aerocatches. These took some figuring out!

Here's some pictures.





I used nutserts in the fibre glass. For the bonnet I think I'll get the proper backing plates.




Just aligning the two pins and getting the lengths right probably took a couple of hours.



Came out pretty neat.

The hatch need to be secured at both sides rather than just the middle as there's quite a tweak the the fibreglass hatch that needs to be pulled into alignment.

I wouldn't be using one of these hatches on a show car, the fit is terrible. Fine for a race car though.

I also made up a brace for the back window to avoid high speed blowouts.

Internally it's a 20 x 30 T section, externally backed up by a 20mm strip.

Inner and outer bars both tuck under the rubber.

Top and bottom of the bar is secured back the hatch with 20 x 3mm bar bent to shape.

Fasteners through the window are M3 Unbrakos with nyloks. M5 dome heads into nutserts in the hatch itself.







The window brace is the most rigid part of the hatch!



Detail of Aerocatch.

Two stage operation. First you press the area where the keyhole is to pop the lever up.



and the puling the lever up slides the locking pin out of the hood pin.



I've got one of the doors built up today too, Perspex window mounted, lock back in and door card mounted. No photos till I clean up the huge mess I made with the silastic!

[roccodingo]

Pete, the toe was done at the designed ride height of the suspension ?? did you do it at full droop and bounce to check the bump steer effect ??

Would love to see the numbers if you have mate.

Doing a great job, prep work takes soo much time .

[Peter Jones]

That's on the list to do Grant,

I'll have to take the springs out to do it and use a jack to move the suspension over its range, mapping out the toe changes.

Bit hard to do at the moment the springs are 400 pound and don't compress much with no motor in there.

I needed to get the steering arms in the ball park adjust-ability wise first. I'll map it out once the final rack arms have been sorted.

[kaanage]

After modifying just about every part of the suspension and assembling by eyeball what are the odds that the top plate would read to the exact camber measurement?

-3° on top and -3° below. I was a bit nervous about the range of adjustment I'd have with this setup but it look like it's all worked out OK.

-3° seem to be about the max and I can get it as far back 0°. Pretty much the perfect range for me.

Caster measured at +4°. I need to do some research on the ideal figure but that seems in the ballpark.

Can you turn the Ground Control strut tops in the towers to adjust caster as well as camber? I've read the MkIV guys on VWVortex talking about this.

The car is looking terrific but will it work the tyres hard enough if they're 8" wide?

[Peter Jones]

No need to turn the strut tops, the caster can be adjusted by sliding them back or forth. The 4 mounting holes in the corners are slotted to allow this.

I should be able to get enough heat into 225s on 8" rims. I know 10"s wouldn't work.

Might have to have the wheels made and source some tyres soonish.

[Jarred]

Great work Pete.

Love the attention to detail!

[gldgti]

All looking very inspiring and pretty Pete.

Can I ask - is it normal/good/advisable/advantageous to run without the brake backing plates? (not a loaded question - just wondering. I always thought that the backing plate is probably designed (atleast in VW's case) to be useful to some degree with cooling or at least keeping heat away from the brake hose - but having said that, I never ran them on my mk3 road car on the rear (they were on the front though).

[Peter Jones]

On a road car they're there to deflect water spray, rocks etc, they don't really aid the cooling unless there's a duct attached.

I just couldn't be bothered with them. Better to have the backs open the radiate heat away and get a bit more air to the rotor.

At least that's my theory until not having them causes me some sort of issue.

It was hard enough figuring out the Girling 60 Calipers, MK2 Hubs and wheels to suit without having to figure out which backing plates fit too.

[kaanage]

is it normal/good/advisable/advantageous to run without the brake backing plates? (not a loaded question - just wondering. I always thought that the backing plate is probably designed (atleast in VW's case) to be useful to some degree with cooling or at least keeping heat away from the brake hose)

I had my rear backing plates removed by my (race) mechanic after he found that I'd cracked one of the rear pads.

[Peter Jones]

Bump steer is looking good with only 0.76° of toe out over full suspension travel.

That's a relief, a lot of guestimation seems to have paid off.

Now I can move on with putting more of the car together.