T3 Race Taxi

Motopark track day and Lappeenranta Midnight Cruising

2009-09-21T23:38:00.000-07:00

We decided to go to a track day at Motopark with a couple Urho endurance racing teams to do some track driving. We were going to drive with both the race taxi and our "Urhon ajot" beetle. The engine of the beetle broke in the first event of the year after an hour. Pekka from the team KLR had promised to repair the engine before Motopark, but because the crankshaft was in two pieces it wasn't possible to repair the engine in time. The engine is being built at the moment, and Pekka already has a new crank. But anyways, back to the subject.
We left on saturday at about 8 towards lahti, from where Erno and Pete got temporary licence plates for the Race taxi. I drove the Golf with the gridgirls. The first stop was Pekka's garage at Kangasniemi, where we got the trailer. Erno continued with the Race Taxi to the track while we made a small roundtrip and got the trailer. They said it was raining inside the Race taxi? It might make a good greenhouse. During the trip we filled some holes in the wheelwells to make the water spray less in the cabin. We arrived to Motopark at approx. 13:30 hours. First we did was empty all the tools and spare parts from the Race taxi and headed to the race track. At this point we had driven it 270km (170mi).

The first thing at the track is to measure the sound level, which is metered as the car drives by. The limit had just changed to 95db and the race taxi made 105db passing the metering point, even though we had last week refilled the silencer with new sound deadening material. The clever racers we are, we headed to the dumpster at the track and found an old oil filter from a motorcycle. Adding the oil filter to the exhaust dropped the noise to 100db, so more was needed. Luckily we found another oil filter and adding it to the previous one dropped the noise to 94db. So track driving could begin.

I'll need to mention that the race taxi's sound after the wild exhaust modifications were more like a jet fighter than a race car. The exhaust back pressure was so high that we only got 0,4bar boost.
At the beginning it was quite wet, but it dried quite quickly. We had a fun time and gave a ride to a group having their bachelor party at the race track. Other Urho cars at the track were KG-Racing.

And KLR (their newest evolution doesn't even need any tires).

Also the Hyvinkää's group was there, unfortunately I didn't get any pictures
DWL was also at the event, but with other than Urho cars.

After the Motopark session we headed to Lappeenranta Midnight Cruising. We had to arrive at 18:00 so Erno had to jump back in time a bit with the Race Taxi ;).
We arrived just in time before the parking lot where the event was held was closed. There were many great looking cars there, and we found a nice place for the Race Taxi in a corner with many other VAG group cars. The event was well arranged and there were really a lot of great cars there ranging from off road cars to tricked out tuning cars. One car that really caught my eye was an 190 Mercedes benz that was really low and tuned with respect to the original nature of the car. Another nice car was a tiny VW Lupo just next to where we were.

After staying in the parking lot of Prisma all cars headed to an local gas station. There were loads of people by the road and we felt like stars when they all were loud and cheering for us (might be that it was the other way around, but I guess it depends on how you look at it). Hopefully the Jetta in front survived home after the steam show it had. I'll put pictures from the show as soon as I get them from somewhere.

Boxer speed day

2009-09-13T04:23:00.000-07:00

We were drag racing at the boxer speed day. We arrived a bit late, and it had started to rain, but we still managed to get the prize for the fastest van.

The race taxi isn't really made for drag racing. The drive line isn't made for such stress, so we had to take it easy when leaving the line and shifting. The clutch overheats because of the stock position of the turbo, and even though we have made heat shields they don't seem to help. We'll have to move the turbo to the rear of the engine during the winter.

The day was a success. We did 30-40 acceleration runs and the car was still functioning after them. Every time we were at the drag strip we had two or more passengers.

Mitsubishi Evo 9 on the left lane. I guess we need more power. Link to the video.

A stock similar Transporter on the right lane. We gave a bit handicap to it, but couldn't catch up because of a shift miss from 2nd to 3rd. Link to the video.

A video from outside, looks as lively as from the inside. Link to the video.

Thanks to Jappe for the videos!

VW Open, Car show and drag racing - Another broken engine

2009-06-24T14:40:00.000-07:00

After the successful dyno day we attended the VW-Open. In addition to a car show you could take your car to the strip, so ofcourse we had to attend with the race taxi.

At the starting line. Everything was still good at this point.

Returning from the strip. Engine broken...

The sound from the engine is the same as the last engine damage. Probably a broken connecting rod bearing again. Felt bad that the engine only gave us one half run on the strip after the strong performance it had on the dyno.

Thanks to Ville Käki for the pictures!

Video of the beginning of the acceleration. Before the engine started making noise. Thanks to Jyri for filming!

Slugs dyno day

2009-06-22T14:37:00.000-07:00

We got the new engine running in time for the annual Slugs Dyno day. Our club has since the beginning a couple years back had the highest horsepower, so we were hoping that everything would be in order with the new engine.

284hv/391Nm according to the Tuningworld dyno. Highest nubers of the day! The video is a bit longish because they needed several pulls to get a good result.

Race taxi on track. Ahvenisto radalle.com season opening - Broken engine

2009-05-08T09:21:00.000-07:00

Mika, Erno and helpers Harri ja Pete worked long hours the days before the event to get the car ready for the track. The work included making a new oil pan because the old one started leaking around the oil stick tube, and we also had to get working lights.

The race taxi being pulled to the track.

Race taxi and the service car. Finally at the track.

Erno took the first turn to drive. The car worked flawlessly for half an lap, after which it started to sputter. The water temp gauge read 130 degrees, so it was driven calmly back to the pits. At the pit it was noticed that the china made gauge was in metric for oil pressure, but the temperature read in imperial, so 130 degrees Fahrenheit wasn't that bad after all.

Mika continued to drive, and as soon as the engine got into boost it started to sputter. The day went mostly when trying to sort this out. Mika went to the track 4-5 times and drove approximately 10 laps with good and bad success. Sometimes the engine worked, but mostly not. The day was ended with an engine failure. The engine started making noise like the connecting rod bearings would have broken.

Even though the engine didn't function properly, the few friends that got a ride were really impressed how well it went on the track. The suspension also worked surprisingly well considering that we didn't get stiff enough springs for the front in time for this event.

Thanks for the on track photos to Toni Lari. More of his photos can be seen at: http://toni.dnsf.org/

Big thanks to all who helped! After the visit on the track we have a better picture of what to do next with the car. A couple weeks until the event at Artukainen street track in Turku!

Preparations before first race track event

2009-04-22T09:12:00.000-07:00

Right after the car show Mika took an angle grinder and removed the front wheelarches. New ones were made by removing arches from another car, welding on a 50mm strip of steel and the new wheelarch was then pop riveted into place.

Widened side door hinge. It is 22mm wider than original to clear the center lug. We tested with just the new wheel that the side door had plenty of space, but the massive nut for the wheel wasn't taken into account. :)

The tool to tighten the wheel nuts. 75mm. Borrowed from Pekka.

A picture from under the car. We took the car to Erno's car lift so we could do some minor details under the car. We ended up spending a week there when we rerouted everything under the car. It was so uncomfortable doing it in our own garage, and getting the whole picture when the car was lifted up was enough to convince us of doing it again.

When the car was up, we decided also to add a bit more steering angle at maximum lock. ;)
Much time has also gone into going the car through one bolt at a time.

American Car Show 2009

2009-04-15T09:10:00.000-07:00

A couple pictures from the car show.

A special thanks to everyone who visited us at the car show! We had a great time!

Adapters, wheels and reverse screens

2009-04-10T08:59:00.000-07:00

We got all parts for the American car show by tuesday and the final assembly started so we could get the car ready for the show.

Changing the PCD from 5x112 to 1x0?. The adapters came from Tommi's billet.

Here's a shot of the wheels what they looked like before.

