Project Wedding Sax - car #4 Rallye resto
 

Following the engagement between me and my beautiful fiancée, we were discussing wedding cars and chauffeurs, and because the wedding car only picks the bride up in the morning, it leaves me and the best men needing a car.

I met my fiancée through Nathan (Nath89) and I met Nathan at a Saxo meet when were around 18, so we thought it would be a good idea if, rather than us getting a taxi or driving our own cars to the church, we could a Saxo, modify it in to something we would’ve driven at 18, and drive it to the church as a sort of tribute to our friendship, and me meeting my future wife. From there, the best men would drive the Saxo to the venue, whilst I go in the wedding car with my wife.

The idea grew and we ended up the a plan to buy three Saxos, one for me, and one for each of the best men, Nathan and Grant.

So here’s car 1 of 3. A 2001 Mk2 VTR in Icelandic Grey. We picked the car up from a local lad who was selling it as he received it in PX against a motorbike. The car is almost completely standard and has done a 183k with no paperwork or service history. It’s a bit rough around the edges and will need some tidying up to get it looking nice again. But it is rust free, feels solid, and looks in decent condition mechanically. It's only had one owner for the majority of its life which hopefully suggests it was looked after.















The first job was to treat the car to a much needed service and start building up some history. When we jacked the car up we managed to get a good look underneath, and it looks as though the car has had a new exhaust front and centre section, and a new rear beam less than 12 months ago.

After an engine flush, fuel filter change, spark plug change, oil filter change and a new headgasket seal, the car was running much better. We removed the airbox and temporarily fitted a K&N closed cone air filter straight on to the throttle body, along with an oil crank breather. We then removed the spare wheel and cut out the spare wheel cage and retaining bolt. We also stripped the car of anything we wanted painting, which was the front grille, rear badges, mirror caps.






The car seems to have been fitted with some aftermarket alarm / tracker / blackbox and has unterminated wiring loom all over the place, along with a button on the dash near the passenger foot well and an LED in the button blanks. Both of which weren’t connected to anything. There’s also a small box under the passenger foot well, screwed in to the metalwork.





The car came fitted with a CD player but no face plate. We removed that to fit a new Phillips CD head unit, and realised there was an electrical grounding issue which we traced and resolved. We then trial fitted an audio build ready for installation once the car had been cleaned. Finally we removed the 1950s leather interior and door cards (now for sale), along with the engine lagging and front headlights, ready to be painted.

Really?

Saxo's to a wedding.

Talk about wedding of the century.

Its Bromantic!

It will be. These are for me and the groomsmen to get to the church.

I know right

If when you met your fiancé you stepped in dog shit how would you incorporate that?

What an odd thing to do! At least make a saxo limo out of the 3 saxos - now that would be arriving in style...

I’d have to buy your Mondeo off you and take that. It’s not quite a dog, but it’s still shit - so I’m half there ;).

Haha touché sir

I like the new Stissy.

You've gone from a snobby twat to a sensible bloke. Even the way you reply is different.

Not something I'd do personally but it's a cool idea and makes a lot of sense given the cost of these things now. Plus you get 3 track cars at the end of it that you can all run into the ground. Win win.

Don't be jealous lads, just because you didn't think of the idea first! ;)

not a bad idea !

but preparing your wedding cars two years ahead of the date ... a little too much isnt it ?

Lol reminds me of this one

what you want to do is cut and shut the 3 saxos into one stretch limo saxo complete with b8s lower brace etc as said

Look forward to seeing the progress on this though seriously. Is the vtr engine burning much oil after that STP treatment considering its on 185k?

My Saxo was my wedding car, the Mrs arrived in a nice Audi then we left in the Saxo. Had beer cans and just married painted on the rear window.

My uncle had the same in his Sirocco in the 80's so why not.

We need all three cars finished by early summer 2017 and alongside that we will be planning the wedding. Plus the next two years are going to be tight, financially, with all of my spare money going in to the wedding. So now is the ideal time to spend a bit on the cars.

The VTR seems to be running alright. We’ve not moved it much since the service so we’ve not checked the oil. It’s on high mileage for a Saxo but feels solid, I’m just hoping the head gasket doesn’t go or anything. They’ll be nothing worse than leaving a third of the groomsmen by the side of the A6 on the morning of the wedding.

Exactly.

Its a nice idea and hats off to you. But I dont think I could do it.

Side indicators out and tinted.




We managed to get a good look at the interior in the daylight, and noticed some rat droppings under the passenger seat.



Then we baked the headlights to split them open, at this point we noticed that the passenger offside headlight had the later clear indicator lens, whereas the drivers side headlight had the earlier orange indicator lens. The passenger side headlight was also misaligned with the bumper and an extra bracket had been made to mount the headlight to the slam panel, which suggests the car has had some impact damage in the past on that corner and the headlight assembly has been replaced. This weekend we're going to get the front bumper off and have a look to assess if there is any further damage.




We also tinted the headlight indicator lenses.




Finally we sprayed the manifold with white heat paint.

Looks nice saxo project..