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PostPosted: Sat Jan 19, 2013 1:13 pm 
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I think it's about time I started a thread for my new build, I'll need a place to pose my questions to the brains trust on this forum!

For those among us that don’t know the story of this car, I’ll go from the beginning, which starts about five years ago.
This is my 87 Park Lane model as it was sold in Japan. When I got it, it looked like this:

Image Image

Seen better days. Two busy weeks of late nights later, it looked like this:

Image Image

I only bought the rolling shell, I had enough parts stashed in my shed to make it drivable – engine, brakes, electricals and enough bits to cobble some kind of interior. What I didn’t have, I made. I bought it because my blue car was miles from being done and I wanted to start mini-ing again. I drove the car around randomly and on weekends, but two years after building it I sold it to pay for a Bini as a new daily hack. I sold the car for peanuts in the end, and regretted doing so afterwards, as it really was a good, solid, mini.
Over the next few years I went back to working on my blue mini, finally finishing it early to mid 2012 though it had been driving for a year before that.

Image


With that car now finished I found myself with a lot more free time, so like most mini owners started looking for and thinking about another project. Though I wasn’t planning to buy until sometime in 2013, the opportunity to buy my old rover popped up as the guy that bought it off me had decided to move overseas. He needed it gone quick and I scored it back for a good price.
That sounded good initially, but the car was now in poor shape. It had been used daily for a year where it racked up an impressive number of kays, and then hidden away for two more years after that. Though it had been resprayed, it was straight over the old paint without any prep, rust repairs or even masking of some areas of the car, and had mechanically been neglected in some areas.

Image

My original plan was to whack a 1275 engine in there, bin the interior and start over, and just keep the car going as a much simpler mini than my other one, but after going over it I decided I should do things properly and redo subframes, suspension and nearly everything else too. Was looking like it might be a full rebuild all over again, which aside from the cost bit, sounded good – something to do!
It was around this time a very good mate of mine was having thoughts of building a GTI mini.
I won’t go into details, but to cut a long story short, the evil genius brainwashed me into doing one too. Didn’t take too much pushing though, I’d contemplated doing this with my blue car during a few moments of insanity.

I’m really not the person to tackle a conversion. A basic list of requirements for doing one as I understand is:
1. Have a welder, and be able to actually weld.
2. Have tools and technology in the garage greater than a hammer and crowbar.
3. Have some level of steel working and fabrication skills / experience.
I don’t have any of those, I don’t even think I have a crowbar.

Plans for where the car will end up? Nothing too crazy, I just want a fairly timid looking car with a G13B in there. I’m not dreaming of going fast, changing the world, or reinventing the wheel, I just want a project to pass the time that’s a step up from the last one. If I get to the end of this having enjoyed the build as much as the last car, I’ll do another one!


Last edited by Harley on Tue Aug 12, 2014 7:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Sat Jan 19, 2013 3:52 pm 
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Ooh a new adventure! I'll be watching this topic for progress! Good luck, Harley!

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PostPosted: Sat Jan 19, 2013 4:21 pm 
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The gti g13b is a good solid engine, and will crack 100hp at the fly from factory and can be easily tuned up to 115-130 hp (starts getting expensive around that) theminiman (matt read) on this forum is a great advocate of the g13b I believe (don't quote me as he spends a lot of time playing with twincam head conversions)


Wander over to www.redlinegti.com when your ready to buy, second hand, rough gti's change hands for 1-2000. Do this as you will need most of the junk up the front (or find a front cut)


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PostPosted: Sat Jan 19, 2013 8:45 pm 
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Location: Burpengary, Queensland - Home of Tricky Performance Engineering
Welcome to the fold, brother!!

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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 2:58 pm 
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69k1100 wrote:
Second hand, rough gti's change hands for 1-2000. Do this as you will need most of the junk up the front (or find a front cut)



And that's exactly what I did over the Christmas break.
I managed to obtain a fully working driving Mk3 Swift GTI for a song.

Image

This was accident damaged in the front, mechanically though, it is fine for what I need. Only done low kms for its age too, so I can probably get away with just consumable stuff as a precaution like clutch, timing belt and water pump. I also bought another spare engine block. It’ll come in handy when I do a full engine rebuild.

Image

A couple of days camped out in the shed and the car was stripped of its engine and electricals. The rest went to the scrap yard, since it was no good to register again.

Pulling it apart I couldn't get over how complicated the engine is. Sensors and valves and vacuum lines everywhere! A lot of them seem unnecessary, but I'm sure its there for a reason.


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 3:08 pm 
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what did you do with the seats ??

any good for a mini ??

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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 3:30 pm 
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I kept the seats too - I might use them in the mini.


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 4:49 pm 
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Looks like the later style of seat. They will still fit (use same frame rails as the "freddo" type) popular conversation into corollas/minis as they offer decent bolsters on a reclining bucket (cheap too)

The should be an O2 sensor, tps and maf as well as water temp and oil. Also check the distributor, the had a tendency to leak from an internal oil ring, a member on redline was rebuilding these.

For the car to run off he standard ecu you will need all of it (replace the vaccum hoses, they become brittle) however you can delete the cold start valve, the stepped thing at the back of the manifold, but you have to adjust revs manually when cold.

Alternatively you could find an aftermarket ecu with a map sensor and electronic ignition (with coil on plug) and run individual throttle bodies.

The standard system works well enough.

No hydro clutch :p.


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 5:29 pm 
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With engine conversions here, though there are ways around things, its generally easiest to run all the stock computer / emissions stuff. I'd like to investigate getting rid of the distributor and going to coil pack or something though.
Not a fan of the cable clutch myself, I'll be looking to change that.

:D


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 6:06 pm 
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Cos yours is a late car too ittle need to comply with more modern emissions stuff so just leave it standard.

If you can't build a frame just buy an allspeed conversion from the uk with all the bits.

Looks like you have some spare rims for your blue one too

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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 8:06 pm 
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Harley wrote:
Not a fan of the cable clutch myself, I'll be looking to change that.

:D


There is a clutch slave cylinder that bolts onto it. From a bigger Suzuki. The exact model escapes me.

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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 8:09 pm 
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Probably the Baleno, it's from the same time.
If not that it'll be a Liana or something. I remember finding that info once before somewhere.
I was just wondering if I could use the mini one.


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 8:34 pm 
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You can, and just make a bracket up to mount it and play with where it bolts on the clutch arm to get the throw right. Alot of uk guys use it. Or take the difficult option like I did and put a wilwood puller on there

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 Post subject: help
PostPosted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 6:56 pm 
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Location: Gosford
can help mate have done 5 mini's with gti motor and 4 wheel dics brake got jigs for all bits
thx
jason


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 8:33 pm 
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If I decide making something is too much for me I'll chase you up.
Thanks.
:D


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