A picture of the lip after they were straightened. The end result looked like it was machined and brand new. They could be polished, but the end result wasn't evenly shiny and you could still see the deeper scratches. But you can't expect more from wheels that cost 30€ a piece.

The wheels were straightened by Amriff in Järvenpää, Finland.

Making the interior. The roof and dash screens have been installed and now it's turn for the rpm meter.

The screens and rear camera came from JJ-Tuonti. The reverse camera has nightvision, so you can see who is behind you even when it's dark.

Erno's friend Pete came to help us install the reverse camera and screens. Thanks for the help!

A better picture of the dash.

Washed outside. Our trailer had become too narrow during the winter, so we had to order transportation to the car show. Luckily Erno's neighbour came to the rescue with his truck.

At the Fair center, almost inside!

Photosession

2009-03-31T13:56:00.000-07:00

We did a small photosession with the race taxi. We just got the skirts and bumpers painted black, so we wanted to see how it looks looked from a distance.

Looks nice. Square panda? The black skirts make the car look a bit like it's a bit higher off the ground than before. I guess we will just have to lower it more...

One week until it's ready. Two weeks until first test.

Battery mounted, midle seat row shoulder harness bar ready and wheels sent to be straightened

2009-03-15T08:17:00.000-07:00

We made some progress on the car. We also noticed a new problem. One of our drivers thinks he can't reach the pedals with the current driving position. I guess we will have to get seat rails for the drivers seat so it can be adjusted...

The battery is mounted. The final position isn't the best with placement of weight in mind, but serviceability is good. The battery mounts will have to be showed at each scrutineering of the car, so it has to be easily viewed.

The mount for the middle seat row shoulder harness.

The wheels were sent to be straightened out by a tire company. We also got one set of centres painted black. When we got the straightness inspected on all wheels, we noticed by pure luck that one of the wheels was of an odd width. At this point we had of course assembled all wheels and taken them to storage. So we had to remeasure each wheel. There were four widths instead of the assumed three. The inner rings were 155mm, 185mm, 195mm and 205mm wide. There was only one wheel with the 185mm inner ring width.

The Race Taxi's first drive

2009-02-28T15:02:00.001-08:00

We drove the car out from the garage, so it wasn't that much. We are still missing the brakes and the car needs a lot of finishing work. Not it can be moved by driving in and out from the garage, so it's a big relief.

You have to have two people driving if you don't adjust the idle high. One presses the throttle in the engine compartment and the other "drives"

Today we got the clutch working, which was a quite big job because we moved the work cylinder. The mounting point for the battery is also almost complete.

Update since a long time, the race taxi got wheels...

2009-02-22T01:37:00.000-08:00

A friend told me that a sales site has 18 pieces of 15" center lock wheels for a reasonable price, so I was going to buy them for our locosts. I found the adverticement and called the seller right away. I didn't have the time to read the ad, and found out that they were 16" that isn't legal in the locost racing series in Finland. After thinking about it for a moment we decided to buy them anyways. If nothing else, we could put them on the race taxi...

The wheels are made by PLS in France and I was told they have been in a Mercedes Benz touring car. The weight is 9 kilos each. The wheels are three piece with a magnesium center.

When I got the wheels to the garage I quickly realized the problem of space required to store 18 wheels.. :-)

Most of the wheels are pretty badly damaged, so they will have to be straightened out. I think we can get a couple straight sets for the car. First we have to check the centers for straightness and cracks, and then check the outer halves too.

The wheels will be mounted in the same fashion as the 911 street car. The bolt pattern will be changed with an adapter.

A new guy got involved in the project, Erno. Erno has already brought energy and enthusiasm to the project which has rub off on to me and Mika. Most of race taxi's events this summer's will be attended by Erno.

The brake calipers arrived

2008-12-16T01:30:00.000-08:00

The project moved forward by the find of brake calipers. The calipers are from a Chrysler 300C and they are street legal in Finland, quite lightweight and you can get aggressive brake pads. The problem with the T4 calipers was that the brake pads available were pretty much stock.

Even though there isn't much work left, we don't have the time at the moment to build the car. We're supposed to begin in January.

Race Taxi startup

2008-07-24T14:53:00.000-07:00

After some trouble, the Race Taxi is alive.

The Subaru Impreza WRX 2 litre turbocharged engine with a half meter long exhaust sounded just as good as we thought it would. And yes, it was loud.

The engine sputtered slightly. Probably because we didn't have the exhaust gaskets so the ECU tried to correct the mixture with wrong information coming from the lambda. But the engine is installed and works. There's still loads of bits and pieces to do, but after this it doesn't feel that bad.

Link to the Youtube video: Race Taxi Startup

Back to work on the Race Taxi

2008-06-19T06:36:00.000-07:00

It's been a bit quiet lately because of other stuff hindering working on the car.

Something new. A video recording system with suction cup mounted bullet camera. This will probably be used as a rearview monitor for our passengers, so the camera will be mounted on backwards on top of the car.

We also bought a data logger on ebay, but more about that once it arrives.

Most of yesterday was spent cleaning the garage and making space for the car.

We got a Porsche to keep the Race Taxi company. The car hung on top of a crane as an advert for a local radio station, after which the listeners could vote if it will be dropped or if it will be the main prize for a lottery between the listeners. You can probably guess the results.

We got interested of the car because they were supposed to drop it head first. Dropping the car backwards pushed the engine about 20cm forward which resulted in the firewall bending the frames of both seats useless. We haven't had a closer look inside yet, but it doesn't look good.

The first we did was to remove the ads on the car.

A picture from behind shows the whole truth.

Hot rod and rock show, Tampere, Finland

2008-04-27T10:26:00.000-07:00

The Race Taxi is on it's second day on the Car Show in Tampere. The show has gone well and people have been very interested in our car.

Transport combination. It was a bit tricky to drive because I couldn't get enough weight to the front.

The nights were spent in the Multivan in front of a local VW builders garage. The rock and roll rear seat was very comfortable to sleep on.

The Race Taxi was on display on radalle.com's stand. They had gotten everything in order during friday night, all I had to do was to move the "fencing" behind the race taxi so people could take a closer look at our car.

Our car from a different view.

The most important info...

After the show begins the finishing of the car, so we can finally get to drive it.

American Car Show 2008, Helsinki, Finland

2008-03-22T07:12:00.000-07:00

The first day is over, and the first day went really well. The race taxi was well accepted by the public and many were exited to see such a special purpose for a VW van.

The day before the car show. Building the show booth.

Some of you may notice the transformation of the Porsche. Mika spent 8 hours making the graphics on it.

Race taxi almost ready for car show

2008-03-19T15:43:00.000-07:00

There has been some progress during the last days, and the race taxi is almost in shape to be officially shown for public. Some vinyl graphics are still missing as are a couple interior panels, but we should get them sorted out tomorrow.

Making the roof interior.

Fresh from the vinyl cutter.

The rear bumper and grille between rear lights installed.

The Race taxi yesterday, waiting to go to Helsinki for polishing.

Ready to go. The Race Taxi is 2cm too wide for the trailer, so it's a quite tight fit at the trailer rear lights.

We found a Vanagon badge from our stash of T3 Transporter parts. The vanagon badge is a bit exotic over here, because these are usually Transporters or Caravelles. Actually this car was sold as a "BUS", so it had a "BUS" badge at the rear.

The laws about modifying cars are quite strict in Finland, but so are laws about towing trailers. This combination looks very suspect...

In this pic you can also see the South Africa lower grille. Looks good!

The Race Taxi polished and waiting to go to the Car show. The paint started running in many places when the car was painted. The lighting in our garage isn't very good for painting, and it's even worse when painting light colors. Black is much easier to paint.

Hopefully this will be sorted soon when we get a painting booth near the garage.

The car got a taxi sign

2008-03-16T04:27:00.000-07:00

Seems like only two pictures have been taken the last couple days. We have been so busy making the car that we haven't had the time to photograph it.

