My Nova Project

[paddy>gsi/turbo]

feck thats tidy. leave it alone! rare to find a nova that good looks new.

[Craig-S]

I had my euro light, grill and bumpers turn up today.

Happy with the bumpers?

[SimonTW]

Yes thanks Craig. Was hoping I could throw them on as they are for a while but the rear probably needs a respray as it's a bit flakey in places. Will give them a sand down and fresh coat of paint

Made a start on the grill


Also noticed it's spewing alot oil from it's cam cover gasket so I have got one of them on order.

[SimonTW]

My chosen Grey colour. I have stuck to the RAL colour pallet as I can then have anything powdercoated in a matching Grey.

First coat going on while I wait for my dinner to cook. Only two bumpers and 4 wheels to go!

[Benn]

Grey looks good.

[SimonTW]

The paint was supposed to have been gloss but it's ended up a satin finish out of the can. I sent the suppliers an email with some pictures and it turns out they have sent me satin finish and not gloss. I'm pretty happy with the satin (standard almost) finish to it so I have decided to leave it and crack on with the front bumper.



and also the wheels (which the paint they had sent for that IS gloss)


Apart from the mess up. The Paints4u stuff is awesome. I can't believe how many cans of Halfords paint I have had over the years and failed to get a decent finish.

[Craig-S]

Bumper looks good. A lot better than it did on my shelf.

Thought you were smoothing out the bottom 3 lines?

[SimonTW]

I thought about it but I didn't really use my last Nova with the smoothed bumper much so it didn't get damaged or chipped but I think if I went to all the effort of smoothing this one out and then it ended up damaged it would look naff so decided to spray it as it is. I can always smooth it in future if I change my mind I guess.

[Benn]

Love the grey, just like nova bumper should be. Isnt it gonna be used on track? If so i wouldnt smooth the bumpers.

[SimonTW]

Yeah that's the main reason Benn. I want to keep it very useable.

Today I did some stripping. I took the majority of the interior out as it's pretty much all sold.




The passenger side carpet underfelt was a bit wet so I have a leak coming in from somewhere. Luckily the carpet hasn't been marked. I threw all the underlay away and the sponge/lead style sound deadening.

I removed the boot lock ready to smooth it over in the future. I also rigged up a ghetto boot release too lol


I also got round to changing the rocker cover gasket. Hopefully that should put a stop to the leak. I didn't get enough time to fit my coilovers fitted though which is a bit of a shame. Maybe next time I get some tinkering time.

[Benn]

Nice work, selling the seat runner plastic trims?

[SimonTW]

They have already sold mate. Sold them, the seats and the console.

Little update

I fitted the bumper after work. It looks so naff without decent wheels and being lowered though and then sods law literally two mins after leaving work a had a gritter fire grit all over it. I haven't had chance to look it over yet but I bet there will be at least one chip.

[Benn]

Bumper look great.

[Craig-S]

Looks excellent. Let me know about those mirrors and i could get them with you in no time.

[Whitterz]

Sy, what do they think of you in work? LOL

[SimonTW]

I hate relying on other people to carry out work for me. I have had the seat rails welded in yesterday.

I dropped off the car and the rails I bought and told the guy to weld the rails in like the ones in this picture.


I picked the car up and he's basically welded them how he thought it should look. The front rail is about 4" backwards to the one in the picture and the rear one has been welded in so it lines up with the back of the seat frame meaning I have no room for adjustment.

I did mention he might need to trim the standard rails. I didn't want the spot welds drilling out as the floor would end up damaged. The floors ended up damaged and he has had to weld holes left by removing the bracket and the drivers side is just rough cut so also looks cack. What's done is done though so I picked up some red oxide primer to get it all protected.




A pretty depressing day all in all.

I am going to have to sort undersealing the car now there is bare metal and welds.

[Craig-S]

At least they are good welds. You can tidy it all up over time.

