Liam-Leon's S 1.6

[Liam-Leon]

I think it's finally time that I create my own thread based around my Leon

MODIFICATIONS TO DATE:

Pioneer CDR-120RR CD/MP3/USB Player
17" Cupra Starfish Alloys
40mm KW Lowering Springs
Bilstein B4 Shock Absorbers
Cupra Steering Wheel
Fabia Rear Wiper Conversion

FUTURE MODIFICATIONS

Golf MK4 Aero Wiper Arm Conversion?
HID/Xenon Conversion maybe

April 2012 - an introduction,

Well how shall I start? Between May 2010 April 2012 I was driving a 2002 1.6 Focus, and it was a great car. Despite it being high mileage (110k when I got it, sold it on 135k), it was a fantastic car and never let me down. However, I was offered this Leon at a great price and I couldn't turn it down. It's a very late 2002 Leon S 1.6 (BCB engine) and the car when purchased was totally standard (apart from a crappy Kenwood CD player that was present). It has 3 previous owners and the last being my step father, who I purchased it from back in April for £1500 (he had owned the car for roughly a year and paid £2700 for it back then ). It has some service history and when I acquired the car it was on 71K, since then and as of writing this post the car is now on 77K. I will detail all the work I have had done in the car with new posts as I go along.

These were taken about 2 weeks after acquiring the car:

Next update to follow...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

May 2012 - small minor update,

This consisted of replacing the crappy Kenwood CD Player that came with the car, god it was awful and glad to see the back of it! Anyway, I replaced it with this Pioneer CDR-120RR. Purchased online from Car Audio Centre for £83 delivered:

The sound was now totally transformed, what a major difference coming from the Kenwood thing! I mainly purchased this CD player because of it's USB connection functionality and because of how well it blends with the rest of the dash

Next update to follow...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

June 2012 - minor repair update,

No photos unfortunately again but here is my write up - the temperature gauge on my Leon started acting a bit tempermental, and kept moving from the 90c mark all the way down to 60c and then back to around 70c again or just simply wouldn't work at all. At the same time too, the car started to have trouble with starting during warm starts. The car would just turn over and turn over but would not fire up for a good couple of minutes, then after a couple of minutes the car would finally fire up but it would idle at around 500rpm's and the throttle peddle would be temporarily disabled for another couple of minutes before the car would then bounce back to a normal 700rpm ish idle and then the car would operate normally.

After researching on here, it would turn out to either be the control temperature sensor or the thermostat OR maybe even both. As I was looking for the cheapest fix available, I decided to take a gamble and purchase the CTS as they were only £5 off eBay. A couple of days later it arrived, and after having the easy job of removing the old one, I had the whole palava of coolant p*ssing out everywhere and loosing about 90% of it!

After cleaning the engine area up a bit and fitting the new sensor in the block and connecting it together, I replaced the coolant too and fired up the car - low and behold it started, idled perfectly, took it out for a 5 mile spin and I finally had a properly working temp gauge again!

Next update to follow...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

July 2012 - major repair update,

I got round to spending one warm Saturday doing the leaky door seals on the car. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos as I was concentrating too much on getting the job done properly, but if you read up on DubSteve's guide on here you get the idea Anyway, here is a write up from the day with how I got on:

"Finally got round to sorting the seals on my 1.6 this afternoon, all in all it took me nearly 5 hours from preparation to finish - longer than I expected lol. I spent a lot of time removing and scraping all of the old seal/sticky adhesive from the door carriers, and also gunk which has materialized from mixing with leaked water at the bottom of the doors.

The butyl tape was a bit of a pain in the arse too with how sticky it is and how much it can stretch, especially on a hot day like today (I wish I had placed it in the fridge overnight as mentioned on DubSteve's guide but I forgot ). The front doors I think were a success. The job for the fronts was near enough no trouble at all (apart from cleaning all of the old seal and the crap that it left on the carriers)

The rear doors, well... when I removed both door cards I was in for a surprise, it was obvious that one of the previous owners had tried/got someone else to try and sort them... and made a bit of a bodge with it. They had used a really tough black sealant that just did not seem to want to budge when trying to peel it off (this particular sealant had also deteriorated in the past as it was still leaking water at the bottom of the doors), this black horrible sealant though was just all over the place and felt like dry tar when trying to remove it off the door itself and also acted a bit like glue with how much it made the carrier stick to the door. I just managed to do the drivers rear side and using the butyl to seal it back up the best I can.

