'85 Merkur XR4Ti Rally Car

In reply to Gaunt596 :

One of the main advantages to this platform is the ability to package 8"+ of wheel travel, I have to say it soaks up bumps a lot better than our old RX7 did.

In other news, Weir Performance keeps on not returning my emails/calls, which means I may not be able to buy premade parts to increase the "L" in my Supra LSD.  Which is fine, because it means I get to do my favorite sort of engineering- wandering around Tractor Supply's hardware section with a part in one hand and a pair of calipers in the other.

I've been thinking about parts availability- one of the first questions people typically ask about the car is "where the hell do you find parts for that?!" so here's what I can remember since I started working on this thing:

5 attempted purchases cancelled or failed to complete  
3 parts currently shipping from Ireland  
4 of those failed purchases replaced with crap of my own design  
7(?!) craigslist purchases  
more Amazon (20+), eBay (5+), and RockAuto (5+) purchases than I want to think about  

For the most part, stock parts have been easy to come by through the normal internet channels, aftermarket suspension parts have needed to come from the UK, aftermarket engine parts from the used market, and aftermarket drivetrain parts have been all but unobtainable.

Speaking of parts, there's currently a $100 Merkur for sale in a facebook group I'm in, if you need another parts car. It's in NC IIRC

In reply to Gaunt596 :

Thanks, you would not believe how many people have sent me links to that thing!  I'm good on stock parts for the moment, and am going to try to keep a "1 parts car at a time" rule and not purchase another until after my current one is fully parted out.

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

Haha, it dosent suprise me. Your one of the handful of people in the states that even has one, let alone one that's stage preped. And i understand there. Far too easy to fill up a space with spare parts.

In reply to Gaunt596 :

True- at Black River Stages in 2016, there were three teams running Merkurs including us.  Before the start we were all joking about how we were about to destroy like 1/4 of the running XR4Tis left in North America.

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

You could look at all the nice photos of the way Ford  reinforced them when they were still using steel ones...worked for them for Dubta Arsey...good enough for a bunch of 2nds in 87-88-89 against the all conquering Lancia Delta Intergrales.  
And Chris, those bushes in the strut tubes...first clean them good, scotch brite 'em then stick the insert in and wiggle and wriggle..There should be about .0015 to .003"..If they around there grease 'em up and assemble> If not you'll have to get them out--loads of fun---and dial bore gage the ID of the tube and I can look and see if there are any extras in the shop..Its simple SAE 660 bronze and we want a 002" to .0025" press so easy enough to make..chamfer the leading edge so it "goes under" and you don't just shave off the 002 that its over.

And forget the Ford 8.8 thing..Its much wider so that means shortening the axle shafts and a LOT of berkeleying around and as a "only 2 pinion" diff its not any stronger than the Supra diff----and its much harder than Supra to bump up the pre-load.. (You could shorten the axle shafts, then re-spline them and I can walk you thru modding the big ugly inner drive cups and probably you could do it but its a lotta work and I can't begin to imagine what advantage it would be, just a lotta cost)

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:

aftermarket drivetrain parts have been all but unobtainable.

Whatchoo having problems finding for drivetrain? gearbox ? propshaft stuff?  Yopu didn't need to make those adaptirs for the propshaft and halfshafts...Halfshaft adaptors are on the shelf, I even have raw ones for spassy boltcircles and the propshaft can be hooked up with a off the shelf flange yoke to a 1310 U-joint for under $45..

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:

The stupid threaded end on that one strut insert continues to be stuck.  I have ordered an impact driver.

Heat and PB Blaster..More heat..more PB blaster...That insert has been in there for more than 10 years now. More heat...propane, MAP gas or more...

And if you kill it a replacement rod is under $40 but only from Bilstein.
You think I deliver slow....hang on to your hat with them..

In reply to janvanvurpa :

John, remember when you told me you were shipping me a Supra diff adaptor + mount kit... over a year ago?  It never showed, and I never heard a thing from you indicating it had been shipped- so when I was ready to tear the car down again, I decided to make my own stuff.  

Other drivetrain parts I had trouble with- I tried to have two different places modify the stock Merkur 2 piece shaft, the first one got mad at me over how it was a Ford part and also metric (believed the two to be mutually exclusive), and the second place still has my driveshaft after many months of "measuring to get a quote."  That's why I'm using a single piece Mustang shaft with an adapter. 

Weir has been totally unresponsive about parts for the Supra diff, so I'll figure out shims/springs for the LSD and weld up the open one I have.  They're both 4.3 ratio so hopefully I'll be OK on gearing.  

I will do my best not to screw up the insert service, I think the impact driver after a week of PB soaking should do the trick.  

Where are you located? 

I have a 8.8 setup in mine, if you want to rip it apart and reverse engineer. 

