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Alright AI, going to give this whole thing a go and finally start a project thread for my 1971 Opel GT. Got a long history with this car and since I think you gearheads will dig it I'll start at the beginning. It's 1986 and my dad is in the Marine Corps. His commanding officer tells him he's setting a bad example for his men by riding a "drat unsafe motorcycle" on base. Dad's solution? Purchase a tiny rear end German sports car and start driving that. The 'for sale' sign I found in the car from then lists it as a "good running classic" with an asking price of 2k. Less than a month later he passes away in a training accident. The car becomes sedentary in the garage where a 7 year old me falls in love with it. The car literally sets the bar for what I consider cool in an automobile at this formative age. All cars growing up are measured against this early lust. Some how at this point it is decided by my mom and eventual step-dad that the car shall be mine some day, and expenses will not be spared to keep it in wait till I can drive. After a move from CA to VA the car is still entirely garage bound. Around 1990/91 the Opel leaves the garage for the first time in years, to be parked on the road to make room for a garage sale. That very day it is plowed into while parked on the street. Left rear is gone, and the car should have been considered totaled. Yet not to deprive me of my dad's legacy the decision is made to transfer the car to a family farm in PA, where it can continue to wait for me. Fast forward to 2011. Life has never offered me the opportunity to retrieve the GT, and I've long since given up on ever seeing her again. I happen to be in PA visiting family when I make a half-hearted inquiry as to the fate of my old love. I was shocked to find out that the poor thing had been dug out of the collapsed shed it had spent the last 20 years in, and was now residing in my Grandma's barn:  Oh that doesn't look like a lost cause at all...  ffffuuuuuuuu...... Yep, sentimentality still has 'mental' in it. Que me spending more to ship the poor thing half way across the country than it would cost to buy a good running one. Simply because it's MY Opel GT damnit. (( Oh yes, this story has gone further, much much further. But for now we'll stop here.)) (edit: fixed images) Five-Ton Lady fucked around with this message at 05:37 on Aug 20, 2015 |
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Aug 20, 2015 05:20
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The pictures haven't even loaded yet and I'm already subscribing.
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Aug 20, 2015 05:23
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Enourmo posted:The pictures haven't even loaded yet and I'm already subscribing.  Really looking forward to reading more of this story.
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Aug 20, 2015 05:24
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Wait a tick.... "5-Ton-Lady"... green Opel... halfway across the country from PA... Oh boy. 
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Aug 20, 2015 06:13
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I feel like this is the 3rd or 4th GT on here, and I don't remember any of them being finished. Don't let me down OP!
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Aug 20, 2015 06:37
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Oh, poo poo. Oh,poo poo. I am so, so in.
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Aug 20, 2015 07:47
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((First off sorry about that image snafu, I swear it worked in preview. Shouldn't happen again. Also a much needed disclaimer: If you are hoping to see a museum class restoration, or hell even things done 'right' wrong thread. If you want to see a chick commit automotive necromancy because racecar, right thread.)) So the car is home, I wipe it down and begin the triage. It isn't pretty, Entropy has had 20 years of PA weather to bend this car over with, and that was on top of a the abuse it got before that. But still after all that, there's a solid seeming shell of a car with all her glass, most of her parts, and all my lust. She goes through several phases of shedding rust, dust, and rodent nests.   That's right folks, rust, nature's weight reduction. Did I mention this car weighed maybe 2000lbs when new? A few months after getting the car home I've already ordered some sheet metal  But lack of experience and utter terror of removing anything salvageable from the car stays my hand for nearly 3 years. Then this happens:  The bondo in that corner was well over a quarter inch thick. Seems this poor car had already been hit and survived one of 'those' repairs in the 70's/early 80's. So knowing I really can't do much worse a lot of slicing, hammering, and booger welding later we get this:  Up close it's bad, but hey it holds tail lights and isn't falling off any time soon. Around this point I finally am able to transfer the title to my name. Working on a car you have no idea if you'll ever legally own, not my idea of fun. Finally laying claim to the car you've been waiting two and a half decades for, priceless. 
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Aug 20, 2015 14:52
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I have been waiting forever for a thread about your car. You're doing good work here.
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Aug 20, 2015 16:01
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There's a disproportionate number of AI posters that have Opel GTs. That's a good thing.
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Aug 20, 2015 16:46
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EVERYWHERE 
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meatpimp posted:There's a disproportionate number of AI posters that have Opel GTs. That's a good thing. I wish I still had one. I think if you stripped all of the bondo out of the '73 my wife had for a few years, it would've looked worse than the pre-repair photos above. So many of these cars are bondo-filled messes because the front and rear are such a pain to properly fix.
