R53 Police Auction Project
Discussion
Just a little mid week update....
Due to different delays and what not I've not had the time to do this before, but it's here!
Just a couple of pictures of some of the new JCW toys.
Also...
Not pictured, but very chuffed with my Limited Slip Differential gear box! To be honest the new engine will be plenty powerful so thought this was a no brainier. I'll get a picture up at the weekend of a few more bits I picked up tonight Including the BKL box, happy hump day!
Due to different delays and what not I've not had the time to do this before, but it's here!
Just a couple of pictures of some of the new JCW toys.
Also...
Not pictured, but very chuffed with my Limited Slip Differential gear box! To be honest the new engine will be plenty powerful so thought this was a no brainier. I'll get a picture up at the weekend of a few more bits I picked up tonight Including the BKL box, happy hump day!
Furyblade_Lee said:
You my friend, are a first class nutter!!!!!!!!
I got as far as the dash removed......
I am hopefully closing the deal this week on a mint '52 plate S which has a temp guage worringly near the top ( although they have not even lifted the bonnet to see why...... ) for just £400. Could be best / worst buy for a while
Haha thanks...I got as far as the dash removed......
I am hopefully closing the deal this week on a mint '52 plate S which has a temp guage worringly near the top ( although they have not even lifted the bonnet to see why...... ) for just £400. Could be best / worst buy for a while
Sounds like it could be an interesting project, ill await the pictures and investigation of the temp gauge. From what I can gather from friends/owners, one of the sensors on the radiator is prone to faults; a £12 fix and you're away. A cheap way of investigation i've always found is to pick up a Bluetooth OBD2 reader from eBay and download the torque app. With the fault code you'll be able to find the problem.
It's been a couple of months...
But i haven't fallen into the 'Great start but left to the side' category.
Looking back at the last post i'd just picked up my engine and LSD gearbox..
I had to wait ages for a few bits to get here but i ended up ( and i'm still in the process of finishing) painting the plastics black. That original silver was awful and a few rattle cans later they ended up looking like this:
I was really pleased with the result and with the further plans i had with the car, i thought it best to go with this colour scheme.
Another one of the plans i had for the overall interior scheme of the mini was to replace the headlining, dash, front pillars and arm rests with suede. Personally, i think it gives a bit more of a sporty look to the motor and so with just the dash done, it turned out like this:
The next problem i had was that the silver faces of the original dials didnt at all work with the new colour combination.
After a lot of head scratching i came up with the best solution ( without paying a company in the US £150 ) to change them to black. Scan them into photoshop, manually trace them out and print them onto clear acetate and stick them to the dials. I'm currently waiting on the printable acetate to do this but in photoshop i managed to get this:
Depending in how they turn out when i print them and attach them, I'm thinking of doing it as a little sideline, seems the market is pretty absent of places you can get this done.
With the new engine waiting to go in, i thought it was the perfect time to start looking at the inevitable suspension woes i was about to face.
After jacking the car up and dropping the front sub frame it was pretty obvious what i was facing:
2x wishbones
2x drop links
wheel bearing on the passenger side
rear control arm drivers side
2x ball joints
needless to say the Bimi has had a hard life.
One of the saving graces of the whole suspension investigation process was removing the sub frame and discovering the P/S pump had ben done in 2013... Win!:
Suspension done ( We'll see what billy bob MOT says in August ), I was looking at different options for the dash.
I'd considered going black with the rest of the plastic, but considering car manufacturers have an overwhelming need to make everything black and or dull, i thought about hydro dipping.
Looking online, sending a few emails about i realised this wasnt going to be a cheap process. I was looking at at least 80 quid for the dash, let alone the inner y piece of the door card i was looking at contrasting. So as a jack of all trades i thought id give it ago.
I'm pretty arty ( and hopefully not too farty) so ordered the stuff online, bought myself a tub from The Range, and read up about it as much as i could. As easy as the process looks lits really difficult to establish the right dipping angle, the preparation takes a while having to paint the piece properly, mark out the film and get the water ready but after a few failed practices i started to get the hang of it. Being somewhat fickle, my new little side line took me to ordering all sorts of different films to try on speed shapes and even doing a few controllers, as well as a few engine bays. Even a few parts of my own dash which i had originally intended of doing, which then turned into my engine bay parts too. Notice the yellow marble splash too, another mini owner wanted their engine the same to match their liquid yellow paint:
Notice in the last picture the original factory CD Player - I hated the aftermarket one that was put in the car so managed to find an original player. Unfortunately, it seems the connector i had in the car wouldn't match to any CD player i could find, so a good few hours testing and crimping, i managed to mate every wire to its designated terminal.