I just use the sticky waxoyl stuff under mine.

Did those mirrors i sent turn up?

[SimonTW]

Yes they did thanks mate. I didn't get round to doing anything with them as they need a bit of filler priming and sanding first. I will get the single one off and back to you as soon as I can though.

I also decided to get cracking on some more messing. I fitted the GTE rear bumper as it is as I find it easier to sand while its mounted. There is a lot of flakey paint I need to get rid of so that will be an ongoing thing. I fitted the JOM coilovers I'd picked up as a temporary set to get the car a bit lower and fitted the Astra wheels I'd been painting.



Just needs a really good wash next!

[SimonTW]

Sy, what do they think of you in work? LOL

They doubted me when I got the Mini so they are only slightly doubtful that this one will turn out nicely too.

I haven't had it a month yet and already it's looking different. I'm really looking forward to the MOT getting out of the way so I can then mess around with the rear beam setup and get the handbrake setup working properly without it being off the road for ages lol.

[The big man]

looking good keep the updates coming fella

[Benn]

Coming along very well.

[SimonTW]

I haven't really touched, driven or looked at the car since the seat disaster. I have been doing a few bits and generally wasting my time and money.

Edd kindly did me a deal on a rear brace. It's a perfect grey colour to match the bumpers too which is nice. I'll use that to mount my harnesses too probably.


I bought a pair of standard mirrors as I have been finding it difficult to use just the one small one to reverse out of the drive and down my road and the mattig ones I ordered never turned up. These were odd colours so I gave them a spray. I'm not sure if they would look better in silver so I may end up trying to get some spare covers to spray silver to swap them as I please.


I also learned a lesson the hard way. I tried to reassemble my steering rack but there was a piece of plastic melted inside the casing. Where it's been baked, the heat has melted the bush inside. I couldn't find a replacement or any reference to it in the haynes so I sourced a replacement rack with a quick rack installed from Colin Smith. I removed the quick rack parts, then tried to get the bush out and failed so had to chop the casing up to get the bush out . I fitted this into my blue casing but the rack feels very tight passing through it. I think I may have damaged it tapping it into place. I think I will cut my losses and just have the rack installed into recon unit or the one fitted to the car and then paint it blue. I'm going to hang onto the casing just incase I can get a plastic bush made or maybe a brass one might do the trick. I hate waste and the rack looks amazing powdercoated.





Hopefully if the weather is dry tomorrow I can get round to sorting a few bits and make it drivable.

I bought some parts to relocate the battery and windscreen washer bottle to the boot


So I can eventually get this fitted maybe. I spotted it on ebay cheap so thought it was worth getting. I can always sell it on if I have a change of plan.

[SimonTW]

As the weather was nice on sunday I decided to take a look at the mess that was the seat rails. I painted the bare metal with some redoxide to stop any rust forming


The mess he made welding the old seat rail holes up


Here's how the camber and toe in looked before I started tweeking as it was pretty undrivable like this.


Here's how the tracking looked after a bit of playing. Almost perfect just by sight but at least I can take it to be properly set up now.


Anyone know a way to remove the aerial without the hole normally found in the inner arch or is it a wing off job


General picture of the overall condition. If I want to graviguard inside here and paint it would I need to strip back all the factory underseal or will I just get away with cleaning it and making sure its fully dried out.




I had a bit of free time left so set about starting the battery relocation

I also tried taking the wheel off. I tried a bit of heat the a bit of WD40 but didn't have any luck. I think I might have to invest in a proper puller as I need my nice sparco wheel fitted.

I took the car out today though to see how it drove and I love it. Looking forward to getting my polybushes, quick rack, and other bits fitted. I need to get the MOT sorted next month first though.

[Craig-S]

Good progress.

I always find hitting the wheel rim hard with my palms usually free's it up. Make sure i leave the nut on when pulling towards me also to avoid black eyes,

[Whitterz]

Good Progress Sy !