Polo G40 oddball

[4wheeledstool]

Bought this in September last year.

 

 

It was for sale for about 8 months for a hideous amount of money and perhaps unsurprisingly nobody had even been to view it before me. The ad bigged up its condition claiming "almost concourse" bodywork and that lots of money had been spent on it. It didn't have an MOT though as there was something wrong with the brakes. A drop in the price spurred me on to go take a look so a trailer was borrowed and I made my way to Croydon.

What greeted me was kinda what I expected - it looked good from a small distance but up close the paint was not at all "almost concourse" There were very few dents, the sills and arches were very good but the battery tray had been bodged with a steel sheet and fibreglass. Its common on these cars for the battery tray to rot out - its a ball ache to do properly but I was up for it. It had been resprayed cheaply at some point - nothing had been removed, just masked up so a decent paint job would be required too. I ummed and ahhed for a bit before a deal was done and I was on my way home with a new project

[gordonbennet]

Wow, always wanted one of these, ultimate Q car before small cars bloated and gained de rigeur styling tat, very pretty.

[derskine]

I have a Polo GT but I'd really like a G40.

Nice one, it's not too often you see a standard one.

[4wheeledstool]

Some pics before work commenced -

 

 

 

 

And the bodged battery tray -

 

[2MB]

T plate? What the fuck

[4wheeledstool]

To get it through the MOT it needed 4 tyres, a master cylinder and front flexy hoses - not bad considering it had sat for nearly 4 years.

Turns out that sitting around is what its done most in its 22 years of existence!

It was built in June 1992 and left the factory on the 17th. Exported to Malaysia it then sat around unused and unregistered for 6 years or so until it came to the UK where it had an SVA in February 1999. It was registered on March 1st 1999 then sold to its first owners on the 30th. They used it until some time in 2006 clocking up 53k miles then it was laid up - I reckon this was due to the battery tray collapsing because of corrosion. All that time in Malaysia was probably spent outdoors and the piss poor design of the battery tray means that unless the car is sat level the water can't drain out. The car was bought by the brother of the bloke I bought it from in 2010 - he did some work on it, got it MOT'd and then never used it. He then emigrated and left it with his brother - who didn't want it. So of its 22 years it only spent 6-7 of them on the road!

There were at least 3 cars that went for a holiday to Malaysia with mine - also on T plates - a green one and a black one, neither has such low mileage as this one. There may be one more but I've not seen or been made aware of it yet.

[4wheeledstool]

Drove it about for a while and really enjoyed it - much quieter and more refined than my modified one. (Not nearly as quick though!)

After a thousand miles the original back box split and this marked the start of fettling. Started by stripping out the interior to sort out the ruined batter tray - it was the only part of the car that needed any metal work.

 

 

 

The shitness

 

 

Bodge repair chiselled out.

 

 

Never seen one as bad as that before - must have been sat tilted passenger side down as the drainage hole is on the offside inner wing!

[4wheeledstool]

Moved it to my unit to get stuck in.

 

 

Bought a 1litre with a good battery tray to bum rape!

 

 

Gave it some grief.

 

 

And was left with this.

 

 

Started unpicking it to leave just the tray.

 

 

Finally left with this piece to go in the blue one.

 

[4wheeledstool]

What's left of the tray coming out - just the back wall to remove.

 

 

And welded in.

 

 

POR 15 and seam sealer and jobs a good 'un.

 

 

[dollywobbler]

Nice work. Interesting history. IIRC, Jet from the Gladiators owned a G40. How's that for a factoid?

[Pillock]

Wow! That's a lot of work.

 

I had a black one, J711KLY although it now wears Oirish plates after the chap who bought it off me exported it. Actually he met me at the airport, paid full asking and drove it home!

 

I loved mine, a bit of mild fettles (decat, stainless system, smoothed throttle body and a PSD charger rebuild) gave presumably 130hp-ish... Enough for BMW baiting and being silly. Handling was terrifying, as were the brakes. Beautiful noise though, especially at 6000rpm+ when it spits flames

[4wheeledstool]

Got on with super tedious stuff next - scraping all the rubbery stone chip and wax and shite off the inner wings and sills. All in really good nick.