One problem that was pointed out to me about looking at swapping the dial faces to black would be the almost invisible numbers and letters on the face. At night, when the cluster would be illuminated they would all light up anyway so it wouldnt matter but during day time hours i had a problem. I decided that i'd have to wire the illumination for the dial cluster into ignition stage one, so that the dials would illuminate when the key was inserted and turned. An hour later, with the help of my little tester i had what i needed:
Whilst chopping cables, i thought it might be a nice idea to see what else i could do. I've swapped the footwell lights for dim red LED's and thought it might be nice to get these to gently illuminate the foot wells at night time. The circuit for the zenon headlights doesnt kick out enough voltage so the easiest way was to splice the rear lights and piggy back off them:
Another nice effect of this, having wired the them into the rears was that when the remote lock is activated, as the footwell lights came on, the rear lights also came on. Inline with more modern cars i thought it would be nice that it also happened to the front so i wired the bottom fogs in to do the same. The little things!
I've been waiting for a good weekend to put the engine back in and having cleared a good lot of exams, this weekend was the winner. It had been a few months since id taken it out so you can imagine i've been somewhat dreading this. I decided to lay out the parts i was looking at, pushed the car onto the ramp and cracked on:
And that last picture is how i left the car this afternoon. I've got 2 spurious bolts that i'm yet to locate a few connections on the loom i cant seem to figure out. This loom has come from a different car, the same one i picked up the ECU, Key, engine etc from... so it may have a few options that mine doesnt have so im going to have to wait and do a bit more investigation.
One of the things i have done is given my old supercharger and gearbox to the breaker with a few bolts and attachments still on, so its stopped me attaching the inlet manifold and the passenger driveshaft. A trip this week should rectify that and hopefully ill have more updates and a video of the car running very soon.!
But i haven't fallen into the 'Great start but left to the side' category.
Looking back at the last post i'd just picked up my engine and LSD gearbox..
I had to wait ages for a few bits to get here but i ended up ( and i'm still in the process of finishing) painting the plastics black. That original silver was awful and a few rattle cans later they ended up looking like this:
I was really pleased with the result and with the further plans i had with the car, i thought it best to go with this colour scheme.
Another one of the plans i had for the overall interior scheme of the mini was to replace the headlining, dash, front pillars and arm rests with suede. Personally, i think it gives a bit more of a sporty look to the motor and so with just the dash done, it turned out like this:
The next problem i had was that the silver faces of the original dials didnt at all work with the new colour combination.
After a lot of head scratching i came up with the best solution ( without paying a company in the US £150 ) to change them to black. Scan them into photoshop, manually trace them out and print them onto clear acetate and stick them to the dials. I'm currently waiting on the printable acetate to do this but in photoshop i managed to get this:
Depending in how they turn out when i print them and attach them, I'm thinking of doing it as a little sideline, seems the market is pretty absent of places you can get this done.
With the new engine waiting to go in, i thought it was the perfect time to start looking at the inevitable suspension woes i was about to face.
After jacking the car up and dropping the front sub frame it was pretty obvious what i was facing:
2x wishbones
2x drop links
wheel bearing on the passenger side
rear control arm drivers side
2x ball joints
needless to say the Bimi has had a hard life.
One of the saving graces of the whole suspension investigation process was removing the sub frame and discovering the P/S pump had ben done in 2013... Win!:
Suspension done ( We'll see what billy bob MOT says in August ), I was looking at different options for the dash.
I'd considered going black with the rest of the plastic, but considering car manufacturers have an overwhelming need to make everything black and or dull, i thought about hydro dipping.
Looking online, sending a few emails about i realised this wasnt going to be a cheap process. I was looking at at least 80 quid for the dash, let alone the inner y piece of the door card i was looking at contrasting. So as a jack of all trades i thought id give it ago.