In reply to Shawnb :

Eastern PA.  It's fine, I'm already part way through making the Supra differential mounts and have already finished the adaptors!  GPz11 is near Chicago, he's the one looking at an 8.8 conversion.

I'm really starting to feel like a bum, reading all that you're doing.

I think my winter rally car plan is something like:

1. rebuild the steering rack because it's leaking.

2. fix the fuel gauge because it doesn't really work.

3. ????

And chances are, I won't get either of those actually done! Goddam your motivation!

In reply to irish44j :

To be fair, if the only things wrong with my car were a leak and a faulty gauge, I'd have a hard time justifying spending all this time on it... what else happened to yours, a skid plate bolt fell out?  I feel like I need to do all of this stuff since I keep breaking everything.

New, regular volume oil pump installed so that the aux shaft will hopefully survive:  

I bolted the oil pan back on with a nice new gasket, for what will hopefully be the last time for the forseeable future. 

Seam welded and painted (poorly) the front subframe:  

Then on to the stubborn strut insert- get your best Jeremy Clarkson impression ready, because it's not gone well.  First I unpacked my brand new impact driver, clamped the strut housing in a vice, and got it nice and hot with the torch.  One whack with the impact driver and...  

berkeley, cracked an ear off the tip of the shaft.  OK, let's just grab what's left with some pliers and turn it...  

Doubleberkeley, I liked those pliers too.  Let's drill it a little:  

and hammer a hex key into it.  Hey!  It's turning, this might not be so bad after all...  

Tripleberkeley, now there's a hardened piece of steel in the middle of it.  Let's ruin all the drill bits... not working, buy better ones... found a spot near the edge I can drill.  Hammer a torx bit into that, heat the thing way up in the hopes that I can turn it the rest of the way with the new off center bit.  A few more turns and...  

Quadrupleberkeley, now there are two hardened pieces of steel in the end of it... but I can still get a socket on the outside of the few threads sticking up.  That turned until it was near flush with the end of the housing, which obviously pushed the socket off.  Quintupleberkeley.  Dremel a little slot, dremel where it's binding on the threads, and go at it with the impact driver...

No photo, I was too mad, but you guessed it- hexaberkeley!  The impact driver broke.  What followed was five hours of torch, dremel, and hammering the everloving crap out of the stupid broken impact driver, which had become basically just a punch with a big handle.  At about 1:30AM the stupid insert finally plopped out:  

The poor, poor impact driver.  Some springs came out of it at some point, and it's about and inch and a half shorter than it was when I started.  The thing on the left is the back, which used to be a dome shape, and the bit is on the right:  

I think the strut housing survived, though it will need to be retapped.  I'm not sure what my plan is for the insert yet, and I'm not happy with how I went about this.  I probably should have just endlessly torched and PB blastered the thing for several weeks until it would turn using a regular screwdriver, but here we are.  My hands hurt.

I'm amazed that the previous post made it 24 hours without any of you telling me what a dumbE36 M3 I am.  I'll assume those reading and posting have gone from "involved participants" to "stunned onlookers" 

Nah...  we're all sitting here nodding, "Yup. Been there..." 

I went 'well that sucks' un my head. Been there done that. I really hate stuck/broken/E36 M3 fasteners.

The good news is that I have found what seem to be a few viable options for repair/replacement.  There are a couple of people in the US who may stock the shaft, a guy who will replace it even if it takes machining from a blank ($!) and a potential (hasn't gotten back to me yet) source in the UK for WAY cheaper since rally isn't just some weird fringe crap there.

I would have walked away from that a dozen time and consumed gallons of coffee looking at it and cursing. This is why you get things done and I just talk about the possibility of doing them. 

It did make me laugh though.

I'm amazed you made it through def-con hexaberkely, and then finished what you set out to do.

I too would have walked away at about the tripleberkeley point to re-group mentally!

I actually tried to walk away from it for a little bit, around dinner time.  

S: "Are you going to eat dinner?"  

Me: "I ate some chips"  

S: "Are you going to eat real dinner?"  

Me: *stares at ceiling  

S: "Are you going to be able to think or talk about literally anything other than the strut thing?"  

Me: *stares at wall  

S: "I'm going to eat dinner, you should probably go do your thing"  

Me: *Attempts to pet dog instead of doing thing.  

Dog: *Accusatory look, knows I can't even focus enough to pet properly  

1 minute later, hammering sounds in garage resume

 I am also giggling like a little school girl reading this.  Being from the rusty Midwest, I am also familiar.  Other than the brake rotors that come off the hub in pieces, I once spent better than 10 hours getting the top through bolt that holds the upper 2 control arms to the front wheel hub on a B5 A4.  

Very cool project! I look forward to seeing more progress.

I really should take a page from your book on stuff like this, I've got a terrible habit of getting frustrated when I run into hangups, and not stepping back and thinking for a second.

I would call you a dumb E36 M3 but I'm not an assholio lol