Hybrid Overhaul

*Thread taken from RSC*

Well as everyone who went on this years Gumball will know my car didnt behave well and dropped all its oil to and from Newquay so ive decided to fix it,heres what ive done so far.

Removed all the various panels that were in the way,started with bonnet then proceded to remove grill ,lights.front bumper.Drained the coolant and removed the rad aswell,drained the oil aswell but there wasnt hardly any left,lol


I want to change the inlet back over to the clio unit so took that off too,bloody pain in the arse as 1 nut is behind everything else,also had to cut a new cambelt as 2 bolts were rounded in the cambelt housing ,eventually got the head off and put it to 1 side and inspected the block.



Argh,all 4 bores were coated/part filled with oil and there was some scratching on each,was going to have to remove the pistons now,so raised block up off away from subframe and tried to remove sump cover,2 bolts corroded in,spent next 45mins hacking at them and swearing a lot.....


Had to do things the hard way in the end.

Removed box from engine and turned it all over ,managed to get the 2 bolts out of sump and removed cover


As i undone each set of conrod bolts the pistons all slid down & out of block,no resistance whatso ever so theyre feckered,have had a mates dad take the block away now to check it over,either re-hone or bore now,he's cleaning it all down and whilst its there im having the crank and flywheel lightened and balanced.

Right,onto the head whilst the blocks away.I had hoped that it was the valve stem seals that were causing the oil loss,but thought whilst the heads off ill change them over anyway,all good learning practice.

Started stripping it down into its component parts



Quite a lot of oil and muck inside casting


Removed the valves and springs to get to the stem seals

and made sure they were all placed somewhere in the correct order,valves look really shitty,dunno if theyre supposed to be that dirty.


Injectors have been sent away for ultrasonic cleaning so they should have better spray pattern when they return.

Will sort the valves later,turned my attention to the head casting,read thru the Haynes manual about the valve seals and it states'just remove the seals' haha what a joke,now i may have been doing it wrong but these buggers are in there so tight it took me 3hrs to prise them all out.With them all removed i decided to clean down the head with some alloy degreaser(from work,lol)


Finished today and things are looking better,going to tackle the valves tmoz i think.


Few other bits that ive been messing with whilst its apart,removed all the dead things from the rad and gave it a coat of black rad paint,also removed all the crap from the plastic rad surround,inc naples overspray and fitted them back together,theres a few digs in the foils but looks better.




Some of you may have seen this before,its the clio inlet manifold that i want to re-fit instead of the polished 19 unit,managed to get one cheap from bass_direct



Gave it a bit of a clean,had to reshape the ISCV clamp as it was a bit mangled,lol,blocked off the internals and had it grey annodised,painted clamp black and cleaned up the TB



Got an o.e airbox from a scrapper,payed a tenner for it ,was a bit grubby and has a clip missing but still ok,forgot to get pics of it tho ,anyways got to work on it with some cleaner,took all the clips off and cleaned them up aswell as they were rusty and replaced the filter element with a spanking ITG unit,new pipework to the ISCV aswell.



Have made up a PTFE inlet gasket to see if it works with heat transfer,will be neglegable i think but apparently the cup racers use them so will give it a go.


Whilst the inlet was being coated i had a couple of other things done aswell.
Battery tray and rocker cover



Things have gone a bit tits up.After inspection of block and pistons it turns out that all the pistons need replacing aswell,im not quite sure how this has happened as ive only clocked up 1k on this engine since i bought it,so things must have been going amiss for a while un-noticed,anyway this is an unwanted expense and ive been advised to maybe get another engine,now im not going to do that as id rather spend the money id have to fork out on another engine which may go the same way as this one on some better parts and rebuild this one so thats whats being done now.The block is now being rebored and having some nice shiny forged pistons put in,new shells and seals etc,no pics as yet but will get them up as soon as i do.

So,whilst the engines out ive decided to give the bay a spruce.So this is how it looked at 9am this morning...