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Aug 20, 2015 17:56
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((Kinda wanting to get to the good current stuff, as well as being surprised on how little actually got photographed through the early processes. I was wrenching dangit!)) Lets see, there was the thrilling adventure with rebuilding the POS Solex carb. Mostly just as a masochistic experiment to see if I could.  The butterflies were completely rusted shut, but I managed to force them open just enough to slip the discs out, hammer out the shafts, polish and untwist the shafts (made one look like a candycane twist), and despite all odds get the drat thing back together. Aside from an issue with the accelerator pump stumble at less than perfect running temp, that poor lump actually works as intended! The exhaust also suffered at the hands of Entropy pretty bad. While I'm all for a nice open exhaust note this thing was kind of removing all the oxygen from the cab:   And of course, the manifold had to get into the act with seized and snapped bolts:  Did I mention I'm still operating on no budget and every worry the car will crack in half and end this project? Because at this point I was. So the bodging continued:   Every little step however kept the car out of the junkyard, and a bit closer to actually running right.
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Aug 21, 2015 02:38
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Five-Ton Lady posted:If you want to see a chick commit automotive necromancy because racecar, right thread. I've been looking forward to reading about your GT for so long.
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Aug 21, 2015 12:33
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Holy poo poo, that looks pretty serious. Have you considered swapping in an Ecotec or something? Probably not gonna be much easier due to the space constraints but at least you'd get more power and reliability.
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Aug 21, 2015 12:55
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mobby_6kl posted:Holy poo poo, that looks pretty serious. Have you considered swapping in an Ecotec or something? Probably not gonna be much easier due to the space constraints but at least you'd get more power and reliability. The biggest issue is that there simply isn't that much room in the engine compartment. That hood bulge is absolutely necessary to fit the cam-in-head 1.9L, and it even has a special sloped valve cover to clear the hood in front. Fitting a DOHC engine is borderline impossible. Opel GTs are tiny. Even my Fiat Panda looked like a full-size SUV next to one. KozmoNaut fucked around with this message at 13:20 on Aug 21, 2015 |
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Aug 21, 2015 13:18
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Love Opel GT's! There's a 71 sitting in the alley behind my house. I made the owner an offer of $800 on it last year. He said he'd think about it, then two weeks later a tree fell over on it. It still sits there getting rustier and rustier.
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Aug 21, 2015 13:27
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Five-Ton Lady posted:Aside from an issue with the accelerator pump stumble at less than perfect running temp, that poor lump actually works as intended! So like absolute poo poo!  I never had to deal with the Solex nightmare on ours, a PO had wisely swapped it for a Weber 32/36. From what I've heard making the Solex actually work properly is approaching Biturbo levels of madness. And yes, these things are tiny. They have the proportions of a C3 in the footprint of a Civic. They don't even have a trunk because that's where the gas tank sits. The power brake booster is mounted on the front of the core support because there's no room on the firewall. Engine swaps are quite difficult between the super low hood and the wonky transverse leaf front suspension. The rotary is theoretically an awesome fit, but seeing as few rotary projects ever get finished there must be some bigger problems to address.
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Aug 21, 2015 15:21
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KozmoNaut posted:The biggest issue is that there simply isn't that much room in the engine compartment. That hood bulge is absolutely necessary to fit the cam-in-head 1.9L, and it even has a special sloped valve cover to clear the hood in front. Fitting a DOHC engine is borderline impossible. Indeed there is very little room under the hood, and what room there is happens to be very specialized. Opel did use the running gear from the Kadett, but they took the engine off the front cross member and shifted it back and down. Technically the car is mid-engined, with the powerplant sitting entirely behind the front axle line. Half the engine sits between the driver and passenger's feet. It would be awesome to shoehorn something else in there, but even without the cost issues I really wanted to get to know this little beastie as she was built long before doing any transplants. So far the hunk of iron she was born with keeps turning!
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Aug 21, 2015 15:45
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IOwnCalculus posted:... From what I've heard making the Solex actually work properly is approaching Biturbo levels of madness. 
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Aug 21, 2015 15:53
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For the comments on size, yeah the GT is wonderfully tiny. I am completely in love with the form-factor of this car. GT's squeeze between cones like you wouldn't freaking believe!
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Aug 21, 2015 15:59
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Gorson posted:Love Opel GT's! There's a 71 sitting in the alley behind my house. I made the owner an offer of $800 on it last year. He said he'd think about it, then two weeks later a tree fell over on it. It still sits there getting rustier and rustier.
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Aug 21, 2015 16:07
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Subscribed - Also - wheres the 5 ton? I miss seeing videos of doughnuts in the parking lot. Edit: vvvv I am pretty sure she has the 5 ton. BrokenKnucklez fucked around with this message at 22:03 on Aug 21, 2015 |
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Aug 21, 2015 21:23
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Wait, she's got a five-ton and an Opel GT? That hardly seems fair. It's like an embarrassment of riches.
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Aug 21, 2015 21:46
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BrokenKnucklez posted:Subscribed - Also - wheres the 5 ton? I miss seeing videos of doughnuts in the parking lot. 
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Aug 21, 2015 22:12
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Nice. Can you carry the Opel around in the truck? 
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Aug 21, 2015 22:16
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CroatianAlzheimers posted:Nice. Can you carry the Opel around in the truck? I certainly want to, it's just the small matter of lifting the Opel up about five feet to the bed of the truck.
