Also bought 5L of noxious thinners (Xylene, Toluene etc) so that I can strip all the sound deadening remnants off the floor.

My enthusiasm for the car is rising again. It feels pretty fast. For comparison, the Astra GSi turbo has nigh on 200BHP, yet my 2.0 8v with 150BHP achieves virtually identical 1/4 mile (15.2s) and acceleration times. Which is nice.

Only on one thing mind you. One of the front tyres was worn just below the legal limit. So I went of down to Protyre and got a set of the new style Goodyear F1 tyres fitted on the rear and the rear wheels put on the front. One hour later and the MOT was over. I've never had such a good MOT. Which was nice.

I washed the car tonight and remembered why I'd had it resprayed. One wash and it looks really clean and shiny. It's still great to drive too - if feels so planted and controllable. Happy days.

Removed original dashboard brackets. Wired in warning LEDs properly. Sorted some surface rust in the spare wheel well.

On the meet I was very happy that I could match a Subaru Legacy and a Clio 172. They loved the stripped out interior too. Photos.

If I can find some lighter wheels then I might swap them over. I'm rather taken by the idea of Steel wheels.

Went round engine place. Picked up new block. The bill's come to around £700 so far! The next move is to build up the block with the new pistons and work out how much they need to be skimmed down to get the compression ratio down to 10.5:1. I love this.

Bought myself a proper engine stand.

Got to work on the new block. Degreased and jet washed the outside of it. Dried it all out. Fitted crank to block with old bearings. Took a while, especially since I fitted the thrust shell in the wrong place first time around, took me a while to work out that the Haynes manual was correct after all. Fitted no1 piston. As I had worked out from measurements, at TDC the piston did indeed stick out above the block by about 0.5mm. Need to do the sums now to work out how much piston to skim off to get the compression ratio down to 10.5:1.

Three bolts, two were a bit tight. "better be careful or I'll shear those off" I thought. How right I was."OK then, I can probably punch them out with a bit of time". Wrong.

So I had to remove the strut brace, air box, alternator, cam cover and cam belt. I couldn't get the remnants out of the housing so I drilled them out and tapped the holes. One of the holes was too large so I squashed the whole part to collapse the hole slightly. But I overdid it and caused a small crack in the metal on the flange. I also knackered the rubber seal that goes between the housing and the cylinder head. A major case of "when easy jobs go wrong".

I also tried to source a 2.0 8v bottom end and a 16v crank pulley. The block is so that  I can inspect the pistons and measure their position relative to the block deck.

I'm not happy with the condition of the cam sprocket anyway - it's Ally and a bit worn away on some of the teeth. So it looks like I'm fitting a new Steel pulley and getting it all timed up at some time in the future.

On the plus side, I did go out for a quick test drive and I can once again confirm that the lack of weight in the back makes the handling a lot nicer on wet roundabouts.

Cleaned up the new block with a wire brush on a drill. Then painted it with Black Hammerite.

Went out for a play in friends Senator 2.5 inline 6 automatic. Which was fun.

Bodged a fix on the thermostat housing with a nut.

Had a bit of a moment early in the morning - water level light was flashing so I stopped at a garage and took a look. The water level was low and I could hear water  boiling on the exhaust pipe. I found that one of the heater matrix pipes was leaking. So I tightened the Jubilee clip a bit more. That was the last of that problem. I think that the pressure had risen because the system had an air lock in it and that it had pushed water out of the weakest point in the system.

Mocked up some Steel wheels in Photoshop. Not so keen on the looks.

Removed a piston from my second 8v engine for comparison.

I've found the major rattle! It's the petrol tank. That will be sorted very soon.

• the brakes feel spongy, I need to bleed out the system
• there is an annoying rattle from the rear, I've worked out that this is the petrol tank
• the engine sometimes hits the lower strut brace, another new engine mount is needed
• a new rattle is coming from the engine though I haven't been able to locate the source
• the steering feels wrong, the car wanders and tramlines. It's the tracking, but I am going to fit a new quickrack too
• the interior is a right mess

I'll sort it all with time! Ordered a new engine mount. Also a ceramic heater which might replace the heater matrix.

Next move is to have the bottom end balanced. Wondering about a paddle clutch.

Ceramic heater arrived.

I've decided to go for a normal clutch, though it will have slightly stronger springs. The price of a paddle clutch was around £350, plus my totally standard one has survived 18 months of abuse without any trouble.

