The Red Thread

[gldgti]

Only you could be so deadpan and awesome at the same time pete

[Peter Jones]

Haha.

Took me about 5-6 days all up. There's a few more challenges than I'd realised and there was a lot of stuff on Red I'd always meant to get around to that this conversion made unavoidable.

I did have an Ashley extractor set I was planning to use but it didn't fit because the ABF is so tall. I ended up using the stock exhaust manifold and fabricating my own down pipe.

40mm Dellortos are off white.

I customised a new set of 16v leads to go into a rebuilt Saab dizzy.

The Saab dizzy is hall effect so I also had to set up and wire in the same Bosch ignitor and coil as the late MK1s.

Bit of faffing about to move the brake fluid reservoir sideways a bit to clear the dizzy and I had to relocate one of the brake lines into a T piece to make it all fit.

Also fitted an air/oil cooler and deleted the water/oil cooler system.

Here's the exhaust work

[Peter Jones]

The gearshift hit the downpipe so I had to straighten one out a bit in the press.



I had to make this tiny throttle cable clamp on the lathe. I made it from a brass tap handle that I'd removed when I renovated my bathroom.





Relocated the brake fluid reservoir with plumbing fittings. I copied the barbs that go into the master cylinder in brass and sweated the copper bends together.

It'll do until I figure out a more elegant way of doing it.



Ebay oil cooler and lines.





Just a reducing fitting I had to make to join some of the heater hoses. Bit of chatter on the lathe but it'll just add a bit of texture for the hose to grip.

[abreut]

Good work, another ABF mk1 is born. Are you allowed to go up to 2l in a mk1 without engineering in Vic? We can only go up to 1.9l in NSW.

[Peter Jones]

Things have changed recently. If you increase power by more that 20% you need VASS sign off. It's no longer purely capacity based.

The most powerful motor fitted stock to a mk1 was an 1800 at 91Kw, the ABF stock has 110Kw which is about a 20% increase so it might scrape through on a technicality otherwise it'll need VASS sign off.

[Petska84]

Love your work Pete..... Is it still going to be a daily?

[Peter Jones]

Yep, being a stock ABF it's quite nice to drive, very tractable.

I've got some smaller venturis for the Dellortos which I might put in there later on.

Plenty of low down torque which suits the tall gearbox that's in there.

I think I'll have to sort out a better air cleaner arrangement too.

It's all pretty tight in there.

[Peter Jones]

Red decided a couple of weeks back that he preferred his engine oil all over the driveway. So we took off the head and sent it away for refurbishing. Looks like this engine's never been apart before.



All shiny and sorted! No major issues with it, just needed refreshing.



Bottom end needed refreshing too.



Took these out.




Got one of these.



Gave the barrels a honing.



All clean and smooth again.



New rings from Japan!



New bearings from Brazil!



One of these.



And back they go.



That's it so far, dinner time was calling.

[gldgti]

Glad I'm not the only person that's been rebuilding engines lately.
Why did it drop its oil?

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

[Peter Jones]

It was pressurising the crankcase big time.

I can only put it down to blowby or perhaps the very worn exhaust guides.

Once above idle speeds it was pumping oil out the filler cap continuously. Very odd behavior.

Crankcase breather wasn't blocked and all the drains from the head to the sump were OK too.

Engine was in great shape when I pulled it down.

Compression readings were all over the place though. Head work and rings will see it sorted though.

I'm going to add another breather to it too just in case by using a new beetle oil filler breather setup.

[gldgti]

Sounds like a bad compression leak... If the crankcase was pressurised enough, the oil will have trouble getting back down the drains from the head.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

[Peter Jones]

Start with this



Add some stuff



Replace thermostat



Needs moar shiny



Realise timing belt is wrong one. Swear. Order new one. Clean up and wait for delivery.

[Peter Jones]

Timing belt received, everything screwed back together





Just to prevent any more oil leaks from the cap.



Catch can's not moving anytime soon.



After sitting around for a few weeks, Red was covered in dust and overdue a bath.



Clean Bunny.

[sports racer]

How user-friendly is it to drive in traffic?

The stories I've been hearing is the ABF needs lots of revs and doesn't have much torque down low which has pushed me towards fitting a 9a into mine (with ABF head). I've got an ABF as well so it would be good to get your opinion.

Cheers

Paul

[Peter Jones]

That's just silly. The ABF has heaps of torque. This one used to push a much heavier Toledo around just fine.

There's been no issues in the MK1, This is a 2.0L motor after all.

Even with the twin Dellortos it'll take off from the lights at idle speed.