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Aug 21, 2015 22:19
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If it's an M813, an Opel GT will fit in the back with 6 inches to spare. That thing is *rusty*. Kudos for getting it back on the road instead of crushing it.
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Aug 21, 2015 22:19
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David and Goliath right there.
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Aug 21, 2015 22:36
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CroatianAlzheimers posted:Wait, she's got a five-ton and an Opel GT? That hardly seems fair. It's like an embarrassment of riches. Have you guys not been paying attention to Doccer's thread or something? They're an automotive power couple, for sure.
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Aug 21, 2015 23:04
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Ooooh, so that's what her name refers to!
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Aug 21, 2015 23:08
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mobby_6kl posted:Ooooh, so that's what her name refers to! It's funny, in his thread when he was talking about their trucks, she was Opel Lady. Now, she's here posting about her Opel, as Five-Ton Lady.
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Aug 21, 2015 23:10
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kastein posted:That thing is *rusty*. Designed by Germans, stamped by the French, and not a hint of rust-treatment in sight. Yeah, they rust.
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Aug 21, 2015 23:37
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Raluek posted:It's funny, in his thread when he was talking about their trucks, she was Opel Lady. Now, she's here posting about her Opel, as Five-Ton Lady. Well, she did pick up the Opel before the 5 ton....
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Aug 22, 2015 00:04
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Doccers posted:Well, she did pick up the Opel before the 5 ton.... Indeed! It's just amusing in context.
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Aug 22, 2015 00:31
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Raluek posted:Have you guys not been paying attention to Doccer's thread or something? They're an automotive power couple, for sure. Oh, poo poo. I didn't put two-and-two together. No, I haven't been following Doccers' thread. I'm going to have to fix that right now.
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Aug 22, 2015 03:10
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CroatianAlzheimers posted:Oh, poo poo. I didn't put two-and-two together. No, I haven't been following Doccers' thread. I'm going to have to fix that right now. Yeeaaaah I'm a putz who let my thread fall off into archives. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3428752
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Aug 22, 2015 04:31
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Doccers posted:Yeeaaaah I'm a putz who let my thread fall off into archives. You're a good man, and thorough.
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Aug 22, 2015 04:39
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MonkeyNutz just got a Suzuki swift GT motor (1.3 DOHC 16v - rated 100hp) for his Opel, great little engines and put out a lot of power for the size, without a doubt worth the effort if you could find one. It must fit decently if he went through the trouble to get one.
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Aug 22, 2015 05:16
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Slugworth posted:'I have decided to accept our previously negotiated price of $800 dollars' Right? I was expecting him to call me after that and fully ready to smugly tell him to piss off. He was kind of a dick about the whole thing anyway. I feel bad for my neighbor because it is her brother's car parked on her property and she seemed excited that I was interested in it. It's a $200 parts car now, will never be sold or restored, and a 96 VW Golf with flat tires sits facing it now which I must assume is also his.
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Aug 22, 2015 11:29
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Would a 12A fit? pretty tiny and (at least down here) cheap as chips.
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Aug 22, 2015 11:53
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Heh, yeah you guys were calling me Opel Lady, but when I heard someone suggest Five Ton Lady in Doccer's thread I thought it more accurately represented my madness.  Engine swaps are certainly a consideration. I keep thinking a Hayabusa plant would be fun... Honestly though so long as the original keeps running I'm relatively happy with it. Fuel injection is high on the list of plans; as is a turbo to turn the low compression pistons into a bonus instead of a 20hp handicap. And heck I even know where I can get 2.4L later model Opel engines that supposedly drop in. For my current fetish however I already have as much power as I've been able to get traction for. More on that soon. One of the other hurdles getting the car on the road was the battery tray. GT's keep their batteries tucked way up in the nose, right over the belly pan that inevitably rusts out. Mine was no exception. There was already a sheet of plywood covering the hole and holding the battery before it spent two decades in a field. My solution was ugly, rushed, and thankfully perfectly functional.  I'd be more ashamed of the welds but given the space I had to work with I'm just glad it stuck. And yes that is a cookie sheet. Was at hand, and worked great. Picture is looking through the radiator mount, all that floor you can see left of the "battery tray" should be covered by bodywork. I consider it enhanced airflow. More recently I got really tired of the heater system blowing nothing but musty smells without airflow. Pretty sure what I would find I set out to remove the heater box. Which required removing the dash. I'm convinced the dash was never meant to be removed with the windshield in place, because they stuffed the screws all the way up at the junction of glass and dash at an axis pointed out the windshield. A phillips bit, two wobble socket extensions and black magic later I had all but one screw out. Dremel grinder on a flex shaft behind an irreplaceable sheet of glass? Why not. Dash finally removed I got the heater box out and found this:  You can take the car out of the woods, but getting the woods out of car, that takes work. I'd been finding nests like this from headlight buckets to tail lights. This mess in the heater was pretty much the last one to be cleaned out. I am happy to report that the vent system has actual airflow now and only vaguely smells of mouse turds.
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Aug 22, 2015 21:14
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