Nick's Titanium 182

[Nick_Leeds]

Thought it was about time I made some effort to record the modifications I have done to date and future stuff planned. It started its life with me as a standard non cup 182. I've had the car for a few years now and the spec is as follows:

Mk1 Yozza Exhaust + Sleeved to Cat
Speedline 2118's
Michelin PE2's 195/50
172 Cup Shocks
Gear shifter from a Scenic with the Yanno kit and the Burpspeed linkage mod
Cup spolier
Steering wheel retrimmed by Royal Steering wheels
Rs Tuner 98 Ron Map
Skoda Fabia Splitter
Cup Washer Blanks
Front fog lights removed.

This is how the car looks at the minute (sorry for the duplication of the pictures from the media thread)

I'd like to get the car on track in the new year and the plan had been to cage it, Bimarco Futura's and harnesses but after looking into the Safety Devices cage group buy and getting some quotes on the fitting of a cage it looked to be beyond my limited budget!

A rethink was in order and I spotted some Recaro's on ebay that were local and well priced. They are out of an Evo 4 and are the Recaro 'Speed' seats the same design as the ones found in Honda Intergra/Civic Type R. The fabric of the middle section of the seat is so 90's it's offensive, but there from a car which production ran from 1996-1998 so I can't really complain and they look 100% better in the flesh than in picture in which they look, well, you can make your own mind up.

Here they are:

Good news is they are clean, the tilt and recline work perfectly all plastics/handles are present and the bolsters have been replaced on the drivers side and are only have slight wear on the passenger side. There is the expected wear on the alcantara but all in all they are in excellent condition seeing as they are 16 years old. Glad Mitsubishi spec'd decent fabric, they'd be in a skip if they had Renault spec fabric on them lol.

So plans now are:

• Recaro subframes from GSM or Capital which are quiet frankly obscenely expensive, but I can't weld or fabricate so I'll just have to be prepared to pay over the odds
• Try to tidy up the worst of the shiny alcantara
• Fit them next weekend.

I will get some more pictures of the shifter and steering wheel too.

If you got this far, thanks for reading! :smiley:

Nick

 

[JoeMarano]

Nice car. What size are the wheels? 15?

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Nice car. What size are the wheels? 15?

Yep 15's mate.

 

[Jammer]

Good stuff Nick - Those Recaros are funky!

 

[Simon_16v]

Looks nice mate, I'd love some 2118s!

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Good stuff Nick - Those Recaros are funky! :smile:

Yeah funky is about right, I'm thinking of getting the middle section re trimmed, but I'm going to to get them in the car first and see if they are keepers.

Looks nice mate, I'd love some 2118s!

Cheers Simon, they have transformed the look of the car. I really didn't get on with the standard wheels.

 

[Dan...]

Titanium > everything else

Car looks great, love the 2118's... And the seats!

 

[Simon_16v]

If you're free one weekend we should meet up at xscape? Be good to have a chat

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Mounts arrived a few weeks ago but forgot to update this, hopefully they will be fitted soon!

 

[JoeMarano]

Spray them mirrors and badges!

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Despite the lack of updates I have been slowly making some changes to the car here's a quick round up.

Between Christmas and New Year @dann2707 and his Dad helped me to fit the Recaros. The fitting went without too much drama but it took longer than I think myself or Dan anticipated, some additional trips to the motor factors for some bolts, slight modification to the slider mechanism and riveting on some bit of french nonsense I snapped off! Big thanks to Dan and his Dad.

Initially I thought they were a mistake, the seating position is great up top great support for my shoulders etc but 14 stone wasn't liking the narrow seat/bolsters. I also had to have the seat pushed all the way back meaning I was in a different post code to the steering wheel. It made for a even worse driving position than it had when it came out of the factory an achievement indeed seeing as it was garbage to start with.

Dan also was kind enough to drop by mine to help me fit the @NorthloopCup pedal one evening - repaid by homemade pizza of course.

Last weekend I fitted the Sabelt I got from @BIGASH

Unfortunately I messed up the steering angle sensor and had the ESP and ABS lights on so today I took it all apart and tried to sort it.


Made sure the steering angle sensor was in the right position this time round with the yellow indicator showing:

I also got a BG adjustable spacer to bring the wheel closer to me:

Some pics of the finished interior, I got some £20 mats from ebay as I couldn't bring myself to fork out £50 for the RS ones. True Yorkshireman.