Moonlit trip to Wales. Awesome, this is exactly what this car is made for. Empty, twisty A and B roads. Very entertaining.

The speed camera photos had arrived. They show a very visually impressive shot of me overtaking a dawdler with a queue of 5 other cars behind. What a load of cack! So I would have been safer overtaking at 60.00000mph then?

I spent a lot of time in the queue at the 0-60 peeling rubber sound proofing out of the car. When I got home I donned a mask and set to with the Cellulose thinners. I completely cleaned out the passenger foot well and bulkhead. Very satisfying.

I spent three hours cleaning out the driver's foot well with the nasty thinners.

Rolling road day with MIG club. I was expecting 145BHP and 138 lb-ft. So I was pleased to make 144BHP and 142lb-ft. I think there's a few BHP that could be gained back from retiming the cam and/or fitting a new distributer cap. Maybe. Allowing for rolling road variations then that's about the same as last time. I'm well pleased, that's a 0-60 day and a rolling road day, both of which I just turned up to and ran.

I've been eyeing up seats. Since they're so hard to come by 2nd hand then I'm looking at new ones. The cheapest ones are around £90 each, but I think the £130 sort of area gives better seats. I'm also looking at roll cages. And having a new roof welded in so that I can lose the sunroof. These are all plans though - I'm not allowing myself to spend any money at the moment.

I've also been religiously sticking to the speed limits. On the motorway I maintain a steady 75 indicated. On 60 mph roads I do 62 indicated, when I overtake I don't exceed 66mph  indicated, even if this leaves me on the right hand side of the road for longer than I'd like. In 30 zones I do 32indicated, even if I have a long queue of frustrated drivers behind me.

Driving on the motorway has now become a different game. I aim to hold 75 indicated all of the time. This involves careful planning so that I don't get stuck behind anyone. After a while the absolute consistent speed starts to feel actually quite fast. It's satisfying in a slightly boring sort of way. The only major annoyance is people who don't hold steady speed. So they overtake me and then slow down so that I'm overtaking them. Or I gain on someone, but when I pull out to overtake they speed up.

To be honest, it's not all a bad way of driving. I get a smug sense of satisfaction from obeying the law to the letter. I don't suffer paranoia about being caught. I let other people speed past me in a huff, but laugh to myself about them being cannon fodder for the cameras.

I now get 35mpg out of the car all of the time, whereas before it'd be 22-27mpg.

Yesterday I was travelling through Neath and was bored almost to tears by a seemingly endless 30 zone. I think my approach paid off today in Bristol. I was travelling at 32 indicated with a car on my bumper being annoyed. I came to a steep hill and was using the handbrake to keep my speed below 32 indicated. I spotted a van at the bottom of the hill. I was sure there were Yellow police markings on the bottom of the tailgate. Sure enough, as I got closer I saw that it was a "road safety van".

As to the car behind me, he pulled past me in a huff at the next set of lights. Ignorant tosh hadn't even seen the van. Whatever way he reacted, not gaining any more points is the highest priority to me.

Having 9 points make me mind my own business much more effectively!

Last year I paid £650. This year the quote was for £692 + 34tax=£727.I told them about the 3 new points, bringing my total to 9 points. That took the total to £756. So 3 points made a £29 difference. Which is nice.

Now I'm sure that if I had 3 points then I could have got a much tastier quote, down in the £500-£600 area. But for a 9 pointer that's well good. So I've agreed to the direct debit and now I can get on with my life.

Then it was on to CCC magazine action day at Castle Combe. I got there about 11am. Bought ticket and got through briefing and then out on the track as soon as possible. After a long wait we finally got onto the track. First thing was to overtake a Golf off the pit lane. Which was nice. I had a pretty good time, but it was a bit of an acclimatisation session really. No major worries, though I got a bit carried away with looking in the mirrors which scared my passenger a bit when a Sierra span in front of us. For a moment I though I was going to have to choose the grass, but it all sorted itself out. A bit later I was once again studying the mirrors a bit too carefully and didn't knock off as much speed as I wanted for that big kink on the main straight. As a result I had to wing it round a bit faster than I had wanted. As I said at the time "I almost scared myself a bit there". We managed to lap a few cars on that session.