We got the polycarbonate windows done, so it was time ton install the windshield. With one of our last cars we were really unfortunate, we tried to install the windshield three times, and kept breaking it (not the installers fault, the window frame was probably bent or something like that), so we weren't really looking forward to this job A windshield in good condition was a real find, or so we thought. When finally getting the windshield in place, we noticed that it read "Securit" on it... For safety reasons you can use only laminated windshields in racing, so I guess we'll have to find a new one.

The rear seats are installed, and at the moment we're making the interior at full speed.

The race taxi has to have a taxi sign. The sign is the same as the official taxi's use in Finland. Seems like near the airport, the finnish "taksi" text is often replaced by the international "taxi".

The paint has dried, time to work

2008-03-12T16:51:00.001-07:00

Oops, seems like I forgot to press the post button when I made the last update this sunday. It's corrected now, hopefully the frequent readers will enjoy a double dose of our car.

The paint had finally dried so se began finishing the car for the car show. Just one weeks left, yikes!

As front lights you just have to have darkened lights with angel eyes. The front is still waiting for the South African lower grille.

This picture was meant to show how low the car looks with the front spoiler installed. You can barely see the front spoiler when you look very closely...

The roof was painted black with a roller to get a vinyl look. You can also see the just installed polycarbonate windows.

Luxury model rear light trim combined with blackened rear lights. The "service" hole in the back is well covered up and there's a nice room for the licence plate between the lights.

Outside painted white

2008-03-09T12:38:00.000-07:00

This weekend was spent painting the exterior. We had to get the car painted to stay somehow

The front brakes installed. There isn't much room between the 17" wheel and the brakes.

We took the car outside when we cleaned the garage to prepare the paint room. We also cleaned the car and did the final sanding.

Damn it's low...

A pic from the inside. The first layer of black was painted earlier. The final layer will be painted once the exterior has dried. In this order it seemed easier to mask the surfaces we didn't want to paint. Also the roof will be painted black.

Car in the "paint room".

Painting in progress.

A picture from the rear left corner.

Exhaust, fuel system and engine wiring ready to go

2008-03-03T06:55:00.000-08:00

The car should be ready by 21th March, that's when the car has to go to American car show. So there's only a couple weeks to get the car ready.

A picture of the ready fuel collector tank. It's a smaller tank that comes between the fuel cell and the engine, reducing fuel starvation especially when the fuel level is low.

A closeup of beginning to make the exhaust tubing.

The same part as above, now with tubing extending to the turbocharger.

A picture of the fuel cell and collector tank.

The ready exhaust tube.

The location of the fuel pumps. We use two pumps to deliver fuel from the collector tank to the engine, and a smaller pump to deliver fuel from the fuel cell to the collector tank. The collector tank will be pressurized to 1bar.

The front brakes. Comparison of the old stock disc to the new T4 front disc.

The relays and fuses mounted.

The steering column lock is usually removed in race cars, so we had to find a good place for the startbutton and ignition switch. The six point safety belts made locating the switches a challenge, because you can't reach many of them when the belts are tightened. The fresh air system switch was mounted in the same spot as the startbutton. Blinkers and windshield wipers will be with the stock switches. The light and emergency flascher switches will be in stock locations and you won't need to and won't be able to reach them while driving.

The engine almost ready to start.

Rear brake adapter, exhaust and rear seat frame

2008-02-24T11:46:00.000-08:00

What happened this weekend:

The rear brake adapters from the mill, still needs a bit finishing.

The adapter and other rear brake parts being installed.

The disc with calipers on the car. And to the left a picture of the discrete exhaust tip location, no twin exhaust, sorry.

We spent some time thinking about what way to draw the exhaust tube. We chose the shortest way.

The exhaust without the side skirt. The tube is 3" inside diameter, can't wait to hear how it sounds!

The frame for the rear seats, under which the fuel cell will be located. The fuel cell is a temporary solution, because we didn't have the time to make our own tank that will be located between under the car on the right side. The current location for the fuel cell will need a refill hole on the outside. Luckily we can use the refill hole for the dry sump system when we have the time to make the modifications to the engine.

Update, It's been a while since last time

2008-02-21T01:03:00.000-08:00

It's been a bit slow on the bus front.
Two weeks ago I was four days in a optimumg seminar in Estonia, the subject was racecar vehicle dynamics and data acquisition. Feels like the more you find out about how suspensions work, the less you know. And last week I was sick. So I think it's time to become active again...

16th February was supposed to be the deadline for the car. We didn't make it. We were supposed to make the car driveable before the final target that is American Car Show (the biggest car show in the nordic countries, not just americans). We decided that it's not worth it to just try to get the car driveable. Building the car has progressed well. But the finishing of it, which we don't have time for, seems to take the most time.

Once in a while a pic of the whole car to the blog.

A picture of the enginebay. Just starting to make the wiring.

The upper mount for the front coil over.

We thought that this would be a nice spot for the fuse box. It's well hidden from outside, but still easy to access while driving. The dashboard will be kept as stock as possible, to keep some of the car's original identity.

The coolant lines are all connected and ready to go. The engine "just" needs a couple wires and fuel. The ECU doesn't really need much, if it gets + and - it's almost ready to go, so making the wiring for the engine isn't that a big job. But making a sense of the stock subaru wiring harness is difficult and time consuming, it looks quite intimidating when you pull it out from the donor car.

Some cool new parts

2008-02-01T15:52:00.001-08:00

I tried to think of something more cool than a half meter long carbon fiber gear shifter, but couldn't think of anything.

A picture of the parts. To the right is the carbon fiber tube, in the middle the aluminium thread insert that connects to the shifter knob and to the left a stainless insert that will be welded to the gear shifter joint. This will be glued together once I get the right angle to drill the hole into the stainless insert.

Everyone who has driven one of these know how enjoyable changing gears is, hopefully with these parts it can be done in style.

Another gear box, installing the rear coil overs

2008-02-01T04:28:00.000-08:00

The computer trouble has continued. I just broke another computer and the homepage ratataksi.com has been mostly down for over a week now because of the internet provider's server troubles.

RJES bell housing changed to another gear box that has a limited slip differential. We also cleaned and greased the other CV-joints that were luckily in good shape. I noticed that the stock drive shafts feel soft, so they will be monitored for twist.

The coil over installation at the rear. The lower mounting point is the stock shock mounting point and the upper point is relocated.

We had to make this special tool to remove the oil cooler. It's an 1/2 inch socket that has been lengthened with a piece of roll cage tubing.

Last Sunday another car joined the family.

New parts for engine and some computer trouble

2008-01-25T15:26:00.000-08:00

We got a couple parts for the engine. Mainly a oil filter relocation kit and a replacement for the intake silencer.

Lower in the picture is the part that replaces the intake silencer. The stock plastic box doesn't look like it has a purpose in the engine bay of a sporty transporter, so we had to get something different instead. It works with the stock intake tubing, it's just a bit shorter than the silencer.

The parts to relocate the oil filter and oil/water heat exhanger. These parts are probably made in china, but how can you complain with the price of 55 dollars and excellent quality? It has also mounting points for oil pressure and temperature, so these gauges will be very easy to install.

I really like the oil/water cooler in these subaru engines. Cooling the oil with the same water that cools the engine means that the faster heating water helps to heat the oil when the engine warms up. This makes the oil reach operating temperature quicker than normally. I'm still a bit worried how it will work in our use, because might be that the oil is kept too cool if it follows the water temperature, but I'm sure the japanese engineers have thought of this.

The broken water tubes were replaced and the engine mount is painted. Next up will be starting with the electricity of the car, which have been already almost planned.