I'm pretty arty ( and hopefully not too farty) so ordered the stuff online, bought myself a tub from The Range, and read up about it as much as i could. As easy as the process looks lits really difficult to establish the right dipping angle, the preparation takes a while having to paint the piece properly, mark out the film and get the water ready but after a few failed practices i started to get the hang of it. Being somewhat fickle, my new little side line took me to ordering all sorts of different films to try on speed shapes and even doing a few controllers, as well as a few engine bays. Even a few parts of my own dash which i had originally intended of doing, which then turned into my engine bay parts too. Notice the yellow marble splash too, another mini owner wanted their engine the same to match their liquid yellow paint:
Notice in the last picture the original factory CD Player - I hated the aftermarket one that was put in the car so managed to find an original player. Unfortunately, it seems the connector i had in the car wouldn't match to any CD player i could find, so a good few hours testing and crimping, i managed to mate every wire to its designated terminal.
One problem that was pointed out to me about looking at swapping the dial faces to black would be the almost invisible numbers and letters on the face. At night, when the cluster would be illuminated they would all light up anyway so it wouldnt matter but during day time hours i had a problem. I decided that i'd have to wire the illumination for the dial cluster into ignition stage one, so that the dials would illuminate when the key was inserted and turned. An hour later, with the help of my little tester i had what i needed:
Whilst chopping cables, i thought it might be a nice idea to see what else i could do. I've swapped the footwell lights for dim red LED's and thought it might be nice to get these to gently illuminate the foot wells at night time. The circuit for the zenon headlights doesnt kick out enough voltage so the easiest way was to splice the rear lights and piggy back off them:
Another nice effect of this, having wired the them into the rears was that when the remote lock is activated, as the footwell lights came on, the rear lights also came on. Inline with more modern cars i thought it would be nice that it also happened to the front so i wired the bottom fogs in to do the same. The little things!
I've been waiting for a good weekend to put the engine back in and having cleared a good lot of exams, this weekend was the winner. It had been a few months since id taken it out so you can imagine i've been somewhat dreading this. I decided to lay out the parts i was looking at, pushed the car onto the ramp and cracked on:
And that last picture is how i left the car this afternoon. I've got 2 spurious bolts that i'm yet to locate a few connections on the loom i cant seem to figure out. This loom has come from a different car, the same one i picked up the ECU, Key, engine etc from... so it may have a few options that mine doesnt have so im going to have to wait and do a bit more investigation.
One of the things i have done is given my old supercharger and gearbox to the breaker with a few bolts and attachments still on, so its stopped me attaching the inlet manifold and the passenger driveshaft. A trip this week should rectify that and hopefully ill have more updates and a video of the car running very soon.!
Next little bit...
I haven't had a chance to get to the breakers yet so no more progress with the engine. I have however started to mess around a little bit with the body work. Some of the bigger dents are going to need to be pulled and properly addressed but im messing about with a few colour combinations for a few of the little details... ( when i say colour, matte black
Thoughts?
I'm going to revert the wing mirror covers to mirror too due to the other plans ive got of putting some go faster stripes ( original i know) in matte black:
Again, any thoughts or comments would be more than welcome!
Its quite obvious from the photos that the body work is in pretty bad condition, so i managed to get my hands on some of the stuff i used to use on yachts and i was pretty impressed with the results considering the age and hard life this car has had. Tried a bit of paint work restoration on a few parts:
Very pleased with the results and as soon as i get a nice few days, ill go over the whole car and identify all the spots that need touching up.
Had a bit of free time at the weekend so also managed to get another mini engine bay ive been working weighed off, along with my air bag cover for the dash:
Managed to get a good bit of the interior plastics done although something reacted with the paint! job was flawless until the bubbles appeared... another few hours with the sand paper it is then:
One of the benefits of being based down here though is you do get a chance to see some of the cool stuff the rest of the world has to offer, had a visit from the USS George Bush this weekend:
And that's it for now, hopefully ill have had a good chance to do some more before leave!
I haven't had a chance to get to the breakers yet so no more progress with the engine. I have however started to mess around a little bit with the body work. Some of the bigger dents are going to need to be pulled and properly addressed but im messing about with a few colour combinations for a few of the little details... ( when i say colour, matte black
Thoughts?
I'm going to revert the wing mirror covers to mirror too due to the other plans ive got of putting some go faster stripes ( original i know) in matte black:
Again, any thoughts or comments would be more than welcome!
Its quite obvious from the photos that the body work is in pretty bad condition, so i managed to get my hands on some of the stuff i used to use on yachts and i was pretty impressed with the results considering the age and hard life this car has had. Tried a bit of paint work restoration on a few parts:
Very pleased with the results and as soon as i get a nice few days, ill go over the whole car and identify all the spots that need touching up.