The front brake discs are a bit warped - they're Vaux ones. Back to ATE Turbo discs next time I think. The brakes still work. In fact, I had not qualms with the car really, it seemed to going well. Noticeably faster speeds than last year too.

In the afternoon it rained. Loads of cars were being pulled off the track, with delays every 10 minutes or so. After a cautious start on the wet surface, I gradually increased the speeds and then had a ball. The Goodybag F1s really are the tyre for wet surfaces. The car was very controllable on the throttle. There were no major scares though I did think I was going to spin it once on the major major corner by the pit lane. We lapped a fair few cars, had a few tussles and also overtook a supposed Skyline. It was being driven very slowly for a Skyline mind.

I managed a third session, though I did wonder if I was tempting fate. The rain seemed to discourage the idiots from coming out, and I'd say the on track behaviour was pretty good right up to the end. Once again we managed to lap some people, including a well slow kit car of some sort. As always, I had some very entertaining moments on the corners. Most satisfying was a new Astra of some sort. I caught it up and overtook. Then he cheekily overtook me on the entrance to quarry corner, but I turned in harder and faster and overtook him on the exit and straight. Never saw him again.

The wet sessions were loads more fun. Less speed was needed to slide the car around and a more cautious power application was needed to keep traction. Loads more fun. A lot of cars slid off causing delays on the track.

The car was noticeably quicker than last year.

Photos.

I gave someone a lift in the car today and they loved it! Really cheered me up that did. To top it off, I was coming up to a queue of traffic when the passenger in a van wound down his window and shouted out "love the car mate". Cheered me up a bit more.

Actually, I'm really happy with the car at the moment. It's as much fun  as ever to drive. A few niggles as usual, but the main core is entertainment.

10:00 am : got up

11:00 am : went down cafe for breakfast

12:30 pm : left Bristol for Gloucester

01:30 pm : B&Q to buy some Red Hammershite

01:50 pm : Homebase to buy some Red Hammershite

02:20 pm : Nipped round Majestic Wine Whorehouse for some bottles of Hobgoblin

03:00 pm : Get home and log on MIG forums.

04:00 pm : Quick look at Evo forums.

07:00 pm : Shove some washing in.

07:30 pm : Make some tea.

08:20 pm : First bottle of Hobgoblin.

Sunday:

11:00 am Go out mountain biking

7.00 pm Get home

9.00 pm Start painting

11:pm That'll do

I rinsed two hole cans into the arches and underneath. The nozzle blocked up. So I took it off. I ended up lying under the car in a pool of the stuff, spraying it everywhere, including in my face.

If you've ever managed to spray Waxoyl without covering yourself or the ground then please write to record breakers.

By now I was pretty perplexed. I'd spent five hours of struggle on the problem and nothing had made a difference. I was too tired to care really.

In the end I managed to get into a position where I could hit the metal and get the noise. I got a friend to sit in the car hitting it whilst I crawled underneath for a look. I could hear the noise loud as ever. But I couldn't see anything rattling around. I moved the handbrake cables, held onto the exhaust, shone a torch around. Still no clue. I moved round to the other side and crawled under again. I wondered if the sound was related to the rear anti roll bar. I touched the anti roll bar and the sound stopped. Let go and it started again. Or so it seemed. So I tried again and it seemed to make a difference. Bingo! The anti roll bar seemed a bit loose.

I jacked the car up again and took a proper look. Sure enough, at one end the anti roll bar had about 2mm of play. The car must have been like this all the time I'd owned it. Because of the loose fit, the anti roll bar can't have been doing it's job. Half an hour spent tidying up the thread and doing the bolt up really tight sorted the problem. Pictures.

A test drive confirmed that I'd solved it. Bliss.

Also fitted new distributer cap and rotor arm. As normal, a noticeable difference in low rpm pull.

Fitted a new Quickrack, sent down by Steve Heley, owner of a brilliant, hardly driven now, MK2 Astra.

Had a go with some chequerplate for the floor. Big thanks to Glevum Sheet Steel.

I then washed and polished the car, took it out for a quick test {very happy} and finally sorted the steering wheel alignment, finishing at about 11.00pm.

After a long looking, but not too bad queue, we finally got out there. I was very happy with the car - since sorting the rear anti roll bar and adding the 16v bar, the rear end is very ready to slide out, but it does so in a very stable and confidence inspiring manner. I was very happy with the on-track performance. The car felt tidy and it didn't even feel like I was abusing it too much. The brakes were OK ish. Didn't warp or fade much, but just lacked a bit of bite in my opinion.

