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Created by Martyn Locke

Since 07/08/02

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GTE 2.0E - History

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31/11/02

Today I picked up my second manta, a 1987 GTE 2 litre injection and it's black.

Although it wont pass its next MOT its not too bad, very rusty around the front subframe, rear sills and of course the sunroof and floor pan, but to my surprise there was no hole in the rear wheel arch where mine had one (which has been repaired). But not impossible to put back on the road, which I hope to do as I want to modify the 1.8 to run a 16valve astra engine in the near future.

11/12/02

A lot of the interior has been swapped into my Berlinetta such as the seats and door cards. So it's now almost ready for welding (just the engine to pull out).

Still pondering on the idea of having this as my everyday car once the work is done, but I've done so much work on the other one I don't know if it's worth all the trouble again.

13/01/03

Due to the appalling weather, not much has been done with either manta, but today I decided to jack up the GTE a do a bit of digging with the trusty angle grinder, to see just how far the rust has gone.

Almost the entire drivers side sill has now been cut out and a good chunk of wheel arch, Although a 400 kit would be an ideal cure for the arches, I don't have the time nor money to fit the rear arches. I can see this car taking up most of my days for quite a while - lucky I work nights really!

Oh, the joys of car restoration.

20/01/03

"This week, I ave been mostly" welding, Both sills are now repaired although I now need the end piece of the o/s side skirt (don't know what these bits are called) as I broke it taking it off. The drivers side floor has also been repaired.

The front bumper and wings have also been removed as a good place for rust is on the inner wings, underneath the factory "fitted" under seal  which tends to split and let in water, also the tops of these inner wings where the outer wings bolt onto is often rusty or in this case was rotten and crumbling away - more welding!

29/01/03

"We continue", both floor pans are now repaired, and the inner wings have also been extensively plated (with fuel lines removed), now I've started on the chassis rails and don't plan on removing the engine.

15/02/03

Passenger side of car has been completely finished, even the chassis rail has been repaired.

Most of the other side is almost complete as well, with only the chassis rail to do.

20/02/03

Chassis rail has been welded, It meant I had to disassemble some of the suspension but it was worth it.

Electric fan now fitted, but I've still gotta take the old mechanical one off.

02/3/03

Its all done! well almost, just the brake system to bleed and its on the road (it will be for the 5th of this month).

5/3/03

Although she passed her MOT, at first their was no hand brake effort on the o/s wheel, so a quick dash home and more adjusting (as I had fitted new shoes that morning) got her the years ticket.

10/3/03

Tow bar now fitted.

27/03/03

When I originally bought the car, it came with a roll cage, so I thought it about time I fitted the thing. A bit of heating and bending; and a coat of white paint, and it was in and bolted down (whether I'll get the back seat in is another story). 

5/4/03

Well its now a two seater as the bloody seats won't fit back in! anybody want a full set of coupe rear seat belts and the recaro (grey) rear seat? cos they ain't no good to me.

27/4/03

The stench of petrol upon getting into the car finally persuaded me to jack up the car and see what the problem was. Turns out that the return line has been dripping at quite a fast rate for about a week (probably lost about £10 in fuel!), so I had to use an off-cut of rubber pipe from when I replaced the entire front  fuel line.

30/7/03

We now have adjustable Spax shockers all round, exclusive (black) alloys and a nice sound system where the back seats used to be - two subs, two tweeters, two mid range speakers and just the one amplifier this time, all bolted to the usual custom made carpeted unit.

The lighting for the dials has now been "modified" with a very small neon tube positioned at the top of the unit (where the original lights usually are) which runs the length of the dials. This runs at 110volts so an inverter is needed to power it, Its a blue neon and it lights up the dials to such an extent that I'm considering changing it for a UV one I've got. Maybe a cheap way of getting under floor neon's ;) Only about 7 quid for the tube and inverter.

19/10/03

Not a lot has changed with this car apart from the very bad noises coming from under the bonnet, possibly a small end is wearing away as its rattling and ticking very loudly when the engines not under much load, usually just under 3k rpm. Also she's blowing smoke from a cold start, so there's also wear on the cylinders and/or a cracked oil ring.

So from the same i200 that the blitz seats came from, there's a nice new engine for mine. (the i200 engines came as standard with a high lift cam, solid lifters, re-mapped distributor and a few other bits) So I'm looking at around 136BHP now, sweet!

3/11/03

The engine (now painted blue/red & yellow) and gearbox from the i200 are in and its all running, but not without some earlier problems - I spent a day searching for a fault as the engine just wouldn't fire up, there was a spark and the injectors were all working correctly, turned out the ignition timing was out by 180 degrees! And there was a mysterious electrical fault which only seemed to present itself when the engine warmed up, as if it was running out of petrol, very dodgy, a brand new coil seems to of cured the problem.

24/3/04

Well due to a new job/life and being away from home and not being able to do a lot to either car, not a lot has happened to either car.

The GTE now has a "halfords special" full underfloor neon kit, in red; unfortunately there wasn't any room to mount the rear tube so that had to go in the boot. Hopefully try and figure something out to light up the rear end as it does need it.