On the internet side there has been some problems. The day before yesterday our service provider decided to block everyone's access to our homepage because the server it's on was attacked. This means that many of the people who tried to access our site yesterday or the day before can't (ever?) get in, me included. I'll wait over this weekend and send another email if they don't get it fixed. The traffic on the site is starting to get back to normal, but as long as I can't get in, probably someone can't get in either, which is a bit troublesome. So I refuse to send them my internet address so that they can fix only my problem.

The laptop I've been using for all this internet work also broke. Luckily I have everything backed up, but I still need to reinstall all the programs I've used on another computer.

Roll cage almost ready

2008-01-20T13:19:00.000-08:00

Work progressed quite nicely this weekend, despite some subaru parts buyers bothering us. Only two tubes of the roll cage need still to be done, plus the shoulder belt mountings of the middle seats.

The upper left point of the main rollbar. There is still one tube missing, so this should be a quite stiff spot.

Here's a picture of what we had to do to install the roof diagonals. One corner had to be hammered out so you could get it more easily into place. Before welding the corner is hammered back in.

A picture of the interior.
Mika brought the corolla in for some maintenance. So don't worry, the car on right isn't our next race car project.

A closer shot of the tubes in the slide door opening. We ended making a low cross structure. If it would have been made any higher, it would have made entrance even more difficult.

We also got the engine parts painted, and we just heard that the flanges for the exhaust manifold are ready. The springrates have also been calculated, so next week we should order new shocks and springs.

Cannibalizing the spare parts subaru

2008-01-17T00:06:00.001-08:00

We got the spare parts subaru from a company called Japan moottorituonti on monday, and took it apart. It was much work, but we didn't take much pictures. Here's the few we took.

The engine is off. We also got the wire harness and engine control unit, so we can easily get the car running with with stock parts.

The dismantled halfcut Subaru. There's still some spot parts to take off, eg. the pedals.

The no. 2 engine waiting for exhaust to be built. We also removed the parts to be painted from the first engine and prepared them for sand blasting.

Making of the roll cage continues pt. 2

2008-01-13T15:51:00.000-08:00

The continuous breaking of electric drills meant that we never got the time to drill the extra cooling holes in the front. Now we have three working drills, one of which is new, so it's much easier to make holes. Ofcourse we began using only the used one.

The front part of the car after adding the safety belt tube and door tubes.
We left about 50mm room between the lower door tube and the inner fender so the roll cage doesn't have to be modified when we sometime in the future decide to lower the car even more.

The cockpit roll cage is done except the roof diagonal.

Adding the other main rollbar. It was off 1cm to right, so we had to do some minor adjustment.

We put the dashboard on and made a several mock up versions for the roll cage tubing that will cover the side door. It's quite easy to get into the cockpit, but adding tube in front of the sliding door makes entry really difficult. We'll see what solution we will come up with, something has to be there, just in case.

The interior.

A picture from the side.

And from the front. It's starting to look like a race car.

I just remembered. We checked the year model of the car, it's a -81 that was originally a van when it was imported to Finland. The car has later been registered as a minibus (you have to pay a high amount of tax to do this), so there is a mark of that on the cars papers: "This car has been afterwards changed from van to passenger vehicle, and all taxes have been paid".

Making of the roll cage continues

2008-01-11T06:55:00.000-08:00

Making the roll cage continued the same way as previously. It feels like easy work and progresses quite quickly.

Both longitudinal roll bars welded and testfitting of the dashboard.

A view from the front, how the cage looks...

The tube in the legroom welded. This tube isn't mandatory, but we thought it would increase safety, so we added it just to be safe...

The roll cage at this stage viewed from the rear. The sad looks are because the project destroyed it's third electric drill...

The subaru engine mount from the front.

And from the rear. The mount still requires a few finishing touches and paint.

Roll cage tubing bent.

2008-01-08T03:19:00.001-08:00

All bends to the roll cage have been done.

The second main rollbar. We're going to have two of them, so every passenger is inside the roll cage.

Testing how the longitudinal rollbar fits the car after it was bent.

A picture from another angle.

The rear engine mount is ready

2008-01-06T03:19:00.000-08:00

I almost forgot this. Getting the Karmann ready meant that we had to move the race taxi from blocking the doorway. The only problem was that the car didn't have a engine mount for the subaru engine and we had measured the engine to be in mounting position. So we had to weld it quickly together to get the Karmann out.

A picture from the inside of the car, so you can see the shape of the engine mount.

And a picture from behind. The engine mount still has to be removed, welded from places that couldn't be reach at this moment, and finished. So the final part wont look like this. On the right side you have to go around the engine, because the cylinder pairs on a boxer engine aren't aligned, the other one is a couple cm more forwards, this means the engine mount had to be made asymmetric.

Starting to make the roll cage

2008-01-06T02:29:00.000-08:00

On wednesday we sent the tube order to another company, and it was told that they have the size we wanted in stock. So on friday I went there to get them.

We've been waiting to bend tubes for a month, so work progressed quite well.

We began by measuring the needed lenght and angles of the bends.

On friday the tubes were left outside filled with water, to make bending easier.

The rule book also states that: "The tubing must be bent by a cold working process".

Measuring and marking where to bend. We've been told that you should begin from the middle, so we did. You should also bend a bit too little, it's easier to get more angle to the bends, than take it off.

Not the first, but the second bend. This is the tightest bend. This is the tightest bend in our cage, we were just a little bit nervous... Notice the clothing has changed from the previous picture, it's starting to get a bit chilly outside.

A closer picture of the bend.

The ready main rollbar

The fit was a bit tight, so we had to press the rollbar a bit together when installing it. If you are way off, you should bend it a bit more, because if there is much stress in the tube, the heat when welding it will alter its shape.

The main rollbar is on.

We decided to bend the lateral rollbar inside, didn't work out. As soon as the metal warms enough that the ice looses it's grip, the bending doesn't work as well. We also realized that our first design isn't legal, as you can only have one bend going upwards. We had a small bend about 20cm upwards to make welding of the front point easier.

The new lateral rollbar. This is the trickiest tube to bend in our roll cage because it has two angles bent into different directions.

The main rollbar mounting foor and reinforcement plate. You have to secure each mount with bolts, and bolting them afterwards through the frame is a bit difficult, so we bolted them beforehands.

Ready main rollbar mount.

When the main rollbar was welded into it's position, it was time to cut the lateral rollbar into shape. We use a tube notcher to cut the tube into the right shape.

A picture of the junction. The tighter the fit, the easier it's to weld.

The main rollbar and lateral roll bar in position. They are barely visible from this angle.

Here you can see a bit of them...

Adjusting the fit of the lateral rollbar front mounting point.

The lateral rollbar follows the lines of the car quite well.

At this point all the hard work concerning the roll cage feel done. Bending the tubes and making the lateral roll bar got done. If they come out good, the rest of the roll cage is just straight tubes cut into the right lenght. Easy, right?

Found a new rust spot, preparing for paint and making rear engine mount

2008-01-02T05:35:00.000-08:00

Much was done this holiday, but preparing the car for paint doesn't feel like anything gets done because you really can't see the change.

We also ordered new tubes for the roll cage. Mika called the company that we ordered them from almost daily, and the last information we got was that the tubes would arrive on 25th November 2008! Feels like it's difficult to order small amounts of tube, and you get no service if you just want two or three. So we ordered them from another company.

Some of you found the pictures of the lathe scary, so its probably best to continue with pictures of something a bit more familiar.

The interior is ready for paint. The car has also been used for hauling stuff, so it's full of small dings and scratches. Because we will be showing the engine bay often, we wanted it to be painted well. Notice in the lower corner some filler that Mika just applied and Henrik sat on before it dried.

We found a new rust spot. From the surface it didn't look that bad, but after a closer inspection we had to make a new metal sheet for it.

Beginning to make the engine mount. The parts for it are ready and it needs just to be welded together.

The Ghia is almost ready, it just need a final clear coat before it can be pushed out from the garage so we get more space for the race taxi.

