Prawn and BigAls A3 Track Car

[Westy]

Thats pretty smooth mate. You happy?

 

[Prawn]

Righty then, today work:

Started off by fitting the first part of the downpipe. Struggled for a few minutes working out how to get it in, then figured out that by rotationg it through a full 360 degrees as I lifted it up allowed it to clear everything, and it just slipped straight into place!
Secured with new stainless nuts, and of course Nordlock washers again like the turbo and manifold.

Then got to work on the IC pipework. First off was making an N75 take off:

Standard Drill/tap and chemical method used

Sanded it down, smoothed the remains of the chemical metal, and painted it black:

Job done. onto the cold side pipework, a few small trims to the first 2 90's, and it fitted perfectly, keeping all the swages on the alloy pipes so it won't be popping off:

A little while later, I had the rest of the pipes in place, and the N75 plumbed in with new silicon lines, reusing the heat shielding for the actuator line

That's the engine bay pretty much done, apart from finding a location for the catch can. I found a handy little tab on the battery box that wasn't being used, so knocked up a steel bracket to fit the catch can there:

then my phone battery died, so no pics for ages!

I tried to fit the final part of the decat to complete the exhaust, only to find the XS downpipe is WAAAAAAY longer than a ko3 one, and I'd need to cut the front 12'' off my catback system. No problem I thought, but I'd need a sleeve to join the two 2.5'' parts together. A trip to town and nowhere had one, but I'm now taking my centre section to a Longlife place nearby to have the end expanded on Saturday, so I'll end up with a better solution after all, which is cool.

I was determined to get it running today, so I could trace any faults and order any desperate parts to fit on saturday.

With this in mind, I decided to bodge the exhaust just to get the lamda sensor in there for the fire up:

I just fitted the second part of the decat on upside down, and it worked a treat with my custom wooden exhaust hanger!

One last pic, just incase it blows up when I turn the key and covers everything in oil!"

Success! it runs:



Very happy about that, it sounds awful, but who cares, it's got no exhaust!

I also took a few pics this evening with the bumper back on, just to show how tight the intercooler core is behind my bumper!

Will paint the IC black this weekend I think, as well as fitting the boost controller

 

[Dane]

Epic work mate! Hope it keeps going well dude!

 

[Prawn]

Cheers matey, without you I couldn't have made any of this happen, I'm just hoping I don't have the same troubles that you did.

So relieved that it's running now, having so much out I was really quite scared of what was going to happen when I turned the key! I had visions of the cam caps being too tight and it not turning and valves going everywhere!

 

[s3dave]

It must be the best feeling ever when she fires to life....Excellent work mate...:icon_thumright:

 

[<tuffty/>]

Looks good bud... glad its all come together for you..

<tuffty/>

 

[Westy]

Be good to see the old girl at Ace Cafe next Tuesday mate.

 

[Prawn]

Hells yes it will Westicles!

I'll be taking it easy, but so long as the weekend goes to plan, I'll be there putting some miles on it

Still nervous about my first drive though, should be saturday. I know I can't give it a load of throttle, but I'm not entirely sure just HOW much throttle I dare give it?

I noticed instantly when it was running this evening, that the ko4 is so different to the ko3S, on a ko3S you can get 1-2psi of boost and an audible noise from the DV just by revving it a bit from idle, on the ko4 the boost guage doesn't even reach 0.

Also, with NO exhaust at all, you can really hear the turbo whistle when you blip the throttle! I was worried about it at first, but I seem to vaguely remember hearing a similar noise when it was run on the ko3S with no exhaust:

 

[George The Diesel Head]

Probably due to lack of back pressure and no exhaust to muffle the sound.... I have seen diesel cars with straight through exhausts make a similar noise.

 

[sportstractor]

My ko4 gets an audiable dv noise on idle... Oh no it must be fudged! Get it off and send it my way, I will send you mine in return

 

[aragorn]

I'd say its fairly normal tbh

As above i've run a VW TDI with no downpipe and the turbo noise was pretty much identical to yours.

 

[<tuffty/>]

Perfectly normal noise that... mine did the same with no downpipe



<tuffty/>

 

[Jason.s]

On my ghetto system which was straight pipe with and without the cat the spool through the exhaust was epic! Nothing to worry about. You get a good idea of how quickly it spools up when you hear that noise all the time.

 

[Prawn]

sweet, thanks folks. I just wondered, because the first sign that my first ko3S was dying was a kind of police car siren noise when driving around on part throttle, it slowly got louder until i was convinced the 5-0 were following me everywhere, then it turned into a scream, and a dead turbo very quickly!

Just got to have the end of my mid pipe expanded at Longlife on Saturday, and she should be ready to hit the road!

 

[aragorn]

I get that "5-0" noise from the hybrid on my A4, mostly when its cold. It better fraking not turn into a scream!

 

[George The Diesel Head]

Sanded it down, smoothed the remains of the chemical metal, and painted it black:

Lovely work by the way...

 

[Prawn]

Thanks George, I painted it up like that after seeing Tuftys in his build thread

And speaking of Tufty, just for you Paul:

 

[Westy]

Is that some more heat sheilding?

