[edit] Introduction
After I had driven the car for two years or so, and had great fun with it, repairing and restoring it bit by bit, I decided it was time to restore it properly.
This page details the long-drawn process of restoring the car, with links to photo albums detailing the work. I took the car off the road in June 2000, and finished it in June 2004... Progress was slow - I have had many distractions, including buying (and scrapping) several other cars along the way.
Restoration Photo Albums]
As an overview, I dismantled and rebuilt the car myself, farming out bodywork, engine and gearbox work to specialists. I had problems with the bodywork specialist, which is covered under "Restoration Problems". While I was waiting to get these problems solved, I continued fitting the engine, and installed power steering.
Note: this page is a "work in progress" and will be trimmed down and better categorised in due course. It mostly comprises the text from my old website just dumped here.
[edit] Engine Rebuild
The engine of my car was rebuilt by Salv - E-mail me if you want to get in contact with him.
I removed the engine from the car and took it up to Salv to be rebuilt. I found the engine fitted quite nicely in the back of my mother's Granada Scorpio! It did dent the performance of the car, and on the way back, the fuel pump failed - meaning the car had to be recovered 150 miles on the back of a transporter! At least it happened on the way home...
Salv set about with dismantling and assessing the state of the engine. These are the things he found wrong with it:
- The rocker gear had been assembled in the wrong orientation - this meant that the oil feed holes were blocked, thus starving the top end of the engine of oil. The engine was pretty clattery when it ran, so I assume this was the cause of that.
- One of the pistons was of an unknown make - 3 were fine, the fourth was a complete mystery! Obviously, it was binned.
- The thrust washers had been put in incorrectly - with the end result that they fell out - allowing the crankshaft to move forwards and backwards. This resulted in the crankshaft and the connecting rods being scrap. The crankshaft had a lovely groove worn in it, and the holes in the con-rods for the gudgeon pins were oval.
- The camshaft was scrap. Not sure why...
So - there was much wrong with the engine - whoever built it previously can't have known what they were doing. Luckily, at about that time, I managed to scrap another Gordini Turbo (the red car in the album "Cars in a Field", found elsewhere on this site. Its engine was not running, in fact one of the main bearings had failed. So, I stripped that engine and shipped all the relevant parts off to Salv - the pistons with con-rods, rocker gear, camshaft, crankshaft and oil pump. Unfortunately, the crankshaft on that engine was also scrap as it had been overheated when the main bearing failed.
With the parts from the scrap engine, Salv was able to make a good engine out of two bad ones. The following extra work was carried out on the engine:
- Cylinder head gas flowed.
- Connecting rods, crankshaft and flywheel balanced.
- Mild road camshaft fitted.
The camshaft is a Stage 1 regrind. The standard cam timing is 10-54/54-10 (Inlet opens 10 degrees Before Top Dead Centre and closes 54 degrees After Bottom Dead Centre/Exhaust opens 54 degrees Before BDC and closes 10 degrees After TDC). The stage 1 camshaft has the timing 18-62/62-18, so the inlet valve opens a lot sooner and closes later. Similarly, the exhaust valve opens sooner and closes later.
Hopefully, these changes should make quite a difference to the performance of the car. The gas flowed head and optimised valve timing should enable the engine to breathe better, thus spinning up the turbo sooner. The change in valve timing should speed up gas flow through the engine - more overlap between the opening of the inlet valve and the closing of the exhaust valve should enable better scavenging and the ability to better fill the cylinder with fresh mixture. However, this will only happen above a certain rev-range. Low speed driveability of the car may be sacrificed somewhat. It will be interesting to see! The engine was originally very torquey low down in its rev-range, well able to pull the light car through town with no fuss. If the engine's low speed torque is sacrificed a little, I'm sure it won't make much difference. An interesting fact is that the engine of the Renault 5 Gordini Turbo produces more torque at 1700 rpm than the MG Metro does at its peak!
