Phase 1 TD Sedan

[306Genesis]

Hello all! New member Ollie here from sunny Somerset. I bought myself a granny spec low mileage example of the 306 sedan back in late 2018 and have recently been modifying it. I love trawling the internet looking at other people's projects and have decided to make my own, hope you enjoy! 

Picture of the car after a clean and completely stock.
   

My first purchase was a phase 1 dturbo front bumper, I don't have any pictures of the bumper when it arrived but it was an absolute mess! Full of dents, nasty scratches and missing brackets for the fog lights and the nearside bracket to hold it onto the car. Get what you pay for I suppose! It was also the wrong colour so I went about a respray.
   
Swapped the brackets over from the old bumper using strong glue and a couple of short screws for good measure.
   
   
Brackets made for foglights using steel (I had no idea what the original brackets looked like but these work just fine)
   
All dents gone thanks to some body filler. Paint also came out surprisingly good considering it was an outside paint jobby!
   
The fog lights were smashed so I painted them yellow which seemed to hide the damage very well!
   

[306Genesis]

Next I needed some nicer wheels, I didn't have a lot of love for the rusty steel wheels it came with. I managed to buy some genuine peugeot 205 speedlines from one of my dads friends, they had been painted with black hammerite, very poorly! The hammerite was a nightmare to get off. Lots of swearing, nitromors and sandpaper later and they were resprayed in gunmetal grey. A set of new tyres and on the car they went.
   
I also installed some lowering springs on the front as it was riding high, now the front and rear sit pretty equal.
   
I would love a set of side skirts as the front bumper is now lower than the rest of the car, does anyone know if the skirts off a 5 door hatch will fit? Or is the wheelbase different?
   

[Mighty306]

Welcome along to the club ...another Somerset member. Seem to be a few of us now! Cheers for sharing your work so far ...already a massive improvement!

I'm not sure about the length of the side skirts but hopefully someone will be along soon to help out.

[Owenmbo]

Welcome a fellow somerset 306 owner really love a sedan u rarely see these about for sale especially a td I would really love one lol, I really like what your doing with it mate keep it up, I fairly sure the 5 door hatch skirts will fit if that’s any help

[306Genesis]

Thank you guys, nice to know there are a few of us. And thank you for getting back to me about the skirts, fairly sure is good enough for me!

---

I've been busy again, sound deadened all the doors and had enough left over for the boot. It made a huuuge difference to audio quality whilst on the move.
   
   
   
   
And made the key look pretty again.
   
   
Front brakes needed replacing (due to a poorly misjudged hammer blow when replacing springs) so I bought new pads and a pair of brembos discs. £33 for a pair on eurocarparts!!! Bargain, must've been old stock. 
   
   

[306Genesis]

Boost gauge is now in. After looking through the cars paperwork and seeing the number pad had been disconnected I thought that would be the best place for the install. I bought some ABS textured plastic off Ebay to match the centre console plastic (or near enough) then cut and filed to fit. A 52mm hole saw was used to make the hole for the boost gauge, then some more filing!
   
I spliced into the wires coming from the back of the stereo to make sure the display on the gauge only lit up when the headlights are switched on.
   
   
I used the grommet just to the top right of the brake servo, It was a right pig to get back in!
   
Just in case anyone is unsure on where to plumb the t piece into. Zipties at the t piece were only temporary while waiting for delivery of mini jubilee clips. It's also worth noting the t piece used was 6mm 4mm 6mm rather than the 4mm 4mm 4mm gauges usually come with.
   
I think this gauge looks great in the car. When tested the car is running .8bar (around 11.5PSI) which IIRC is healthy for a standard Dturbo engine. Unfortunately the second hand gauge is sticky on the way back down to zero, and rattles like mad! It functions and will do for now but a replacement will be needed at some point. A manual boost controller is also on it's way!
   
While driving to the shops yesterday the brake pedal went straight to the floor with very little braking! The handbrake is also practically useless now, all was working absolutely fine the day before!   I have a feeling somethings gone wrong inside the rear drums. The fluid looks a little gross so that will be flushed anyway, I will do some investigating on the weekend. Then I'll have a little play with my pump!

[Mighty306]

Nice neat job you managed there with the boost gauge. I'm sure you're enjoyment of it was quickly sapped by the brake issue. Have you worked out what was going on?

[doogle-d turbo]

If the needle for boost gauge is rattling, putting a cigarette rollie filter in the tubing behind the guage helps level the fluctuation. Sorted mine out.

Sent from my SM-G960F using Tapatalk

[306Genesis]

Cheers for the (filter) tip! I used an inline filter on the vacuum line anyway as the line from the intercooler was a bit oily. What I meant by rattling is the noise it makes, it's just a bit old and tired I suppose.
As for the brakes only one drum at the rear is working, on euro car parts there are 2 sizes of drums available 180mm and 201mm and I foolishly didn't measure them up over the weekend so will be doing that tomorrow and ordering some new ones.
In the meantime I replaced the rear shocks as the rear end felt quite loose, I went with bilstein b4s for the replacements, second hand but very cheap and in good working condition.
   
New ones.
   
Immediately it was obviously the old ones were properly knackered! When compressed they were very notchy and didn't even spring back out again!
   
Only took it for a very short drive around the industrial estate to check if all was well and it felt 10 times better than before, the reaction time of the rear suspension (if that makes sense!) over even small bumps was vastly improved, it feels much tighter. It will be great to have a proper drive in it once the brakes are fixed.

[Owenmbo]

I think I just saw you and your car in Exeter u probably saw me looking I was in a silver golf, your car looks stunning mate looked really clean