The Project Pad

Hello Everyone!

So about a year ago my '99 Camry got totaled. I was browsing through craigslist looking for imprezas, legacys, BMW 3s and 5s when I came across an '86 Coupe GT in Tornado Red. It had sat for a couple years in front of this guys garage but prior to that it was a daily driver. It had a little less that 90k miles on it. I came to check it out and within a minute of being behind the wheel I decided this was going to be my next car. The camry was ridiculously cheap, reliable, and tough, so I only thought it was fitting to go to a tempermental old Audi. My grandfather owned an early 90s Audi 80 and kept telling me it was going to be a bitch to maintain and the parts are going to be expensive and blah blahh blah... But I distinctly remember him buying it in average condition, barely ever taking care of it and it refused to die. He started using it to haul wood and other crap from the hardware shops and it still would not stop. He ended up selling it after 7 years and 90k miles, aesthetically terrible (see "barely ever took care of it") but mechanically solid as a rock. So despite all the nay saying and advice against, I went down to his house, handed him $2000 cash and drove off in my new/old Audi. It's been my daily driver since I bought it and we've been through a lot, but I stand by my decision 100%. A brief list of things that have happened that I've fixed:

1.Small water pump leak that was there when I bought it
2.Tie rods both got bent badly after hitting a curb in the snow
3.Steering rack bracket came loose and the tie rods disconnected while in motion, luckily nobody got hurt.
4.Clutch bearing exploded and took out the pressure plate and clutch disk with it after which I put a new clutch kit in, albeit I messed up because I somehow ended up cracking a clutch disk trying to get the tranny back onto the engine, so I had a great little shop down the street from me to do everything that I had just done, but they did it better
5. Front right ball joint blew up on my way home from pick her up after the clutch work.
6. Bottom front right brake caliper attaching bolt broke (replaced all the bolts for the front calipers)

List of current issues:
1.Lack of bumper, I clipped a chevy malibu in such a way that my bumper hooked onto the malibu's rear fender and got torn right off. As a result the 2 stanchions that the bumper attached to from the front are bent, and the plastic clips on side of the bumper and fender are ripped to bits also. I'm trying to figure out what to do with it. I have the actually plastic from the bumper in my back yard but the metal frame was completely mangled. My Idea was to make another frame for the bumper and to get the small plastics 3d printed as the ones on the other side are still intact and are just a mirror of the broken ones. Anyone have any ideas or experience with that sort of thing?

2.Dented/a little rusty front left fender. It was hit prior to me buying it. The only thing I did was take it off and punched out the dent to make it a little less bad looking. Now this sort of ties into the prior issue in the fact that the bumper attaches to the fender, but I want to get new fenders for it too. I guess the ideal way that I would want to do it is by replacing both the fenders (the other side is totally fine but I like to be symmetrical while repairing things,) and figure out the bumper attachment. Thoughts?

3.Front right strut is shot. A lot of potholes opened up in the spring and summer on the roads I drive on and they happen to all be on the right. This one is easy, just something I want to do soon rather than later.

Future Plans:
Engine replacement (mine's running great it's just weak for my taste)
Hydraulic Handbrake
Strut Tower Braces (front and rear)
Wiring replacement (as much as humanly possible)
Racing seats with 5 point harnesses
Roll Bar (not cage) for said Harnesses
Weight reduction, taking out the rear seats, all interior trim etc. But I must have a radio. so the dash will most like remain while the rest of it goes.
Replacing these completely unnecessary 17 rims with the 15s that came standard. Combine the low profile tyres and the stiff suspension and my back is in a constant state of bouncing around.
I'm sure there is more that I can't remember right now but I will later!

Pictures Are all coming tomorrow, It's a tad too dark for me to take any that are worth while right now.

Thanks a lot to whoever reads! and It feels great to be here!