Parts for lower a-arm ready

2007-12-24T14:27:00.000-08:00

The parts for the a-arm got ready yesterday.

Thinking in hindsight, they would have probably been faster to make with a manual machine because even if it only takes 2-3min to make such parts, programming and setting up the machine takes so much time that it probably isn't worth it. It's good practise though...

The machine had enough power to get a tap this far before it got overloaded. This particular machine is designed for manufacturing of small parts, so it doesn't have much power for doing something "bigger".

Attach the workpiece, press the green button

Wait 2 minutes and 31 seconds and when the door opens up the ready part awaits. To the left of the spindle (the part that rotates) is the measuring arm for the tools, and to the right you can see one of the 12 tools that fit into the machine.

This machine is by it's real name a cnc turning center, it means that besides turning you can mill grooves and drill anywhere on the outside or front face.

I had to make the threads by hand because the cnc machine wasn't up to the task. Because I had the tap already set up, I made a 8mm deep thread with it to help to guide the tap straight when making it by hand.

Milling the "bolt head" manually. Width is 27mm, just like stock.

The first ready part.

Even when trying to make a race part the resulting part reminds me more of something from a tractor.
It still needs the mounting points on the chassis, the right length from the tube and then it needs to be welded together
The camera lens makes the tube look bent.

Machining parts for the front suspension

2007-12-22T12:04:00.000-08:00

I began making parts to adapt the front suspension for spherical bearings. The first part is for the lower a-arm longitudinal support. The part will be welded to a tube and the spherical bearing will be fastened into the other end.

The old compared to the new one. It still need the "bolt end" machined to it so it can be tightened.

Testfitting a new bodykit, painting some parts with primer

2007-12-18T00:27:00.000-08:00

We got a bodykit to make molds from, so we had to testfit it on our car. The bodykit makes the car look a bit more aggressive, and lower.

A picture from the rear

A picture from the front.

We also painted some of the stock bodykit parts with primer.

You can see from the background that the last couple weeks have been spent cleaning the garage. Now there is almost double the stuff there was before. I guess we will have to do another cleaning round this year. The results of the cleaning was about 12 100l garbage bags and one T3 full of metal junk.

The rear door and dashboard were also painted with primer. Also the ghia..

Fixing a part of the side skirt kit

2007-12-18T00:10:00.000-08:00

The side skirt kit we bought from german ebay had one part that was in two pieces (we knew this when we bought it). So we had to do some glass fibre work.

The stock side skirts and bumpers seem like molded glass fibre. The parts look exactly like plastic parts from the inside. This is probably the way glass firbre parts should look like if you manufacture them for a series production vehicle.

In two pieces. Where the work began.

I tightened the piece into shape, and then glued it together with polyester resin to get it to stay in shape. After that I turned the piece upside down and reinforced it with some glass fibre cloth and polyester resin from the inside. Sadly I don't have any pictures from the inside, but I'll still have to reinforce it a bit more, so I'll add the pictures to this thread.

First layer of filler on. I opened up the cracks a bit and filled them with carbon fibre filler. It is structural, and should hold up, but we'll see how it lasts in use.

A couple more layers of filler and a layer of base coat. The piece still needs a couple finishing touches.

Improving the stock suspension for track use, planning

2007-12-07T02:24:00.000-08:00

Because a wannabe sports car fills up the garage, we have some time for planning.

A red, soon to be black, Karmann Ghia.

Modifying the suspension for race track use seems a bit more difficult than we thought.
Pictures from beneath the car, from where you can see the problem spots.

The suspension bushings aren't aligned with each other. This is no problem in a stock car with elastic rubber bushings. But if you want to replace them with something stiffer to keep the wheels aligned under racing abuse, you will have problems.

A drawing of the front suspension point for the lower front a-arm to clarify what I meant. The front suspension point is far from ideal, it consists of two washers that tighten two rubber donuts on a steel plate, and this is all that limits longitudinal movement of the lower a-arm.

In the back the situation isn't as bad, but not very good either. The bolts are almost aligned with each other. If the bolts holding the rear suspension would be aligned, it would be easy to turn a couple metallic bushings to replace the stock ones. We do have some ideas to get it better.

Camber adjustment is also one thing that will be improved. We would like an adjustment that is easy and accurate to adjust even on the race track.

Disassembling the spare parts van, cleaning the cellar

2007-12-03T02:32:00.000-08:00

Sunday was spent disassembling the spare parts van and cleaning the cellar next to our garage. When we started disassembling the car Vilho showed up, with the front suspension in his mind.

Like the race taxi, we began with tipping the car over. We then took as spare parts the radiator, heater, shifter assembly and wiring.

The front suspension is coming off, with frame and everything.

You usually don't see the front suspension from this point of view.

The car after we were done. Ultra rare double sliding door version. The coloring is what the Finnish telephone company used at that time, a nice three tone paint job. The car also had a good windshield, so we took it as a spare for the race taxi. The vent grille at the upper rear corner was also taken, in case we want to make a claer style grille for engine intake.

Rest of the day was spent cleaning the cellar. There was still garbage bags, building material and insulation material from the time when the garage was built. I didn't take any pictures, because it looked really bad... It's a work still in progress, we only got through half of the stuff.

The race taxi had to go outside for a while. We'll have to paint a karmann ghia before it can go back in.

Bringing stuff to the garage, relocating the clutch slave sylinder, finishing the rear compartment

2007-11-29T06:24:00.001-08:00

In the beginning of this project I wondered why everything weighs so much...

Not anymore. The plastic engine cover has to cope with transporting lathe chucks from village to village, and I guess they have quite big lathes in Germany... While on the subject of lathes, we're getting a "new" lathe to our garage.

If we need to do some turning on under 40" rims, we should be able to do it in the future. The size and current drain of the machine were both estimates. We also brought some metal we saved from going to garbage.

We also relocated the clutch slave cylinder to a better position.

Lenghtened clutch actuation arm.

In "stock" form the slave cylinder is right next to the turbocharger that you can see on to the right.The previous slave cylinder didn't like being so close to the turbo. Well actually only the rubber seal melted, but the clutch pedal feel was a bit odd after accelerations.

We also finished the rear compartment. The holes will be covered by aluminium, but they will still haunt us if we won't do them well. At the same time we lost a bit more weight.

Now it's starting to look like it should.

Lovering the oil pan, testfitting the intercooler

2007-11-26T02:10:00.000-08:00

Lowering the oil pan, and at the same time wondering where to put the baffles. The oil pan was lowered ca. 50mm. The oil pan is longer to the rear to get a bit more displacement for oil.

Picture of what's inside.

Done, you can see the first spot for the drain plug.

Height compared to stock.

We also testfitted the intercooler, and in the process had to remove more metal from the cars body. The engine has been raised ca. 4cm compared to our previous project, so now the intercooler is even closer to the firewall. Cool air to the intercooler will be directed through the right side air channel. The intercooler will be moved forward, so we can put the air ducts in the firewall instead of the engine hatch. Intake air will be drawn through the left side air channel.

The shifter is also installed. Someone of the previous owners had of course adjusted the shifter wrong, so just reassembling it like it was when we got it didn't work. The reverse gear lock was in a wrong angle and bent a bit, so it took a while to wonder how it works and to get it like it should be. Luckily we have another car as a model.
After cleaning the parts the shifter all the friction is gone and the parts feel like new, I guess this has to be done on our other cars too...

Making the front brake adapters

2007-11-25T02:25:00.000-08:00

For a start we're using T4 VR6 parts for the brakes. The front brake discs will be ventilated and the rear discs will be solid. Legal and smart brakes seem to be hard to find for such a heavy vehicle, but we will continue our search and upgrade once we find some.

