AUDI 80 rebuild- Open light

Good Morning everyone, lets try putting this in the correct area eh?

Finally getting around to rebuilding the Rally car after the roll at Idaho this year. I had initially planned on shelving the car for the winter to work on the Datsun. after the roll, plans have changed.

My little shop is a 25x25 space that isn't really big enough to do two side by side projects of the magnitude I have in mind for the Datsun and the Owie. So I took every part and piece for both cars shoved em in their respective cars. I started pulling out all the mix'n'match shelving, storage and too big workbenches acquired from garage sales and friends and sold, gifted and traded it all away. Sneaking in time from the family and house projects I managed to get new workbenches built, organizing shelves, and a workspace that just might house the mess I intend to create.

I'm tugging the Rally car down to a frame rack today to straighten out the strut tower that relocated itself then going to Start a complete refresh of the car moving into open light.

I've been slowly collecting parts and pieces as well as selling off a bunch of the old parts over the last couple of months. I think I've finally come up with all the bits and bobs to put together a really nice OL car.

Yanked the old 10v turbo and sold it and the spare motor to some dude in Salt lake. Picked up a NA 20v from a coupe quattro from a guy in california along with a whole bunch of other niceties.
Factory long tube header
Set of Piper Camshafts
Head with bigger holes going in and out of it
CNC machined large bore MAF, Machined Throttle body, Factory ECU with some fancy mapping
Balanced crank, flywheel, and Aluminum front pulley.

Also big thanks to Mike Hurst for his help in the repair process. I picked up a parts car to start swapping wrinkled and crushed parts off the rally car.

John once I get it off the frame rack I'll run through the suspension. I got fed up with the mess and made myself a promise that I wouldn't touch the car until the shop was ready to work in.


Really getting excited to complete the strip down and refresh.

One of the local body shops, hit a slow spurt and was kind enough to put the pig on the rack and see how bad things are. Other than the drivers strut tower everything else checked out and looked good. After I brought in a 24 pack of Heffe we pushed some tin around and got it to line up just right.

After towing the car home I went to town cutting spot welds and removing anything mangled or out of position. I still need to strip the rest of the parts n pieces out of the engine bay, but it's coming along with an hour of work here and there.

cant wait for round 2

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First Rally: 2010 First RallyX: 2004 (a bunch)
Driver (0), Co-Driver (7)
Organizer (3), Volunteer (3)
Cars Built (2.5), Engines Blown (2) Cages Built (0) # of rotations (3.5)
Last Updated, Apr 9, 2023

EXTRA EXTRA Read all about it.

Moving again! (I hate moving) back to the Spokane area, new job within the same company, closer to the family. I'm in a mad scramble to finish all the nick nacky projects around the house done to get it on the market. May have some time while its up for sale to finish the car - All the necessary bits have been cut off, replacements cut and is ready to be welded back together.

In the meantime, I'm tentatively in the market for bumper tow enclosed trailer to use as storage, hauling to the next state. (and of course future rallying)

If we can come out as ahead as I think we can on this house, and with the perks of a move up I think there may be more racing than less in my future. (and probably bigger house projects)

Wish me luck and I'll be back as soon as the house is ready.

House is done. I have till June 1 to get er rocking. cleaning up in preparation for new bushings, stitch welding and getting the engine bay rocking. time to put the block on an engine stand and get it put together. Starting with the front end and moving backwards

So she'll be ready for Idaho Rally yeah? Haha I know.... we've talked about this.

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deaner
So she'll be ready for Idaho Rally yeah? Haha I know.... we've talked about this.

I'm going to try, but I wont be running with the move and all. I'd really like a to find a codrive for it though.

This cut and paste stuff is a real learning experience for me. the stitch welds are kicking my ass. the plug welds (filling the old spot welds) are pretty solid but the stitching took a little while to get the timing down with 2 different thickness pieces. I thing i've got a handle on it and I'm enjoying it which is a big plus.

Is there any pro's and cons to trying to put all the OEM core support and front cross member mounts back on? or should I just go to town with some square tube? I think cutting and pasting the factory mounts from the parts car would be faster, but with some creativity I think I could switch to a front mount radiator.

AJ

Glad you've gotten the hang of it. It can def be pretty frustrating until it clicks. The more you do the better you'll get, just like anything else I suppose. Idaho is still looking for plenty of volunteers! You can come work road block with me at Grimes! I'll bring my welder and we can practice haha.

Front mount rad.... I was going that route with the AAN in my B2 until I scrapped the whole thing and went 1.8t. I had a decent sized griffin I was going to use and with the core support cut out, I could have def made it work. Looking back, between the cost of the griffin, materials to rec tube part of the core support and make a grill plus the time involved, I think I would have been better off just having a nice thick sidemount built for like $350-400. With as far out front as a front mount rad sits, a lot of the bumper beam has to be cut out which leaves the area between the headlights pretty much wide open for damage with even a small impact.

The nice thing about B3s is most of the core support is already removable. If it were me and I'm understanding you right, I'd make the factory support work so you don't have to monkey with rebuilding something that's already been built by the factory. Just my .02.

No1 priority AJ: get it moving..does the upper rad support currently demount? I might give some thought to making it removeable using the new part and the remains of the old but not spend too much think time..Think instead what we'ze gonna do to make those top mounts work happily.

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John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
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John, The whole shooting match is removable from the factory. Aside from the caps to the frame rails the whole front end disassembles as you see it here in about 20 minutes. It's one of my favorite things about the cars.
After sleeping on it- you are right KISS. Just put in a thicker radiator.

I managed to get about an hour and a half on the car tonight. Need to break out the grinder to get the frame rail caps the rest of the way off but progress is progress.

Impressively all the bolt holes for the front end line up with 0 persuasion so far. I must have guessed right somewhere or got just enough of the measurements wrong. Either way wrapped up with a smile tonight.

You better go buy a lottery ticket!

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john vanlandingham
No1 priority AJ: get it moving..does the upper rad support currently demount? I might give some thought to making it removeable using the new part and the remains of the old but not spend too much think time..Think instead what we'ze gonna do to make those top mounts work happily.

Been thinking about this quite a bit- subaru mounts make the most sense, but what I've got will work for the time being. I'd really like to make those adjustable mount's I've got on the workbench work but the stock pin is sooo skinny. Best case is to go play around with a chunk of aluminum and see if I can't remake the adjustable mount with a good sized bearing but running driving is most important.

Robert- it crossed my mind.

This has taken substantially longer than I thought. The cross member lines up but isn't welded yet. One side is ready but the other needs some massaging. Finding clamps to hold it in place is an exercise in creativity