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General Do i have the worst Brava in Britain?

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General Do i have the worst Brava in Britain?

Been a bit slack with the brava this week due to a new addition to the family, pop over to the marea forum to see the new member, a Marea HLX 130TD
There's also a lesson to be learned about buying a car that was only MOTd the month before. Things aren't always what they seem!

Anyway I'll be back on with doing bits to the brava this coming weekend hopefully.
 
Finally got to spend a day on the brava, after the marea diesel was taking up last weekend.
Cleaned up the chassis legs and gave them a coat or two of primer

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Then after spending the day at cadwell park on Saturday watching the time attack cars and even a black coupe on track, I've decided I need some track action.
I'd already stripped the engine bay side of the firewall of the sound deadening material, so with gusto I removed the dashboard support bar and set about ripping out all the sound deadening material from the inside of the firewall.

IMAG0251.jpg






15.5kg removed there plus 2kg from the front side. I then attacked the drivers footwell and got that chipped off too. Another kilo there.


Then I tried the coupe dash support bar and dash but that's a no go.
So put the brava dash support bar back in and refitted the dash loom and fuse box, next was fitting the coupe throttle pedal as I'd heard it was different, but it was identical figment wise.
Next in was the brava bonnet cable back in.
I then spent a very uncomfortable hour and a half trying to remove the coupe fuel lines and tank. The coupe rear tank to bumper panel was refusing to come off, then the off side rear tank trap bolt sheared.
And smart arse here putting the coupe right in the corner of the workshop to save space really didn't help with access.
Still I got the fuel pipes I needed.

i was going to knock up a cradle to try and get the engine running out of the car, but thinking about all the extra bits I'd have to weld on to mount stuff like the oil cooler on, and plus there's exhaust and cooling to think about, I may as well save myself a shed load of time and just drop the engine in the car now I've got. Decent crane.

So next weeks jobs are to

Fit the coupe loom into the brava
Change the clutch on the coupe engine using the helix kit
Change a couple of weeping gaskets here and there.
Fit the new heater matrix in the heater unit and refit that using the coupe hoses
Then it's time to trial fit the engine and box.
 

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steve20vt said:
Finally got to spend a day on the brava, after the marea diesel was taking up last weekend.
Cleaned up the chassis legs and gave them a coat or two of primer

IMAG0246.jpg


IMAG0248.jpg


IMAG0249.jpg


Then after spending the day at cadwell park on Saturday watching the time attack cars and even a black coupe on track, I've decided I need some track action.
I'd already stripped the engine bay side of the firewall of the sound deadening material, so with gusto I removed the dashboard support bar and set about ripping out all the sound deadening material from the inside of the firewall.

IMAG0251.jpg






15.5kg removed there plus 2kg from the front side. I then attacked the drivers footwell and got that chipped off too. Another kilo there.


Then I tried the coupe dash support bar and dash but that's a no go.
So put the brava dash support bar back in and refitted the dash loom and fuse box, next was fitting the coupe throttle pedal as I'd heard it was different, but it was identical figment wise.
Next in was the brava bonnet cable back in.
I then spent a very uncomfortable hour and a half trying to remove the coupe fuel lines and tank. The coupe rear tank to bumper panel was refusing to come off, then the off side rear tank trap bolt sheared.
And smart arse here putting the coupe right in the corner of the workshop to save space really didn't help with access.
Still I got the fuel pipes I needed.

i was going to knock up a cradle to try and get the engine running out of the car, but thinking about all the extra bits I'd have to weld on to mount stuff like the oil cooler on, and plus there's exhaust and cooling to think about, I may as well save myself a shed load of time and just drop the engine in the car now I've got. Decent crane.

So next weeks jobs are to

Fit the coupe loom into the brava
Change the clutch on the coupe engine using the helix kit
Change a couple of weeping gaskets here and there.
Fit the new heater matrix in the heater unit and refit that using the coupe hoses
Then it's time to trial fit the engine and box.
Click to expand...

The Brava pedal is only different if it's the last versions with flyby wire throttle
Otherwise they are the same
 
Since the car will now be more track oriented, there will be no rear seating. It will still be road legal and have the dash, carpet and front door cards. But the rear door cards will be replaced with thin plastic or perspex sheeting.
At this stage it won't be caged but eventually it will be with decent seats and harnesses.

Until I can afford to do that It will just be a road / track toy.

I'm going to relieve a Peugeot 106gti of its power steering pump at the weekend which will be mounted in the boot along with the battery.
 
steve20vt said:
Since the car will now be more track oriented, there will be no rear seating. It will still be road legal and have the dash, carpet and front door cards. But the rear door cards will be replaced with thin plastic or perspex sheeting.
At this stage it won't be caged but eventually it will be with decent seats and harnesses.

Until I can afford to do that It will just be a road / track toy.

I'm going to relieve a Peugeot 106gti of its power steering pump at the weekend which will be mounted in the boot along with the battery.
Click to expand...

Looking forward to seeing this finished! A stealth Brava will be so much fun!
 