[edit] Bodywork
I stripped the car myself, to a rolling shell, and took it to a local restorer. I chose the restorer because their work on other cars looked excellent. Unfortunately it turned out I had many issues with the work carried out, detailed here:
[edit] Restoration Problems
When I collected the rolling shell of the car from the restorers (who shall remain anonymous), I found a number of issues with the work that had been done:
- Poorly finished paintwork - scratches on a door and the tailgate. Dust in the paint on the roof.
- Holes in the floorpan - even though I had asked for it to be repaired.
- etc., etc.
At that stage, I didn't realise exactly how much work had been done poorly, but I submitted a complaint and arranged to return the car to the restorer for remedial work.
When I picked up the car from the restorer, I inspected it, but it was not until I got the car home that I realised the restorer had fixed some issues, but still had not finished the car to my satisfaction.
So, I catalogued all the problems with the car and submitted a complaint and request for part refund. Problems I found included:
- Bodged repairs to the rear suspension turrets (rust was starting to bubble through already).
- Badly finished repairs to n/s A-post.
- Poorly finished underside - no preparation was done, nor was any attempt made to protect the metal in repaired areas.
- Floorpan was not repaired properly - a large rust hole had been filled in with silicone sealant.
My complaint included evidence of the problems I had found (shown in the photographs here and here). The response was an offer of a third of the money I wanted in terms of a refund. Naturally, I refused (as this sum would not have come near to the cost of rectifying the work). I received no response to the reiteration of my complaint, so was forced to use the small claims procedure (in the UK County Courts).
[edit] Small Claims Court
After submitting my claim to the court, the defendant was given two weeks to submit his defence. He was four days late! This enabled me to submit a judgement against him, and he was forced to pay up. He took some time, and showed no sign of producing the payment, so I had to get the bailiffs involved. Thankfully, a letter from them produced the desired results. The defendant still tried to get the claim overturned, and to submit a counter-claim, but it was all too late.
[edit] Rectification of Poor Work
I was delighted to have received the refund, and used the money to pay another restorer to rectify the work. His name was given to me as a personal recommendation. If only I'd used this recommendation in the first place!
I was very pleased with the quality of work performed by the second restorer. He fitted, amongst other things solid repair patches to the rear suspension turrets, new floorpan panels, etc. He also found evidence of other work that was covered up by the previous restorer, which was duly rectified.
[edit] Reassembly of the Car
I started re-assembly of the car as soon as I got it back from the first restorer, and continued to fit everything up as far as I could, whilst working round the areas that were poorly finished. The process of getting my money back from the first restorer and finding a more able second restorer took most of 2002, and some of 2003! During that time, I got married and nearly made redundant from work. So, a busy time.
While I was waiting for resolution of the dispute over the restoration, I chose to fit my own Power Steering Conversion to the car. To my knowledge, I am the first person in the UK to attempt this conversion on a Gordini Turbo, particularly in the manner that I did so, using a Citroen Saxo electric pump, connected to a TX steering rack.
[edit] Fitting up the Engine
This album shows pictures of the fitting up of the engine of my Renault 5 Gordini Turbo after its restoration. Follow the picture sequence to view my progress.
I have had the engine, gearbox and turbo rebuilt. The engine was rebuilt by Salv - E-mail me if you want to get in contact with him. In brief, the engine was built to standard specification, except that the head has been ported and polished, flywheel, crankshaft and pistons balanced, and a mild-road camshaft has been fitted.
I intend to put pictures of the engine rebuild on the site in due course.
Other work done when fitting up the engine, and performing associated tasks, includes:
- Before I fitted the engine, I stuck some sound-proofing to the bulkhead. The sound-proofing comprises 3 layers - an open foam, a heavy rubberised layer and then foil (I presume for heat insulation).
- Rubbing down (to the bare metal) and repainting all brackets, where possible.
- Cleaning up and painting (with aluminium paint) the gearbox and inlet manifold.
- I painted the exhaust manifold with heat-resistant paint. I wonder how long the paint will last?
- Repairing a wiring loom - I took the loom from another Gordini Turbo and repaired it where necessary, including:
- Unwrapping the front portion (that goes along the right-hand side inner wing.
- Incorporating dedicated wires for in car entertainment (no I do not intend to fit a high-powered booming stereo)! I may be young, but I am a classical music buff and I'm after quality.
