LostInSpace's RB 182 Cup

[LostInSpace]

I’ve owned the car since December 2018. After returning a company lease car, I wanted something fun for occasional commuting and weekends. Decided I wanted a Cup and found this very original RB Cup from @Mbeau just before Christmas 2018 with 76k miles. Only non-standard items were a Scorpion resonated cat back exhaust, Skoda front splitter and Ph1 style gear knob. The body work is OK, a few small marks and the originally fitted stripes have been removed. Everything works and the car has been completely reliable since purchase. I’ve just put fuel in and driven it in all conditions since then.

I’ve been permanently working from home since February and lockdown (no furlough for me) but stupid busy. Work has now calmed down, I had some time and holiday to use. As I’m not using the car much at present decided it was time for some TLC as unsurprisingly, 15 years of use has taken it’s toll.

• Front seat spacers removed – I’m 6’4” so a slight improvement, but need a better solution at some point in the future to properly lower the seating position and get some more support
• New footwell and boot mats
• Replace alloy pedals and rest, including wide accelerator pedal
• Service in November 2019 by the Clio Man (Gary Spooner). All fluids, filters and plugs service, fitted HEL braided brake lines & 19mm PMS rear ARB
• New Scorpion resonated centre exhaust section as the old one had several cracks around the muffler, welding would only be a temporary fix
• MOT passed December 2019, advisory for minor dent (compression) of rear hard brake line
• Fitted Brembo HC discs, Mintex 1144 front pads, March 2020
• Remove and clean drivers side door trims

Current mileage is 84,xxx

Earlier in the year whilst I had the wheels off for cleaning, I noticed the front springs had corrosion. I snapped up some lightly used Eibach Sportlines and also new Febi top mounts, the plan was to fit these over the August Bank holiday, along with giving the wheel arches a clean.

So, onto the planned August Bank holiday job to replace the springs and clean the arches.

Naturally, things didn’t go to plan.

Despite soaking the top mount nuts in penetrating fluid a couple of days earlier, the passenger side shock shaft split whilst counter holding. The rear shocks were mismatched - 1x Renault, 1x Boge and the rear chassis had some corrosion along the rails/seams and spring seats on the beam.

Queue scope creep….

 

[LostInSpace]

Decided to replace all the shock components with new parts and ordered new front and rear Cup shocks, spring hats, shock shaft protection sleeves (great service from @renaultpartsdirect ), Powerflex purple rear shock mounts and stainless ABS brackets off the bay. Ordered a a heap of drills in 1mm increments. A 30 minute job became 4 days until they arrived on Tuesday after the Bank Holiday.

With parts ordered, I set about removing the rest of the shocks. The offending mismatched Boge and general state of play.

Then onto cleaning. Front arches, well dirty and the dirt behind the plastic arch lines was packed in. The rears were in a similar state.

 

[LostInSpace]

Next up was the rear chassis rust treatment. The usual Bilt Hamber products were used.

The beam is generally in a poor state and the whole underside needs a good bit of TLC, so the aim was to treat the worst bits and get the car back on the road to enjoy the late summer weather.

Also treated a few rust spots on the front arches.

I wasn’t keen on repainting the treated chassis areas black, a search of the Interweb found a thread on Pistonheads recommending Buzzweld. I’ve ordered some of their WAR Underbody Rustproofing Superwax in Racing Blue. It's not a match with the lighter blue on the chassis, but still prefer it to black.

 

[LostInSpace]

Drills arrived on Tuesday after the Bank Holiday, but I had Tuesday and Wednesday off too

It's in there somewhere.... Messy job, managed to keep the metal contained. 15 mins of patiently drilling out the shock shaft in 1mm increments and the strut dropped free. It was late in the day, so a victory beer was had whilst tiding up.

Cleaning the arches is just a messy job and took all of Wednesday. Sprayed APC (2:1) left to soak 15 mins, then repeated, followed by scrubbing with hot, soapy water. Then rubbed Autoglym Intensive Tar Remover everywhere, left to soak for 15mins, then used sponges soaked in Tar remover and a plastic scrapper to avoid scratching the paint to remove every piece of tar in the arch, followed by a final wash with hot soapy water. Repeat on all arches and the plastic arch liners. The results were well worth the effort and I was well chuffed. And knackered! Plastic treated with Aerospace 303 as I've got lots of that spare, the wheel arches were treated with Dynax UC.