andyb5

Well, the weather is nicer and it’s time for an update on the body work: The damage is being repaired! I’m also having some other work done while it’s at the body shop. Edit: here’s a before to jog everyone’s memory:

Awesome. Happy to see you’re still plugging away on this project Matt. What pistons did you order? Does JE offer an FSR piston for our engines?

I'm so happy that you finally got some decent results from all your hard work. Way to stick with it Matt, I'm excited to see how the summer goes!

Good to know! The eBay one is definitely not as efficient in warming the car up as the OEM one, but if Nissens isn't any better then that's too bad.

Just a quick update to make sure I don't lose track of things like this. Driver's side front caliper piston seized up so I replaced the caliper Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I finally replaced the heater core firewall coupling and got my heat working about a month after the manual swap. I had never replaced one of these before - they're a total pain in the ass to physically access when the engine is still hot! I had a little fun explaining what I was doing: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr New clips on the engine side: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I also installed the eBay heater core from my 99 R to replace the leaking Behr one that was in there. It wasn't in perfect shape so I might end up replacing it with a Nissens down the road. Nissens adopted the same style crimped junction between the end tanks and fins as the ebay core to be more durable than the Behr/OEM ones. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Otherwise, this car continues to be an awesome daily driver that can handle anything winter throws its way! Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr

Ugh. That job is such a bastard because of all the things that can potentially go wrong.

I always disconnect one end link from the strut to decouple the whole away bar assembly and then move/rock the car. If the noise goes away, it's a bad endlink or worn sway bar bushing.

http://www.retroturbo.com/?product=760-960-series-multilink-mk1-pu-bushings-rear-suspension-prt If I were to redo all the bushings in my rear suspension, I'd seriously consider buying the poly version on Retro Turbos site

Woah! That's really bad, lucky the engine didn't hydrolock!!

Damn dude that's so frustrating. Should be pretty simple to see if it's getting spark though. Good luck, and I hope it's something simple!!

Thanks! Yeah, decided to wait on the body work until the weather is nicer - didn't want my nice fresh paint to end up all chipped from the sand/salt on the roads. I'll share updates on the body work as they happen!

A couple weekends ago, I swapped the B5234T8, M66, and all associated parts from my old 99 R into this wagon. I started the work on Friday 1/19 and finished up on Wednesday, 1/24. Pulled the front subframe assembly from my 99 R into the shop and got my wagon ready for the swap: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Engine bay before. It was a mess, everything is covered in oil and PS fluid from a swollen, leaky reservoir Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr The engine is ready to come out: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Lift the car up and off the front subframe, then roll the subframe assembly out of the way: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr "Old" and "new": Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Clutch master installed: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Ran the hardline from the clutch master to the slave cylinder. I notched the airbox bracket to allow the line to fit without passing through the bracket. The OEM routing through the bracket makes it nearly impossible to remove the bracket without disconnecting the clutch line, which is a pain in the ass. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Disassemble the ECU box and pull apart the connectors to modify the CANBUS wiring Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Depinned, cut, and crimped the TCM wires together. After crimping, I used some heat shrink to seal the joint up and ensure everything stays protected from the elements. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr You should never use a solder joint on a car; a proper crimp joint is a much more reliable and durable connection. A solder joint can potentially crack due to the vibrations created by the engine and drivetrain. Of course, I only learned this after I soldered these wires on my old wagon Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr B5234T8/M66 bolted back up and in the engine bay Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Got some help from my girlfriend replacing the spark plugs and installing the newer coil packs from the B5244T that came out of the car.Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I lost the better part of two nights of work trying to figure out why my heater core connection was leaking. After many trials and tribulations, it turns out there was a small crack in the connection for the lower hose. I temporarily bypassed the heater core until I could order and install a new firewall coupling. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr How it sat for the first attempt at starting. I was a little nervous because the engine had been sitting since September. I put a couple drops of oil in each of the cylinders, cranked it over by hand a few times, and thankfully it fired right up on the first try! Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Center console is all buttoned up: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr And a couple glamour shots of the finished engine bay: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I still need to get a tune from Steveo, but I'm so happy to have a M66 in my life again! I'll update this post a little later with a full list of all the work I did during this project but I wanted to get all my photos uploaded and shared with you guys! Here's a list of the setup I installed for this project. Parts in bold are new to this car, other parts were previously installed on my 99 R. B5234T8 from my former 99 R with ~223,000 miles. Factory 18T w/ angle flange Forge CBV Snabb intake pipe w/ Spectre cone filter (I really should buy a higher quality filter...) 99 R downpipe w/ Bosch (OES) O2 sensors Rebuilt cylinder head BTCC style dual oil filler necks w/ IPD Viton filler cap seals OEM valve stem seals Bosch (OES) coil packs and OEM spark plugs "R" manifold + OEM MLS gasket from P1 Gates Racing timing belt Aisin (OES) water pump Xemodex ETM New OEM RMS Powerflex polyurethane upper engine and firewall mounts M66C (from 05 S40 T5 AWD) w/ 99 R angle gear OEM single mass flywheel, Sachs SD 693 clutch, OEM 850 R pressure plate P80 clutch master cylinder, new P80 clutch master to slave cylinder line, new P1 FTE (OE) slave cylinder P1 shifter and cables, R Design aluminum shift knob PDV Motorsports upgraded collar gear Colorado Driveshaft remanufactured 99 R driveshaft New OEM coolant reservoir/cap/hoses, new OEM water pipe hoses Rack Doctor remanufactured steering rack w/ inner tie rods and new OEM outer tie rods. New OEM 05+ power steering reservoir, new OEM 05+ suction hose, new OEM return hose, new OEM steering column u-joint. OEM sway bar with Energy Suspension polyurethane bushings and custom adjustable endlinks I spent a couple hours cleaning and degreasing the engine bay. I also installed a VW 99 adjustable wiper relay; which is one of my favorite convenience modifications for these cars.

