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I just finished this build (June 2020) and I thought this would be entertaining for everyone. I picked this car up locally about a year ago. The previous owner only had the car for a couple of months and his comment was, "It ran great for a while, then it just wouldn't go." I assumed it was due to the timing chain or carbon build up, as I would find out after diving into the car, I was grossly incorrect.
I say that I took this car from an abusive past and gave it the proper future it deserves.
It started out looking pretty good. OZ Racing Wheels, Gray trim, limo tint, cheap cold air intake, but the interior was the first indication of a larger project. There had been signs that an amp or some type of stereo was installed, very poorly executed. It sat for about 10 months until I could get to it.
Brought it in and started the tear down.
Immediately I noticed a critter had beat me to the tear down by chewing through #4 coil plug. I had used it as somewhat of a parts car while diagnosing some of the other cars, which left a nice safe opening for the rabbits during a snow storm. There was rabbit droppings all over the top of the engine as well as the chewed wire. Those wascally wabbit.
The engine had all the typical signs of an R56 with ~100K. Leaks, oil residue all over, and a few hoses worn out.
Once I got to removing the head, I noticed the Timing Chain was perfectly intact, so I figured it was something deeper. So out came the engine.
Ended up being the clue as to why "it wouldn't go". But as you can see in the pics, the clutch and flywheel were burned severely. The flywheel had hot spots and cracks all over and there was very little material left on the clutch. The throwout bearing was toast too. Someone was either riding the clutch or didn't know how to drive a stick.
Bottom line was this motor had to get the royal treatment.
I next moved to the brakes and suspension.
Rotors looks about a bad as I've seen. Chipped, grooves, and cracks. I also noticed one of the rear calipers was frozen which lead to very uneven wear of the pads.
Shocks were as I've found on the other cars, very worn out. Parts cleaned, greased and a new set of Bilstein Sports did the trick.
One important item is to thoroughly clean and re-grease the front bearings. After 100K miles, they looked bad, but after a cleaning, they still functioned great.
I forgot to take a post cleaning picture, but they look almost brand new. It was an amazing transformation.
New pads, rotors, rear calipers, and suspension brings a lot of confidence to the long term functionality.
As the engine rebuild continued, I started on the interior. I had to track down what all had been done with the stereo modification as well as correct the dash rattle and a few other annoyances.
Once I had the rest of the interior removed, I could really see the level of wire repair.
I quickly noticed a lot of cut wires with the method of wire-twisting/black tape was applied to every wire.
I can't figure out why they cut both taillight harnesses and switched all the wires. I can't imagine anything was functioning correctly.
I managed to pull out every random wire they "installed".
A little solder and shrink tubes should bring them back to proper functionality. I had to repair about 15-18 wires and connections.
The headliner was next. It was very dirty and I couldn't get it clean to the level I wanted, so why not recover it.
I went with black because it will hide any future dirt as well as bring the black/gray color scheme of the interior together.
Some may not like the gray handles with the black headliner, but once the interior was back in, it matched really nice.
That annoying dash rattle had to be fixed, plus, I had to make sure there were no other wire cutting modifications.
Even the rearview mirror was broken.
It also received all the new gaskets, filters, and seals. Here is the fuel filter which you can see needed a replacement.
The previous owners had disassembled the headlights and tinted them from the inside as well as glued all the internal pieces. I tried sanding, but then noticed they were broken, faded, horribly glued and the same wire twisting/black tape method had been applied to the cheap LED lights they tried to install.
Luckily, I had a set of Spyder lights I had picked up a while ago that would fit this project perfectly.
The grille ended up needing replacement as well. Not sure how it was broken.
It turned out the gray trim was just a spray-on film, which actually protected the original trim under.
I decided to play on the Blue/White theme for the stripes. I had a good set of JCW wheels and Pilot Sport tires which really completed the package and saved the OZ wheels for another car (coming soon).
There was a laundry list of other details and repairs I had to do that I didn't mention. It was missing a bunch of screws, bolts, and support brackets that previous repairs/mods failed to reinstall. This was a fun project, but definitely a challenge.
Last edited by texasmontego; Jul 4, 2020 at 08:09 AM.
Perfect example of why I won't even think about messing with "cosmetics" --- interior and "trendy" improvements. Strictly performance and HP for me. My "sleeper" interior, paint and trim is pretty much OEM. When I want style and comfort, I go for the wife's Lexus.