First I measured the needed measurements for a preliminary CAD model. Then I printed the model on paper, made final adjustments with a scissor to get the final shape right. The other way would have been to make CAD models of all parts, but it would have required so much more measuring and modeling that I thought making it this way was much faster. It took about 15 min to make the model.

At the same time I had to measure the weights of the parts. The spindle with hub and disc weighs 20,5 kg and the front caliper weighs 8,4 kg. And you still have to add the suspension arms and wheels to get the whole unsprung weight. We just have to remake the front suspension using lighter parts.

CAD model

CAM model. Toolpaths are visible in green.

Virtual machining, a friend took some pictures with his phone of the actual machining, I just haven't had the time to get them yet.

Finished part. About 11 min of machining time each.

Installing steering quickner, testing coil overs at rear

2007-11-22T10:04:00.000-08:00

The steering quickner arrived and we installed it right away. I'm not sure what the internals look like, but I'm guessing it has a planetary gear that makes the steering double as quick. This model is nice because it has the input and output aligned, so you can just put it somewhere in the steering column without changing the angles of the original joints, so it's quite easy to install.

You can guess that we joked about installing it the wrong way, making the car a handful to drive, so of course it was installed the wrong way at first. Before the steering was four revolutions from end to end, now it's only two (and in the middle it was eight).

The steering column was pressed to the coupler, and it will be also welded.

We had to make a hole in the cabin floor to make some room for the quickner.

A picture from beneath. The quickner was installed as close as possible to the frame to ensure an as rigid mount as possible. If you would have installed it more rearwards, the mounting would have been more complex.

And a picture of the floor after the mount is almost done.

We also tested the locost's coil overs on the rear, because we already happen to have them. We just had to test the stock mounting points, and of course it didn't fit.

At this height it is starting to look okay, sadly you can't really lower the front as much.

The coil over is almost in line with the trailing arm, not good.

There's still a bit room for bump.

Looking good. I guess we will have to think of something for next year to get the car really low. At the moment the car doesn't look normal compared to a stock height Multivan, because you can see over it.

Making panels and floors

2007-11-18T23:53:00.000-08:00

Not much progress during the weekend. We finally had to clean the garage, so most of our time went in to that.
We had to do something to pedals, as can be seen from photos,if you want to push clutch or brake pedal, you had to raise your foot quite a lot. So, plan is to shorten the pedals about 8cm to get them in the same level as the throttle pedal.

Test fitting the Multivan side skirts.

Aluminium panels for floor and front seat frame.

Extra space for middle seat passengers feets.

We also measured extension for clutch cylinder rod. Cylinder is too close to turbo so the heat burns the rubber parts. Plan is to move it about 15cm. to better clear the turbo.

Making mounting points for the front seats

2007-11-11T10:39:00.000-08:00

We didn't get the roll cage tubing for this weekend, so time was spent making mounting points for the front seats. We also tested the right seating positions for the car, and visibility forward is good even from the last (third) row of seats. The gap between the seats becomes smaller as you go rearwards, so the last two seats are as close to the center line as possible. The temptation to reduce seats is big, because with it we would lose so much weight. But we set 6 as our goal, and we will try to keep it that way.

The mounts for the front seats turned out great, and they will be the frame for the metal covering the front floor. The front seats will be mounted from the bottom with four bolts, and there will be approximately 10cm of length adjustment for the drivers seat. Height adjustment will be done with some kind of "cushion".

The mounting for front seats is starting to take shape. We used tubes that were left over from our locost. It became quite much lighter than the stock, and stiffer.

Hammering a lip to the sheet to make the plate stiffer, it's quite loose unless you stiffen it.

You can see from the pictures that I have trouble with white balance. It's really difficult to photograph a pure white car, you have to adjust the camera all the time and sometimes you forget to do it.

And a closeup of the lip...

Only finishing left! The panels that will cover the front floor will be removable to ensure easy access to the front suspension.

Penkkien sovittelua

2007-11-08T23:31:00.000-08:00

I took seats from our Porsche 914 and Urhon Ajot Bug and test fitted those to RaceTaxi

While i had the saw in use anyway, i continued to cut some more metal. I had to make little more leg room for the middle row.

Measuring roll cage tubes, first FEA analysed part

2007-11-08T12:25:00.000-08:00

We measured the lengths for the roll cage tubing. We need 12m of the thicker and 42m of the thinner tube. The weight will be approximately 90 kg, and that's the weight of one passenger.

Calculations of needed tube lengths. Some tubes missing from the picture, e.g. the tubes where the shoulder harnesses are going to be mounted.

First Fea analysed part, the mounting for the shoulder harness for the middle seats, seems to hold up well.
I thought that we wouldn't need to make Fea models and calculations for this car, but I guess I was wrong. No sense in guessing if safety related parts will hold up. The solution reminds me of something in a roller coaster.

We decided early on not to model the roll cage in a Fea program. Even though the roll cage in itself is easy to model, it's interaction with the car body is very difficult to model. So it's very complicated to get reliable results for improving the stiffness of the car.

Side skirts arrived, testing the aluminium floor

2007-11-08T00:32:00.000-08:00

The Multivan side skirts finally arrived. We ordered (or won) them through ebay.de and after a few delays, we finally got them. Soon we can begin the fibreglass work!

We also tested the front bumper with round headlights.

Reiska cut for us aluminium sheet for the floor. Now it's really nice to walk around in the passenger compartment.

Rest of the time was spent sanding. Feels like last two months that's all we've done...

Big bumper with round headlights. Doesn't look that bad. The VW factory never offered this combination.

Testing the fit of the aluminium floor. We had some doubts that 2mm would be thick enough, but it seems to be fine.

Side skirts and sanding...

Lightening, finishing the interior and testfitting the engine

2007-11-07T01:12:00.000-08:00

We took all unnecessary metal off the rear of the car, and the interior only needs a couple finishing touches before installing aluminium to cover up all the holes. We removed the beam from front that directs fresh air to the sides, on the left side we had to keep a bit of it, so the pedals and steering wheel would have the mounting point.

We test fitted the engine, and there isn't at least a need for more access holes... Without the rear valance, you don't really have to lift the car or the engine when installing it.

There is a big temptation to drive it. All we would need is a seat, battery, and some patent for to get fuel to the engine to get the car moving forward. This light it would probably be very fun to drive around with. This would mean a couple days of work, and sadly we cannot afford that, time is tight already.

The lower frame beams were also boxed.

The rest of the time was spent preparing the right side for painting.

The interior at it's worst (=most lightened) state.

Mika has just welded a piece of metal to keep the steering wheel and pedal mounting points stiff, because the beam from the fresh air system is removed.

Because of the removed rear valance, installing the engine is a one man job. Others can for example take pictures undisturbed.

The engine "installed". There was still 8,5 cm ground clearance under the engine, the minimum amount for a street legal car is 8 cm in Finland. The oil pan will be lowered to gain more ground clearance, as will the exhaust. We will also install a skid plate under the engine, to protect the oil pan.

Stock engine? Fits really well into the engine bay.

Checking the limit of bump travel for the front suspension

2007-11-04T14:47:00.000-08:00

We didn't really know how much you can lower the car before something binds in the front suspension, our guess was that the ball joints would be the first to limit the travel.

The information lying around on the net wasn't that helpful either, usual answer to our question was that with lowering of 80mm or more, the upper suspension arm hits the frame, limiting travel. According to a fellow builder, you can go over 100mm, and that then the front wheel hits the wheel well. So we couldn't find any real info.

About hitting the inner fender. We have experience of that when it happened to Mika with his Porsche on Ahvenisto's fastest corner (a Finnish race track). When a rear wheel hits the inner fender, it's like pulling the hand brake. Luckily nothing bad happened.

But back to the point, checking how low we can go:

Upper front suspension arm. The angle is quite bad, and it's close to hitting the inner fender. With the tires we're running the tire would be 3,5 cm above the fender.