Awesome work so far!! Glad to see you brought it back from the previous owners neglect and are enjoying it at the limit during autocross too!!

In the past, people have used a brush bar from a Ford F-250 as a lightbar on the front of their wagons. Steve (ghostshadow) was the first to do so on his XC - other mods included 27" tires, camo, etc. That may help you find something that works as a light bar.

Thanks Kevin! It actually took me a few hours split over two days to get everything done, including modifying the fender liners to fit and everything. It's a tedious process, but was worth it to ensure everything came out well. I'm pretty confident that with the right wheels I could fit more rubber. At this point, I want to focus on optimizing the front suspension geometry (scrub radius, roll center, etc) to use the grip I have better before I go to more rubber, but a future setup more rubber is definitely something I've been thinking about. Here's something along the lines of what I had in mind: http://forums.swedespeed.com/showthread.php?232263-(4)17x9-quot-Ferrari-348-by-Speedline-235-40-Nitto-NT05. Still working on getting the bodywork sorted out, I'll post updates on that as things progress.

IPD Stage 3 suspension?!? No way!!

I'm sure there is a torque spec for the lock ring, but I have no idea what it is. Here's the tool: https://www.ipdusa.com/products/11580/124535-fuel-tank-lock-ring-tool Make sure the fuel pump seal is fully seated in the tank before tightening the lock ring - I had a hard time getting the seals aligned at first.

If you have an opportunity to grab some M12x1.75 threaded rods, put one in each of the 4 larger bolt locations in the chassis. It makes reinstalling the subframe so much easier. Glad you found the source of the leak and it's an easy fix! Did you buy the actual tool to install those lockrings or are you using channel locks/pliers like I did?

Thanks gdog! Yeah that's the same process here. My car was valued at ~$3,500, and after deducting a scrap value of ~$100, I got a check for around $3,400. I need to review it the work with the shop I'm taking it to, but fingers crossed it'll be enough to get my car fixed. I trimmed the fender liners to fit up onto the folded lip. It's not a perfect solution, as they're hard to remove for maintenance, but for now it's functional. I'll try to share some photos of what I did next time I'm working on the car. Thanks! I'm going to see about getting some other paint work done while I'm in there, but I don't think I'll be repainting the whole car. Thanks, hopefully I can get it fixed. Any money left over from the insurance will be spent on paint/body work, it just makes sense to do as much of that as I can while it's already at the paint shop. Nope. The total loss doesn't really affect my ownership of the car. While there are some cosmetics that need to be addressed, this car is so clean underneath due to it having never seen road salt before that I really don't want to move onto another one. Put the Satellites and studded Altimax Arctics back on for winter Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Here's where you can really see the front fenders have been pulled - the front wheels sit about 2 inches inside of the fender Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr

Sorry to hear that. I had so many gas leaks after I replaced my fuel pump, but my issues were self-inflicted when I had to remove the OEM bulkhead wire fitting.

