Jay A3 's 1.8T On-Going Build Thread

[Jay A3]

So.....

I've gone and gotten a 6 speed conversion done! Thanks to Benjamin for fitting it all. That lad still amazes me with his knowledge and mechanical skill.

6 speed box
Starter motor
Clutch pipe
Power steering pipe
Gear linkage
Drive shafts
I needed the cv joints nut type.
New LUK clutch
Flywheel
Release bearing

My setup was really old,, the speedo sensor and reverse lights needed upgrading.

Thoughts... Absolutely love it! My gears struggled to go in and when it did there was so much movement there. Now it's smooth, slots into gear and feels tight. Just getting used to the extra gear now.

Since fitting the brembo i used the old discs and pads. Not a good idea as the car/steering wheel wobbles so much when braking. I have just ordered new discs and pads to solve this.

323 Mtech discs
LCR brembo pads

The 5mm spacers I had on the front is not enough to clear the calipers. So I swapped the 15s from the rear to the front. When I travel between 70-80mph there is a small wobble from the wheels. I'm hoping it's only because the spacers aren't flush. New spacers on the way to fit same time at discs to see if that eliminates the wobbly.

 

[Prawn]

Nice one Jay!

6 speed is awesome isn't it?

 

[Jay A3]

Nice one Jay!

6 speed is awesome isn't it?

Absolutely love it! More so that the gear changes are tight with no play!!

 

[Mrharris2]

If you don't mind me asking where abouts are you I'd like the 6 speed as my 5 speed is exactly the same sloppy as a 60 year old stripper annnnyway I don't trust any if the garages near me as they are only into swapping original stuff back onto the car, do you know of any places or PEOPLE around the West Midlands that could do this for nice cash

 

[Jay A3]

I'm down in kent. Maybe dynodaze next door to rtech in Hinckley or try a3 lee on here? There are more but not had much work done up that way.

 

[Mrharris2]

Ah cheers for the reply dude can't trust @A3-Lee he takes forever to collect a steering rack let alone fit a 6 speed conversion Only playing lee

 

[Jay A3]

So the discs and pads that came with the brembos were horrible. Every time I broke there was so much vibration! So had to sort them out straight away

Heard some people say to try mtec so I found some with brembo pads



Fitted these and the brakes were fine along with new bearing and hub

Well so I thought... There was a massive grinding sound every time I moved from a complete stop. Couldn't for the life of me figure out why!

Took it to see the genius that is Ben and he knew straight away. The brakes were kicking in thinking I was wheel spinning. He Diagnosed it and it's either the new wheel hub ring is faulty or the abs sensor is as it was not picking up any readings. Will get it checked out this weekend hopefully...



On top of that I also have another fault. Parked up after a good half hour drive. Went indoors for 15mins and tried to start the car. No joy

All lights were on, but the engine just wouldn't turn over. Reesy scanned the motor and picked up the engine speed sensor. He had been through this himself so knew what the fox was.

New engine speed sensor / crankshaft angle sensor



Bosch: 494 44 0217
£50.34

Apparently over time when this gets too hot it can stop your car turning over. Will attempt this later and hope it fixes one problem.

 

[MIGGZ]

those are sexy discs mmmmmm

 

[Jay A3]

They seem to do the job!

 

[MIGGZ]

They seem to do the job!

o yeah it has a function to lol

 

[A3-Lee]

Ah cheers for the reply dude can't trust @A3-Lee he takes forever to collect a steering rack let alone fit a 6 speed conversion Only playing lee

Just noticed this you pleb I'm a busy guy lol

 

[superkarl]

Did you paint on top of the black coating they come with or just leave it? Mine have that coating but apparently don't protect the discs for long

 

[Jay A3]

Left them as they are Karl. Came all black coated

 

[Mrharris2]

Just noticed this you pleb I'm a busy guy lol

Took a while to notice lol

 

[Jay A3]

Problem solved!

The abs sensor was not picking up any readings. It was either the abs sensor being faulty (possibly the original one) or the new hub.

Had a look at the sensor and the gap was much greater compared to the driver side. (Working and untouched) the gap from the hub ring and the sensor on the driver side was no more than 0.5mm away. Whereas the passenger was at least 2-3mm. Which is probably why the sensor couldn't read anything.



Couldn't push the sensor any closer so decided to smash it out and replace. New sensor for £7 filed it down the edges and the washer to ensure it sat closer to the ring. Job done, took if for a test drive and all 4 wheel sensors reading correctly. No more horrendous brake grinding noise!

I thought it was worth a pic, never knew what the inside of the abs sensor looked like. All this compacted together!

 

[Jay A3]

Boring update...
Been looking for a 6speed gearknob and was set on the new s3 one until I came across this one.

From a brand new Cupra I believe

Used my existing gaitor and swapped it over



Car has been having its issues

Lack of power, over fueling, Misfiring. A new MAF has sorted this, but now I think I have a leak somewhere, exhaust tone has changed so will be investigating this later

 

[Jay A3]

So the issues now seemed to have gone. Issue with the sytec pump, so a new LCR Pierburg Fuel pump and new set of plugs fitted.
Car has been running like great! Power is back, no hesitations or mis-firing.

Been to the COV rolling road day at AMD not too long ago to see how the car was performing.

Rtech mapped it at 288bhp in 2014
AMD recorded 286bhp in 2014
AMD recorded 294 in 2015

The car seems to still be running strong. Not much planned for it at the moment, I have a front S3 bumper to go on at some point as i find there is more room behind it compared to the A3 one

 

[Jay A3]

So its been very quiet on the mods front... although this isn't classed as a mod since its a replacement of a broken part
Recently the bolt from the dog bone mount to the gearbox snapped, causing the engine to rock back and forth quite a lot which also cracked my downpipe and deformed its shape. The legend himself "Mr Parsons" did an awesome job welding it up so i could still use it but suggested replacing it sooner rather than later.

