My Future Plan

[Eeyore]

Hi Guys,

Just thought I would share my plans and see if anyone had any advice or suggestions.

Current situation

My current situation is that I am doing about 400 miles a week and the 1.8 is too inefficient. It is very difficult to start in cold weather and needs essential work to the coilovers, exhaust. At the moment its all very much hanging on in there.

October - March

My plan is to fix up the hdi estate and get it back on the road. I can save money and have a near enough standard car that I dont need to worry about.

This allows the 1.8 to be stored and have the work done to it without having to worry about getting the job done by the next day. The plan for the 1.8 is to transfer all the mods to a 3 door 1.8xs shell. It can be a gti if it has to be but id rather it was the xs so i dont have to declare an engine swap. Once its a 3 door I can set out stripping it all out and fitting a cage and going proper race car.

March - October

Come late spring I will be able to get the 1.8 back on the road and put the estate into storage. Once in storage I can git a FMIC and stage 2 the estate whilst using the 1.8 as a daily.

Conclusion

Apart from having 2 MOTs and swapping the insurance and sorting out 6 months of tax for each car I think this should save me money or at least break even due to the cost cutting of the estate. If it breaks even thats fine as I will have been able to work on the 1.8 and get it to a state im happy with. This whole plan would also benefit if I can rent out one of the units across the road. Its a 7 bay garage that is rarely used far as I can tell so would be perfect if I can rent a space to work in. Has lighting, heating and electric etc and used to house a classic collection of landrovers!

Thoughts?

[THE_Liam]

Sounds good to me man, I'm in the same boat, trying to decide if I can justify using the Merc every day, or whether I should buy the 1.7 diesel Cavalier Danny is trying to sell me, and then swap the Merc for a 205 GTI because I miss French stuff.

[Sambarker]

No Liam, you should by the XM James has for sale, and not buy a f*cking vauxhall!

[procta]

Id just you any old 3 door shell, and go from there, cheaper to pick up a 1.4 /1.6 3 door? that way you can just re body your 5 door. declaring an engine change isn't that bad at all to the insurance. I told my insurance that the GTa had failed its test and wasn't going to be cost effect to repair, so I am going to swop the full works over on to the replacement shell. The insurance didn't see a bother as they said it was the same car really with a change of reg and paint. you can tell your insurance the same thing.

[puglove]

Sounds Like a plan as far as the hdi is concerned. It would be silly not to if its an option.

As for the 1.8 goes. If you insure with the likes of green light or other bhp insurence companys the engine swap makes no difference. It makes no odds if your putting a spitfire 27L v12 in a 1.0 shell aslong as your within the bhp they quoted you for. Also you can then mod away as much as you like without effecting the premium aslong as bhp stays with the quoted limit.

BUT from what i have seen here and over other forums over the years a total reshell often takes a whole lot longer than expected, cost a whole lot more than expected and becomes a real ball ache. If it were me id just plum for a gti straight away. And get the extra power and the body you want. And all the money you would save from not f*cking about with a re shell you can have your ecu mapped for a gti get some cams in there and break that 200bhp mark!

Thats my thoughts anyway

[Jonny81191]

No Liam, you should by the XM James has for sale, and not buy a f*cking vauxhall!

James is selling the XM?!

[darrenjlobb]

No Liam, you should by the XM James has for sale, and not buy a f*cking vauxhall!

James is selling the XM?!

12 months ticket!!!!

[Eeyore]

The whole point of the 1.8 project is not to just drop in a gti engine. As we all know... the 1.8 is faster than a supercharged 6 on track...

Anyway its hardly a complete reshell. Its dropping the engine in with the omex, Stripping, buckets and cage. If there is a 3 door 1.4 or 1.6 I guess thats an option but I have rarely seen those!

[Niall]

People seem to think that its all about that final power figure but never consider that the drivability and how that power is delivered. A ITB GTi engine can easily make 190-200 with the right bits but wheres the fun in that when every other person has one? Keep the 1.8, get that new head on there, fix your epic bodges and get it remapped. Who cares if it doesn't break 200bhp? It will still be brilliant fun, you can say you have built it and i bet it still wouldn't be far behind a ITB'd 6 engine anyway considering the weight saving and how lazy the 6 engine is.

