Gaunt596's Busted Nuts Rallyx Car Build

After drooling over all the cool performance builds on here (Looking at you Torspd), and with having a family backround in dirt track racing (My dad raced stock cars and Dirt late models, and i grew up building them with him) I got the go fast bug early, but never really had the chance to pick up a car to race until now. And, after attending one of the DC Regions rallycross events, and getting to ride in an absolutely balls to the wall Subaru Impreza, i went out and bought the rally car i could really afford, A rusted, dirty and neglected 1999 Chevrolet Cavalier Base Model, with a 2.2l GM 2200 Engine coupled to an Isuzu 5spd.

Here it is the day i brought it home:


It was in decent shape for what it is, the motor runs fine with no strange noises, the trans shifts into every gear and dosn't pop out of gear over bumps, and the clutch feels like it still has plenty of life left in it. The pain it trashed, but thats ok since it will be getting a rattle can special once i decide on a color scheme.

It did have a few things amiss when i bought it, mainly a rotted out passenger rocker

\

and it also appears to have an oil leak someplace up top, i just have to clean the engine off to figure out where its leaking at


Current plans are too get the car fixed up and ready for the July WDCR Rallycross event, since it consists of a test'n'tune day on friday, a drivers school on saturday, and the 5th race event on sunday.

This thing:


is the main source of inspiration for this build.

The car will be raced in the Stock Front Wheel Drive Class for now, so the plans are

• Fix oil leak
• Solid Face Rotors
• Bendix Ceramic pads
• Firestone winterforce tires in 195/65/15
• Sparco Mud Flaps
• UHMW Front Skid Plate
• Custom Catback Exhaust
• Custom Battery Tray
• Rattle Can Special Paint Job

Thats it for now, there will be more to come as I inevitable break things or find stuff that needs to be modded further, and eventually, move on to the Prepared and Modified classes

 

Also of note, this is my first Manual transmission car, i learned to drive in my taco, which as the 5spd auto. there may have been a tiny learning curve associated with learning a manual..... now to go back to icing my neck

 

This one two

 

Did some work on the car over the weekend, Cleaned all the junk out of it, and vacuumed probably 20 pounds of crap out of the carpet. also confirmed that the oil leak is from the valve cover gasket, so i ordered the rocker panels and a Fel-Pro gasket to fix that, also got the dent in the passenger fender hammered out.

Before hammerwork


And after Hammerwork

 

Fun project. A good friend that used to race on weekends told me the best brake mod he did was to direct the most amount of air to the brakes, using dryer ducting or whatever you can fit. Sounds ghetto, but he said it helped a lot.


Also, make sure the battery is secure.
Remove everything you can and still be legal. IE spare, back seat, carpet, headliner, stereo, AC, repair kit, etc.
Cutting weight really helps you drive quicker.

 

yeah, the stock battery hold down is just a crappy rubber clamp on the bottom, im thinking of bolting a marine box in the stock location to both protect the battery and keep it where it belongs. the Stock class for rallycross requires that i leave most of the interior in place, but the spare tire and all of the tools have been removed, along with the cover in the trunk. ill have to check again, but i might be able to do the brake duct thing

 

Marine/RV battery box would work, if you can't fit that maybe an easy battery disconnect at least.

 

yeah, im planning on a battery disconnect as well. biggest hiccup im finding right now is because the J-body platform is so outdated, aftermarket parts are not as readily available as they would be for say, a 99 Neon, which is probably the king of the Production 2wd rally cars

 

Valve cover gasket replaced, learned a few things along the way, mainly that whoever worked on this car before me is an idiot and that i didnt title this the "busted nuts" build for nothing.



new cover installed and a little oil on the seal for good luck

and then, when installing the cover, this happened



Snapped both a stud and a cover bolt, got SUPER lucky that they broke off with enough sticking out to extract it with a pair of vice grips. this is also when i realized the threads were all gummed up with loctite of some sort. also, my dad came out to look around this time and informed me that because i have an aluminum cylinder head, i would have had to chase the threads with a tap to get the bolts to seat right anyway.



No pics of the installed cover because it was 90*F out and i wanted to get the car buttoned up before i died. Also, the new oiled air filter showed up today, so hopefully i can find a minute to install that.

 

all of the suspension, belts, hoses, spark plugs, wires, and brake pads showed up today, along with some tacoma parts, my room looks like a parts store now

 

some progress on the car recently, my new work schedule makes it impossible to work on the car except for weekends. New suspension on all four corners, even after settling it sits 1-2" higher than before, that's nice. Plugs and wires are installed, and I've started patching up the rust holes, pop rivets ftmfw. Need to get the snow tires mounted and the new belt and radiator hoses in. I also tore my passenger cv boot, so I've got a new passenger cv going in as well, I'll probably rebuild the old one as a spare with a new boot. I might make Frostburg yet

 

Had a somewhat productive weekend, the rust is now 100% patched and dealt with, the new CV is in, along with new gear oil for the gearbox, and did an oil change.... both were much needed, the fluid coming out was pitch black and smelled terrible. got my snow tires mounted and found out one of my wheels is bent a little, but all be damned if the tire shop guys didn't go out of their way to make it run straight. also got my number panels in, its officially a rally car now

and now for the pics of the weekend

All up on stands ready to work


Rust repairs finished





Thats not supposed to do that.....


Blurry Suspension and brake porn



New Shoes


And a full side shot with number panels, also you can see the crazy amount of weight it took to get the bent wheel to run straight