Looks killer, really nice job on that whole project!

Time for updates So I basically didn't work on it at all this summer. I pretty much just drove it from point A to B, and enjoyed the cushy stock suspension and nice, cold AC. Even the 5 speed auto isn't horrible for a daily driver, but certainly not the best option for sporty driving. Snagged a good shot parked outside a credit union I designed last summer: 89CC8034-6476-415F-BE8D-026D47C17F85_zpszuufdwtg by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Then as Swedish Car Day approached, I started to get a few things done. I started by mildly rolling the rear fenders: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr The factory rear fender lips are double layer metal and are a pain to roll. Before: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr and after: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I was pleasantly surprised by how clean the suspension/drivetrain appear to be. Everything is in much better condition than the rear end of my 99 R Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I pulled the front fenders about 1/2" and rolled them as well. Fronts are much easier to roll/pull than the rear. Before: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr After: Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr In the process of rolling the fenders, I removed all the factory plastic mudflaps and trimmed/modified all the fender liners to fit with the newly rolled fender lips. Don't really have pictures of that at the moment, but it's kind of a trial-and-error process to trim the fender liners and get them lined back up on the rolled fender lips. Bit of a full house before SCD at our shop - 7 different Volvos across a range of models. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Installed my front CX Racing coilovers. They still look pretty good after ~35,000 miles on the car. Seriously, for a sub-$700 pair of coilovers they're greatly exceeding my expectations and the coating of Boeshield T9 is continuing to do a great job keeping corrosion away. The handling improvement is pretty noticeable - the reduction in dive and body roll is nice. The ride quality (5kg/mm springs) are pretty soft, so there's still plenty of compliance and travel to soak up bumps. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr I also installed my adapters, and put the STi BBS wheels and Ventus V12s on before the trip. As a quick refresher, the STi BBS are 17x8, forged and weight 18 lbs. The wheels' native offset is +53, and 19mm adapters get the offset to +34. Lastly, I gave it a quick wash and we all drove out to Larz Anderson. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr At this point, I was fairly happy with where the car was, and was able to work on getting my 99 R taken apart and sent to the junkyard. However, a mere 6 days after I got rid of my 99 R disaster struck. I was on my way home to my apartment when another driver pulled out from a stop sign and hit the side of my wagon. Thankfully, I was unharmed, but my wagon was definitely not ok. It needs a new rear quarter panel, driver's side rear door, and there was some damage to the rear drivers side wheel as well. The good news is that the door still opened and closed normally, the glass wasn't damaged, and the suspension was untouched, so it still ran/drive normally. IMG_2969 by Andy Buresh, on Flickr IMG_2976 by Andy Buresh, on Flickr This is the intersection where I got hit: The other vehicle was stopped at the sign pictured here, and I was driving from right to left across the photo. IMG_2972 by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Both streets are 1 way, and the other driver was deemed at fault by the police, and their insurance accepted 100% liability. The repair estimate came out to ~$5,400. That meant the car was a total loss, but I am working on getting it fixed anyways. I ended up getting a quarter panel, door, and side skirt from Eric's ( @Leco510) 98 R. Made some sparks Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr and after a while, had myself a quarter panel Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr It's a pain in the ass, but a rear quarter panel does actually fit in the back of one of these wagons. Untitled by Andy Buresh, on Flickr That's currently where things stand. I've been avoiding working on modding/repairing things while dealing with insurance and figuring out the whole repair process.

Jason, the ABA clamps that were mentioned earlier are available from Bel-Metric online for a pretty reasonable price; and in my experience are way better to deal with after a couple years on the car than the clamps I've bought at my local parts stores.

No gasket between manifold and turbo. I used aftermarket turbo hardware (studs, nuts etc) when I installed my rebuilt head/R manifold. Seems to be holding up fine so far and cost a few dollars total instead of a few dollars each for OEM hardware.

Jason, incredible work and you've done an impressive job documenting everything for the rest of the forum!! This is the thread I most anticipate updates to each time I log on here. Keep up the great work sir!!!