The left side is at it's limit, and the right side is at our normal ride height. Only about 10cm makes the suspension look that wrong.

The steering rod is the first to bind, not the ball joints. You could modify the frame to get even lower. Also the suspension geometry limits lowering, even at the ride height we will be running at, we cannot get the camber values to the recommended stock. At this point we have no need to go lower, because it would take so much more effort. Maybe next year...

Pictures with new rims

2007-11-01T01:22:00.000-07:00

Mika just sent a couple pictures that were taken yesterday by email. Enjoy!

The car has been lowered Ca. 100mm.

Wrong spacers, they are too wide for these rims.

Brake caliper adapter

2007-10-31T23:30:00.000-07:00

I made my first cnc milled part, an adapter for T4 front brakes for our street car. It took about 6 hours to make it while learning to use all that there is to make such part from a cad model. I've milled some small pieces before, but nothing this complex and doing it independently still takes some practice.

I'm already comfortable using a cnc lathe, but the bill is so much more versatile and complex. I'll have to start milling every wee, so I won't forget the skills that I've learned.

The adapter looks horrible, compared to what it should. Luckily it's just a mock up piece. I didn't dare to make the thread (I'm sure something bad would have happened), so I made it by hand. That's why the part has some marks from clamping. The raw material I started with was just a bit too thin, there wasn't enough material to machine it smooth, this is why the surface looks dented.
I'll make it better next time...

It took about 9 minutes for the machine to make the part, so it doesn't take very long to make once you have made the code and set up the machine with the right tools.

A nice home studio. The edge of the A4 breaks the illusion in the upper edge.

Even when T4 brakes will fit with these parts to the RaceTaxi, we're not sure yet what brakes to use, so all suggestions are welcome. We have to use brakes from a car that weighs the same or more as ours, so there aren't many options available. We already had Cayenne brakes, but they required so much space that the rims you had to use made no sense.

Lightening, lowering and painting the left side

2007-10-27T14:35:00.000-07:00

After measuring the weight we were really motivated to work on the car, especially to lighten it even more.

First we removed the dash fresh air/heating system with hoses. The car has it's engine at the back, and the radiator and dash heater have their own hoses. So by eliminating the dash heater, we got rid of ca. 8 meters of hose.

Next we lowered the rear by removing the upper mounts for the rear springs. The upper mounts would just be excess weight when converting the rear to coil-overs.

When the rear was at the right height, we noticed that we didn't lower the front enough when the car was laying on it's side. So we had to of course also lower the front. Cutting the front springs was easy when the car was on it's side, but not anymore, so we decided to lighten the front floor and at the same time create access holes for the front springs.

The car is now at a decent height, both front and rear tires have about 5cm of room to travel, which should be enough for track use. We will still have to check the travel of the front suspension, probably the shocks are bottomed, and hopefully not the balljoints...

Rear end, springs and their upper mounting points removed. Resting on only the shock absorbers.

Lightening the front floor. The floor will be covered with aluminium.

A design flaw by the VW factory? When you lower enough the breather tanks interfer with the wheels.

The car lowered.

Left side painted.

Measuring the weight

2007-10-26T02:35:00.000-07:00

We finally got the race taxi on scales. We measured the weights of two Multivans at the same time, the other one being without an engine. The results were quite stunning, because we had no real idea what to expect.

Multivan 1, without engine, 1384kg (3051lbs).

Multivan 2, 2,1wbx, 1616kg (3562lbs), with 10 liters of gas.

Gear box, 51,5 kg (113lbs), without oil.

Subaru engine on engine stand, 172kg (379lbs). We assumed that the engine stand would weigh about the same as the exhaust, flywheel and other missing parts. The factory says it weighs 147kg (324lbs).

The Race Taxi, 759,5 kg (1675lbs)! Without windows, doors, engine, gear box etc.

The goal weight has been 1300kg (2866lbs), but when quickly counting together missing parts, 1100-1200kg (2425lbs-2645lbs) doesn't seem too impossible. Getting the weight to 1100kg would be great, then it would weigh approximately the same as Mika's Porsche! When thinking about the weight, and how much hasn't been lightened yet, even 1000kg doesn't seem impossible if you do something radical... Maybe next year.

Getting the weight this low motivated us to lighten even further, and the first thing we decided was to remove the stock fresh air and heater system from the front, and replace it with a Caravelle rear heater to get some heat when going ice racing. Some lightweight fresh air system will be fabricated, so we can get the car through the inspection.

Rest of the evening was spent sanding and preparing the car for painting, it gets closer each day that passes by.

Homepage

2007-10-23T13:48:00.000-07:00

We got our homepage running at http://www.ratataksi.com/

Please visit us and check out the photo gallery section, it has loads of additional photos not seen in the blog.

Beginning painting

2007-10-21T16:40:00.000-07:00

We testfitted the skirts and bumpers when it was light outside. The Project Zwo front bumper looks too skinny, it might fit well with the early rear bumper, but with the big bumper it just looks wrong. The current vision is to put the kin spoiler of the project zwo to a stock big bumpers.

The filling and sanding is starting to be on a good stage, so we started to partially paint the car. The temperature was +3 degrees C, so it was a quite good weather for painting. But the drying took ages... At this stage we painted the door openings, fenders, body seams and the interior around the window openings. The preliminary paint will be applied in our garage, and the surface will be sanded smooth. The final paint layer will be applied in a paint shop.

Testfitting the rear bumper and the rear grille. The final version of the grille will be narrowed to fit between the lights

The front bumper looks too small...

In Formation.

Right side, painting in progress.

Right side, trying to visualize what the widened fenders will look like.

Left side.

Preparing for paint continues

2007-10-20T23:40:00.000-07:00

The car is again a bit closer to being painted. The rest of the seams are glued and sanding and filling continues at a good pace

Smoothing the cleaned body seams is loads of work. We removed just two layers of paint, but to make it smooth we have to fill the equivalent amount to make it look good.

We also removed the rear valance old school style, to make engine changes and servicing more easy.

Sweet looking paint job, it looks almost cute. Lots of sanding left.

The gas cap.

The removed rear valance. It wont end up looking like this. The bumper will cover up the most, and we will make a grille to cover the hole between the rear lights.

Spare parts van

2007-10-18T23:34:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we got another T3 for spare parts. The car has good doors, windscreen and many body parts. I was really glad to get a spare windscreen.

We removed the doors and other small parts right away and then much time was spent cleaning up spaces to get proper storage space for them and other spare parts. We also transported the caravelle from ruining the scenery around the garage.

We got hold of big bumpers and side skirts for upcoming glass/carbon fibre work. The parts require some minor fixing before we can make molds from them, but nothing bad. We decided to remove the bumpers from the yellow caravelle, and skirts were bought from ebay. The stock glass fibre parts are really nicely made, especially the inside, they remind of injection mould plastic parts.

We also cleaned all the seams in the body, and all rust spots were sand blasted. The left side is also filled with body filler, like when the car left the factory.

We have ordered a domain for the homepage, and the pages will hopefully be up next week. The cars are also supposed to be weighed next week.

A nice looking combination, also comfortable when driving. The 2,1 wbx feels strong enough for this use, but it is highly stressed and fuel consumption is quite high.

The venting grill at the rear. They are just the right size so we can put them on the side behind the rear wheels to improve the air intake to the engine.

A picture of the filled seams. When taking this picture, they looked so awful, that I just had to focus on the wall of the garage.

Painting the doors

2007-10-11T01:03:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we sanded and painted the doors. We also washed the car.

I don't really have much to say about how we spent the the time yesterday, feels like not much was done... Painting is so time consuming. Everything has to be gone through, filled and sanded, and the parts also have to be clean. You have to be really careful when handling big parts like these, because if you ding or dent anything, you have to start over. Even making and cleaning the space where to paint takes so much time, not to mention cleaning the tools and space afterwards.

