It seems the GTi has had an altercation with an object at some point in the past, and this had been dealt with in a bit of a poor way. The near side front inner wing had rust under the fusebox, and on investigation with a wire wheel I found it had been half replaced, and welded, then fillered up!
Luckily I can do what should have been done to start with and replace that whole section.
But first I need to wait for the engine and box to arrive so I can start test fitting it. Should be here on Friday I hope, then once that fits okay I can start with rebuilding the engine bay and getting...

I've now stripped the new gti of all its engine bay gubbins, so I can begin to clean all the paint off and see what there is to play with.
I'm trying to sell all my J4 stuff as the little pug will be running a bigger heart! More of that later as its a secret SHhhh!

The weather is still shit and I'm only getting one day a week to do anything, plus I'm helping my mate do his 106 too.

More soon........

There was no way I could get the 02 plate through a Vic check with so much of it missing, so that idea was shelved, I've also moved house and been left with no place to work on the car.

But on the plus side, I'm now good buddies with the lad who had the quickie and I've been heling him with his car over the last few weeks, in return for some garage space

So in the weeks that have passed, I've moved, scrapped the saxo shell, binned off the 02 shell and retaxed the gti for another 6 months.

The gti developed a bit of a rattle from the rear, which...

Well since running the GTi for a bit I had a look round for someone localish to get a heater box and matrix from, as doing a 50 mile commute to work (only once a week though) is no fun when its freezing and there is no heater!

I found a lad who was breaking a quickie, so went to help him take the heater box out. After half hour or so it looked like it was gonna be a ball ache, having to remove the dash, wiper motor and all that.

In the mean time I had a look round the shell, hmm I was thinking.
It is an 02 plate, and was being broken as the lad hadn't got...

Well, I miss my little vts so much, I've gotten myself a 106 GTi to play with while the vt gets finished.
I was looking for another shell when it caught my eye over on 106owners, the lad had tried to sell it with no joy so took off his mods and with nothing to put back on it just sat there in his garden.

Few emails, and pics later I was relieving my vts of both front struts / brakes
Rear dampers
Exhaust
And drivers seat.

Armed with some tools, brake fluid, gear oil and engine oil.
150 miles later I'm banging the bits on and...

Well its been a bit since I anything last happened, the car has been stuck on the front waiting for the garage to get built.
Its still waiting tohave the concrete poured for the base do it will be longer yet

So this weekend I decided I was gonna get the brake pipes all sorted and free off the seized brake compensator.

Didn't get as far as that as I thought I'll just whip the exhaust and rear silencer heat shield off, then a bit of wire wheel and drill action. Which led to the removal of the rear wheel arch liner (small one at the back) where upon I found...

Well, got back with the Mrs. The S is off the road for a bit now as I'm running another daily.

While its off the road I've. So far binned off all the ABS and replaced the ABS master cylinder with a 23mm 406 non ABS jobbie.
My braided hoses have arrived along with my monster front discs and pads 283 x 26mm
My 406 calipers are no good as the carrier won't fit
So I'm just waiting on some 307 xsi calipers and carriers arriving.
Total cost of the front brake set up is likely to be around the £130 all in so I'm still happy

Now as I'm...

I had an interesting weekend. Got home from work Friday night, Mrs was asleep in bed. Got up sat morning, had a row with Mrs and left. Got as much stuff in the car as possible (mostly car stuff and tools then a few clothes)
Now I'm staying at parents back in Grimsby.

Not gonna go into details about the breakup but basically we are just too different people wanting different things out of life.

So now I'm looking for a lockup in Grimsby do I ca get stuck into getting the vts done.

Looks like I'll be out all this week, living in a lorry is not much fun. Especially when its 27 degrees!!

Man if I was single I'd be so loaded and the vts would be one boosted little mofo!
But as it stands I've got a a full house to buy carpets for, decorate and all that shizzle.

Now she wants a shit zoo, (sounds like that anyway) some kind of small mut that she cart around like some kind of wag.

Still, its swings and roundabouts aint it, she gets a dog, and when I've paid out on the house I get to crack on with collecting boost parts while...

Pulled the horrid coilovers off today, and fitted the original struts. That's after I had stripped them and welded the pring pans on and new top mounts and bearings.
For now I've (carefully) welded the balljoint into the polybushed wishbone and fitted that.
And while it was all off I've replaced the leaking diff seal, so that's the gearbox leak sorted now too.

I'm now planning to pick up another set of struts to grit blast and fit B8s and faulkners to.

That's all I had time to do after work today and before I had to take our lass shopping.