good luck

 

Good luck on the project!! I have a 92 awd 4g colt in my garage currently almost finished up. Its a good friend of mine. I don't know if you post over on colt.org but its posted over there.

 

In for a promising outlook

 

No use in blasting it before all the fab work is done. I will be cleaned up before it is campaigned though. It looks worse than it actually is. The car has sat in the high desert for a number of years so there is just some light surface rust on some of the cagework.

I don't post over there but I'll check it out.



To everyone else thanks for the comments. Next step is to wait for my front uprights to get here and find some reasonably priced front lower control arms *hint*. The rear of the Evo arm is different from the Colt arm so i have a couple of brackets to put together. After the front suspension is completely Evo it will be time to get the engine/trans/x-case mounted.

 

A local buddy campaigned one in NASA rally about 10 years ago, wadded it, and hurt himself in the process. He had this one built identical to the first but never got back in the dirt and moved on to racing Bimmers on the tarmac.

He gifted it to me earlier this year with the promise that I'm going to run the **** out of it after I finish getting it together

 

I'll try to keep things updated over the next couple of months but at this time I'm just stockpiling parts. I'm moving into a new shop sometime in August so I need to keep it a roller until then.

My front Evo IX uprights showed up today. I'll get some pics of the refurb when I get the time. The rear uprights should be in sometime next week.

Next I need front lower control arms and a couple of engine mounts that didn't come with the rest of the drivetrain. I'll get the whole front end mocked up before I tackle the rear.

I'll be swapping the entire Evo rear subframe/suspension into the Colt. In the end the car should have the same track as an Evo but the wheelbase will be ~6" shorter. A little extra toe up front should keep it stable down the straights but I'm going to have to watch that I don't run enough to induce an uncorrectable amount of understeer. There will end up being a considerable amount of track time to tune everything.

 

I finally got moved in to the new place and settled to the point where I felt the need to start tearing into the project (plus people are waiting on parts that I promised would be coming off of it! )

First up on the list was to weigh the heap and then dive in to the first stages of weight reduction. You're probably wondering where I am going to cut weight out of an already empty shell right? Well let's start with the corner weights, total weight, and cross weights.

Up on the scales





Initial readings, 1256-57 lbs





After weight reduction there was a huge shift of corner weights because of how it settled



So what did I remove 57-58 lbs of?.... THIS









That's right! Rat turds and sand!

 

Time to go up on the stands



And here is how she sits now; with some other toys :P (a 125cc TAG/Rotax kart and the frame of an FSAE car that my roommate is rebuilding)

 

I was baffled you got 60 lbs out and I was thinking WTF could it be?? Didn't even occur to me lol...good luck!!

 

I was gonna say that looks like a FSAE car frame, that brings me back

 

keep the updates coming, you should direct Chris (rallyguy) to this thread

 

I've got him updated on an identical thread on the Colt forum and I keep in touch with him. I had to promise him I would do something cool with the car before I got it from him... that and clean all of the old Colt parts out of his garage and the side of his house

 

Well there is a first time for everything right? How about Evo IX LCA's on a Colt...

Stock Colt and Evo Side by Side



The Evo LCA is just a tad wider and uses a balljoint with a non-tapered stud that the upright clamps onto. In addition to saving a few pounds on each corner this setup gives me the proper track for the Evo halfshafts and allows the Evo upright to be a bolt on affair.



Right Side





I'll be fabricating a new bracket to secure the rear spherical bushing mount.





That's all for now... next will be the rear LCA mounts and modding the strut tower for my JIC's.

 

So I putzed around in the garage today and mock assembled the new rear end and worked on the front end a bit too. I made my templates for the new strut tower tops to fit the JIC Evo camber plates and then got antsy to see what the front would look like all put together... it's evil looking!

Here is the rear end all put together



One side so you can see all 4 links



Almost home



Oh how I needed this motivation



Looks like I'll need some flares after all





I'll also have to trim the fenders and the front bumper... 17's are big





Also note that there are no rotors behind that wheel right now so I expect the wheels to extend another 5/16" - 3/8" or so when I get the rotors on it.

The goal is to get it sitting on all 4 wheels with the engine in by Christmas. I can guarantee the front suspension and engine will be done by then but the rear looks like it will need a lot more modification than I had originally thought.