 

 

 

Engine ready to vacate its home.

 

[Sigmund Fraud]

Great work so far... Those G40s are very rare nowadays, especially in standard form !

[4wheeledstool]

Bit more stripping down.

 

 

Battery tray and sills ground to metal and hit with POR15.

 

 

 

[4wheeledstool]

Inner wings were up next for the POR15 treatment.

 

 

[4wheeledstool]

Engine bay next - there was a few spots of surface rust here and there so the seam sealer had to come off. Oh joy!

 

 

 

 

Then more of the shiny grey stuff.

 

 

[4wheeledstool]

Bits of surface rust on the inside of the wings were ground back and treated.

 

 

Seam sealer was applied to the battery tray and engine bay.

 

 

[4wheeledstool]

Wow, always wanted one of these, ultimate Q car before small cars bloated and gained de rigeur styling tat, very pretty.

Cheers - been hooked on them since my first one in 2006!

[4wheeledstool]

I have a Polo GT but I'd really like a G40.Nice one, it's not too often you see a standard one.

Aye - not a lot left as VW intended!

[4wheeledstool]

Nice work. Interesting history. IIRC, Jet from the Gladiators owned a G40. How's that for a factoid?

Cool - wonder if there are any pics of her with it? (Boioioioing)

[4wheeledstool]

Wow! That's a lot of work.

I had a black one, J711KLY although it now wears Oirish plates after the chap who bought it off me exported it. Actually he met me at the airport, paid full asking and drove it home!

I loved mine, a bit of mild fettles (decat, stainless system, smoothed throttle body and a PSD charger rebuild) gave presumably 130hp-ish... Enough for BMW baiting and being silly. Handling was terrifying, as were the brakes. Beautiful noise though, especially at 6000rpm+ when it spits flames

Cheers! Its been finished a while now so I've forgotten the pain. You're right about the brakes - took a bit of getting used to as my other one has Golf mk2 16v brakes which actually work. Standard brakes are no better than the non servo ones in a mk2 polo!

[4wheeledstool]

Great work so far... Those G40s are very rare nowadays, especially in standard form !

Cheers - this one will remain totally boggo!

[Pillock]

Other things I remember are oil surge and the low pressure buzzer will scare the crap out of you when on a tight motorway exit slip, and and thrashing them from cold WILL shred the charger scrolls which isn't cheap.... Thankfully there's a bit of mesh to stop them doing a flying tour of the combustion chambers.

 

I regret selling mine, but I'm still alive so bonus. I was only 20-something when I got it so had a lot to learn about silly cars and driving quickly, safely. It remains the only car I've outrun the police in!

 

I remember reading about the T-reg ones being exported and reimported, looks like they've had a relatively easy life. Mine was a 1991, and in 2005 or so I was already chasing rust around...

[Partridge]

Christ! That really is a ball ache! You sir, have 1,000,000,000,000,000,000.7763 x more patience than me. 

[4wheeledstool]

Slam panel and headlight bracket done next - proper fiddly pain in the cock!

 

 

[4wheeledstool]

Started tarting up the undercarriage with black POR15.

 

 

 

Meanwhile, my main paint man was returning the engine bay to a state of blueness.

 

 

[4wheeledstool]

Inner wings and sills hit with stone chip.

 

 

Started to put stuff back in the engine bay now.

 

 

 

So now it rolls again - back to the paint booth (eventually)

[gordonbennet]

I'm loving this.

 

Uncontrollable trouser tent.

[4wheeledstool]

Brakes back on - complete with garish blue paint.(will be silver one day!)

 

 

Had a bit of a tidy up to start beautifying the engine and box.

 

 

One shite encrusted gearbox. Note the reduction gear for the speedo cable - fitted by the importer so that the factory fitted metric speedo reads in mph. That's right - the clock reads up to 240mph!

 

[4wheeledstool]

One shite encrusted supercharger - there was a receipt for a rebuild of this from 2010 given to me when I bought the car. Either its fake or the poor bloke got his hat nailed on! This has never been off the car let alone rebuilt!

 

 

Started stripping the lump for a freshen up.