Looks like you did a beautiful repair job on this project, congrats. Best of luck on future projects.
I just finished this build (June 2020) and I thought this would be entertaining for everyone. I picked this car up locally about a year ago. The previous owner only had the car for a couple of months and his comment was, "It ran great for a while, then it just wouldn't go." I assumed it was due to the timing chain or carbon build up, as I would find out after diving into the car, I was grossly incorrect.
I say that I took this car from an abusive past and gave it the proper future it deserves.
It started out looking pretty good. OZ Racing Wheels, Gray trim, limo tint, cheap cold air intake, but the interior was the first indication of a larger project. There had been signs that an amp or some type of stereo was installed, very poorly executed. It sat for about 10 months until I could get to it.
Brought it in and started the tear down.
Immediately I noticed a critter had beat me to the tear down by chewing through #4 coil plug. I had used it as somewhat of a parts car while diagnosing some of the other cars, which left a nice safe opening for the rabbits during a snow storm. There was rabbit droppings all over the top of the engine as well as the chewed wire. Those wascally wabbit.
The engine had all the typical signs of an R56 with ~100K. Leaks, oil residue all over, and a few hoses worn out.
Once I got to removing the head, I noticed the Timing Chain was perfectly intact, so I figured it was something deeper. So out came the engine.
Ended up being the clue as to why "it wouldn't go". But as you can see in the pics, the clutch and flywheel were burned severely. The flywheel had hot spots and cracks all over and there was very little material left on the clutch. The throwout bearing was toast too. Someone was either riding the clutch or didn't know how to drive a stick.
Bottom line was this motor had to get the royal treatment.
I next moved to the brakes and suspension.
Rotors looks about a bad as I've seen. Chipped, grooves, and cracks. I also noticed one of the rear calipers was frozen which lead to very uneven wear of the pads.
Shocks were as I've found on the other cars, very worn out. Parts cleaned, greased and a new set of Bilstein Sports did the trick.
One important item is to thoroughly clean and re-grease the front bearings. After 100K miles, they looked bad, but after a cleaning, they still functioned great.
I forgot to take a post cleaning picture, but they look almost brand new. It was an amazing transformation.
New pads, rotors, rear calipers, and suspension brings a lot of confidence to the long term functionality.
As the engine rebuild continued, I started on the interior. I had to track down what all had been done with the stereo modification as well as correct the dash rattle and a few other annoyances.
Once I had the rest of the interior removed, I could really see the level of wire repair.
I quickly noticed a lot of cut wires with the method of wire-twisting/black tape was applied to every wire.
I can't figure out why they cut both taillight harnesses and switched all the wires. I can't imagine anything was functioning correctly.
I managed to pull out every random wire they "installed".
A little solder and shrink tubes should bring them back to proper functionality. I had to repair about 15-18 wires and connections.
The headliner was next. It was very dirty and I couldn't get it clean to the level I wanted, so why not recover it.
I went with black because it will hide any future dirt as well as bring the black/gray color scheme of the interior together.
Some may not like the gray handles with the black headliner, but once the interior was back in, it matched really nice.
That annoying dash rattle had to be fixed, plus, I had to make sure there were no other wire cutting modifications.
Even the rearview mirror was broken.
It also received all the new gaskets, filters, and seals. Here is the fuel filter which you can see needed a replacement.
The previous owners had disassembled the headlights and tinted them from the inside as well as glued all the internal pieces. I tried sanding, but then noticed they were broken, faded, horribly glued and the same wire twisting/black tape method had been applied to the cheap LED lights they tried to install.
Luckily, I had a set of Spyder lights I had picked up a while ago that would fit this project perfectly.
The grille ended up needing replacement as well. Not sure how it was broken.
It turned out the gray trim was just a spray-on film, which actually protected the original trim under.
I decided to play on the Blue/White theme for the stripes. I had a good set of JCW wheels and Pilot Sport tires which really completed the package and saved the OZ wheels for another car (coming soon).
There was a laundry list of other details and repairs I had to do that I didn't mention. It was missing a bunch of screws, bolts, and support brackets that previous repairs/mods failed to reinstall. This was a fun project, but definitely a challenge.
I really love the stripes against that color blue. Which company did you use to print them and how's the quality?
I cut the stripes and applied myself. I bought the 3M vinyl in a large roll and then cut each stripe width for what I want. A little time consuming, but I like that I can tailor each stripe pattern to the project.