Had a bit of free time at the weekend so also managed to get another mini engine bay ive been working weighed off, along with my air bag cover for the dash:
Managed to get a good bit of the interior plastics done although something reacted with the paint! job was flawless until the bubbles appeared... another few hours with the sand paper it is then:
One of the benefits of being based down here though is you do get a chance to see some of the cool stuff the rest of the world has to offer, had a visit from the USS George Bush this weekend:
And that's it for now, hopefully ill have had a good chance to do some more before leave!
Hainey said:
-01SQ-, I'm loving this thread and a personal thanks from me for bringing back some great memories. I fixed my fair share of motors for oppos going weekenders back in the day (mid 90's) in that same car club when I was on nukes course. Some of the best lads and some amazing laughs.
Assuming you've not cracked some sea time in yet, the hard graft you're doing now is worth it the first run ashore foreign.
And don't be shy to get a crate in
Great motor.
Great to hear from you! Slowly becoming the go to guy here for anything car related.. a few late Thursday nights making sure couple of lads can get on weekenders.Assuming you've not cracked some sea time in yet, the hard graft you're doing now is worth it the first run ashore foreign.
And don't be shy to get a crate in
Great motor.
I'm here on LET(SM)QC here... so had a good few jollies already! i think its what they to call the old tiff course.. funny how these ideas seem to come round again. Where did you go post mob?
If you check back later this week, i'll upload something that'll bring back loads of memories, i'm sure you'll remember it lthough perhaps not in its current form.
Slightly off topic and as promised to Haigney:
Given the age of the car club down here we've gathered quite the collection of manuals over the years and thought i'd share them with you ( and i promise, its worth reading through them, some absolute crackers! )
Some absolute rarities!
Having a look in one of the drawers, i also found these, The earliest of the pile is Jan 93:
I wonder if that last offer still stands??
Given the age of the car club down here we've gathered quite the collection of manuals over the years and thought i'd share them with you ( and i promise, its worth reading through them, some absolute crackers! )
Some absolute rarities!
Having a look in one of the drawers, i also found these, The earliest of the pile is Jan 93:
I wonder if that last offer still stands??
Hainey said:
Crikey that brings back memories, more than you know 
There should be some later BMW ones as well and definitely one with an M3 on the cover. I know, I bought it!
If you find a load of Men Only mags as well those were mine. A partucular favourite was the one with 19yr old Leah on the cover
Man I feel old.
I'll have a poke around see what i can find. Did pop my head into one of the old doors up the side and found a load of old 80's/90's men mags but they looked very worse for wear... There should be some later BMW ones as well and definitely one with an M3 on the cover. I know, I bought it!
If you find a load of Men Only mags as well those were mine. A partucular favourite was the one with 19yr old Leah on the cover
Man I feel old.
If you ever did manager there, i'd probably be able to find you on the old cash books. Last one i saw dated to 73, with one of the more 'recent' ones being 1999.
I'll keep my eye out for the M3 mag though, anything else you remember i might be able to find still kicking about??
Where do i even start with this....
So a few things have happened since i last posted on here.
I've been living in glasgow, moved house, got married and and ive been back on a course down on the south-east for about a year. To be be quit honest my passion died off for this little beast when i bought my Lotus in early 2018 and i haven't touched it since then. Now i n reflection it feels like an utter shame to have left this where it is. So pre covid i went back up to see the car and a few years of being exposed to the south coast and being parked on soil/ grass meant that i had to almost machete my way through the growth to get to it. im fortunate in the sense that only the exterior has faded a little bit, the interior was pretty much how i left it but the paint job i did on the plastic back then and the hydro dipping don't seem to have stood the test of time. The covering on the dash has all but sun faded now and the beast just looks very sorry for itself.
With my thoughts moving to different areas in life now, i am contemplating selling my lotus, however after chatting to a few dealers im probably better off waiting until the prices go back up, another unfortunate event of covid.
What that has left me room for is a different way of thinking returning to this. I'm quite interested with a few more years of experience behind me now how i would approach this.
Do i sell it? in its current state it wouldn't be worth much more than scrap
OR
Do i start again? seems a bit bizarre to be contemplating this because i did quite a lot of work to it back then but in hindsight i think i focused on the wrong areas. equally, there aren't many of these left especially with the JCW factory engine upgrade and the factory fit LSD gearbox
What i should have done it replaced only the parts that needed fixing and then when all back on the road undertake any improvements but i rushed into a lot of the choices i made, creating extra work for me and realistically making me lose interest in the project.