It feels like time spent is tripled when you remove a part for painting. Maybe it's because when you remove the part, you have to concentrate on something smaller, and that makes you cut less corners in the process.

We also got to loan a pressure washer, because we have loaned our own. Now the car is clean and ready to be taken inside if necessary.

Much time was also spent in the electrical problems on the other Multivan. The second oil pressure sensor is probably broken. When you get up to speed and revs rise over 2500 the oil pressure light starts blinking and a summer goes on. We tried to make some kind of quick fix so we could drive the car today without the summer on all the time and with the other oil pressure sensor still functional. We removed the wire going to the sensor that's broken and we also grounded the wire, neither made a difference! The simple solution was to remove the electrical connector going to the instrument panel... Today we'll have to change the sensor to see if that helps. Hopefully there is nothing wrong in the wiring of the car. Adding one wire elegantly to the car is a pain.

After the evening at the garage we went to see another T3 for spare parts. Our car will be a track car, and it will be driven hard. So we need all kinds of spare parts like suspension parts, drive shafts, gear boxes etc. in case something bends or breaks.

A picture of the Race Taxi when it was still bright outside.

Sanding and cleaning the door.

Mika painting.

Painted doors.

Painted and sanded side door.

A couple more night shots. Four T3's.

Wheel arches done, testfitting front bumper, lightening the doors

2007-10-07T23:18:00.000-07:00

The first front wheel arch was so difficult to widen, that we decided to widen the rest using our spare wheel arches. The rest three took less time than making the first one.

We also tried a Project Zwo front bumper, it fits surprisingly well.

We also tried to lighten the door by removing the side impact structure, but it still weighs as much when we started (I wouldn't recommend doing it in hindsight). The side impact structure looked heavy, but seems like all the weight comes from the front and rear double/triple metal boxings that are there to support the hinge and door lock, so we'll still have to try to lighten it with a hole saw.

The car was "driven" to the front of our garage, so now it will take much less time to get the tools to and from the car. We finally could take away the subaru that was taking the spot. It's a rare front wheel drive one, so we put it's gear box into storage to wait for a future mid-engine project.

The homepage is also almost ready, it just needs a few final touches so it can be published.

Left front wheel arch, the first one we widened and that's why we have the leftover piece for this corner. Here you can see the difference between the stock and widened.

Rear wheel arch, notice how much easier it looks after the first one we did. You only have to weld one seam, and don't have to fabricate a strip of sheet metal to fill the gap.

Right front wheel arch with primer on, the picture is before filling and sanding. You can also see the new gas cap hole. The new cap is a aluminium one and fits the racing theme of the car well. I'll have to take a picture with the cap on...

Project Zwo front bumper. We'll have to do some modifications to make it fit better, and fix the damage on the bumper. The car has to be lowered even more, but the bumper fits surprisingly well on the front.

Front door, when you remove the interior steel and side impact structure, you lose about one kilo, which is in a car with this high total weight about 0,1%! Not something that I would do again. Making a light door by other means than using a stock piece will consume so much time, that we will have to use the stock one as a basis... For now.

First wheelarch done, rustjob

2007-10-05T20:04:00.000-07:00

The first wheel arch is ready to be finished, the interior is almost ready for paint and we have also begun filling and sanding the exterior. All the cleaned body seams have to be filled to get the surface smooth, so there is a much work to be done. Luckily almost all places have been gone through, because when sanding the body, you seem to find new rust spots all the time. The surroundings of the gas cap are the only rust spots left, and fortunately we have a spare part for it.

Widened wheel arch

The surroundings of the gas cap, I just ripped out the old cap.

It becomes dark quite early, but it's not yet too cold to work outside

The rear is way too high...

Widening the wheelarch and welding rust spots

2007-09-29T07:50:00.000-07:00

Even when the car isn't supposed to be outside for long, we built a shelter for the car in case of autumn rains.

We also began widening the front wheel arches so we can fit wide wheels on the car. The same will also be done in the rear, but in the rear we also have to take into account the sliding side door that will interfere with the wider rear wheels.

Almost all rust spots are welded and we're also supposed to paint the car in the next few weeks. Looking good.

Seems like we will weigh the car after we have the car painted. We have to lend the scales to weigh the car, so getting them always takes effort.

Mika welding a repair piece on a rust spot.

The repaired rust spot and beginning to widen the wheel arch.

Widening the wheel arch.

Preparing for paint

2007-09-25T21:01:00.000-07:00

We got the roof and hard to reach places in the underbody painted, so we could put the car back on all four. Lightening the car and making the weightlist also continued

Walk through option -11.8kg (the car didn't come with this option, so we removed the inside wall)
Half of the front bumper internal 9.2kg
Side door without window and interior 23.0kg

The car is also almost ready for painting, and this weekend we are going to weigh the car, engine and transmission (the heavy parts that we couldn't weigh on a person scale). We are also going to weigh two other T3 buses, so we get a good idea of the baseline weight.

The interior looks quite spacious with the walk through option, reminds of a train.

The front bumper, made from ~2mm steel.

Testseat in!

The car looked silly when in stock height so we had to lower it just a bit

The Project begins

2007-09-17T06:59:00.000-07:00

The project started about a week ago by cleaning all the rust spots and doing the metal work. The interior and other parts that are in the way of repainting the car were removed. We also began lightening the car by removing the floor that will later be covered with aluminium. Measuring the weight of of the car's parts has also begun so we get an better idea where we should lighten the car and how much each part will be lightened.

The dash 7kg (only the dash panel, no instruments, adjustments or knobs on it)
Windscreen 15kg
Side windows 5kg each
Plastic engine cover 7kg
Rear door with window 25kg
Front door with window(s) and interior 27kg each

It's not hard to imagine anymore where the weight of the car comes from...

At the starting point

One of the few rust spots on the car, the car had rusted through in the middle of the side, and on both sides of the seam.

The lightened floor.

The under body from the other side.

Introduction

2007-09-12T05:01:00.000-07:00

We are building a bus for the Summer 2008 for race track use mainly in Finland. The basis for the car is a Volkswagen Transporter 80-92 (T3 or Vanagon, however you call them), the last of the rear wheel drive ones. We will do a turbocharged Subaru conversion, and modify the suspension and brakes to cope with track day abuse. The car will also be lightened and equipped with a FIA approved roll cage and six racing seats.

The car will be street legal, and getting the approvals for a bigger engine in Finland will be a part of this project. Getting the needed documentation for it has been a huge struggle this far, but failing isn't an option. Failing would mean that we would have to sell all the T3 VW's we've got this far, because who wants to drive one of these with a stock engine?

These are the design specifications that were decided when we decided to begin building this car. First year will be spent testing, making the car reliable and making it handle well, in the next years we will have time to go crazy modifying it.

Also check our previous projects: Bogeyracing Locost Yamaha R1 and Porsche 914 RS

	Design specs:
	Car:		VW Transporter T3
	Layout:		Rear engine, rear wheel drive
	Engine:		Subaru EJ20T, turbocharged, intercooled, wet sump oil system
	Gearbox:		2.1 liter 5 speed with limited slip differential RJES bell housing kit
	Suspension:		Independent front and rear suspension, coil overs in the front and the rear, adjustable sway bars
	Brakes:		Hydraulic, dual circuit, power assisted, ventilated discs front and rear
	Steering:		Power assisted rack and pinion, 2 times quicker than stock
	Length:		4570mm
	Width:		1920mm
	Height:		1900mm
	Weight:		<1300kg
	Other features:		FIA approved roll cage, 6 FIA approved seats (5 passengers), 6 point FIA safety harnesses, road legal

These were the design specs, and it will be fun to see how the real specifications turn out compared to the ones written before the build even started!

From right to left: Race Taxi, Henrik's 1990 Caravelle, Mika's Multivan and Mikas SuperBay.