I was going to go for a miltek one but they were out of stock of the 1.8t's. I ended up buying the Pipewerx DP and Decat, my initial thoughts the quality is nice. welds aren't bad, I would probably like to add a few extra welds on the flanges. Can't wait to get it fitted now!

Hopefully the pictures have uploaded ok.

 

[Jay A3]

Changing the front end set up for better handling has been on the cards for a while but never top of the list. Driving my mates facelift A3 8L the difference in handling was night and day. So of late I have been looking to upgrade this. Hopefully I will be picking up the Hubs, steering rack and cast arms from a 2005 LCR. They are giving me the front arb and subframe too as its all together. Bonus!

I will clean them up and I intend to poly bush the arms.
Being the later LCR the front wishbone cast arm front bushes I believe are 45mm, I'm going to change the front wishbone rear bushes too along with the Tie rods and track rod ends. The bushes for the S3 arb are already polybushed.

Is there anything else I should look to replace / upgrade while the whole set up is out?

 

[superkarl]

Mk2 TT ball joints for some mad camber yo

 

[Jay A3]

How mad we talking here? Lol

 

[superkarl]

How mad we talking here? Lol

See prawns thread. Up to 3 degrees I think. Just nice to have that adjustment, you don't get much with the stock ones.

 

[Jay A3]

Maybe something I will look in the future, but probably better to try out the lcr ball joints before upgrading them.

So picked up the lcr setup 2005 and it had 82k on the clock. Quicker Steering rack, hubs, cast arms, front arb and subframe.





Got a delivery of parts today.

Ball joints
Tie rods
Track rod ends
Steering rack boots
Powerflex poly bushes


Can't wait to fit it all, will try and get the dp fitted while the subframe is off for more room.

 

[Gops]

Looking great mate! Sytec pumps seem to be failing as of recent!

 

[Jay A3]

Cheers gops. Yeh when the demand went up for that second batch something went wrong there. They don't hold up very well. Near the top end. The LCR pump seems to be doing to trick. If this fails I'm inclined to try the DW

 

[scotty_24]

So the discs and pads that came with the brembos were horrible. Every time I broke there was so much vibration! So had to sort them out straight away

Heard some people say to try mtec so I found some with brembo pads



Fitted these and the brakes were fine along with new bearing and hub

Well so I thought... There was a massive grinding sound every time I moved from a complete stop. Couldn't for the life of me figure out why!

Took it to see the genius that is Ben and he knew straight away. The brakes were kicking in thinking I was wheel spinning. He Diagnosed it and it's either the new wheel hub ring is faulty or the abs sensor is as it was not picking up any readings. Will get it checked out this weekend hopefully...



On top of that I also have another fault. Parked up after a good half hour drive. Went indoors for 15mins and tried to start the car. No joy

All lights were on, but the engine just wouldn't turn over. Reesy scanned the motor and picked up the engine speed sensor. He had been through this himself so knew what the fox was.

New engine speed sensor / crankshaft angle sensor



Bosch: 494 44 0217
£50.34

Apparently over time when this gets too hot it can stop your car turning over. Will attempt this later and hope it fixes one problem.

Are those disks backwards? They are \ and need to be /

 

[Jay A3]

They've since been changed round

 

[scotty_24]

Happy days! Ive managed to destroy a set of mtec at the ring ha ha they are warped to hell now. Im trying plain Mintex disks now. They are good for the price those mtec mind!

 

[Jay A3]

They ain't bad, but I definitely need to try out some new pads. Ds3000 I hear are the ones, but any good for fast road use and the occasional track day?

 

[scotty_24]

Ive got DS2500 and i find them ok, but DS3000 are meant to be the boys to have and are meant to be a different level according to prawn etc

 

[Jay A3]

Yeh few people have said that now, going to add them to the list of next things to buy and try!

 

[Westy]

I had that same issue with one of my wheel speed sensors. I'd fitted it myself and it wasn't quite seated correctly which meant at speeds under 10mph there was no reading from it and the ABS would pulse. In VCDS I could view live data of all 4 wheels and I could see one of the rears went blank under 10mph.

 

[Jay A3]

I had that same issue with one of my wheel speed sensors. I'd fitted it myself and it wasn't quite seated correctly which meant at speeds under 10mph there was no reading from it and the ABS would pulse. In VCDS I could view live data of all 4 wheels and I could see one of the rears went blank under 10mph.

Yeh my sensor just needed to sit in a little further and worked fine after that.

 

[Jay A3]

Since the subframe, arms, hubs etc are all coming off I will get the DP and decat fitted at the same time for ease. But I also can't stop looking a Kw v1 coilovers...

 

[Jay A3]

In the end I didn't stop looking at KWs....



Can't wait, with this and the lcr front end setup it should feel like a new car.

 

[Jay A3]

And to accompany these...
Just picked up a set of Team dynamics 1.2
17"x7.5J ET35.



Taking shape now

 

[g60leigh]

And to accompany these...
Just picked up a set of Team dynamics 1.2
17"x7.5J ET35.



Taking shape now

Good choice

 

[Jay A3]

Same ET Leigh? You running spacers? I'm hoping they clear the brembos but not poke out much

 

[g60leigh]

Yes I think so. No spacers on there at the minute and they just clear the brembos.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Jay A3]

Very close! They poke much or room for spacers?