Finally got round to the last hurdle of the job, the rear passenger door. This one had also been bodged up with the horrible black sealant in the past but didn't look too bad, managed to remove all of the bolts holding the carrier in place... apart from one. The black sealant had got in the screw hole and was really holding the bolt in place, so much so... it sheared off when trying to undo it I couldn't even use my flat headed screw driver to break the seal between the carrier and the door because the black sealant acted like a glue. I decided in the end before I ended up doing some damage was just to use the butyl to seal the outer edge of the carrier carefully and hope for the best - just to add as well that I've noticed since owning my Leon that the rear passenger door never has leaked that much water compared to the other doors.

So, that was how I spent my Saturday afternoon and I really hope it pays off! We will see when it next rains."

Luckily since god knows how much rain we have had since July, all that work did pay off that day and no more leaking doors since

Next update to follow...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

Aug 2012 - major service update,

Had a mechanic friend of mine replace the timing belt, tensioner & water pump on the car in early Aug as to my knowledge and according to the service book, it had never been recorded as ever being done, and so one Saturday I got him to carry out the work. On the Sunday I got the car back he did the entire job without any problems but he did inform me that the timing belt had definitely been replaced at some point in the past as it wasn't OEM, but both the tensioner & waterpump were still the original parts so it was good to still get everything replaced and better being safe than sorry and £220 for parts & labour I wasn't complaining.

Another update from Aug 2012 - minor repair,

I noticed for a while that when playing music in the car, the sound from my side of the car wasn't very loud at all - and from what I could tell the lower/bass speaker on the door had at some point died in the past, so it was time to find a replacement from somewhere - eBay it is then. With having no luck with dedicated listings on eBay, I decided to search for breaking Leons on there and I emailed around 10 ebayers who were breaking some. Only about 4 of them replied, 2 of them said straight away that it was not possible for them to sell one to me (properly because the speaker themselves are a pain in the arse to remove as they are riveted onto the door carriers) anyway, one guy wanted £25 for the speaker delivered as he did state that they are a pain to get out and that one was off a Golf, but the one I dealed on and ordered was only £12 delivered and did come off another Leon.

The following weekend after recieving the speaker I cracked on with getting the old speaker off the car & replacing it with the new one, and also using a power drill to drill the old rivets out, position new speaker in place and position new rivets, then finally using a rivet gun to clamp them in place.

Connected the speaker up and finally, one working bass speaker again A word of warning though with fitting new rivets onto the speakers. The speaker frame itself is only plastic, and be careful when clamping in the rivets - and there is a 50/50 chance that you will crack the speaker hole edges - which unfortunately I did do with 2/4 holes but luckily it still did hold tightly in place.

Yet another minor update from Aug 2012 - minor repair,

Ever since having the Timing belt job carried out, I noticed over time that the temperature gauge started playing silly buggers again and eventually just completely stopped working, dead as a dodo This time I decided that it must be the thermostat, so I ordered a new one from the vwspares website and fitted it the following weekend (complete with the same palava of completely emptying the coolant again!) - after a 5 mile round trip drive and let the engine warm up, still no working temperature gauge aahhh!!

After a couple of weeks of pondering and reading, I had read that possibly the replacement CTS sensor that I ordered weeks previously could of prematurely died, or the newly purchased thermostat could be dead on arrival. As the CTS came with a 24 month warranty, I decided to email the ebay seller about the problem on the 28th and low and beyond they sent me another one out free of charge with no questions asked

So the following evening, I replaced the CTS sensor again for the second time (and having the palava of loosing coolant, yet again!!) Anyway, half an hour later after fitting the new sensor & replacing the coolant, I took the car for a good spin to warm up and I have a working temperature sensor once again yay!!

Next update to follow - WITH PICTURES!...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

Another update from Aug 2012 - major update!,

I had been keen on the idea of changing the wheels on my Leon since day 1, as quite frankly, I've always hated the standard 15" wheels! Just the look of them really let the car down in my opinion. So for a little while, I had looked at other members cars on here to see what they were driving on and which alloy sizes. After some consideration I finally decided to go for some 18" RS6 replicas.

