Engine bay tidying

[SturdyHSV]

fred bloggs said:

Coils relocated, valve covers crackle red and a silly intake. Still need to do the resivoirs and move the abs pump, but that’s a job for next winter, when I pull the engine to refresh.

If you want to go to an electric power steering pump to ditch the reservoir etc. I can let you know belt length etc. although I'm sure you're more than capable of sorting

One day I shall be copying you and putting those ITBs on the Ute

Lincsls1 said:

^^^ There's some real talented guys on this forum.
How you've got the time and skill to do what you do to your cars is beyond me.
Great work!

Time I suppose is one thing I have the benefit of, skill on the other hand... I got the Monaro 10 years ago (almost to the day) and I had never even seen a spark plug or an air filter, the Monaro was my first 'proper' car (as in one I actually liked / wanted) and I've just learnt as I go.

What I've basically found is the more stuck in you get, the quicker you learn as you realise much more quickly how simple it all is. There is so much information and pictures and videos on the internet (not just that sort... ) that provided you don't need to have the car finished and back on the road by Monday, there's really very little one couldn't tackle at home.

I can't weld yet but at some point I'll pick up a mig welder and start playing with it, watch some lessons on youtube etc. and in another 10 years who knows

Edited by SturdyHSV on Thursday 25th February 11:38

[fred bloggs]

It’s funny, time and skill is not my issue, it’s budget at the moment.
I have a list as long as my arm of things to do to my car, but have just moved house to a doer upper, and there is an equally long list to do on that, sucking my time and money.
I have managed to put up a full sized garage for the car though, and managed to pull out the soaking carpet and dye it black, and I’ll also be re-doing the headliner in suede over the weekend.

[Lincsls1]

SturdyHSV said:

Time I suppose is one thing I have the benefit of, skill on the other hand... I got the Monaro 10 years ago (almost to the day) and I had never even seen a spark plug or an air filter, the Monaro was my first 'proper' car (as in one I actually liked / wanted) and I've just learnt as I go.

What I've basically found is the more stuck in you get, the quicker you learn as you realise much more quickly how simple it all is. There is so much information and pictures and videos on the internet (not just that sort... ) that provided you don't need to have the car finished and back on the road by Monday, there's really very little one couldn't tackle at home.

Whilst you're right, and these cars are very straight forward in fact, especially for a relatively modern vehicle, you are being modest!
I suppose having a decent sized garage (my Ro completely fills mine) and a decent selection of tools will help.
I should have tried harder at school!

[fred bloggs]

gsd2000 said:

Any more info on the ecu relocation

I’ve done this, it’s actually easy, and a worthwhile mod.
Disconnect battery, Pull the ecu up, remove the plastic box it’s in, pull the plugs into it, pass the wires through through the big bung at the bulkhead, and you can fit it behind the kick panel under the glovebox. There is plenty of loom length.

[SturdyHSV]

Lincsls1 said:

Whilst you're right, and these cars are very straight forward in fact, especially for a relatively modern vehicle, you are being modest!
I suppose having a decent sized garage (my Ro completely fills mine) and a decent selection of tools will help.
I should have tried harder at school!

If you take the front bumper off that frees up a surprising amount of room I am fortunate that the garage is a bit wider than average as it's part of the (incredibly shonky) extension the previous owner put on the house.

Had to roll it back out of the doors to get the crane under, left it all hanging over the slam panel overnight

Fortunately was able to rotate the crane 90 degrees to drop the engine down onto some old tyres in front of the car and it still fit with the garage doors shut



Tools definitely help, every job seems to require a new tool but after 10 years I've amassed a lot of them now! Having the utility room as a workshop has been the real benefit, clean / dry / warm / bright space to do stuff is infinitely better.

fred I totally understand the 'doer upper', I've been in my house 5 years and there's still a room with no paint on the walls and the original carpet. There were at least 18 months to 2 years where I was completely paycheque to paycheque trying to improve things. To give an idea of the quality of the workmanship, the remaining room is an odd shape and clearly the cheap carpet wouldn't fit in one run, so they just put layers and layers of duct tape across the join...

[outtadrally]

I’m a few months in a “new” house myself. I know this feeling.

Monaro is in the shed not been driven due to lockdowns and I have a rallycar with the engine on the floor that I just can’t find the money to get rebuilt. Have a wedding coming up too and all I can think off is when will I have money to rebuild the engine

[fred bloggs]

Lol at the carpet. Sounds oddly familiar.

It’s not engine bay, so a bit off topic, but interior is coming along nicely, and cheaply. £20 carpet dye, £25 roll of faux suede headliner material and a flocking kit £25 to do the pillar trims.


Scraping the old foam of the headliner was hideous
[url]

|https://thumbsnap.com/sB3JkGhX[/url]

[SturdyHSV]

fred bloggs said:

Lol at the carpet. Sounds oddly familiar.

It’s not engine bay, so a bit off topic, but interior is coming along nicely, and cheaply. £20 carpet dye, £25 roll of faux suede headliner material and a flocking kit £25 to do the pillar trims.


