Thanks guys! It's been quite the weekend getting the car done then getting to the Nurburgring and back so this could be quite a lengthy update or more of a journal post, I'll try to recall it all in chronological order...
So after changing the driveshaft bearing, my next task was to get the tyres on the wheels. I'd gone a bit different from my previous wheel builds and bought some stubby rubber tyre valves as I think the bolt in ones I've had previously had started leaking where the rubber washers degrade over time.
Night before I was due to take a pair to the tyre shop and of course the rubber valves are the wrong size! Reverted to plan B which was to use some of the various bolt in tyre valves that I have left over from previous projects, had to order a couple more as the front and rear rims have different sized holes for the valves for some reason! Amazon prime sorted those next day though.
As my usual tyre place is closed currently while they move premises, I found another local shop that actually seemed to be cheaper and quite decent, bit of an old school little garage but ideal.
Tyres went on fine, had to take them in pairs due to the less than capacious boot of the Crossfire
It was also around this time that we were seeing reports of queues and issues at Dover. We were due to head down Friday morning but figured that we might be safer going down Thursday evening and staying near the port if it was going to be as bad as reported. This wasn't an issue as I had taken Thursday off work to finish off any bits left on the car (good job I did as well!)
Thursday morning: chuck wheels on, admire car, pack and get ready to go.
Or that was the plan! I may have mentioned a couple updates ago that I had some 5x112 > 5x114.3 spacers made up to fit the RAYS wheels on the Crossfire. I specified the bolts and studs for these to match the hubs and wheel nuts that I already had respectively.
First off, I wanted to use my slimline internal drive wheel nuts which I had used with these wheels on my old Honda Legend, these allow the fitment of the centre caps (even though I haven't got round to painting them yet). Even after giving them a good clean, they didn't want to thread nicely onto the studs, I'm still not sure why, but I have some other wheel nuts which did thread on fine. They're green, which isn't ideal but that's a secondary issue. I did also have to faff about removing some of them from the MGB where I'd been using a couple for reasons.
The second issue was a bit more of a problem; for some reason I only thought to check the wheel bolts that hold the adapters to the hubs that day, I had been sent 19 x correct M12 bolts and 1 x rogue M14 bolt. Cue some panicked calling around to see if anyone keeps bolts in stock, no such luck so I tried cutting down and tapping an extra M12 standard Mercedes/Chrysler wheel bolt I had lying around.
The shank diameter wasn't big enough and ultimately this didn't work. So plan B was to order and collect some M12 locking wheel bolts from Halfords. I used the above bolt temporarily as it's not a long drive. I got around the corner but had a "click....click....click" noise. Drove back and some investigation showed that I hadn't quite cut the bolt short enough and it was catching on something inside the handbrake drum.
Whipped the wheel and adapter off, chucked one of the oem ones back on and got off to Halfords. On my way there, I thought I could hear a faint clicking noise again, but barely audible, I then noticed the button on the handbrake was vibrating slightly, so I think even the "correct" wheel bolts that came with the spacers were touching something inside the handbrake. I carried on at this point as I'd wasted enough time. On my way back, the stability management light came on, which had me wondering if I'd damaged the sensor.
To solve the issues of any bolts hitting the handbrake parts, I put a 5mm slip on shim style spacer under each rear adapter, not ideal as they're not hubcentric but it solved the problem. I then moved to the front happy that I wouldn't have any handbrake issues there!
... Until I realised the adapters wouldn't go over the grease caps for the front wheel bearings
Now I did specify the centrebore of the adapters correctly, but on the wheel side, I'd specced a smaller cb, in case I ever wanted to fit 5x114.3 wheels with one of the smaller cb's for whatever reason. I had some spigot rings in stock to take this up to the cb of my aftermarket wheels. The depth of the hub flange and bearing cap was more than the depth of the adapter. In an ideal world I'd chuck these on my lathe and open out the diameter, but I don't have a lathe, and I didn't have time to find someone with one, so I just sacked off the bearing caps.
Yes some chisel and hammer work was required
With them gone, the fronts went on and I could finally look at the car on all 4 wheels
I'm pretty damn chuffed with how it looks to be honest! I had niggling doubts about whether white wheels would work, or going down from a 19" to a 17" on the back would look odd, and it needs a little tweaking (with some adjustable camber arms as mentioned previously in the thread) but overall it looks just about as good as I'd hoped
No time to rest on my laurels, I changed the auxiliary belt and idler pulley which thankfully was an easy task. Plastic cap off the idler pulley, crack off the bolt, 17mm sockect on a breaker bar on a slightly hidden hex on the tensioner, rotate anti clockwise to release tension and the belt, swap on new pulley, route new belt, jobs a good'un
With that, it was pack up and off to meet a couple mates on the M1 for the drive down to Dover
The "hotel" in Dover was right next to the port, but my mate hadn't read the reviews before booking and it was quite frankly, a dump
a typical British seaside Victorian era house/hotel that hadn't seen much love in the past 130 years or so. I also ended up "sleeping" on the sofa as there were only 2 beds for 3 of us, single glazed windows, net curtains and the main road to the port 50 feet away meant I could add sleep deprivation to my anxiety of driving a freshly modded car to Europe
Something I forgot to mention, is that I found I had to top up the brake fluid again the day before the trip but a few days after bleeding the brakes, I just assumed I hadn't topped it up enough before, but I did have to keep an eye on it.