Thanks for the post and welcome! We're glad to have you here. If you're concerned about handling (the strut tower braces, and hanesses would lead one to believe you are), then goign to a higher profile tire doesn't make much sense. The stiffer sidewall of a 17" tire vs a typical 15" tire makes a HUGE difference in transient response in my opinion.

Good luck, and keep us posted!

Hello again friends,

Sorry I haven't been able to follow up on the first post till now. I've just been incredibly busy the last few weeks but anyway, here are the pictures I was talking about.


My sister thought the quattro badge would be hilarious, I agree.


2.2 5cyl NA

The Bumper

Small sheen of rust has been forming on the head, I need to replace the valve cover gasket soon so I was thinking about taking it off, cleaning it, and painting it before I put it back on. The discolouration bothers me.


And now a few updates!

I replaced the front right strut a few days ago but didn't have time to get to the left one. I'll do that one Thursday.

I also went to the junkyard and pulled some odds and ends off some vws and an audi 90 (bumper clips, shift knobs, 2 handbrake assemblies etc.) The part of the rachet that clips into the teeth just wore down and doesn't hold anymore. One handbrake I pulled was from an A4 Jetta and the other from a B3 Passat, neither of which are even remotely like mine. I'll either make it work or try to find another replacement.

I'm ordering tyres tomorrow and replacing them on saturday hopefully so everything will be good to go!

More updates coming soon. I'd love to hear any suggestions on any of this stuff because, I'm always looking for ways to improve!

Alright so I'm going to be doing a bunch of work tomorrow. I've got a control arm bushing that needs replacement, while I'm down there I'm going to replace the strut. Also I've got a coolant leak that has randomly appeared from somewhere. I'm hoping it's not the water pump but I gotta get in there and find out. Tons of pics coming tomorrow

I saw you are in MD, there is a CGT that is being parted up here in PA. Here is a link
http://harrisburg.craigslist.org/pts/4617491120.html

Where in MD are you located? I'm up here in York PA, just 16 miles north of the boarder.

Well, at least I had the foresight to call this a very long term project!

Since Agata stopped running properly, I spent some time living in Maine, getting a lot of dirt driving experience in a variety of cars.

This is Jaime, my current daily, on the way back down Cadillac mountain.


Unfortunately my relocation to Sunrise County didn't pan out so I bought a house just south of York, PA. During that time, Agata sat at my dads house next to his '79 e21 under a car cover.


When I would visit periodically, I would pull the cover off and check for simple things like rust, paint fade, moisture, etc. I also started her a few times just to make sure nothing locked up and that everything was good. Well, as good as it could be with bad compression on 2 cylinders. The biggest reason I bought the house I'm in now, besides being closer to my family, is the fact that I finally have a garage! I finally have a place to store and work on my various projects! After finishing off a couple motorcycles, I got some tires for Agata because the ones on the original wheels that I kept from the parts car (I sold my 17s with the roller) were 18 years old. On my birthday a few weeks ago she finally got to come home and begin her new life as a "street legal" racecar!! Thanks to my buddy Jack for letting me borrow his Forester last minute to tow her.


When I got her back to my house I got right to work pulling apart the interior and cataloging all the parts I'm going to keep, and what I'm going to sell (for dirt cheap, I'd rather see the parts going to people who need and will use them rather then throwing them out or trying to rip anyone off. Post of that coming later to the swap meet section!)







Next was all the ancillary stuff and sorting and labeling wires!







After that I yanked the drivetrain as one unit.




The bag has the bolts to the subframe and engine and trans mounts. Important stuff!