[THE_Liam]

No Liam, you should by the XM James has for sale, and not buy a f*cking vauxhall!

James is selling the XM?!

12 months ticket!!!!

Yeah but it's too much money for me.

[Midnightclub]

IMO you should've just got the GTi head and exhaust on instead of stumping up for the bodies.. as from what I can tell (correct me if i'm wrong) this made about 4-5hp more with ITB's and an Omex over standard with just a GTi inlet? Where as you'd probably be looking near 150hp with just the GTi head and zorst (map to suit obviously). Although this is all irrelevant as you've already bought them lol

[r3k1355]

Seems like a sensible plan.

No-one wants an un-reliable daily during the winter, there's nothing worse than getting home and then rushing around to fix something in the cold, dark and pissing rain.

[Eeyore]

Its not a problem of affording things its a matter of time and having the car off the road. It just cant be done when I'm doing 400+ miles a week and sailing every weekend. Ive got a head lined up I may be able to collect this weekend, need some bigger injectors and then ive got all the bits to fit.

[Eeyore]

Seems like a sensible plan.

No-one wants an un-reliable daily during the winter, there's nothing worse than getting home and then rushing around to fix something in the cold, dark and pissing rain.

Exactly. I have been under the car every 2/3 days. When the exhaust broke I had to do 150 miles with just the cat :/

[r3k1355]

Mmm migraine material

I remember driving around a week when my backbox fell off, doing 70 odd miles a day on the motorway started to grate on you pretty well.

[Orta]

The plan is sound. Most folk just bumble along from one problem to another without any sort of direction (me!) so knowing where you want to end up is a win.

As for reliable daily during the winter I couldn't agree more! Been doing some work on the Rallye over the last couple of days has been a pain in the cold, and now the rain. But I've given up and left it in bits and it doesn't matter because I'll drive my (still horrid, but reliable) warm diesel Toyota to work!

[procta]

Sounds Like a plan as far as the hdi is concerned. It would be silly not to if its an option.

As for the 1.8 goes. If you insure with the likes of green light or other bhp insurence companys the engine swap makes no difference. It makes no odds if your putting a spitfire 27L v12 in a 1.0 shell aslong as your within the bhp they quoted you for. Also you can then mod away as much as you like without effecting the premium aslong as bhp stays with the quoted limit.

BUT from what i have seen here and over other forums over the years a total reshell often takes a whole lot longer than expected, cost a whole lot more than expected and becomes a real ball ache. If it were me id just plum for a gti straight away. And get the extra power and the body you want. And all the money you would save from not f*cking about with a re shell you can have your ecu mapped for a gti get some cams in there and break that 200bhp mark!

Thats my thoughts anyway

procta here reshelled his gta 16v with in 2 weeks, had a good few months of driving until the mot test failed this shell.

[Toms306]

You won't find a ph3 1.4/1.6 in 3dr, they didn't make them! They did in ph1 though.

Sounds like a decent plan though, I really need to make a plan instead of impulse buying and rushing into stuff lol.

[Eeyore]

Sometimes impulse buys are the best though tom. Sometimes you will miss good deals and opportunities. Everything is experience.

[mr_fish]

Will be good to see the estate make a reappearance.

good plan, crack on

[Toms306]

Sometimes impulse buys are the best though tom. Sometimes you will miss good deals and opportunities. Everything is experience.

Can't agree more, I did indeed miss a good deal by pondering last week!

So I made a quick impulse buy this week, hopefully that turns out to be an equally good deal though.

[C.A.R.]

IMO you should've just got the GTi head and exhaust on instead of stumping up for the bodies.. as from what I can tell (correct me if i'm wrong) this made about 4-5hp more with ITB's and an Omex over standard with just a GTi inlet? Where as you'd probably be looking near 150hp with just the GTi head and zorst (map to suit obviously). Although this is all irrelevant as you've already bought them lol

You wouldn't get that without headwork and an aftermarket ECU though.

My old 1.8 was RR'd with the above shortly after I sold it and it made 99bhp. Less than the 112 standard! Can't say what the next owner did with it however, it seemed quick enough when I had it...