Liberated a Citroen Saxo VTS power steering pump, got all the pipe work, wiring and relay
I'll only be using the pipes for reference for the hydraulic pipe man to make up the new pipes to get the pump in the back. The main advantage here is that I can cut down the Huuuge alloy bracket that serves as an engine mount, alternator mount, air con pump mount and pas pump mount.
The pas pump is mounted in a strange bearing which can give the five pot a strange whiting noise when they wear.
I'll have to remount the alternator a little but I'd prefer to mount it like it is on the 2.4 diesel at the back of the engine, Moving the weight behind the drive line.

Moving the battery, pas, and the heavy firewall cladding should take around 30kilos off the front axle. There was noticeable difference in handling just binning off the air con on the coupe.

IMAG0260_1.jpg
 
Spent yesterday rubbing down the engine bay then priming it
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Then set about fitting the Helix paddle clutch to the engine, refitted the box and intermediate shaft.
Also removed the chod, as there was a leak on the alloy housing to the block.

Then when the primer was dry put a few coats of black on


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Next was getting the coupe loom into the car, I put it through a large grommet on the near side, the plan is to get the engine running then trim off the unused wiring.


IMAG0276.jpg


More updates soon.
 
Update time.

i parked the engine in front of the car and connected everything I could find, even wired the alternator, fans, fuel pump (spare one I had), air bags. In fact everything bar the heater and door electrics.
I had the loom earths on the car body, so needed to use jump cables to Earth the engine / body.
20150517_131453.jpg


Next was to connect the battery, all good (y) nothing catching fire.

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Next step was to try the ignition. No dash warning lights, no code light, no injector or battery light.
After a little head scratching and some poking around the fuse box and the next try provided the right noise from the fuel pump, battery light on the dash, injector light on then off and code light on then off.
The only problem was the air bag light which never came on when it was in the coupe.
I found the bulb had gone, so replaced that and now it works but doesn't go out, but that's no Problem for now.
The engine turned over and the fuel pump continued to run so I'm confident the engine will run no problem.

Then I disconnected everything engine side, and made a start on getting the engine bay looms in order.
Next week I'll get that finished, then get the heater box back in, fit the coolant hose of death (been waiting for a new seal for the alloy housing) and then, get the engine in! :slayer:
 
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The engine I'm putting is is straight out of my coupe, it's done 185k so it's a bit tired. But it runs well and it will do the job of making sure everything works while I build up another engine in the garage at home.
It's a shame I can only spend a few hours on a Sunday doing this, but I reckon three more Sunday's should see it running.
 
I just wish I had more time, I'm on with three projects, work away from home most of the week, spend sat with the family and Sunday mornings which leaves me about five hours Sunday afternoon to play cars lol.
 
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Not much visual progress this week, just cleaning up the looms and making a few length corrections, sealing up the grommets etc.
fitted the coupe brake and clutch reservoir,but basically just spent four hours doing wiring.

Boring.
 
Great project (y).

This reminds me of a secret fantasy of mine - fitting a Toyota Supra engine + auto box into an Alfa 156 .. I must be mad :eek:
 
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This weekend I fitted the fuel pipes from the coupe, got the heater matrix fitted and then fitted the heater box and pipes.
Sorted the new cable from front to rear for the battery. All the engine bay looms are ready.

Trial fitted the steering rack and subframe and pipework to the Peugeot electric steering pump.
No pics this week, was too busy lol
 
So a little progress again,
I've been looking at how to get round moving the alternator so I can bypass the stock pas pump.
The OE set up uses a large belt that runs on the crank pulley, an idler, a tensioner, air con and then down to the power steering pump, which has a double width pulley that then finally drives the alternator via a second short belt. Yes complicated.
Having already done away with the air con pump before I took the coupe off the road, swapping to a non air con set up which used a different engine mount / ancillary bracket, alternator, top alloy water pipe and different tensioner a and pulleys, again complicated.
I've basically mounted the alternator the other way up (still spins the right way) and used the OE adjustment bracket on the back side so it's rigidly mounted, then using the alternator belt from the 1.2 brava (which is too short) to see if everything lines up, which it does so I'm happy.

The gist is that the alternator needs moving out about 30mm to line up and then I can run the alternator directly from the crank pulley and using the OE air con type set up adjuster to tension it

20150628_145139.jpg



This is just a rough set up to see if it works, the point being to make things less complicated by using the electric pas set up and getting rid of the annoying OE pas pump bearing noise the 20v suffers with plus reducing drag, and finally if the belt goes on the stock set up it generally takes the cambelt with it. Using a much narrower belt will reduce the risk of ingestion.
Ives used the full sized belt in the pic just for photo purposes, and none of the fixings currently used will be in the finished set up, they're just what I had to hand at the time.
 
i think the pas pump is what is making a noise on my bravo actually - gonna try change it but not sure how hard it will be but i forsee swearing happening lol.

I must say that i really hate electric pas as fitted to 99.9% of modern cars and i really like having hydraulic setup again, think the only other car I have had with it is my old Punto GT and i loved the steering feel on that too. Interesting idea though, and should free up quite a bit of space and weight - i guess you will hack off the part of the big mount that the pas pump bolts to as well.?
 
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