Next I'm going to be pulling off the accessories and manifolds from the engine and running my boroscope through and see if I can see anything is damaged from that perspective. As you can tell the valve cover needs to come off so I'll get to see if anything is busted up there. I already have another one prepped for painting. There was no metal or water in the oil so I would expect it to be salvageable. All the accessories will be cleaned, disassembled and painted. Everything is getting new gaskets and seals. The fuel injectors will all be cleaned and tested. I will then run a compression test again and hopefully I don't have to get it fully rebuilt! Not a lot of extra money lying around so I'm trying to save where I can and I would love to keep my KX going. There's a lot left to do for chassis prep and wiring, mostly cleaning, labeling and tidying up. I'll be posting updates as often as I can. But I'm happy to be back on the forums and back in the car! I'll find my camera so I can get better quality pictures up as I go throught the paces and I'll actually write up the current list of stuff to do in the next post. Cheers!

Looks like a good candidate for a race car! Look forward to up dates.

I've gotten a bit more done to the car, mostly prep stuff. I started a new job recently so I haven't had a lot of time to work on her when I get home. But I got the engine partially torn down. I ran my boroscope through and didn't see anything out of the ordinary, no bent valves, no scoring that I could see, just a lot of carbon deposits in the exhaust ports. Partially from being 30 years old, partially from running rich for a good bit when she was still my daily. I cleaned everything off but It will need a few more powerwashes and a bit more disassembly in order to wire wheel it and paint it. (The valve cover is unbolted, I just put it back on to wash everything.)




I also got all of the wiring out except a few things at the rear which I don't need to touch for the time being. More than likely I'm going to reuse most of the harness (definitely all of the CIS harness, I don't wanna mess with that,) deleting the unnecessaries and repairing a few spots. I could do a new harness ground up but it would take an incredibly long time and I don't think its needed.


I cut out the inner door panels and got them ready for their new covers. I'll be using ducting steel because It's thin and cheap and the weight difference between that and aluminum is negligible. I already installed door straps, a la Porsche, which will poke out roughly in the center of the new panel. They will be cleaned and degreased before the new panels get installed with self threading screws so I can remove them for the Lexan window and new exterior door handle installation. The original exterior door handles are long gone and none of the aftermarket ones lasted longer than 6 months so I designed a different "handle" (it's more of a button latch) about 2 years ago that I never got around to building. Once I adjust the CAD files, make a few prototypes, then make some more adjustments, I'll make the CAD files available to anyone who wants them. I version I'm making for this car will not have a locking mechanism but my design also allows the possibility of a locking mechanism. I plan on making mine out of ABS plastic but It would probably look better in aluminum.




I started cleaning up a bit more of the adhesive and gunk inside the car but it's going to take a long time and a lot of scrubbing before I see any real progress.


The last important thing that I did was to roll her outside and power wash the front end/ engine bay. I got most of the grease/dirt/road grime off but it's going to take a few more washes to get out the really old stuff. But I found out that the hose from the brake fluid reservior to the clutch master cylinder was originally blue and white! Useless info but still cool considering that I thought it was black, just like everything else in my engine bay. Exhaust leaks are great when they're coming right from the manifold.



Oh yea! I also cleaned and painted the subframe but that is outside drying and it's quite dark so I'll a shot of that for the next post!

I will post another update when I install the door panels. Slowly but surely everything else will get planned, done and documented. Cheers!

Congrats on the new house with a space to work on the project. That definitely helps to get things moving in a forward direction.

jbrentd wrote:Congrats on the new house with a space to work on the project. That definitely helps to get things moving in a forward direction.

Thank you! If I didnt finally get my garage I probably would have been able to get her running again, but I wouldn't have been able to be this thorough. I'm actually already thinking about adding another bay to it!

I know all too well how that goes! Shortly after I moved into my new house, I wished the garage was bigger.

Haven't been able to do much more with her in the last few weeks due to a very hectic schedule but I did get a chance to make the door panel for the passenger side, which will just be mirror for the other side, but I have to come up with place to put a guide for the bar that attaches to the door strap before I close everything off. After that the last thing that will be done to the doors is Lexan windows and custom door handles!

Also Dave stopped in and said hello and brought the Bandit with him!

I'll post another update when I make the other door panel and the shut-off plates for the firewall. Cheers!