Silver phase 1 R21 Turbo

This car has been around a few owners lately but now resides with Craig who contacted me for some support. It was (supposedly) running but idling at 2500rpm for a few seconds then stalling out.

It arrived on a truck - battery flat, no clutch pedal, obviously hadnt run in quite a while. Brilliant. Cue the owner getting a somewhat angry phone call lol. I got it running anyway and got it around back, did not sound great. Expansion tank cracked...




Coolant was FILTHY with rust, TPS wires all shredded







Swapped it out for a spare pending repair and still wasnt right. Idle valve was brand new so obviously someone had tried to fix it before and failed. I took the ECU out and tested the idle valve wiring and it was OK, so I popped open the ECU and...





So I think whats happened is the old idle valve has gunked up and jammed, and thats burned out the control electronics.

Fitted a new ECU, and all of a sudden we had an idling car

Repaired the original TPS

Rinsed out the cooling system.

Over

and over

and over again






Then did the belts, and a bit of a clean up while I was there. Before



During



After - also fitted a good used tensioner, the bearings in the old one were worn.



Old PAS and Alt belt were not good.



Better - new expansion tank too



Plugs also done, engine oil and filter, gearbox oil, you know the drill.

Boot catch wasnt working, so fixed that, the rod had come off the handle. 5 mins to fix, but satisfying.

On to the brakes, front calipers were binding so sourced some new ones.



Discs and pads didnt have much wear at all so cleaned up and hopefully will go again









Bled up and all seems OK.

The rad fans were shagged, one was making noises so new fans ordered, then build a new fan loom with fuses and relays.







testing



Working OK

New thermostat and wired the fan switch in on the rad, then reassembled a load of bits.





Fan relays accessible but not in the way

Rear brakes cleaned up, not binding and not worn so just derusted.



Fuel filter changed out





New dipstick fitted as the hook was broken on the old one, red heatshrink to make it red again.

Heater blower wasnt working on any speed, its usually the thermal fuse in the resistor pack so I pulled that out and tested but it was OK (for a change). I mean, this isnt good because it means the issue will be infinitely harder to fix

Diagnosed the issue was in the slider switch somewhere so out came the middle dash assembly FFS



Stripped the slider assembly out then took it apart, BOTH the heat control and directional control mechanisms had broken clips and the power slider was toast.



Once cleaned it seemed OK and didnt need soldering or anything.



Cleaned the contactor too, on the slider.



I "fixed" the heat and direction controls with some small nut/bolts, it means you cant quite slide the controls fully to the right due to the angle of the cables but its better than not working and you cant get the clips any more!

Reassembled and working on all 3 speeds now. Looks easy in a thread but this was about 4 hours work! Ran the car to temp, fans cut in, heater hot, quite pleased but when I shut it off the coolant level rose to the top of the tank - looks like the tank cap is leaking so will need to sort that. Its not original so probably releasing pressure too early - should have an oe blue cap which is 23.6psi release pressure. Ill block the valve on this one until I find an original one.

Oh and found a tip under the ash tray