I'm trying to get these updates in order as it's moving quite fast at the moment!
I had a delivery to do in Bridgewater so thought it would be good to pop in to TSR while i was there and speak to them about a roll cage. I had been in e-mail contact with Rob already but just wanted to show my face and have a quick chat. Once i was there they showed me a couple of the cars they were building and i booked mine in there and then. Sadly with both TSR's and my workload, this turned out to be nearly 2 months before i managed to take the car down.
While the car was away i still had plenty to be getting on with. When the car was on the lift I noticed that the rear axle was not in great condition and i needed to change all the bushes anyway so set about trying to find one that i could refurbish and build back up so all i would have to do is swap them over.
However getting hold of a MK5 GTI rear axle is actually quite difficult! I spoke to several breakers who never got back to me, A couple on eBay that had seen better days and others that were in Scotland or London with no way of getting them to me. I tried one of these "find a part" websites in the end and within half an hour i had a breaker on the phone with a low mileage complete axle and he could ship it to me! The price was actually better than what i was quoted from other people and that didn’t include shipping. It arrived a few days later and I expected it to be on a pallet wrapped up. However the driver said to me “6 parcels mate”. The breakers had taken the whole thing apart to ship it to me, saved me doing it I suppose! lol
Next, I needed some bushes. Funnily, at the same time as I was looking superpro released a new track/race kit for the MK5 Golf platform. You can see the press release for this at
http://www.superpro.com.au/whats-new/media-a-press/item/309-superpro-upgrade-its-mk5-golf-kitPerformance VW also did a feature on the kit which you can read here.
http://www.superpro.com.au/images/whats-new/Mk5_Golf/SUPPVW0616_-_SuperPro_-_Golf_MK5-r.pdf
I was already in contact with Henry Wright and Jamie Packham at Jtech performance parts as they are a Club GTI sponsor so I let them know what I wanted and they came back with a cracking price for it all. This included the alloy arms, front to rear bushes kit, front and rear ARB’s etc. The whole 9 yards. They also offered lots of advice which was great. It wasn’t just about the price, the service was excellent also. I ordered the kit from Henry and a few days later it turned up. It’s beautiful! [:|]
However, the replacement rear beam was not so beautiful. In fact it was a mess of flaky paint, surface rust, road grime. The usual problems any rear subframe faces to be honest. I couldn’t bolt on £1000’s worth of bushes, alloy arms and roll bars to a rusty subframe could i? ;)
Let’s get cracking on the paint removal then. I could have got this professionally done but I’m trying to save money at the moment as the spending is a bit out of control! I managed to pick up a sand blasting gun and some aluminium oxide shot for a good price from eBay. I have never done anything like this before so it was a bit of a learning curve to be honest but it came out pretty well I think.
First problem, we needed to remove the old bushes, I found the best way (as suggested by Justin) was to hole saw the middle out and insert a hacksaw blade to take a nip out the side. This releases the pressure and you can knock it out with a socket. I had them all done in an hour!
The second problem was where the hell do I sand blast these? I have a big workshop but it’s pretty full, I can’t just shoot metal filings everywhere and mixed with the rust it would have been a terrible mess. I also wanted to reuse the shot if possible as I know I was borderline if I had enough or not. So I needed a sealed container, big enough to take the subframe (arms removed). I know...
Yes, that is a pallet bin. We use it to tip waste into a large skip outside. We didn’t care about the paint on the bin and it’s sealed around the sides, bottom and back so it just needs a lid and it’s good to go! The pallet as a shelf worked well also, it allowed the media to fall through to the bottom and I could just hoover it out.
I spoke to one of my material suppliers to see if they had any scrap material. She had a scratched sheet of 3mm PETG that is perfect for what I needed so chucked it on my next delivery and it was like new to be honest. I managed to pick up a pair of blasting gloves from eBay also so I had the makings of a DIY blast cabinet for large items. A bit of hinge later and we have this contraption!
It worked really well, however I could have done with much more media for it. I put it through the 2nd time and it was less effective. It took twice as long to remove the paint but that’s all I could do really without spending more money.
Here are some comparisons of the parts.
Pretty good as you can see. The paint that is left on there is very strong so I left it on for added protection.
Then it’s just a case of hanging them up and giving them a few coats with the black hammerite. I did the arms and a few other bits one night as it was very hot that week. 30+ in the workshop so had to be done at night to stop it from drying out so quick.
I spent a morning outside painting the larger parts as I couldn’t fit it all on the forklift
They have been left for about 4 weeks now so I think that’s enough time to let it go hard. I will be putting it all back together with the superpro kit soon. :D
