Cav Gsi restoration

[lee.w]

Well dont know where to start really!
I bought the car in 2008, it had a bit of test left on it so i used it as a daily driver until the Mot ran out.
Ive had plenty of cavs over the past few years, from a 1.7td, a few sri's, and 5 Gsi's.
I knew there was some work to be done on this one for its next MOT so decided to take it off road and bring it back up to scratch.

Here's a couple of pics of not long after i'd bought it.




The pictures really do the car justice as the paint work was actually starting to look very tired in places, plenty of scratches and scrapes and although not really noticable in these pictures the rear arches were shot, and as i wanted this Gsi to look like it had just come out of the factory there was only real one option, a full respray.

So i began to strip it down and see how bad things were, so into the garage it went.

[Gaz86]

nice project, is that a hole in the sill?

[lee.w]

A few panels stripped,




got the skirts off and found a pair of rotten sills, (suprise suprise!)




After plenty more stripping and sanding...




Knowing that it needed sills and new arches, had a delivery..

[lee.w]

Now this is where it started going downhill!!
A good mate had offered to help me out with the welding as im not the best so the day he came to make a start.....

As you can see a previous owner has had a go at repairing the arches, badly. They had just tacked the repair panels on over the rotten arches




After a lot of cutting and grinding, we found out how bad the inners were too

[lee.w]

And just to top the day, discovered this on the O/S chassis leg.



Was now beginning to wonder whether there was any point doing much more with it, Is it worth it? Its a 20 year old cavalier at the end of the day. But i eventually decided to go for it, There are hardly any gsi's left now and to find one that doesnt need welding is rare, And i wanted this car to be on the road for another 20 years, (in my possesion of course!)
So we decided to trailer the off to his garage as there just wasnt the space to do it all here.
So off it went.



Anyway the following work i cannot take any credit for as it was all done by him

[lee.w]

Forgot to mention, the floor was pretty sound, although there was a small patch to sort in the rear footwell

[lee.w]

Wanting an original car, found this on ebay and had to buy it!



Then for the arches...

Inners in,

[lee.w]

So again i cant take credit for all the bodywork! But anyway its done now!!




So now back in my garage, with winter fast approaching and funds tight due to my son being born, i decided to pull the engine out and give it a bit of tlc over winter.

[lee.w]

Began with taking the head off and giving the block a bit of a tidy up.
Fitted new Water pump, new sump gaskets, baffle plate, oil filter, core plugs, and a general tidy up.
Not going daft on the rebuild so i left the crank, pistons etc where they were as apart from much else its only got 63k on the engine so didnt bother with a full rebuild.






With the head stripped i took it for a bit of a tidy up, had it bead blasted and re-skimmed, didnt really need it but at least i know it right now.





And while that was away i dropped the rocker cover and plug cover in for sandblasting and painting.




Got some new valve seals, slight difference in new and old!

[*Adz*]

looking good mate, do have a soft spot for cav gsi's

[lee.w]

And thats about where im at now, hoping to get the shell into the paint shop in the next month or so.
Will update as i progress!

[lee.w]

Wow, i havnt updated this for a long time, and id like to say ive got plenty to report....but i havnt!! its pretty much done nothing this year due to house moves and personal situations etc. BUT......Ive finally found some motivation, space and enthusiasm to get cracking again.
So after a few house moves, and trying to keep everything together, i found that a lot of parts had gone walkabout, annoying little bits of interior trim, small under the bonnet things and generally stupid little bits that would take forever to find on ebay. So i hunted around and found this.....





Been sat a few years but fires up an drives and is complete. So i shelled out some cash an took it home on the trailer. Plan is to just sit it there and let it donate parts, i now have everything i need to finish mine. I dont like to break them but this one is pretty bad, the outer arches have been replaced but the inners are gone, the rear chassis rails have been patched but are going again, and under the bonnet around the strut tops are fu*ked. Also round the front windscreen an sunroof are the same. shame really but not to worry.
So thats where i am at the minute. Progress will hopefully resume very soon. Oh and also, i got it home and was having a route around under the bonnet and made a pleasent discovery which should either make me a couple of quid back, or sit in the shed for future use........

[rc]

great work on deciding to save it

[steve jordan]

Great work and fair play to you sticking with it!

[humbucker]

Nice one. Look forward to updates. Get a WIP thread going on Vauxhall Cavalier Mk3 Owners Club too

[Th0m45]

great thread mate! glad you kept going with it!!

[Tomo195]

good work on saving the cav. it would have been a shame to scrap it. your mate has done a really good job on the bodywork

[Adam]

hard work but satisfaction guarenteed good thread

[chrystle]

wots hapend to cavalier