Datto_610's 180B - Street Legal!

[brocky41]

CHeck for straightness stud hole to stud hole - it may be flat length ways but across, if its bowed, will leak in the middle like your gaskets have. Ie no amount of tightening will put any crushing pressure in the centre.

I had that issue with the CA sump - all the bolt holes were bowed towards the block and had to be penned out to gain pressure and seal - hope that explanation helps.

Also a plus one on that copper rtv stuff john talks about - i swiped some while he wasnt looking and it sealed a non sealer.

[Datto_610]

Sweet will check that also I'll check the head too but that should be all good

[Datto_610]

Made use of the good weather this weekend and fitted the manifold and turbo etc back on. It was such a mission but I got there in the end. Stud hole to stud hole were flat all the way accross so saw no reason to not refit this manifold, upon removal of manifold I must've bent the water feed and return lines from the turbo as they didn't want to line up with out a bit of persuasion. After a bit of undoing quite a few other things to get the banjo fittings to line up properly I was able to refit the rest of the turbo piping and intake. One of the last bolts at the bottom of the manifold was such a prick to tighten I was only just able to get it done up with my 1/4" dr ratchet but went out and bought a stubby 14mm spanner and tweaked it as much as I could so hopefully it's tight enough...
After everything was all hooked up again I thought I'd better check how good these gaskets are meant to be. So ran the engine up there was a few pops and bangs after some cold rev ups but smoothed out once warm. There was steam/exhaust gasses coming off the manifold and dump pipe but nothing coming out between the manifold and head so could it just be grease and dirt from my hands burning off?? It went away after the running for a bit.

So with manifold back on yesterday I set to getting the new longer sway bar link's fitted. That was also a big mission hardly any room around the steering and suspension components, to get the links to fit nicely I had to put them through the forward most adjustment hole on the sway bar. I'm not sure what effect this will have on the handling as it was originally set up with the link's in the center of the adjustment holes but it all fits now! And achieved desired result. I'll leave the excess length on sway bar link's at the moment as I'll get the guy's at chamberlains to take another look at the sway bar as I've no clue if I set it up right.


I've known for a while now that I needed to do something about my front brake hoses as they are not clipped in the middle or anything as I don't have a bracket on my struts to mount them too. I can't remember if I cut the mounts off or maybe they never had them?? Either way I had to do something so found some P clips and moved the hose into a position where it's not going to bind or rub against sharp edges I'm just not sure if cert man will approve... But they don't hit anything at full lock both ways so see no reason why it wouldn't be ok??



I thought while it's jacked up I better give the brakes another bleed just to make sure they are all good. But some how managed to cock that up and now they hardly work at all!!! Spent ages to sort but nope... should've left them.... anyone keen to help bleed them??

[Bartman]

I can try lend a hand at easter some time.
You got a compressor at yours?

[Datto_610]

Oh mean! Na but my brother has one I can borrow

[Datto_610]

Right so I called Ian Smith of Smithy's Modified Vehicle Certification (Ex West Eyreton Motors) yesterday to get the 180 booked in for cert. After a bit of a run down of what Ive done he said yeah no worries but to call him after April 11th as he's on annual leave soon and wasn't near his diary to write it in. So I'll call him back after April 11th and book it in for either the first or second week of May, he said he wasn't that booked up yet so any of those two weeks would be fine.

The 180 is also booked in to see Nick M again early April to get the exhaust modded slightly so it doesn't rub on the handbrake cable, I'll also see if he doesn't mind making up the intake pipe for the turbo nice and tidy and away from the radiator.

Now Ian told me on the phone that the wheel alignment sheet had to be no older than 14 days... I was under the impression that it was 28 days but they may have changed it... So that means I'm probably going to have to get tyres fitted first so I can roll the gaurds, and set the speedo up accurately and then when everything is finished and the brakes are bed in everything works properly I'll get the wheel alignment done then off to get cert.

But for now I really need to get the brakes bleed!

[Bartman]

I might be near your neck of the woods tomorrow mate.

[Datto_610]

Siiiiick

[Datto_610]

Bart came round on sunday to help bleed the brakes well he did most of it I just watched lol. Anyway got all that done then thought better test them out! But the damn thing wouldn't start! Well it ran for maybe 5 secs then died but wouldn't fire again after that. Tried some start ya bastard cleaned the plugs which were pretty black but absolutely nothing! So I've go charged the battery and got new plugs to try I pulled out iridiums but just going to run standards til I know it's running properly ran out of cash for fresh gas too pay day tomorrow though. Bart also ripped into how I clipped my front hoses which I admit wasn't the best. So was gonna go to pick a part and try and scavenge some hose clip brackets and then realised I had two R31 rear drum brake control arms so whipped them off those! Cleaned and painted them up and cut a small piece out so I can put the hose in easily. I mounted one and tried it out looks pretty nice but on full lock the hose was stretching... so I've found a longer brake hose at work which I'll get tomorrow when I get paid

[broke]

Haha, geez Greg, what is it with you and routing hoses?

Nice progress there mate, you must be fizzing to drive it now.