Wreck to Race.

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Originally Posted by golfworx

Nice work Pete.

Wish I was having as much progress & luck with your project as you.

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I've made lots of mistakes along the way! Mostly it's perserverance.

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Originally Posted by golfworx

I reckon this will one fun machine on the track & reckon you'll do well.
Look foward to hearing some track day storie's & thread's.

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I hope so. It's underpowered IMO but that should make it a good basis to learn racecraft again.Once I figure out what I want to do class wise I'll build the right motor or buy the right car.

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Originally Posted by golfworx

Those tyres look very nice. Quick question, why didn't you go to something like a 205/55R14?
Much bigger foot print for $20 more a tyre.

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I think these will suffice. I wanted an all round tyre that could be driven to events if I had to. I have 195s on my other car and it's a PITA with tyre scrub. On the track I didn't want to have tyres anywhere near the bodywork. There's still scope with these to push the rears out by 10mm each side. I also had a look at what other people were running on Golfs, this was a pretty popular size. It's also the cheapest tyre in the R888 range for some reason.

They're a good place to start from for my first set of race tyres.

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Originally Posted by golfworx

Also on a side note. I'd be covering up your B+ battery terminal. those raised battery post style battery's come very close to the bonnet.

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That will be fixed. I just haven't decided how yet. I still have some work to do there. I am very experiened at DC power system cabling, I just haven't thought this one through yet. I have several battery isolation swithces on my desk right now, I'm just agonising about practicality vs CAMs compliance in a street driven car. I may yet pop a Gel Cell in the boot, I could do with the extra space up front for more air horns:).

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Originally Posted by golfworx

I prefer the flush style battery post's, with a battery cover.

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Yeah but I was stuck miles from nowhere and that was all the Marshal guy could lay his hands on. I'll replace it with a euro DIN battery or a gell Cell one day but it's doing the job for now.

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Originally Posted by golfworx

Useless info, but the standard pedal rubber's can become very slippery with only alittle bit of moisture.

I removed my clutch & brake pedal rubber's & fitted some racing pedal's, grinded them flat & Arildited some low grit (can't remember what grade but was very rough) sand paper on to the pedal's.

No more feet slipping off the pedal's. Ever!

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Good solution! I'm trying to work out what to do with my pedals. I've got a nasty habit of leaving my left foot on the clutch pedal which can lead to me riding the clutch out of corners. Ideally I'd like a foot rest to brace against but my foot is a bit wide too fit between the clutch and the console. More thought required but I thought I'd start off with the standard setup and develop from there.

Nice engine bay by the way. Is that a factory K-Jet install?

Pete

I made up the seat frame today - what a PITA!

I was working with one I'd started on and one I bought from an ex racer.

I bolted up the purchased one but it made the seat too high in the cabin so I used it as a reference to take measurements from and went back to modifying my first attempt.

It's really hard to get a race seat low enough over the standard mounts.

My goal was to use the original mounting system in the car to avoid engineering issues. I also wanted to be able to mount a stock seat belt buckle so I could have both a harness and a street legal seat belt in there.

I tacked the frame together , bolted it to the seat and tried it out... over and over again! I must have pulled it apart 3 or 4 times before I was happy with the driver position.

My biggest difficulty arises because I'm 6'2" tall and the helmet adds about another 3". The first seat mount had me pinned to the roof. You can get the back mounts lower than the front but that tilts the seat backwards. I eventually found a reasonable position after a lot of re-designs.

Here's the frame, it's blue to match the seat. massively over engineered no doubt, but I don't want to fall out mid corner.

I'll pop up a pic of the seat in the car when the paint is dry and I've purchased the correct bolts.

http://www.vwwatercooled.com.au/foru...P1290401-2.jpg


Pete

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Originally Posted by Peter Jones

Nice engine bay by the way. Is that a factory K-Jet install?

My biggest difficulty arises because I'm 6'2" tall and the helmet adds about another 3". The first seat mount had me pinned to the roof. You can get the back mounts lower than the front but that tilts the seat backwards. I eventually found a reasonable position after a lot of re-designs.

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Nice work as usual Pete.

Yes that's the engine bay in my once pristine GTI. But my new car should look the same, except I'm hiding as much of the wiring as possible, the ign. coil, The brake pipe's etc.
There a crappy/messy looking engine bay IMHO & there's an old saying. "You cant polish a turd, but you can try!"

That comment about how tall you are. j:

I'm roughly 5'7" & didn't have any problem's with head room, till I fitted my helmet & sat in the GTi , then realised it also had a sunroof, which take's up another 2-3" more room. :o

I had to hunch down in the seat just to drive it! I know the pain your going through.

You may not be able to polish a turd, but you can always paint it red with fiddly bits!

:)

Pete

Nice strong bit of overengineering there Pete :)
Its never gonna break.

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Originally Posted by Golf Loon

Nice strong bit of overengineering there Pete :)
Its never gonna break.

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The design got revised so many times, I could probably have cut some more of the leftovers out.

The bugger of it all is trying to get all the alignments right between the runners, the seat mounting holes and the position of the seat in the car there's too many factors at play. I gave up measuring in the end. This design is more evolution than engineered.

I killed my previous race car (Beetle) on the street in a head on accident with a Subaru (15 years ago). It had a cage and racing seat fitted. I was wearing the lap/sash belt at the time rather than the 5 point harness. I walked away with only a broken hand and I'm sure the the seat saved me from serious spinal injury. The seat was stuffed from the accident, it deformed around me but the mounts I had made for that car stood up to the task. I broke my hand because a '65 beetle doesn't have a collapsible steering column, I bent the steering wheel right into the dash.

I'm glad I didn't have the standard low backs in there at the time.


Pete

Well if there was ever a case to over engineer - that would be the reason!

Hopefully the ebay special never suffers the same fate as the beetle!

Dropped the car off to have the Harness bar fabricated this morning. I should have it back in the next day or so.

Looks like the radiator has had it. The tank on the hose side has started to leak. I've got a new one on the way, if all goes well It will arrive just as I get the car back.

I've got most of the hoses new to put it in with and I've lashed out on brand new stainless steel worm bands for everything too.

That's about it then, I think after that it's ready to hit the track on Saturday.

I'm going to trailer it down to the island, just in case.

Waterboy, What's the score on pitting at the Island?

Pete

You should have tried Seal Up. Used it on the goof radiator 4 years ago and it never leaked. Dad uses it all the time for customers to get them out of trouble. It'll even fix a blown head gasket (within reason..).

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Originally Posted by Preen59

You should have tried Seal Up. Used it on the goof radiator 4 years ago and it never leaked. Dad uses it all the time for customers to get them out of trouble. It'll even fix a blown head gasket (within reason..).

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Nah, It's only delaying the inevitable.Don't want to spring a leak on the track, the marshals hate that stuff and it delays everyone elses racing while they clean it up.

Pete