- Re-wrapping the front portion of the loom with non-sticky electrical tape.
- I fitted a fuse for the cooling fan. Many a Renault 5 has gone to the scrapyard due to a siezed fan causing an electrical fire. Renault, in their wisdom, chose not to fit a fuse to the fan.
- Replacing corroded spade connectors, where necessary.
- Checking the loom thoroughly for chafing and damage, repairing where necessary.
- I also checked the rear wiring loom. All MK I Renault 5s eventually break their wiring looms where the wiring goes from the car body (through a long rubber grommet) to the tailgate. My car was no exception.
- I unwrapped the rear wiring loom all the way from the end (where it connects to the accessories in the tailgate), to the left-hand light cluster.
- I then incorporated an extra wire into the loom for a third (high-level) brake light, should I choose to fit one. I'm not sure at the moment if I do want to fit one. Maybe the reduced risk of a rear-end shunt is worth the price of a tiny bit of lost originality? E-mail me and tell me what you think!
- Repairing all the broken wires in the flexing part of the loom. I cut out each wire in turn and replaced the flexing part with wire from another loom. I made sure I replaced more wire than immediately necessary - I cut the wire to beyond its entry into the tailgate, and past where it enters the car body. I soldered new lengths of wire, covering the exposed joints with heat-shrink tubing. I also made the joins at slightly different places in the loom to minimise the bulkiness of the repairs.
- Re-wrapping the rear loom with non-sticky electrical tape.
- Refitting the rear long grommet was hard work. Even though I'd made my repairs as compact as possible, the grommet and rubber tube was a really tight fit over the wires. Eventually I managed it!
- Fitting new drivebelts (alternator and water pump).
- Painting all originally plated items with metallic gold paint, where possible.
It was many, many hours' work to get the engine in and ready to go. Even manouvering the engine into place was hard work - it's a tight fit into the engine bay! It was also hard remembering where all the brackets and nuts and bolts go. On that subject, I replaced all the nuts and bolts I could with stainless steel ones.
Eventually, the engine was ready to go. I filled it with water and oil and spun it on the starter to prime the turbo. I added spark plugs, ignition module and petrol.
I didn't expect the car to start first time. It didn't! Eventually, I managed to get a spark (initially I didn't get a spark as I'd not plugged in all the required relays for the ignition). Still, the engine would not run.
I found that the car would backfire quite violently, but just wouldn't run. I suspected the timing was out. I tried swapping the order of the HT-leads, but to no avail. At this point I became quite depressed. My worst fear was that the flywheel had not been put on in the right orientation, or that the timing for the camshaft was incorrect.
Anyway, my father came round and helped me - together, we removed the rocker cover and turned the engine over so that No. 4 rocker arms were in balance (rocking). This should have put piston No. 1 at TDC (Top Dead Centre). Indeed, it was - a relief - confirming that the camshaft timing was correct. Also, the mark on the flywheel was aligned with the mark on the clutch bellhousing flange. Again, a relief, and confirming that the flywheel was on correctly.
At this stage, the distributor rotor arm should have been pointing towards the firing position form No. 1 cylinder. It wasn't... The key! The distributor drivegear was out of alignment...
So, we removed the distributor and fabricated a tool (made from a socket, a socket extension and a tap, normally used for cutting threads), and removed the drivegear. We aligned it and tried to start the engine again. No success! By this point I was pretty fed up...
Then I spotted that I'd looked up the wrong setting for the distributor drivegear - it's different for the different engines... Once I'd aligned it correctly, I turned the starter, heart in mouth...
... it fired! And then, after another go, it ran! What a sweet sound - the engine was blowing from round the exhaust and turbo, but at least it ran...
Since the first running of the engine, I have tightened up the exhaust and manifolds. They are no longer blowing.
On Salv's recommendation, I ran the engine to operating temperature (until the electric fan switched on), then let it cool down, then re-torquing the cylinder head. I then re-set the valve clearances.
Phew! What a list! I've spared some detail (believe it or not), but it took me a long time to get the engine in and running.