Went about removing the loom,driveshafts,suspension,downpipe,then removed the subframe


Went to work on all the crap in the bay with some heavy duty degreaser,lol by the looks of the naples coming through its a bit too heavy duty.

Was quite pleased that the brakelines went back to their original green now


Doesnt look a lot but i didnt finish until 6pm, im quite happy with todays work.

Some other bits that ive done this week whilst in work.


Spent all of today prepping the bay ready for painting,so sanded it all down then gave it a good wash over with soap&water,allowed to dry then masked it all up as best i could.


then gave it a blow over with grey primer,ran out of primer so knocked it on the head for today as im losing fingerprints now.




Going to get some more primer tmoz and finish this coat then sand down high spots again,ready for base colour.

Small update,was worried about the state of my valves,there was so much caked carbon on them i thought they'd have to be replaced,but i spent my dinner break on the pencilblaster(high powered air with talc powder added) and they cleaned up nice,theyre going to be reseated anyway but just wanted shot of the black shiz.



Put the second coat of primer on now and flattened that,applied a first coat of the blue that ive picked,a few marks have appeared that i never picked up on with the flat primer but ill do those as i go on.Think the blues a good match,it hasnt got the gold flip in it but its close enough.Also painted all brackets,mounts and various bits & pieces in black aswell.
Some pics of the first coat of blue.




Second coat of blue now on.Had to smooth down the slam panel aswell and give that a coat of primer then 2 blue,also put 2 layers of clear laquer on it all aswell so hopefully it will be fairly tough finish(famous last words).



Did all the parts of the frame that are under the front bumper and the subframe areas in rust proofing chassis black.



Going to start on the subframe tmoz

Started on the subframe today.It was in a pretty dirty state.


Removed the a.r.b and both wishbones,ordered some nice new wishbones with new bushes and ball joint so just gotta wait for them to arrive.Removed power steering rack aswell and put it all to one side.Got to work on the main frame with the degreaser then jetwashed it all down.


Sanded it down and removed most of the top rust then gave it a coat of primer.

Then coated it with the chassis black.


Fitted couple of new clips and re arranged the brakelines back into place,looks much better allready


Just been putting things back together today,some of it will have to be removed again when the engines put back in but for now ive put them on the car just to get them up out of the way,anyway heres how it looks after todays efforts.




Had the day off today aswell so got on with the power steering rack,was a bit grubby..



Stripped it all down and cleaned all the ally oxide off the main body then gave it a coat of black ally paint,couple of the pipes had paint missing but i inspected them for splits and they were fine,cleaned up both gaiters and checked for splits there aswell,offside was a new one anyway and the nearside was fine also,new grease inside and some new zip-ties,replaced nuts and bolts where possible with stainless and cleaned up all hoses,may get some track-rod ends as they look a bit feckered.Also sanded down my a.r.b and painted that.



Small update,went to GSF & Renault today collecting various parts so never done a lot really,fitted power steering rack back to subframe,thats about it,lol.

Note to anyone thinking of taking theirs apart...take lots of pics of what goes where



Bolted all the new wishbones on today and connected the a.r.b back on with all new bushes,this was an absolute git of a job and lots of swearing was involved again,eventually got it fitted then refitted the subframe to the car,this involved superdad as i couldnt do it myself(only 2 hands).Its getting easier now as theres less bits to worry about trying to rehome,fitted rad back in just to make more space in garage as engine wont be finished for a few weeks yet





hmm something missing in those pics

Gearbox next

Was thinking about taking the gearbox apart so that i could dip the 2 cases in acid to get rid of 12years of crap,but after consideration im not going to bother as i know the box runs well(for now anyway) and if i mess it up taking it apart ill need another,got put off by the gearbox pdf manual stating tolerances and stuff,lol.So out with the degreaser again,had the lab in work make up some cleaning fluid for the more stubborn bits,just says 'very corrosive' on the bottle lol,it shifted some of the crap but it has been hard work,kept at it for about 5hrs before i got cheesed off with it for today,heres what it looks like atm...




