dewismotorsport's Astra coupe

[dewismotorsport]

Had the crap job of grinding off all the seam sealer from around the rear damper top mounts so I could get to clean metal, quick hoover out and it was time to make some back feet mounts


Both sides welded on



And made up some back stays.


Just got the rear X and harness bars to make and it's done. will get that done Monday

 

[milo]

Like to see how much weight u saved now over stock

 

[dewismotorsport]

Like to see how much weight u saved now over stock

I'm hoping to be under 1100kg race weight (me and fuel) but maybe closer to 1150kg I expect. I will try and get the corner weight scales on it soon.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Had a friend of a friend out today to take the windows out, only charged £40 and that's to re fit the front screen again after paint so a right bargain.


And got the rest of the cage finished, so much easier without the glass in, God knows why I didn't have them out before hand



Also welded the front gussets on and made one to the centre of the car too, so technically a 11 point cage now

 

[dewismotorsport]

Finished the steering coloum mount, rivnut'd the modded mount so that it can still be removed if needed, then welded the top part onto the dash bar


Made some harness eyelets spreader plates, so harness eyelets were drilled and fitted


Then started making probably the most elaborate heater box ever, ah well it will do exactly what I need. tacked the pipes on then bodged some sealant round them and then riveted back to the dash



Then made a new top piece, two pipes feed the side vents for the side windows and the other four do the main windscreen.
Tacked it all up


Riveted it onto the main body and chucked loads of sealant around it, just need to make some mounts for it and some flexible 2" hoses to join it all together


Not pretty but will be mostly hidden and it will get a dust of paint

 

[Dave Gilbert]

If it works it works. Dunt matter what it looks like. It's behind the dash hidden lol.

 

[dewismotorsport]

So made some mounts up for the heater box and gave it a quick spray, will probably end up spraying it black though I reckon. Just waiting on the flexable hose and jic fittings to turn up to plumb it in.




This afternoon I went down to my mate and sponsors bodyshop to get the interior painted. we de greased it all and masked it up before they jumped in to paint it.




Quick primer then paint





Loving the colour contrast between the Ford stealth grey and vauxhall Europa blue.

 

[dewismotorsport]

So the rebuild starts, taped and tidied the loom and mounted various bits out the way



Painted the heater matrix black and added the jic -12 fittings, also the fittings and hose turned up for the catch tank


Piped all the coolant side and routed the air hoses


Dash fully fitted (will come out again at a later date to get flocked. Won't have time before the first race as I'm away for 6 weeks) shifter back in, will make a larger mount for it to sit higher at a later date, clocks, steering wheel, seat and harness fitted. roll cage padding temp fitted for now.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Ordered some polycarbonate sheets off www.plasticsheets.com they cut it to order, I went for 5mm rear screen, 4mm rear sides and 5mm fronts came to £151 delivered which is a bargain as various company's want over £1000 to do the coupe. So within a couple of hours I had the rears all cut to shape ready for the windows man to re seal them. Unfortunately he's busy until new year so will have to wait for now. Will get the fronts done shortly.



Next job was to trim the rear apron down. After removing the spare wheel well I was then left with a back bumper that's acting as a air drag so I cut just over 2"s of metal off and the black section out of the bumper to allow the air to escape




I will re visit this at a later date when I have more time and build a diffuser and remove a fair bit of the rear bumper to allow the air from the back wheels to escape but for now this is enough as time is against me.

Re tracked the front and then lowered the rear by 20mm, this is just a rough ride height setting for now as I still need to corner weight it once finished.

Couldn't help but see what it looked like with the carbon btcc spoiler, just need to make the uprights for that but I love the look.

 

[dewismotorsport]

So todays mod was to chop up the inlet and convert it to air to air using a intercooler instead of a charge cooler.

I've never rated the charge cooler system and once on track it just wasn't effective at all.

So out came the grinder and got chopping, wasn't easy getting the lamnova holders out.


I was then left with this



Next up was to improve the flow
Before:


After:


First divider made with 2" tube




Then second air chamber made





All welded up just need to make the return pipe from the actuator. I purposefully left the tubes long as I wasn't sure on intercooler pipe runs but once fitted I could then remove 2" from their length. Inlet still retains the support bracket underneath.

Mocked up with intercooler and pipes cut to length


And then with the radiator in, all fits nicely and actually has more free space than standard.


Will finish it the rest tomorrow!