With the wheel closer to me the seats have been transformed, dunno what it is but I feel much more connected to the car now. The Recaro base mounts could possibly be modified to reduce the seat height, something which I might look into but I'm very happy with it now as a package. One thing that is on the list is to bring the neutral position of the shifter back a little more.

The next thing will be for me to remove the middle section of the Recaro seats to dye them, it might not work but my Mum is quiet adept at upholstery so if it does I will ask her to re-trim them for me.

I have some Eibach and H&R spacers to go on soon also.

Comments welcome ta for looking!

 

[imprezaworks]

Looks fab.

 

[JoeMarano]

I need some new seats and possibly a wheel or im selling my 172. I've had enough of not being able to feel what the car is doing.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Looks fab.

Cheers mate

I need some new seats and possibly a wheel or im selling my 172. I've had enough of not being able to feel what the car is doing.

Do it, makes a massive difference. What seats were you thinking of?

 

[dann2707]

I wondered when you were going to update this

New wheel looks great and thanks for the reference, had fun and those pizzas were absolutely lush!!

Definitely need to go for a good drive soon

 

[JoeMarano]

probably sprint 5's or corbeau clubsports.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

I wondered when you were going to update this :tongueout:

New wheel looks great and thanks for the reference, had fun and those pizzas were absolutely lush!!

Definitely need to go for a good drive soon

Yeah lets get a date in.

 

[dann2707]

But we've only just had valentines day :kissingheart::kissingheart:

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Flol. Romantic meal for two it is then.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

After months of not having much time to spend on the car I pulled my finger out Sunday and had a look at trying to bring the gear shifter nearer to me:

Currently this is how the linkage looks at the gearbox end:

As you can see the male linkage end has already been shortened and pushed as far as possible into the long black linkage arm. Not the nearest job by whoever did it and it is now completely jammed together :rage:

This leaves neutral looking like this...

Which with the Recaro's all the way back leaves me reaching miles away for first and fifth which is fine for general driving but anything more involved it isn't up to the task.

I'd ideally like to have neutral here (where 4th is)

Which would leave 1st, 3rd and 5th level with where neutral currently sits (in the first pic of gear stick)

Plan is to cut the black linkage here:

Then cut some new grooves (shown roughly marked the second pic below) and refit the clamp and linkage arm ... Like this (bit in red will be cut):

Wonder if you chaps had any thoughts highlight any potential issues with the plan @Tony Hunter @Jay Payne , sorry to tag you out of the blue but you know about the original linkage mod so might have some thoughts.

Making the new grooves will be a pita under the car but doable, only other thing i can think of would be the shifters ability to go that far back for 2nd and 4th (towards the driver) but i'll check that before i start cutting! Any thoughts. @dann2707 ?

Apologies for the massive/blurry iphone photos.

 

[dann2707]

I think i'm with you it's kinda hard to get though, are the grooves so that you can squeeze them together to slide in the clamp? But aren't you going to have the original linkage stuck in there afterall that's your issues with it being stuck in?

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Yeah sort of the clamp will fit over the new section of linkage without cutting new groves but the grooves are to allow it to literally clamp the linkage as on the original.

Once the old seezed linkage is cut off i'll cut the grooves and use the male linkage end from another linkage kit ( that's the one shown in the clamp and on the bench).

@dann2707

 

[Tony Hunter]

I'm surprised that it's not further back than that, without having to go to all that trouble.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

@Tony Hunter yeah i know it might be that the linkage is from a scenic and is a little longer? Even though it looks like a faff it's easier than the other option of dropping the exhaust and removing the linkage from the shifter end (been there on stands and it is a PITA)

@MicKPM do you have any thoughts?

 

[Tony Hunter]

Ah, different shifter.
I think we only cut about 1/2 inch off, and it pulled the lever quite a way back.
I was having trouble with 3rd and 5th.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Right haven't updated this in ages and to be honest it'll just be a way of keeping a to do list somewhere were I won't lose it!

Changes since the last update - not in any order.
Scenic shifter replaced with ph1 stick with another yanoo - the linkage has been shortened
Got some proper Recaro seat covers
Replaced the track rod end
Got Mick at Diamond to fit a ph1 stalk so I have a horn and turn off the airbag and service lights.
Fitted DS2500's and HC discs.​

Immediate jobs that need doing over the next few weeks....