[Eeyore]

Its an an intermediate stage at the moment. You could have gone for the head first but either way it needed an after market ecu. Thats obviously done and the ITBs are on which is at least something. The head and exhaust should show the biggest gains now! its all about doing it in little steps to make sure everything is working...

[procta]

You won't find a ph3 1.4/1.6 in 3dr, they didn't make them! They did in ph1 though.

Sounds like a decent plan though, I really need to make a plan instead of impulse buying and rushing into stuff lol.

why not a d turbo shell/ hdi, shell then, HDi engine could be kept as a spare engine for the estate.
i used a carb shell for my sleeper, and swopped the full gta gear into it, bar the interior, which was f*cked tbh.

[Jonahinoz]

Hi Guys,

Just thought I would share my plans and see if anyone had any advice or suggestions.

stripping it all out and fitting a cage and going proper race car.

March - October

Come late spring I will be able to get the 1.8 back on the road and put the estate into storage. Once in storage I can git a FMIC and stage 2 the estate whilst using the 1.8 as a daily ....... Apart from having 2 MOTs and swapping the insurance and sorting out 6 months of tax for each car Thoughts?

Hi,

I've mentioned elsewhere that taxing a car for six months is uneconomic. DVLA add 5% for the priviledge. On a £200 pa VED, that is two lots of £110. Also, if you surrender the disc, you only get a pro-rata refund of the £100. Even if you surender the day after you take the tax out, they will keep the full £10. Better to tax it for 12 months, surrender after 6 months, get £100 refund.

I have not factored in any credit charges if you pay monthly, as I have no idea how they calculate them. I wonder if DVLA have a money lenders licence? If so, they should provide full details to prospective borrowers.

Check whether your insurers penalise you for changing vehicles.

I can't quite get my head around how to get a 13 month MOT, if the car isn't insured, no doubt it can be contrived. My insurers (LV=) allow me to drive "any other car", even if it is not insured ... but some insurers don't. OK, you hopefully won't fail an MOT, but it would be a pain if you did, and you had to transfer everything back to the other car.

602

[Eeyore]

The £20 or so quid extra for taxing for 6 months is easily offset by the cost savings or running a diesel for 6 months!

[r3k1355]

My insurers (LV=) allow me to drive "any other car", even if it is not insured ... but some insurers don't. OK, you hopefully won't fail an MOT, but it would be a pain if you did, and you had to transfer everything back to the other car.

Whats the deal with that tho, do you still have to phone them up and say you intend to drive it so they can put it on the MIB or is it just a case of hop in and motor off??

Cos the car will ping ANPR and stuff if it's not listed as being insured, and the DVLA can now confiscate the motor if they think it's been driven un-insured.

[toseland]

Hi Guys,

Just thought I would share my plans and see if anyone had any advice or suggestions.

Current situation

My current situation is that I am doing about 400 miles a week and the 1.8 is too inefficient. It is very difficult to start in cold weather and needs essential work to the coilovers, exhaust. At the moment its all very much hanging on in there.

October - March

My plan is to fix up the hdi estate and get it back on the road. I can save money and have a near enough standard car that I dont need to worry about.

This allows the 1.8 to be stored and have the work done to it without having to worry about getting the job done by the next day. The plan for the 1.8 is to transfer all the mods to a 3 door 1.8xs shell. It can be a gti if it has to be but id rather it was the xs so i dont have to declare an engine swap. Once its a 3 door I can set out stripping it all out and fitting a cage and going proper race car.

March - October

Come late spring I will be able to get the 1.8 back on the road and put the estate into storage. Once in storage I can git a FMIC and stage 2 the estate whilst using the 1.8 as a daily.

Conclusion

Apart from having 2 MOTs and swapping the insurance and sorting out 6 months of tax for each car I think this should save me money or at least break even due to the cost cutting of the estate. If it breaks even thats fine as I will have been able to work on the 1.8 and get it to a state im happy with. This whole plan would also benefit if I can rent out one of the units across the road. Its a 7 bay garage that is rarely used far as I can tell so would be perfect if I can rent a space to work in. Has lighting, heating and electric etc and used to house a classic collection of landrovers!

Thoughts?

just pay the Excise duty monthly. it is the same price (overall)_ as paying 6months.