After that I just had to get back out there. After a quick cool off (me and the car) I rejoined the queue. Mig member Lukedoggdog was coming out as passenger this time. Things were similar to the first outing, only I gave the car some more abuse this time. I had a great time holding off a Calibra leaving him behind on some of the corners. Oh how we laughed when it finally got past us and we saw that it was a 4x4 turbo. We experienced some bad behaviour from a Diahatsu Charade on this lap - he overtook us on a corner. Then he undertook me coming into the slip road. What a tosser. As soon as he got to the bridge the marshal pointed him into the sin bin lane. Ha ha.

After two good sessions, I just had to tempt fate and go out for a third. Mig member Gaz came along for a ride this time. This session went pretty similarly to the other two. The car felt composed and fast - I even found myself relaxing on the straights, waiting for the bends to come up. We had a good run of a lap or too with no cars close to use.  I suffered a niggly misfire coming out of quarry, which I suspected was surge in the fuel tank. The car picked back up and was fine. Next time round I had misfire in exactly the same place. And the next. Funny how it didn't happen earlier - a combination of less fuel and faster cornering I expect.

I made my only mistake on this session - I allowed myself to be pressurised by an Escort Cosworth on my tail and went into one of the S chicanes a bit too quickly, but made it round OK. We did laugh when the 3.0 Carlton went past us only to spin on the next corner. We never saw it again after that.

Finally mig member CP@Novaload kindly took me out as a passenger in his 1.4 16v 160BHP Nova. It was great being a passenger - I could just enjoy being thrown around and looking at the other cars and the track. First impressions were that the car was quite nippy, then he took the revs up to the active area. Whoo that's good! There's no substitute for power, the 1.4 16v TBs really are the business. As a passenger, the handling felt similar to my car. The tail did come out, but it felt smooth and stable. The car was noticeably more nimble on the S bends. Charles wasn't holding back from giving it some abuse either. Very enjoyable. He's a very methodical and persistent driver - we were sat behind an MR2 turbo for a good while. In the end we got past. But the other driver obviously felt riled by that and overtook as again. At quarry corner he was really giving it some. As he arced round the corner smoke appeared on the rear tyres. Then he did a lovely spin. Charles took an evasive route, but the MR2 started rolling backwards into out path. So we headed for the grass, missing the Toyota by a decent margin.

A great ride, thanks to CP.

I watched John Walsh (editor) take the Total Vauxhall Astra 2s out at the end. Seemed to be going well, though they did cook the front brakes.

Next it was on to the Pod for the Performance Vauxhall Show. CP and myself took a scenic route. Some of it was very frustrating as we followed dawdlers down some fine roads. But we got some good bits in near Chipping Norton. The sun was shining and the roads were dry as we managed some tidy corners. The two cars seemed pretty well matched really. He has a better power to weight ratio but needs to rev all the way to get that, whilst I've got a more torquey engine. So in the limit he's faster, but when not caning it, the two cars seemed well matched. Not that we were doing silly speeds anyway - we didn't break any speed limits.

Round Milton Keynes it was a roundabout playground. CP was suffering from his alternator hitting the chassis in his car, hence his variable speeds depending on whether he was turning left or right. I didn't know this at the time - I just assumed that he was very cautious going onto roundabouts.

Beer was drunk. I decided to fix my gear linkage - it'd been crunching a bit. Many thanks to {name unknown} who sorted it for me. I held the gear lever in the central position whilst he did the pinch bolt up. He said "oh I do loads of these, this is the best way". Fair play - it worked brilliantly.

At some point we went to see Sir Steve of Heley and his White/Blue Astra. It was on the trailer. I don't normally get too excited about looking at cars, but this made me moist. Feckin lovely. We even got told off by his Mrs for leaving a bottle on the trailer (still 1/2 full). "IT'S NOT A TABLE YOU KNOW" she said, half smiling, half threatening. I also met another MIG poster, Garrie and we had a philisophical discussion about websites. He expounded his theory of "the triangle - your ideas, your finances and your mechanical situation". His Mrs said "you don't half talk bollocks when you're drunk Garrie", but I thought it made total sense.

Then we drank some more beer. I was feeling tired - my head hurt from concentration, the sun, and the crap music surrounding me.

Sunday woke up to more crap music. Turn that shit off!