After trawling through ebay and not having very much luck with finding a good condition used set, I decided to bite the bullet and purchase a brand new set from ebay. I got them for £430 delivered which I was fairly chuffed about. The next purchase would have to be the tyres and after some heavy research and on a slightly tight budget (£75 a corner) I took the plunge and purchased 4 Falken Ziex ZE912's in 225/40/18, I got these from Blackcircles. I did originally intend on getting them from Camskill but annoyingly, for some reason they temporarily took them off there website on the evening I came to order them so I had got them off blackcirles instead (for a couple of quid more per tyre mind). Then typical, 2 days later Camskill have them back up on their website again!

To the following weekend - Right, enough of my jabbering - here are some photos of the alloys & tyres when I recieved them & the car straight after having them fitted:

Absolutely love the wheels, and the suit the car really well. It did a bit of getting used to the slightly different ride as it was a bit higher and slightly more stiffer but the tyres do perform well and are quieter! As most of you will probably think and so did I, it is now in dire need of lowering!

Next MAJOR update to follow...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

Sept 2012 - major update!,

After much thinking for a while, I had my mind set on lowering the car - and especially now after fitting the alloys as it really had to be done! Originally as I was on a budget, I decided to take the plunge and purchase a JOB Blueline coilover kit for £170. However, after receiving them my mate managed to talk me into selling them to him because he desperately wanted them, convincing me that the ride for me will be really uncomfortable when using them and that to keep as much ride comfort as possible, it would be better for me to get a brand new set of upgraded shocks and a lowering spring kit. So I decided to sell the coilover kit to him.

After a few days of research on here and on google, I decided on some KW 40mm lowering springs from DPM Performance for £148 delivered and a brand new set of Bilstein B4 shocks from an eBay shop for £188 delivered (Sorry Damian @ DPM, this eBay shop were cheaper in this case ). Anyway, I finally recieved all the parts today! And after much excitement and eagerly waiting, I finally got them fitted this afternoon at my uncles garage, here are some photos:

Last photo of the car on the original suspension before being taken to bits:

Nearly 3 hours later, 2 of them hours being spent on the front and with the most time consuming part was removing the shock from the lower part of the strut because everything had nearly seized up & positioning the new shocks on the lower part of the struts and countless number of times hammering the damn thing in/out! and the rear shocks & springs only took literally only 25 mins each side to replace! After all that, here is the finishing result:

I am really over the moon with the result, the ride & handling has totally been transformed. I no longer really feel small the smallest of bumps anymore through the steering wheel/rest of the car like I did when I first had the new 18" alloys fitted and it's amazing how much quieter the road noise appears to be in general now! I'm really impressed with the handling too. I will post up another photo in a couple of weeks as well to show how the car looks after the suspension has properly settled in, as the mechanic stated that the front may lower a little bit more in time too.

Many thanks for bearing with me everyone Next minor update to follow....

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

Sept 2012 - minor cosmetic update,

This is just a minor update that is still in the works, for a little while I have decided that the original steering wheel in my Leon looks really dull and worn - and besides the original 15" wheels letting the car down, I think the steering wheel does too! I really like the look of the Cupra steering wheels and they really match the dash much better, so I decided to do some hunting on eBay over the weekend and last night I found one from another Cupra, complete with the airbag with 3 hours to go and no bits/starting bid at £19.99. I watched it until the last hour and decided to put a bid in.

Nervously counting down the last minute and the countless number of times of hitting F5 on the keyboard lol - the auction finally ended and I won it! £28.98 inc. shipping altogether! Dead chuffed! Now just can't wait to receive it, and hopefully I will by the weekend so I can fit it while taking photos as I go along.

Next update to follow soon...

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

Update regarding the Cupra Steering Wheel,

I received it this morning - and I'm glad to report that despite what the eBay seller said that there are a few marks here and there, but from what I can tell there are only 2 or 3 noticeable marks on the steering wheel and that's it, the overall condition of the steering wheel is excellent!

Photos to follow but once again Photobucket is down for maintenance aahh!!

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

Update - Cupra steering wheel!

Well as mentioned in my previous post, finally here are the photos (courtesy of ImageShack, as Photobucket still isn't working!)

