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The Car Thread


MadManMike

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Massive spotty crack.

Took the fairlane out today and smashed about 60 miles, used a little water but I think I've got a colaping bottom hose, the symptoms would suggest so I'll swap out when I get the electric fan on along with all the other hoses, new rad and water pump.

Ran like a dream though, I think the issue has been underlying since I bought the car to be honest, it's never ran so smooth and it goes like a rocket.

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So about a year ago, this came up for sale down in Plymouth area.. I pissed about for too long and missed out..

IMG-20180704-WA0051.thumb.jpg.d73e01d9478bfc2d50e62ccbebd3154c.jpg

 

Went to the hot rod meet last night and there's a guy there with a 51 Cadillac convertible, talking to him for a looping time and he mentions his 58 mercury. I think nothing of it and keep talking about the fairlane and his Cadillac, then he mentioned his mercury station wagon on air. So I asked about it some more and he shows me a picture and it's that car.

I asked him a bit about it and got chatting and he tells me he's looking to swap for something different. I offer him the fairlane as a PX and he's really into it. Swapped numbers and he's gonna call me in the morning..

Long story short I've just bought a f**king sick station wagon on air.

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I've included it in the deal with the fairlane. The deals kinda done, but not happening till autumn time as I've got a shed load on at the minute, and the current owner wants to do the rest of the show season in it which suits me too.

It's not that big anyway, only 19ft.... :lol::lol:

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Those thunderbolts are the thing of legend. Held drag records across the states well into the 70s. They built the Boss 302 mustang to try and trump them, failed haha.

Balls to taking the fairlane on track, just getting throigh each day is scary enough.

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The DC2 isn’t mine unfortunately. It very nearly was.. looked underneath this afternoon to inspect condition and it’s poorly :( 

 

shame as it is VERY fast. Hilarious in fact..got me wondering what some increased air density in the form of a turbo would be like on the civic.. 

Edited by SamKidney
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Boooooo. A buddy of mine used to own a boosted b18 DC2 and it was violent for want of a better word. It had something like a gt25 on so spool was quite late in the range, vtec liked slightly after and it was nuts. Made such a beautiful noise though.

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I've gone properly back to the start this week and fitted a 3" DP/decat on the Leon - n00bing it up with the best of them. I'm basically one step away from asking whether to bolt on an atmospheric dump valve on Facebook groups :lol: Anyway, here's a shameless copy-paste job from elsewhere. Probably a tad disjointed but it's all your getting...

 

Been too busy enjoying the sun to work on the car really, so more time passing without much by way of updates. Few little bits going on, will post those up as and when they’re done.

Went exploring the south coast some more. Weirdly this is only a short drive up the coast from home, but there’s so much to explore right on the doorstep that I’ve never been here before.

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Met this creepy motherlover a little further afield.

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Golf developed a nasty knock and was pulling right under braking. Pulled a wheel off and was instantly apparent that a pair of the ball joint bolts had worked a little loose. Not pleasant but easily rectified. Spotted a pretty worn tyre while I was in there, so will get a new pair put on this week. Need to get the car sold really so we can buy something a little more practical for lugging around the baby and assorted paraphernalia. 

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Also sorted out a slightly sticky brake slider while I had the tools out.

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Had a few hours spare Friday evening, figured I’d get the car ready to sort out this awful downpipe. For those who are new here, or have forgotten, here’s the general gist - Poorly executed, non-OEM downpipe and cats. DP restrictive and puts the lambda where the exhaust manifold wants to be resulting in this:

killedlambda.jpg

I cleared access form the top to see how much I could get to - I was hoping to be able to undo the three turbo to DP bolts from above. In hindsight this was stupid and without a decent stubby ratchet, which I don’t have, not gonna happen. In that case, may as well pull things apart properly…

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The full extent of how bad this thing was becomes very apparent at this point.

The top opening initially appears to be ok, with an ID of ~80mm at the flange. Unfortunately about 8mm in from the flange this tapers down to just 67mm. This then steps down again to around 55mm, all before the first bend in the DP. Madness.

olddprestrictivetop.jpg

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In comparison the replacement is a touch smaller at the flange, being 73mm, however it remains this size for the entire length and is mandrel bent, unlike the necked tubing on the one that came off the car.

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Incidentally, the fork in the old pipe was also mega nasty. Badly built, and even more restrictive. Given the wall thickness of the pipework it appears that this forks into two semi-circles of around 34mm on the major diameter, which is a worrying figure.

Based on this, there’s a flow area at that point of just 904mm^2.
The new pipe at 733 diameter gives a massive 4185mm^2, 4.6 times the area and absolutely ridiculous in comparison!

As anyone who has ever fitted a cheap DP will know, they tend to come with an awful perforated gasket. These tend to be ok further down the system, but aren’t typically up to the task at the turbo end so it’s best to run an OEM gasket here instead.

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So, having wiggled the old system out through a hole that the internet tends to tell you is impossible (it’s not, evidently) next up was putting something back in the gap it’d left. Pretty simple task, and mounted up perfectly to the stock exhaust hanger. Who said cheap Chinese parts weren’t well put together?!

dpfitted.jpg

The main trouble I was going to have was mating up the decat to the catback system - old has a flange, new doesn’t. No flange, no welding gear and a requirement to have the car back on the road within 24 hours. Made it work, but it’s very much a temporary solution as it causes things to sit a little off centre.. Might be a good excuse to adjust and stick my 3” catback on soon though...

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Dropped the car back on its wheels and turned the key. Cue puffs of white smoke from the engine bay. Balls. Fortunately it turned out to be one of the three top DP bolts that wasn’t quite tight enough - the one at the top that’s blind and I’d snugged up first, but not torqued up enough after seeing to the other two. All appears to be well now, though will give it all a good check after some miles to get things sooted up.

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Stripped down and cleaned up my AP coilovers last night. They're far from a high-end performance branded part, but I've found them to be significantly nicer than cheap coilovers (JOM/FK/ST/other generic eBay types) for daily use so they'll be going on the car when the opportunity arises.
 
strippedcoilover.jpg

Also pulled the Silver Project top mounts apart and replaced the spherical bearings while I was at it. Along with new bearings underneath (the old ones actually felt almost new on removal) things should feel pretty good once installed on the car.

strippedsilverproject.jpg

 

@george_seamons , don't suppose you've got that old photo of your modified k04-023 decat? Looks like to make this one properly fit all I need to do is cut out the straight section between the flange and the bend, then extend the rear end to mate up with my 3" catback.

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Mike, yes, but trying to hash out the deal really. I'm not getting hold of it till October time though. The guys in no rush and I want my fairlane for my wedding.

The caravan was with it when it came into the country, got split in the deal as it was too much. Caravan was on air too :lol:

Just discovered it has a rebuilt Ford 390 in there with some silly cam, edelbrock inlet and holley carb and some awesome headers. The fairlane is only a 289 (4.7l) and that goes like a rocket, this things a 6.4l with goodies so should track along nicely!

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On 05/07/2018 at 9:46 PM, Pete.M said:

Think I missed that, you've got an mx5 now? 

I'll eventually do an update on here. Struggling to get it running at the moment. :(

 

On 06/07/2018 at 11:48 AM, Adam@TartyBikes said:

Haha, yeah I missed that too! Good lad Dan. How's the Clio doing?

Clio engine is dead so I bought an mx5 for the summer. I'm loving it. Fell in love with them that time you took me out adz. 

 

How's you anyway adam? You've gone from Facebook? Hope you're great buddy. 

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