SO
My plan - With having been to minitopia again recently and getting a bit enthusiastic again, i plan to remove everything from the car and buy ( relatively cheaply by all accounts ) all the parts i messed about with on the interior again as stock. All matching and stock for now. ill keep all the parts i painted and messed around with but leave them for when i feel like customisation.
After the success of power coating a few parts on the lotus, im going to remove most of the suspension parts and get them powder coated or replaced along with the bushes ( standard for now) .
The brakes will be refurbished and the only "upgrade" ill be doing is replacing the fronts with R56 callipers. very inexpensive and that way it saves me reconditioning the old callipers
I'm also going to remove the engine again and take it apart fully, giving it the rebuild it will most likely now need.
the bodywork will also require a lot of attention. This however will be my last priority.
I'm going to start with the interior. It'll cost me about 100 quid to get it fully back to the way it was stock and having weighed that off, ill be able to see a good amount of measurable progress and just take things step by step to bring myself back into this slowly.
I look forward to being able to share the progress a bit more thoroughly over the next few months!
So a few things have happened since i last posted on here.
I've been living in glasgow, moved house, got married and and ive been back on a course down on the south-east for about a year. To be be quit honest my passion died off for this little beast when i bought my Lotus in early 2018 and i haven't touched it since then. Now i n reflection it feels like an utter shame to have left this where it is. So pre covid i went back up to see the car and a few years of being exposed to the south coast and being parked on soil/ grass meant that i had to almost machete my way through the growth to get to it. im fortunate in the sense that only the exterior has faded a little bit, the interior was pretty much how i left it but the paint job i did on the plastic back then and the hydro dipping don't seem to have stood the test of time. The covering on the dash has all but sun faded now and the beast just looks very sorry for itself.
With my thoughts moving to different areas in life now, i am contemplating selling my lotus, however after chatting to a few dealers im probably better off waiting until the prices go back up, another unfortunate event of covid.
What that has left me room for is a different way of thinking returning to this. I'm quite interested with a few more years of experience behind me now how i would approach this.
Do i sell it? in its current state it wouldn't be worth much more than scrap
OR
Do i start again? seems a bit bizarre to be contemplating this because i did quite a lot of work to it back then but in hindsight i think i focused on the wrong areas. equally, there aren't many of these left especially with the JCW factory engine upgrade and the factory fit LSD gearbox
What i should have done it replaced only the parts that needed fixing and then when all back on the road undertake any improvements but i rushed into a lot of the choices i made, creating extra work for me and realistically making me lose interest in the project.
SO
My plan - With having been to minitopia again recently and getting a bit enthusiastic again, i plan to remove everything from the car and buy ( relatively cheaply by all accounts ) all the parts i messed about with on the interior again as stock. All matching and stock for now. ill keep all the parts i painted and messed around with but leave them for when i feel like customisation.
After the success of power coating a few parts on the lotus, im going to remove most of the suspension parts and get them powder coated or replaced along with the bushes ( standard for now) .
The brakes will be refurbished and the only "upgrade" ill be doing is replacing the fronts with R56 callipers. very inexpensive and that way it saves me reconditioning the old callipers
I'm also going to remove the engine again and take it apart fully, giving it the rebuild it will most likely now need.
the bodywork will also require a lot of attention. This however will be my last priority.
I'm going to start with the interior. It'll cost me about 100 quid to get it fully back to the way it was stock and having weighed that off, ill be able to see a good amount of measurable progress and just take things step by step to bring myself back into this slowly.
I look forward to being able to share the progress a bit more thoroughly over the next few months!
Scrump said:
I was with you until you said engine rebuild.
Don’t make the same mistake again, but this time with the engine rather than the interior.
Get it on the road and use it a bit.
Whichever way you go, keep us up to date
cheers bud, Don’t make the same mistake again, but this time with the engine rather than the interior.
Get it on the road and use it a bit.
Whichever way you go, keep us up to date
I should have probably been more specific: Ill swap the chain, HG belts fluids ETC and do a S/c service. Defo not taking the bottom end apart!
Scrump said:
Sounds a bit more realistic. I thought you were going to take out the engine and strip it for a rebuild which would inevitably escalate into new pistons, rods etc. etc.
Are you still using the RN car club facilities?
I'm not at the moment, it's still closed in line with SD guidelines but in hoping when they seem it safe to open I'll be able to get there and do a good load asap. The majority of everything I'll be doing will be there thoughAre you still using the RN car club facilities?
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