Jim Davey
R H Davey Welding Supplies Ltd
- Messages
- 5,736
- Location
- Southampton
Some time ago I blew up my track day prepared 306 Gti6, it was a good little car and I put a lot of time into getting it how I wanted, (full Tig welded cage, stripped, buckets, harnesses, roller bearing wishbone bushes, LSD, throttle bodies etc) and when I killed it I fully intended to slot in another secondhand lump and carry on enjoying it. Then I was offered some race cams that were at a very low price, seemed silly to say no. Problem was race cams don't mix with standard pistons or lifters, forged pistons deserve forged conrods...
Fact is, all of these bits are a bit overkill on a track day car, so might as well go the extra mile and race it.
Plans are made to go wrong though, I ended up being offered a complete professionally prepared 306 rolling shell with all the custom suspension gear I planned on getting, all it needed was an engine. Plan was to built a hot motor, bung it in and go racing a lot sooner than would be possible if I carried on with my old car. So a deal was struck and I packed my 306 off to its new home, unfortunately in my haste I failed to notice the cage in my new car had some fairly serious weld defects (cold lap on about 70% of the joints) these were initially hidden by a very nice paint job but soon started to reveal themselves under closer examination.
Long story short, I ended up stripping lots of paint back and going over all the bad stuff but essentially ended up further behind than when I sold my old one.
Still we all make mistakes but having done all the work once, the second time around I was considerably less motivated!
As it stands now, I thought sod it, I might as well go the whole hog and seam weld the shell, cut a section out of the floor to allow me to drop in a fuel cell and sort any rusty areas now as there will never be a better time.
Old car...
New car...
And how she looks now
Louvres were "rescued" from a dead PC 60 plasma cutter before the rest of it went in the scrap bin
There was no dash bar and no door bar gussets so I thought I'd sort that while I was at it...
That's as far as it went until this year, but I've managed to make a little more time for the car this year and moved it on a bit (I'd kill for a decent garage, I'd get so much more done if I could just do a bit whenever I wanted but due to where the car is kept at work it all has to be packed away before I can go home)
Here's chopping out the floor for the fuel cell, unfortunately the cross brace for the cage didn't fit my plans so it had to go...
I also finally got around to fabricating my inlet manifold. (I'm not a welder by trade, I fix them mainly and I do some demos but mainly the idea is to get the torch in the hands of the professional as soon as possible) but I thought I'd be ******ed if I'm paying someone to do a job I can do myself.
I also knocked up a bracket for my twin fuel pumps and modded my catch tank to take AN10 hoses...
I also dicked around wondering what a Transit on throttle bodies might look like...
Anyway, life has got in the way again and not done anything on the car for a while now but hopefully spare time and motivation wil coincide again soon
Fact is, all of these bits are a bit overkill on a track day car, so might as well go the extra mile and race it.
Plans are made to go wrong though, I ended up being offered a complete professionally prepared 306 rolling shell with all the custom suspension gear I planned on getting, all it needed was an engine. Plan was to built a hot motor, bung it in and go racing a lot sooner than would be possible if I carried on with my old car. So a deal was struck and I packed my 306 off to its new home, unfortunately in my haste I failed to notice the cage in my new car had some fairly serious weld defects (cold lap on about 70% of the joints) these were initially hidden by a very nice paint job but soon started to reveal themselves under closer examination.
Long story short, I ended up stripping lots of paint back and going over all the bad stuff but essentially ended up further behind than when I sold my old one.
Still we all make mistakes but having done all the work once, the second time around I was considerably less motivated!
As it stands now, I thought sod it, I might as well go the whole hog and seam weld the shell, cut a section out of the floor to allow me to drop in a fuel cell and sort any rusty areas now as there will never be a better time.
Old car...
New car...
And how she looks now
Louvres were "rescued" from a dead PC 60 plasma cutter before the rest of it went in the scrap bin
There was no dash bar and no door bar gussets so I thought I'd sort that while I was at it...
That's as far as it went until this year, but I've managed to make a little more time for the car this year and moved it on a bit (I'd kill for a decent garage, I'd get so much more done if I could just do a bit whenever I wanted but due to where the car is kept at work it all has to be packed away before I can go home)
Here's chopping out the floor for the fuel cell, unfortunately the cross brace for the cage didn't fit my plans so it had to go...
I also finally got around to fabricating my inlet manifold. (I'm not a welder by trade, I fix them mainly and I do some demos but mainly the idea is to get the torch in the hands of the professional as soon as possible) but I thought I'd be ******ed if I'm paying someone to do a job I can do myself.
I also knocked up a bracket for my twin fuel pumps and modded my catch tank to take AN10 hoses...
I also dicked around wondering what a Transit on throttle bodies might look like...
Anyway, life has got in the way again and not done anything on the car for a while now but hopefully spare time and motivation wil coincide again soon