Lowered VBD mount for the drivers Recaro
Black Recaro stickers for the mounts
New discs and pads for the rear
New clutch cable
New gearbox selector bush 77 00 872 205 & circlip 82 00 328 305
Replace cat to manifold gasket
Replace broken/damaged door strips
Either Vibra engine mounts or Kangoo one with a Powerflex insert.
New Bosch wipers F&R
RS Mats
Rear plate light
Paint calipers silver
Sort out my cruise buttons as it currently looks like I'm trying to hot wire it!
Headlight restore
Clean it as it is absolutely fucked.​

Plans for summer:

RSR, R888 or NSR2's for the summer/track season
Safety Devices 1/2 Cage - just need to work out fitting costs to made it a viable option- if this can be done I'll run harnesses with the Recaros for the time being
RS2 possibly once the house buying is done as it'd be going on a credit card
Might get silencer fitted to the Yozza as without the seats in it does my head in as a daily
Some kind of ducting for the fog lights as they look a bit s**t with nothing in there at all
Fit black seat belts
Spacers - maybe - but if I do it'll be with a maps stud nut kit

 

[imprezaworks]

How did you find the scenic shifter nick

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Position was good, liked that it was higher. It's longer so without modification the throw is longer (downside). I had a yanoo fitted with it so it was nice and precise. The problem I have is a sit quiet far back and even with the linkage shortened I couldn't get it as far back as I would like- shortening the linkage further led to it fouling on the manifold so I kind of gave up and got a ph1 with a yanoo already fitted for cheap so put that in. Prefer the gear knob on the ph1 over the richbrook thing I had on the scenic shifter.

 

[imprezaworks]

Ah ok cool, thanks. I was interested in the scenic shifter but swaying more towards a pms. But down to cost/justification I'm not sure. The fact they have zero helps, lol.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Well I have a scenic + Yanoo sitting in a box in the loft if you fancy giving it a go? I'll dig it out and send you some pics and if you want it we could sort out a price. Let me know.

 

[imprezaworks]

Yeah ok mate thanks. Can you pm me a rough idea on price please

 

[dann2707]

Position was good, liked that it was higher. It's longer so without modification the throw is longer (downside). I had a yanoo fitted with it so it was nice and precise. The problem I have is a sit quiet far back and even with the linkage shortened I couldn't get it as far back as I would like- shortening the linkage further led to it fouling on the manifold so I kind of gave up and got a ph1 with a yanoo already fitted for cheap so put that in. Prefer the gear knob on the ph1 over the richbrook thing I had on the scenic shifter.

Mine did this so lengthened it again. I'm going to bend my gearstick in a vice at the pivot point this time to get it nice and far back.

Plans look great Nick, really can't wait to see it take shape. Car already looks the sex.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

Bit like the dc2 shifters @dann2707
@imprezaworks i'll pm you tomorrow night mate.

 

[imprezaworks]

Cheers Nick

 

[Nick_Leeds]

RS mats, rear brake light, wipers and cat fitting kit all purchased. Off to get the Recaro mount on Saturday hopefully.

 

[Nick_Leeds]

@dann2707 Do you know anywhere near us that would be able to weld the mounting plates for a cage? I'm not sure the level one 'intro to welding course' I'm going on will be sufficient 😂

 

[dann2707]

@dann2707 Do you know anywhere near us that would be able to weld the mounting plates for a cage? I'm not sure the level one 'intro to welding course' I'm going on will be sufficient 😂

@bashracing You have a welder don't you? Do you have the plates already?

 

[bashracing]

I do but my welding requires lots of grinding afterwards:smile:,
But I also have a friend who was one of the very best Tig welders in top end motorsport if you really want something special, like Really special!

 

[Nick_Leeds]

@bashracing You have a welder don't you? Do you have the plates already?

SD cage comes with a fitting kit; quote from Mark Fish....
Re fitting (Lal B3N), these are quite easy to fit all you need is to be able/get someone to weld the footplates to the floor, you can retain all the interior.
They come complete with all fittings (Andy93).

 

[Nick_Leeds]

I do but my welding requires lots of grinding afterwards:smile:,
But I also have a friend who was one of the very best Tig welders in top end motorsport if you really want something special, like Really special!

Just needs to be safe not particularly pretty, but do you think you could contact him to see what he'd charge for fitting the footplates in?