 

[Prawn]

yea, it turns out standard S3 heat shielding goes around to the drivers side more and covers the servo area.

When i fitted the first lot, I didn't think about the downpipe coming out sideways, and centred my shield to the manifold to give that max protection, so I need to add some on the side to stop it from cooking my brakes!

Wish I'd just sourced a standard S3/LCR heat shield from a breakers now. Grrrrrrrr.....!!!!!!!

Also, it feels like both my clutch and brakes need bleeding after it's been parked up for a month, I've changed the clutch pressure plate, but not the friction plate, and the bite point seems MUCH lower, with the top half of the pedal travel feeling like air, and the lower half being stiffer than before due to teh uprated plate. not a nice feeling at all. Brakes are a bit soft too, so i think it just needs a general overhaul, which will be Sundays job i think. as well as whipping the bumper back off and painting the welly cooler and it's brackets.

can't WAIT to have a first drive though, so excited!

Gizzmo is here, so that'll go on this weekend as well.

 

[aragorn]

Give the clutch some time.

I've found new clutches seem to take some time to start feeling "right". The one in craigs S4 felt horrible when we first drove it, squishy at the top and stiff at the bottom etc. No amount of bleeding would fix it. Once the car was actually driven though, it sorted itself right out.

 

[Prawn]

Cheers Kev, will see how it feels when I finally get to drive it tomorrow.

Got my centre section off this evening after much banging, in the rain, in the dark, under the car.

I've marked it up and cut it down, and cleaned it all up ready to have the end expanded at long life tomorrow.

Should have it all fitted up and ready to run before 10am

 

[Prawn]

Another mini update whilst I have breakfast before starting work again:

I took a few pics of the XS mani last night, and to my surprise, it's started going brown after just 30 minutes on idle!

Comparison against the downpipe:

I wonder what colour it'll go after a thrashing?

Also, I shortened the end of my catback last night, and popped down to Longlife to have it expanded,

Before:

After:

Time for breakfast, then I'll crack on with it!

 

[Paradox1]

hurry up get a move on! lol

strange why the manifold is changing colour. this normally happens if lots of head goes through it. like your old k03s downpipe. ask welly if he had the same with his.

 

[Jason.s]

Most stainless exhaust stuff with extreme heat goes gold then brown. My manifold on the Civic was gold less than 10miles up the road.

 

[Prawn]

meh. Right now it feels like it's all been a ****ing great waste of time.

Listen to it:



Mint condition 80k miles gearbox my ****. I knew it was worn, but not THAT bad surely....

 

[sportstractor]

Shocker... Get onto the seller

 

[Westy]

Oh no mate

 

[Paradox1]

id take it back to the seller and demand my money back. put your car on hold again

 

[Prawn]

meh. I've had a bit of time to calm down, and I guess the world isn't about to end, not just yet anyway.

So, a write up of todays work:

Got back from Longlife, and the expanded exhaust fitted perfectly over my XS decat:

Got the exhaust fitted up, bit of a strange fit on the A3, as it's VERY obvious that this downpipe is designed for a car with a propshaft! it sits much lower, and off to one side compared to the A3 exhaust, to make way for the prop on an S3:

Fired it up, and she runs perfectly!

Bit of steam which worried me at first when it didn't stop, but I think it's just due to condensation that's built up in the box over time whilst it's not been used.

With that done, I fitted the headlights, and set about remounting the horn.

Simple solution to fit the horn back in place was to bend the bracket back on itself - easy fix

Then I refitted the bumper, which need one last final trim to clear the wellycooler properly:

By this time, the manifold had cooled down, so I was able to fit the final bit of heatshield, Tufty advised I fitted this, to stop the downpipe from heating up the brake servo too much! Sounds idea, and I'm glad I did.

Quite happy with how this came out really

Decent air gap behind the shield, as important as the alloy shield itself.

Finally back on it's wheels for the first time in about 4 weeks

The wellycooler doesn't look too bad at all, will probably still paint it black tomorrow though to blend it in a bit more

Manifold starting to go all kinda of cool colours after another half hours running:

The finished engine bay:

Out and about:

I had my first decent drive in it this evening, I popped over to Andover to pick up my new Oz Supertourismo wheels

These have decent pirreli road tyres on, and will be going on the car tomorrow to be kept as road wheels, and I'll fit a set of my A048R's onto the Rotas and retire the Federals for now. Will save them in their road legal state for a future ring trip I think.

SO, the gear box, it's horrific.

The noise in first gear is simply terrible, not happy with it all, and will be contacting the seller. Can't exactly give it back, as I've had my diff fitted to it now, but that's not in any way linked to this utterly hateful noise.

The only solution will be to get ANOTHER gearbox, so that'll be number 7 for the car in it's life, and then I'll have to spend yet more money on having my diff transfered into the NEW new box.