Scraping the old foam of the headliner was hideous
[url]

|https://thumbsnap.com/sB3JkGhX[/url]

That looks like a really nice job, good stuff!

I've been replacing my brake lines and will be running a new fuel line once all the AN bits arrive, it was a job I was dreading but actually I've really enjoyed it, I think it helps that everything is already in bits so I have a relatively decent amount of space most of the time. The car officially has no wheels on it, so it's now firmly in the "never ending project" stage of its life

[SturdyHSV]

The tidying continues, primer on, will be painting it tomorrow after work.

Have hidden the wiring that ran along the driver's side strut tower / arch, so it's going to look relatively clean when it's all back together I think, although will need to run a bunch of lines (brake, power steering, heater) along that chassis rail, hopefully making them nice and neat will keep it looking fairly tidy.

[Lee20k]

Not done anything on the Monaro yet but done quite a bit to my old Vectra GSI.

Edited by Lee20k on Thursday 25th March 12:21

[99PBATR]

SturdyHSV said:

The tidying continues, primer on, will be painting it tomorrow after work.

Have hidden the wiring that ran along the driver's side strut tower / arch, so it's going to look relatively clean when it's all back together I think, although will need to run a bunch of lines (brake, power steering, heater) along that chassis rail, hopefully making them nice and neat will keep it looking fairly tidy.

Good work fella, should look awesome when you are done. One day I want to do the same to mine and get all the bolts plated and metal parts polished.....

[SturdyHSV]

99PBATR said:

Good work fella, should look awesome when you are done. One day I want to do the same to mine and get all the bolts plated and metal parts polished.....

I'm quite tempted to replace a lot of bolts whilst I'm in there, there's lots of tidying to be done in there anyway, it'll look fairly unique once it's done at least



Most of the first coat on, the can didn't last anywhere near as long as I expected

[99PBATR]

SturdyHSV said:

I'm quite tempted to replace a lot of bolts whilst I'm in there, there's lots of tidying to be done in there anyway, it'll look fairly unique once it's done at least



Most of the first coat on, the can didn't last anywhere near as long as I expected

You might be interested to see what I did with my last car.....4 years hard labour and effort

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=17...

[SturdyHSV]

99PBATR said:

You might be interested to see what I did with my last car.....4 years hard labour and effort

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=17...

Have just read through it, username suddenly makes sense!

That was a serious labour of love! I'm not quite at that stage of disassembly this time round, but one day maybe

Was interesting they removed the rear crash bar on the Type-Rs.

Has your Ro had any similar treatment to the ATR?

[99PBATR]

SturdyHSV said:

Have just read through it, username suddenly makes sense!

That was a serious labour of love! I'm not quite at that stage of disassembly this time round, but one day maybe

Was interesting they removed the rear crash bar on the Type-Rs.

Has your Ro had any similar treatment to the ATR?

I've done about 120 hours on the paint, wet flatting and cutting it and bringing it back to life as it was quite poor, I also had the alloys shot blasted and powder coated in shadow chrome, so it looks very good now but in terms of what I did to my ATR, not even a patch on it as that was enough for a lifetime what I did to that. One day when I have more time and cash and room, I will have the engine out like you have done and go to town on it for sure but until then, I will just enjoy driving it on the odd weekend I think

[SturdyHSV]

99PBATR said:

I've done about 120 hours on the paint, wet flatting and cutting it and bringing it back to life as it was quite poor, I also had the alloys shot blasted and powder coated in shadow chrome, so it looks very good now but in terms of what I did to my ATR, not even a patch on it as that was enough for a lifetime what I did to that. One day when I have more time and cash and room, I will have the engine out like you have done and go to town on it for sure but until then, I will just enjoy driving it on the odd weekend I think

Yep I can totally understand that, I think I'll be similar in terms of hiding wires and things I won't be doing on any other vehicles, but doing the engine and other general modification I've enjoyed.

My reader's cars thread is over here which I've been keeping up to date more recently. I saw you sent your ATR motor off for a freshen up, if you do pull the Monaro's out, I'd heartily recommend giving it a go yourself if you haven't dabbled before, it's good fun, plenty of pics in the thread learning as I go

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

[SturdyHSV]

Fuse box is back in place with the wires run through the box section above the arch, so no more plastic trunking around the strut tower

[99PBATR]

Enjoying watching the progress on this. You are doing a great job sir. If you ever happen to come down to Caffeine & Machine, do let me know and I will buy you a beer!

[SturdyHSV]

99PBATR said:

Enjoying watching the progress on this. You are doing a great job sir. If you ever happen to come down to Caffeine & Machine, do let me know and I will buy you a beer!

It's (not) a date!

It definitely seems a shame to put anything else in the engine bay at this point, it looks so clean and tidy in there:



The engine isn't actually at this stage, it's just bolted together to seal it up whilst it's in the garage and I see about where to run power steering lines and oil cooler lines etc. once the headers and things are installed.

[SturdyHSV]

Still fairly tidy and has power steering and power brakes. Need to run the hard lines from master cylinder to ABS module next, will be trying to keep those as neat as possible to keep things tidy