Ive got a large gap at the back of the n/s turret where the arch liner used to be,because ive fitted the larger wheels they had to come out but now that area gets covered in road film and dirt so decided to make my own splash panel.Cut one out of card to start with then trimmed it to fit ..




then i bought a square of thin blue plastic and went about replicating it,quite pleased with the fit but now im not too sure if it looks too 'blue' lol.




Small update
My new header bottle finally arrived from GSF so fitted that..


Tidied up the loom today,bought some loom tape and 3M of various dia black wire covering,bit neater now.
before:

after:


Had the downpipe painted in the same exhaust paint as the manifold,looking much healthier now.


Finally finished degreasing the gearbox,gave it a light coat of ally paint and generally tidied it up,happy with the results,dunno how long itll stay this clean but the 12yrs of crap are gone.




Just need to get a new earthing strap and the rubber cover that goes over the gear selector linkage

Not much happening atm,pistons have finally arrived,they sent std size to start with but i need o/s so thats why ive had to wait 6 weeks,will get pics up when i go collect block.

Off to Craig(stan) @ APD today and taking this little lot with me so hopefully in a few weeks time ill have an impressive head for my engine

New clutch arrived today,uprated Gtt jobbie,or volvo according to Dunc,lol



Clutch has gone to m/c shop doing block as they need it to balance the bottom half correctly.My injectors came back from being tested and cleaned today,they werent that bad really,but new o-rings and filters fitted and now theyre flowing like new.
pre clean:

post clean:



Had a small delivery today.....

My clutch is back,its been ground and the whole unit has been lightened


My crank has also been re-ground & lightened,all new shells to go in,conrods have been lightened and machined square with crank&clutch


Block has been re-bored,dont know exact spec but will find out,its also been chemically dipped





Everything has been machined/clocked so it all runs balanced

As if i havnt got enough bits to find homes for ,lol


Doesnt look a lot but Ouch


Anyways,thought id be not very sensible with the block,so masked it up....


...and,first coat of colour

Its an old water pump so left it on for masking

Also Winston sent me a starter heatshield as i never had one fitted,got hold of some heat tape and gave it a spruce


Second coat tmoz now

Forgot to mention,no piston pics as theyre still at workshop,gotta wait to get head back so that they can be skimmed to fit at correct compression

Unmasked the block after 3 main coats,Orange is a bad coverage colour,lol,still a few bits to touch up,wasnt quite sure that id made the right decision when it was bare but soon cheered up when the contrasting bits were put on for test,hopefully stan will be finishing the headwork in the next week or so so can get on with the rebuild then.





Small update

Got hold of an ally injector rail,thanks to Winston


Gave it the usual going over


And this lot turned up today...


Going to stans Saturday to pick the head up aswell,maybe i can start with the assembling then,have sorta resided to the fact its not going to be done for FCS
but ill still work on it up to the saturday hoping.

Yet another set back so head wont be ready yet,to say im dissapointed would be an understatment

Anyway,few bits that ive done.

Assembled the new front shockers,big thanks to Chris H & coops for various info here


New front hub bearings being fitted,got one fitted so far,lol,like Chris H said the old ones aint easy to get out,a lot of poundage needed on the hydraulic press,cleaned,painted and new bolt kit,just got to press the hub flange back in now then do the other one


Power steering pump was given the once over aswell,cleaned,painted & greased


Sump had a crack in it so re-welded it up,cleaned the casing then sent it off to powder coaters


Just the driveshafts left to do now and a few bits to finish tinkering with then im sat twiddling thumbs again in anticipation of the head returning.


Had to take all the front struts apart again due to some idiot forgetting to fit the rubber dust covers,doh :Only 1 but you get the idea..


Inlet is now black,hope ive made the right decision with this,im sure it'll look ok once its on lump,fuelrail is having a bit of an upgrade but not finished yet.



Also fitted all the cleaned parts into the sump,just trying to keep on top of what goes where really so the final assembly wont turn me loopy


New top half of cambelt housing,plastic painted black


can you tell that im getting bored......

to be cont....

	ISCV Idle Speed Control Valve