Pretty **** really. Putting the car on hold isn't an option now though. I never really open it up in 1st at all anyway, and certainly won't be doing so now. it's not like it's an old knackered box with bits floating around waiting to cause trouble, it's freshly built, and just happens to have a worn 1st gear, so providing I stay out of 1st under load, I see now reason why it can't still be mapped. Will have to talk to Nick about it.

Still, aside from 1st gear, it drives brilliantly now, can feel SO much potential in the new turbo, it's so hard trying to keep off the loud pedal!

 

[<tuffty/>]

meh. Right now it feels like it's all been a ****ing great waste of time.

Listen to it:



Mint condition 80k miles gearbox my ****. I knew it was worn, but not THAT bad surely....

Bad times bud... read the other post (and liked) before I realised this had happened...

Feel for you mate....

<tuffty/>

 

[16Klappe]

So **** about the box dude

Have a chat with dad tomorrow, I'm sure he'll sort you out something if you get him another box. He will be disappointed to know it isn't perfect but it's better you know exactly what the noise is and you've got him to sort it out if you can get a new gearset.

 

[Prawn]

yea man, your dad said it'd whine when reassambled, and we knew first gear was worn, I just didn't realise how bad it'd be.

The work jonny did was sound, but nothing can account for a ******** gearset! Shame. but I'll definitely take ANOTHER new box back to jonny for having the diff swapped over AGAIN.

 

[Prawn]

today hasn't been any better I'm afraid folks! It seems like this car is going to fight me the whole way

Started the day off with a simple task: fit new wheels to make me feel better

Only it wasn't quite so simple after all, I took the first wheel off, and found the inside of the rim was coated in brake fluid:

Turned out to be a leaking joint at the caliper, no idea how long it's been like that!

Whipped the joint off, and the crush washers didn't look great at all. Cleaned it all up for now and refitted, and it's sealed up, but I'll have to get new crush washers for that ASAP, and bleed the brakes in the week.

New wheels on, and I'm very happy with them, they look very touring car-esque!

Brembos look wicked behind them too:

And of course the full 'door open to show off cage' shot:

Done. So I popped down to halfords to pick up some Y pieces to install the gizzmo. I was chatting to Frenchman on the phone in halfords, and I was telling him how I wasn't feeling great about the car, and just waiting for the next thing to go wrong.

Came out to the car, turned the key, and it sounded like a ****** subaru! ********. I guess I kinxed that then

A quick check of all the injector plugs and the coilpacks and ICM, and after prodding the ICM it seemed to fall back into line, obviously a connection issue there then, perhaps not helped by the cold wet weather.

Got home, and made a start on the gizzmo:

Having had one of these fitted in the car before, all the mounting holes were there, which was nice

Ran a new line from the DV inside the car to replace my old boost guage line, and T-d into it for the Gizzmo map sensor:

Wasn't happy with the way the original boost guage pipe went onto the T, it kept trying to go off centre and wouldn't sit right, so I ended up taking the pillar pod out and running a new line up to the guage as well:

I managed to get my handy little grab tool down through a grommet next to the pollen filter, so taped the gizzmo solenoid loom onto it, and pulled that back through to the engine bay:

Then mounted the solenoid onto the side of the main loom trunking:

All piped up with new T's and silicon, it's looking a bit complicated now!

I ran the wires through the car, and plumbed it all into the back of the gizzmo:

And job done!

It's in, and can be seen very easily from the driving position:

Not that I need to look at it anyway, as I've got a mechanical gauge I much prefer to use.

it's fairly unintrusive, and sits down there quite nicely

Most importantly though, there's still enough room in the pocket for a can of redbull and my sunglasses!

Had a bit more subaru lumpyness on a test drive earlier, but I think it just needs some wd40

 

[ScottD3]

What is the gizmo?

Liking the new wheels mate.
Looks good.

 

[sportstractor]

its an electronic boost controller. when and where are the track days nick?

 

[Westy]

Christ nick you have no luck do you!

At least apart from the box the rest of it's simple proplems, you'll have it all sorted in a week :thumbsup:

 

[george_seamons]

Have you tried putting some dielectric grease on the plug and contacts of the ICM? I used to have similar problems with mine (with no apparent rhyme or reason). Since greasing all the conacts, I haven't had a problem since. I also did the MAF contacts while I was at it, apparently it can be benificial to do so.

 

[Prawn]

where on earth do I find dielectric grease spunky? Sounds like a good idea, and I think it's definitely my issue. It can be ticking over chug chug chug, and I prod the ICM, and it goes dead smooth again!


Think I've got some 440's sorted out too, cheers Dan!

 

[Westy]

Think I've got some 440's sorted out too, cheers Dan!

This is what I'm talking about! You don't mess about :thumbsup:

 

[Barks]

Have you tried putting some dielectric grease on the plug and contacts of the ICM? I used to have similar problems with mine (with no apparent rhyme or reason). Since greasing all the conacts, I haven't had a problem since. I also did the MAF contacts while I was at it, apparently it can be benificial to do so.

A dielectic is insulation barrier, that is not going to be great for reducing contact resistance. Would be good for reducing water ingress though. Just a good clean and s light film of very light oil should help. Then a little silicone grease for protection