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My...Uh..Not really a build thread.

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#1 · (Edited)
So about a year ago, I decided to liquidate all of my VW bits. After so many, and a lack of time because of work and family I figured it was time to be done tinkering.

This car sat on a local classifieds for about 6 months just taunting me, many a times I simply passed over it when friends suggested I buy it. The car was brought to Utah, tinkered on, and driven casually by the previous owner, but not much was changed.

After reading aeffertz's build thread a dozen times, reviewing every detail and going over it in my head I decided it had to be mine to "finish"

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?5630936-Alex-s-Rabbit-Project-Take-Two

--

So here it is, almost exactly as it was left....

The Good



  • Almost exactly as Alex left it
  • Running and driving



The Bad



  • Paint issues (chips, dings, polishing burn, deep scratch on the hatch, etc.)
  • Oil Leak (Valve Cover)
  • Cool bits were sold (moroso, scientific rabbit manifold, etc)
  • Excessive Head Tick (likely lifters, or valve stems)
  • Dash is degrading (repairs falling apart)



Not much else to say, other than I plan on finalizing a few of the unfinished things. Improving things that I'm not a big fan of. And really just driving and enjoying it. The good news is that it's in amazing shape and doesn't "need" anything at all.


Current condition









 
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#428 ·
Nothing new to share as far as progress. Rabbit is all back together and I spent the day detailing it. Thus far the car has no wax or anything on it to allow the paint to cure/breath but damn it shines.

https://youtu.be/RAf1Pw83D90

Headed out tomorrow with my friend to get a final shoot in for the season with a few friends.

Looks like the heron will be going in this winter, I’d like to keep it driveable for now as fall and spring are the best times of the year to get out and drive this thing.
 
#430 ·
It totally is!!

But I’ve waited this long, would have been done by now if it wasn’t for the hood incident. But now I want to enjoy the car while I can.

Seriously haven’t gotten enough seat time in behind the wheel and I love driving this thing.
 
#433 · (Edited)
Refinished and installed the metal ST badging.



I have a panned cruise with some local friends, should be a good 150/200miles in heading into the high Uinta mountains this next weekend.

Lastly, I’ve been narrowing down a time to install the heron and getting it all tuned and ready, it’s sounding like the second or third week of Nov!!
 
#435 ·
I decided that I was going to refinish a set of factory steels to have on hand. I lucked out finding a bunch of nos parts instead of having to refinish everything.

I was able to source nos early black caps, nos lugs, nos lug covers, and nos chrome caps, and clips as well.

Thus far only these have arrived




And the steels! They just need some blasting and powdercoat.



I’m on the hunt for nos or super clean beauty rings as these ones are damaged. If anyone knows of any please lmk.
 
#439 ·
Not much to share, but it’s been awhile.

Snagged some OG hubcaps I plan on restoring over the winter. I’ll likely never run them, but I like em.




Also found some nos directional rabbit stickers for them



I then finished off the year with a 200ish mile drive up into the high uintah mountains with some friends.

 
#442 ·
No! It will be done by spring :)

It will actually be done in the next few weeks to be honest, just spot checking all my parts and ensuring we have everything we will need.

The random check valves, random bolts, sourcing a knock setup, etc are really all that’s left.
 
#453 ·
I guess everyone needs to eat....

I remember their early catalogs mentioned they were a performance company and you’d never see them sell license plate frames, and shirts, but guess what.....?

Everywhere I read stated you needed to lower the compression when installing a JH head ABA block. I called and was going to send my pistons in, to be cut. He told me to try it without and if it pinged, to instal a knock sensor. He could have easily taken my money. Collin, has given me a lot of good, free advice.

-Todd
 
#454 ·
Good convo and details guys!

That was my thought as well. I couldn’t think of any reason it wouldn’t work, but we shall find out soon enough :)

As for Colin being the awesome dude he is, I think he has given all of us very sound and free advice over the years. He even told me that I was silly for boosting a heron “why the hell would you do that!”

[emoji23][emoji23]
 
#456 ·
I would agree that they never said it was for solid lifter heads but I do not recall VW building the knock system for an engine with solid lifter heads either.

There definitely is a noise difference from a knock and a poor valve adjustment. Since neither one of us designed the system VW uses, we do not know what the computer was designed to 'hear'. If the sensor is too sensitive for a hyd head engine, then it may just be as sensitive running a solid lifter. It's just a hunk of aluminum and IF there was an issue with the system being too sensitive, then you could always stick one in.

With the type of driving I do, solid lifters is not my style. There is a lot of information that was around back before the internet and although I agree, it might have been heresy, the people that knew about are not around and neither is their digital footprint.
 
#466 ·
I’m curious how it goes with installing the phenolic spacer gasket. I tried doing it in situ and kept running into clearance issues so I’ve given up for now.

What’s your plan for installing the motor, will it be fully assembled with the turbo and manifolds and then installed, or bolt those on after the motor’s in place?
 
#469 ·
Are you axles horizontal to the ground? I suspect not because I have the same pan and I have a lot more clearance than your picture.

Out of the box thinking, you could always raise the engine. I suspect that you could raise the engine an inch without too much hassle. If the axles are not straight now, raising the engine would help that angle too.
 
#470 ·
I’m not quite level due to some Interesting tire sizes and some work I did to make the E75s for how I wanted. I’m debating upping the sidewalk up front to match the rear.

For now, I’m likely just going to go back to the osvw shorty pan and have a kick out added to make sure I have the capacity I want. I know the oil cooler ads a bit, but not enough to get to normal. Great callout on raising it a tad though, that’s an option I’ll look at now as well.

Going to proceed with the shorty for now as swapping a pan once I get things all worked out isn’t hard.
 
#471 ·
Sure looks great under the hood nice work!
Yeah that pan looks too low to me especially since it's aluminum. One hit and you are done for. Maybe you could come up with some kind of slider/guard or as suggested my thought was also to raise the engine 1 1/2 inches or so? Low looks great but would hate to see you lose that heron after all the awesome work done to this rig.
 
#472 ·
Sure looks great under the hood nice work!
Yeah that pan looks too low to me especially since it's aluminum. One hit and you are done for. Maybe you could come up with some kind of slider/guard or as suggested my thought was also to raise the engine 1 1/2 inches or so? Low looks great but would hate to see you lose that heron after all the awesome work done to this rig.
Yep, that’s what we have realized, the plan for now is to run the OSVW shortly, the extra oil capacity added by the oil cooler will help, I’ll likely use a larger filter as well to add a bit more.
 
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