I've also fitted the Sikura alarm system from the Berli, the small tweeters have also been swapped over and mounted on the underside of the dash.

Had to do a spot of welding as a front anti-roll bar mount had parted company with the chassis rail (rusted off), Out came the oxyacetylene again, It wont be coming off again! Not sure how long this had been loose, probably since putting the new engine in, as there was a bit of a knocking now'n again but I put it down to the exhaust which was a custom build which might of been hitting the body. Since it's been welded back there's been a major improvement in handling.

Took the GTE for it's MOT on Friday - Happened to look at the old certificate and noticed it ran out on the 4th! I rang up my local garage straight away and they said bring it round now, which was nice. Passed on the emissions which I was pleased about as she's burning a little oil but failed as the left front brakes weren't doing much and the right hand handbrake was none existent. And then there was the fog lamp which I'd taken off which had to go back on.

So I spent most of the weekend sorting that out - the rear just needed cleaning up and adjusting (a lot) and the front calliper had completely seized solid, so that meant taking it off and persuading it with the vice and then bleeding the brakes when I put it back. It's all good fun.

Fog lamp was a bit easier, had to put the switch back in the dash and bolt on the lamp to the bumper, instead of just the one though; I put 2 as it looks a lot better.

While I was fixing the brakes I decided that the Spax adjustables were crap and so put the originals back on.

21/4/04

Finally decided that the exhaust that I custom made my self had to go, the centre box was only 3 inches off the ground with nothing in the boot!

So I fitted the Jetex exhaust Id bought from a guy in Marham and although she's a lot quieter now (its has compared to a tractor) there seems to be a slight increase in performance. Next is a performance air-filter me thinks.

Also I'm moving the sound system as I'm putting the back seats back in soon so the subs will be mounted in the parcel shelf with a custom made box underneath for maximum bass.

The seats will also need modifying as the roll cage is in the way.

26/4/04

Now moved the subs to the parcel shelf, they're mounted on a fairly thick piece of aluminium which has been cut to the size of the original cardboard, carpeted in black and mounted on top of hard foam to avoid the sheet moving.

Seats had an encounter with the hacksaw and a sharp blade as they had to be cut to fit around the roll cage.

25/6/04

A very nice bloke from Leicester has provided me with another solid coupe roof and solid rear windows (both from an imported GSI which was scrapped), this means that both mantas can now be fitted with solid roof's when I can find someone willing to do it!!

The guy from Leicester's brother also had an i200 which is one of only 14 left in the UK now it seems.

I've now fitted the 400 style bonnet which was meant for the berlinetta but I have other plans for that bonnet.

19/7/04

Currently waiting for my local garage to get hold of a redtop engine so I can get it cleaned up and ready to go in during my 3 weeks off in august, My insurance company have proved very un-helpful regarding any sort of mods at all and have raped me because of my new postcode. However all is not lost until I reach 25 as Performance direct have quoted me a price for a 16v modification that is cheaper than what I'm paying now for a standard GTE!!! So 4 years of being insured with Direct line gets you no where it seems, forgot to ask PD about the supercharger mod though ; )

30/7/04

Still waiting for an engine to come my way, If it doesn't appear soon I'll have to get a complete Astra GTE and scrap it.

Bought a nice new Sony head unit, plays mp3's, 3 pre-out's, aux in, motorised front panel, remote control it's sweet.

5/8/04

Finally sorted out a nice 16 valve redtop engine, should be picking it up this Saturday and fitting it in a couple of weeks.

Also as the head unit's a Sony I can finally fit the Sony 10 disc autochanger I've had for ages but couldn't wire up to the Kenwwod - Cables on order (£40!) so that'll be on this weekend.

5/10/04

Had a bit of a disaster with a temporary air-filter I'd made (hang head in shame), to cut a long story short the engine sucked in the foam I'd used and somehow had damaged the air-flow meter, which made the engine run like a bag of sh*te as you couldn't rev it over about 2500, in fairness I did achieve approximately 450 miles to a tank of petrol but only cos I couldn't rev it!

14/10/04

Engine now running normally after I managed to get hold of another air-flow meter and also a shiny new K & N 57i kit - Very fast!!

But she's using more fuel now, but still not as much as the old CIH was, I'm getting around 350 miles to a tank which ain't bad as it does get thrashed.

20/10/04

Bought some very well made custom chrome panels from Clive (sales@customsolutions.me.uk) which are now fitted inside the engine bay and look amazing.

26/10/04

I've also made my own heater system using the original matrix and some of the plastic housing as well as two 80mm PC cooling fans.

31/12/04

Well, another year has passed and many jobs on the project/s have been completed, 2005 will bring more complex jobs as well as costly.

Since my last update not much has happened to the GTE, fitted some nice 15 inch MVK alloys a few weeks back in order to fit the big volvo 240 calipers on along with the big discs.

Today I'm undertaking some welding to the nearside rear sill, been meaning to get it done for ages as it had gone quite bad.