 

[corsaZ22se]

that's some neat fabricating and welding there.
air to liquid will never work as well, once its warmed up you still have to loose the heat again.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Cheers mate Yeah it struggled to last 20 minutes on trackday let alone the 40 minutes of racing so the way forward really.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Turned myself down some billet so I could make a actuator return


Used some rectangle box to make the extension, gave it a taper and then welded it on



Made up some O rings to act as the seal


All going well until I snapped a manifold bolt, after much swearing I drilled and helicoiled a new one in


And fitted, weighs a lot less than standard which is a bonus and also has more clearance.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Slowly working my way down the to do list, next up was to make a catch tank. Msa blue book states that anything over 2000cc must have a 3 litre catch tank so with space tight and wanting to keep as much weight over the gearbox side I measured up and made a start.............once body was welded I decided to check my maths was correct and filled it with water and it holds exactly 3 litres to the drop!!!!!


Welded the fittings and breather tubes on


Made up some braided lines and fitted, I'm running a gearbox, cylinder head and block breather


Also fitted the air filter, electrical and fire extingusher pulls in the scuttle, just got to fit a few grommets and that's that finished bar the battery wiring. Waiting on another clamp and then rad and intercooler can go on and be filled with coolant then a start up.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Been cracking on with it, made some front windows but then needed to hold the shape, so made some 3mm alloy window frames, these will be riveted to the polycarb. Windows are due to be bonded in on Tuesday.


Finished the intercooler pipework and gave the cooler a quick paint I re fitted it


Finished off the extingusher pull cords


Came to start the car and would crank, had fuel.and spark but wouldn't run. Turned out to be a cut immobiliser wire from the transponder to bulkhead connector which then goes to the ecu. After some greatly appreciated help from various users I got to the bottom of it and once re connected it started straight up


Took the car for a quick test drive, with no windows I decided safety first so donned some goggles lol


Diff definitely works


Car drove really well and pulled nicely due to the diet, the map seems to be fine if still a little rich and there are no noticeable side effects from the intercooler setup so really happy with that.

 

[dewismotorsport]

Finished the electrical cut off and external pull, also fitted the switch for the demister and mounted the traction control button


Fitted the front windows, had a bit of a mare trying to hold the curve in the middle, once shut it poked out slightly so had to just add a extra bit of polycarb in the centre and rivet it whilst I bent it. I will re visit this at a later date and worst case buy some pre curved ones at an extortionate price


Had the window guy back to bond the windscreen, rear sides and rear screen. Got them to prime a boarder on to hide the metalwork behind. Also fitted the sunstrip and race decals, still have a load to put on for the race series and my sponsors but don't have all of the stickers yet



Got the car to minimum race spec now but have 2 1/2 days left so will crack on with the rest of the mods I want to do.

 

[dewismotorsport]

So today I corner weighted the car, was always hoping for around 1050kg so this was pretty close to that, this is the weight without me in and car has about 6 litres of fuel in it.


Car has a good front to back ratio which should help the handling


And after lots of coilover adjustment I settle on this, almost 50/50 but I'm tight on time and knowing I will re do again after I get round to fitting a front splitter



Weight with me in it, I imagine race weight will be closer to 1185kg with the extra fuel


My last dyno was 243bhp but I have a slightly smaller charger pulley on now so I imagine power to be 250bhp, so that makes 215bhp per ton and 182whp per ton so I'm 18bhp inside my class B category of 200whp per ton

 

[dewismotorsport]

Finished off the last few mods, replaced the old battery and gave the insides of the doors a quick squirt and modded the door pull wires to open the door with a pull on any part



Then made myself some spoiler uprights, I've copied the original btcc astra design which allows three adjustment settings



Test fit after drilling the boot


Made some spreader and strengthening plates, the spoiler is strong enough for me to do pull myself onto it with all my weight


Squirt of paint



And final fitting



So race day at Donington Park, few pics from the day, was a very wet qualifying which put me about middle of the pack which was good to say it was my first drive on the track and of the car and in the wet.




The track dried out a bit in the afternoon and had a dry line so put the drys back on



Race was going well climbing up a few places and having a good battle with the skyline r32 gtr (480bhp) realing him in on the braking and corner speed but he had the legs on the straight. Going into the sixth lap the car spat the oil cooler feed hose off mid corner chucking oil onto the tyres and causing me to spin into the gravel. Only damage to shell was a cracked wing mirror glass but the engine is toast.

Put it on the trailer and cracked open the beers to enjoy the rest of the weekend of racing and will deal with the engine this week. Next race is at Silverstone in 5 weeks.

 

[milo]

Any on board video bud?

 

[dewismotorsport]

I have mate but not uploaded it off go pro yet but I put some I filmed off my laptop on Facebook