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Shugs increasingly solid Manta A project


Shug
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Was a 1999 1.8. Course vauxhall use feckin torx bolts on everything and I only have a normal socket set with me at the mo, and I can't nip to halfords for some cos the cars buggered.

Tricky.

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Aye they will try anything to get you to put your car into dealerships same as not giving out or letting you buy some of the special tools required for some jobs but you get round it all thi same.

rab.

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  • 2 months later...

I welded on a wheel arch and it looks like sh**e!

Well, its no that bad but it certainly ain't the prettiest, specially when I discovered some filler when I was grinding to clean metal to weld. Powder everywhere.

A skim of filler and it'll all look pretty again tho. Took me bloody ages to cut the repair section and wheel arch to shape properly. Think I'll use my joggler on other side. Much quicker!

Also de-rusted my engine block and sump and painted it in a very fetching shade of black. Used por 15 engine enamel. Looks like damn good stuff.

Annnd I removed door hinge pins. Quite easy when you know how. Just takes the hinge pin removal tool, a hammer, a blowtorch.

Oh, and an angle grinder

No pics cos you've all been very naughty. Or I've misplaced my phone cable. Again.

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Hi Shug, good to know your making steady progress, please post some pics of the wheel arch repairs, as soon as the dust settles from all that grinding the filler .

Am part way though sorting out my rear wheel arches, has taken several days, will post update soon.

That yellow door has seen better days, but nothing that you can't sort out to bring it back to life :thumbup

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Heres the few pics I took. Didnt actually take any before pics of wheelarch.

arch.JPG

(rear lower quarter to go on still hence the arch looking lower on right)

Heres my improvised rust bath. One old plastic cold water tank sealed with silicon and a fish tank heater to keep temperature above baltic! and half a carton of Bilt Hamber's deox c powder.

bath.JPG

One shiny block painted with Por 15 black engine enamel

block.JPG

One freshly reconned head. Skimmed, recut and valves grinded back in, years of old mostly solid gunk cleaned out for 120 quid.

head2.JPG

And one shiny timing chamber that took forever to clean up. full of aforementioned gunk!

timing.JPG

And lastly, is the exhaust supposed to be like this on an audi a3 quattro?

audi.JPG

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  • 4 weeks later...

With a week off work thought I'd get loads done.

Welded on new sill, 2 wheel arches and 2 rear quarter panels. Not putting pictures up til I've grinded and hammered fuck out of them and covered with filler cos its bloody atrocious. Nearest I've come yet to torching the bloody lot.

Today was especially good. Started out by losing my welding gauntlets (found them later sitting on top of a tyre. I had to buy black ones, didn't I? ) Rigger gloves are no substitute for welding. Ouch.

For my second trick I broke a piston ring by not paying enough attention whilst fitting pistons to engine. I now have a 3 piston engine. can you buy single rings?

Thirdly I mis cut the wheel arch section and had to fill in gaps of 1/2 centimetre. Good fun with 0.6mm mig wire.

I've also lost count of the number of times I set fire to the car. Never on purpose tho. Not yet.....

I hate bodywork.

I also broke the rear seat in my audi, and the boot doesnt open anymore cos of a faulty microswitch.

Should have stayed at work this week :brick:brick

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Glad it's not just me that has days like that

Don't think you can buy single rings but I'm sure you can buy a single piston set

and yeah, rigger gloves - mine decided they weren't taking any more sparks from the welder today. I've got several perfectly good RH gloves but the LH ones all have the backs burnt off

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What's catching fire.........filler, black sound deadning sheets or seam sealer

Yes.

Looking back at it, I reckon I got a decent amount done. I even successfully managed to successfully order some bits from vauxhall for it! (head bolts. 2.4 are same as 2.2. 40 quid with trade discount tho.)

Funny thing is if I weld something for the manta, where it won't be seen, its a work of art. Something of true beauty, welded with precision and skill. As soon as its gonna be visible it turns to s***e!

Still, I'll get to practice panel beating, and I bought a huge tub of dinitrol filler which'd be a shame not to use up!

Just need one piston ring and part of rear lower valence a and I can finish the body and drop the engine in. The wiring is scaring me tho.

Oh, and the black welding gauntlets were bought cos I lost the red ones.

Naturally found them once I bought another pair.

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Another reason for no pics is the fact I didn't take any

Still, heres some random ones anyway

A vectra. My pride and joy

vectra.JPG

vectra2.JPG

Actually its the turd thats been keeping me from doing loads to the manta. Off to the scrapyard next week.

Heres some work I did actually do on the manta:

arch3.JPG

And another reason for not doing more to manta:

ullapool.JPG

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  • 2 weeks later...

Theres something about working on a manta, that causes problems with my audi.

Remote and central locking no longer works, boot will not open at all now, and if you don't get the key in the ignition within 30 secs of opening the drivers door the alarm goes off. I also need a new diverter valve, steering angle sensor and possibly MAF. I also found more rust in it than I ever found on my vectra. Its also demanding a service. Yay for galvanised german reliability, eh? bay.JPG

Took back to bare metal and etch primed. Took a while. (decided on nice shiny black to match the rest of car)

Also did the front lower valence. Then ran out of etch primer so couldn't really do anymore.

So, the big question is, what will cost more this month. The audi or manta?

(bearing in mind I was about to buy everything to spray it as well as some tools and parts)

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Your getting there Shug, take ages to get the engine bay done, esp in all the aquard corners, thats another area you have got the dreaded tin worm out of

Actually, paul had already done the engine bay before I got the shell from him.

I just decided suddenly I wanted different paint on it

Going to order lower rear valence, and a piston ring so hopefully next time I can finish building the engine, and have all the exterior bodywork finished.

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  • 1 month later...

Another month gone and the thing still largely looks the same.

On the bright side, I finally shifted the heap

vectra.JPG

It was a very emotional day. (as in, thank **** thats gone, ******* **** heap!)

Next job was to pretty up my workspace:

advert.JPG

Then removed rear valance. Wasn't sure if I needed to at first but then....

oldrear.JPG

Also changed

hole.JPG into

cleanhole.JPG to replace section where someone had welded over the filler hole.

And got my doors back from the blaster

door.JPG

Still need to hammer hell out of one to get it into shape, and the acquisition of 150 quid worth of frost stuff should help with that. I swear I'm having more fun buying the tools than I do using them.

Also got a deVilbiss gun for when the manta is ready for painting, one day....

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Hi Shug .......Your almost on the home straight with this project, stay with it, no going back now

That rear valence had seen better days, new one sure is the best way forward. Not sure what you mean by someone welded over the filler hole (Petrol filler hole?)....did it have a filler cap elseware on the car?

Buying tools is an obsession for me too, buy more tools than car parts at autojumbles and boot fairs. Also am a ebay addict, have been checking new Opel listings in uk and Germany, every day for the last 5 years, still do it now, even though I have most of the parts I need. Will have to go into rehab soon, to rid me of this Ebay addiction :hair

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That rear valence had seen better days, new one sure is the best way forward. Not sure what you mean by someone welded over the filler hole (Petrol filler hole?)....did it have a filler cap elseware on the car?

A round plate had been welded over the petrol filler hole. There wasn't a filler hole anywhere else. The shell has been a project for a couple others before I got it, tho no shortage of work to do on it (or repairs to be remedied, but not those by the immediately previous owner!)

Once the valence is on, there is just a patch inside the car and the spare wheel well to weld in, then I can sand and paint. Engine fully stripped and partly reassembled. Shouldn't take too long to finish rebuilding.

Its all getting rather exciting now!

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