Luckily also got to fit it this evening too, with thanks to my neighbor who by chance had the correct attachment that fitted onto the centre bolt to remove it

Looks miles better now - just how I pictured it be. Took it for a quick drive this evening and the horn works normally as it should (and no airbag warning lights) which I'm pleased about. It actually feels a bit like driving a new car now with this steering wheel lol!

Liam

 

[Brettyboy]

Looking good mate

Are you planning on colour coding the black strips on doors & bumpers ?

I reckon colour coding bottom of the bumpers make them look lower

 

[Liam-Leon]

Looking good mate

Are you planning on colour coding the black strips on doors & bumpers ?

I reckon colour coding bottom of the bumpers make them look lower

Hi mate,

Yeah that is something that I would like to do some time soon, when funds allow me to lol! I think I read up yesterday that you made an enquiry regarding this to another member or a parts specialist?

I've got only 1 worry about the steering wheel, coming to fit the new one on - I set it the wheel as straight as I could and placed it on carefully and I'm 99% certain that it's in the right dead on centre position. (it looks normal as even with the old wheel before, since changing the alloys it has knocked the steering alignment out every so slightly as I now have to position the wheel to the left a tiny bit, and after changing the steering wheel tonight I still have to position it slightly towards the left).

However, upon looking on here & googling - am I correct that with how the spline system works, there is one spline which is slightly bigger than the rest which is located dead on centre and the steering wheel can only fit in one way which is the correct way, and therefore the process of aligning the steering wheel correctly back on cannot go wrong? Or am I wrong and all the splines are the same size?

Thanks - Liam

 

[Brettyboy]

Have you had your tracking done since lowering ?

If not it needs doing after any suspension work

 

[Liam-Leon]

Have you had your tracking done since lowering ?

If not it needs doing after any suspension work

It was part of the plan that straight after having the work done that the mechanic was going to do the tracking but the work took longer than expected and by the time it was done it was closing time, though he said to come back in a few days when the new suspension has settled and he will check it over/adjust if needed so I'm going to pop over one day again next week.

Liam

 

[Brettyboy]

It was part of the plan that straight after having the work done that the mechanic was going to do the tracking but the work took longer than expected and by the time it was done it was closing time, though he said to come back in a few days when the new suspension has settled and he will check it over/adjust if needed so I'm going to pop over one day again next week.

Liam

When i lowered mine i drove it for a few days before getting tracking done,was out by quite a bit but i think it was out anyway

 

[Liam-Leon]

When i lowered mine i drove it for a few days before getting tracking done,was out by quite a bit but i think it was out anyway

Will definitely get mine checked next week, with mine the wheel has to be positioned about 3mm to left to go straight.

Brettyboy did you buy new centre caps for your RS6 alloys after you purchased them? As I'm looking for some but I have no idea which are the correct size ones I need! I've had a couple of sample ones arrive from Sere Motors today but they are all too small in diameter.

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

COSMETIC UPDATE

Recieved the brand new Fabia rear wiper conversion kit today Took me literally only 5 minutes to fit it haha, anyway here is the finishing result:

Liam

 

[Liam-Leon]

UPDATE ON RECENT DEVELOPMENTS

Due to unexpected redundancy that has very recently occurred, I've been forced to sell on the 18" RS6 wheels with the tyres and really need the funds... gutted doesn't even come to close as to how I'm feeling right now

However, by chance yesterday I came across a full set of 17" Starfish alloys complete with tyres (2 of which very nearly have full tread, the other 2 have around 5mm left) and I got them for an absolute bargain and I had to go all the way to Middlesborough to pick them up, what a long day it has been lol. I'm hoping to get them fitted tomorrow.

Will post a photo shortly.

Liam

 

[Brettyboy]

Sorry to hear that mate,i know how you feel as its happened to me a few times

 

[Liam-Leon]

Sorry to hear that mate,i know how you feel as its happened to me a few times

I've got someone already interested in them but he's waiting to see if he can get the money together. I'm not too certain on how much I should let them go for, I purchased the wheels & the tyres 2 weeks ago as you know and the tyres have only covered around 500 miles and all the wheels are still in as new condition (apart from one of the rears which unfortunately only just touched the kerb with last week, therefore there are 2 very minor 1cm scuff marks).

Got the wheels for £430 and the tyres for £280 brand new.

Liam