The car seemed to drive ok-ish down to Dover, as said, I was certainly a bit anxious of the various mods and bodges to get me to this point.
The next morning we encountered no queues and I went straight through the port and pretty much straight onto the next available boat with barely enough time in the queue to add my UK sticker
Unfortunately the other two somehow got lost in the port and missed the boat
so I ended up killing some time in and around Calais for them to rejoin me for the drive to Germany
It's quite a nice area, and some interesting Atlantic Wall history if you're into that sort of stuff. I also went to a Carrefour and grounded out on a speed bump or two #lowlyf which also brought my stability control light back on again
Anyway, eventually we all reunited and drove through France, Belgium, The Netherlands and got to Germany that evening. The car had quite a shake/judder at 70-80mph, I was trying to ascertain whether it was a wheel balance issue or related to my slightly cobbled together rear spacers/adapters. There was also quite a drone which I assumed was either the wheel bearing noted on the MOT or the new tyres.
The next morning we were rudely awoken by a bell ringing at 6:30am, which seemed to be thanks to a small chapel in the village. So again I didn't really get to catch up on my sleep and I was starting to feel a bit ill (I thought it was Covid again but have since tested negative).
Saturday saw me just take passenger rides in the Clio and the M2, the Clio is pretty well sorted and the M2 is clearly a fast car but neither knew the track particularly well so they were tentative laps. Did all the 'ring museum and tried our hand at some esports sim rig setup as well which was very cool and difficult to master!
The next day (after another half 6 alarm call) I decided that I was going to work on the Crossfire to get in at least one lap on the track. The brake fluid level had dropped again, not below min, but certainly lower than the near max level it had been. I went round checking each of the bleeder screws and managed to tighten them all up a bit more, there was a bit of fluid in a couple of the caps which made me think maybe this was it
The hoses aren't in their first flush of youth either so there's going to be more to come on the brakes going forwards..
I also torque checked all the adapters and wheels as I was paranoid, and tightened up the front right wheel bearing a bit. This was the one mentioned on the MOT and I had brought grease with me to re-pack it, but decided I couldn't be bothered with the mess. The funky hub nut arrangement meant it's a simple job of loosen the allen screw, and the hub nut is then free to move. I tightened it up a bit by hand, then to give it a bit more, had to get creative with a G clamp
With that done there was nothing left to do other than head to the track and see how it fared. On the drive over I could still hear a drone, and there was still some sort of vibration but I was determined to just do an easy lap. I also nabbed a quick photo with "the" sign on my way over
On track, it actually did pretty well
(I have bought a photo as well but can't download it yet!)
For reference, when we last went, I was in a Toyota Corolla T Sport, which was better set up than the Chrysler but really lacked the torque for some of the long uphill sections. Having the power of the V6, which while not huge, was certainly helpful in this regard.
I did video it which I'll pop up when I've sorted it out, I think I got round in about 10mins judging from the timestamp on the video so wasn't going crazy, my fastest in the Corolla was 8:59. I actually ended up going quicker than the 182 and M2 though just from remembering the track layout
years of Gran Turismo and Forza paying off!
Lap done, I wasn't going to be tempted into another, I could feel the vibrations while going round and while I checked the brake fluid after parking up and it was fine, after we took some nice photos..
I noticed it had dropped again! So I made a hasty retreat to the house to top it up and that was me done for the day. Next morning was hometime
Fluid hadn't dropped overnight noticeably so just a long day of driving while still feeling fairly ill. The vibration was still there at 70-80mph so I set my cruise a bit lower and let the other two go. My suspicion is that the vibration is from the driveshaft, I didn't get the front and rear halves in exactly the same orientation after I split them for the centre bearing, although I thought it was close enough to not make a difference...
I caught back up with them at Calais, no such luck with an earlier ferry this time though, and it was a couple hours wait
Back in blighty, it was a pretty smooth drive back with the cruise on 60mph, I wore ear plugs on the way back as the sound from the exahaust drone, general road noise, bearing/tyre drone and all was a bit too much. I think the M1 was closed so got routed up the M11 and A14, which meant I was home well after midnight but it made it
1137.5 miles in total so quite the shakedown!
Some bits went well, some bits certainly need some work, but overall even from my one lap on track I'm pleasantly surprised by the Crossfire. I think in some circles there's very much a "follow the crowd" mentality when it comes to track driving, as evidenced by BMWs and Porsches dominating the general car population there, and they may be very good, but that's not to say that you need an M engine or even rack and pinion steering to have an enjoyable time on track.
There is certainly potential here, and even on the ferry back I came across an M113 4.3 V8 for only £180... but for now it will be a case of getting the drivers side engine mount changed (as the car still knocks/shudders on shutdown), find the source of the driveline vibration, work out some solutions for the wheel adapter fitment, work out where my brake fluid is going, and quieten that bloody exhaust!
two advisories, one for a front wheel bearing with a bit of play, which I'd not noticed at all, and one for the centre prop bearing having play. I think the latter could well be the source of the noises on hard acceleration, so one has been ordered and is on it's way.