Made it round to the MIG show stand. Very good turn out and lot of very clean cars. After being surrounded by people doing polishing I decided I'd better polish my car too.

After that bought a pass and did some 1/4 mile runs. I couldn't beat my previous best of 15.16s, making mainly low 15s, with 15.3 my best.

Then watched some other people run.

Then decided that maybe I could do some better times so bought another pass. Didn't do any better. Results (including videos).

Finished off with a scenic run back behind more MIG people,Nova X and Rob Fairbrother. We got a good run at some of the bits, very enjoyable round Chipping Norton again.

ATE discs haven't warped despite abuse at Castle Combe. The brakes are starting to bite really nicely now.

Sorting the rear anti roll bars has improved the hard cornering immensely. TBH, the car is outrageous on low speed sharp bends. I've been whooping out loud like the good old days.

The car is feeling so nice that I've been just happy sitting in it driving in a straight line below the speed limit.

I've looked at the Pod times from Saturday. I couldn't beat my previous best of 15.16s, getting 15.3s. I was 0.1s down on my 60ft time, the other 0.05s is probably a gear change, the weather,luck or something. I'm not sad about it.

Just like the good old days.

I've been looking into cams. Online Autosport recommended some Enem fast road cams that they sell. At least 7-8BHP extra at the top, with very little torque loss at low revs. Just a slight camminess on idle they said. They also sell some Enem solid lifters which might be necessary as I raise the rev limit above 7000rpm.

Left Glos at 9:15. Arrived at Great Witley (near Kidderminster) at 10:10. Mark arrived a little while later, having driven up from Enfield this morning.

We cracked on with the route: A443 and A456 due West past Tenby. There was a bit of traffic around, but we still got a good 60mph run at most of it. Then onto the B4362 towards Prestiegne, a friendly wave to the Police Discovery at the crossroads. We were now onto the real business. Windey and pretty much desserted B roads. Next Knighton, Clun and then the top class road to Newtown. At Newtown we met up with Evo board member Cefski in his Impreza. He must have been unimpressed with the sight of an Astra and Cavalier! Not to worry, we put on a good cornering demonstration as we worked North past Welshpool. We took the classic B4391 to Bala. Some excellent bends on that. The bit over the top was great, as were the bends coming down the other side. I was getting some flow on this bit.

On Cefski's advice we went North up the B4501, along the A5 a bit and then took another mag rated road, the A543 towards Denbigh. This is quite narrow, with walls on both sides and an endless stream of bends. Top fun. Then back South down the B4501 to Cerrigydrudion. Here Cefski went off on his merry way.

MarK and myself had the small matter of driving back through mid Wales on our hands. We retraced our steps to Bala and then did one of the Evo triangle roads, the A494 to Dolgellau. Followed the A470 to Llanbrynmair. Here I tried a new B road, the B4518. It was a bit crap at first - just a small lane. After a while it opened out and we were treated to a very entertaining B road with views, hills and a reservoir. Then over the A470 and straight on to Rhayader. From Rhayader took the boring option of the A470 down the to the Happy Vomiter at Builth. After the involving B roads it was nice to cruise on a smooth and wide road. I'd forgotten how much fun the A470 is around there. Loads of lovely smooth bends.

At Builth the Little Thief was so slow that we walked out and picked up some stuff from the garage. Some bikers were most entertained by the lack of interior in my car, had quite a good chat to them.

The final leg was Builth - Kington - Leominster - Ledbury - Gloucester.

It was a bit of bumper day really. In about 8 hours we covered aorund 330 miles of Welsh A and B roads. I'd gone through tiredness and come back out the other side, and was starting to really flow round the bends again.

Most amusing moment was taking a right hand bend and moving over to the left a bit because some old duffer coming the other way was waiting to turn right. I hit some gravel, the back slid a bit, but not much. I looked in the mirror and there was a massive cloud of dust!

Don't laugh, but Mark's 1.6 Cav goes round corners really well. It's been lowered 60mm and runs on some reasonable rubber. I was most surprised. He said he was giving the engine hell to keep up, but he never fell far behind.

Here's what Cefski had to say:

Tom, what makes you think that I was unimpressed by the Astra and the Cav? I'm a little offended by that . I wouldn't have enjoyed today's mini meet any less if I'd have turned up in a wheel barrow, or any more if I'd have been driving an Enzo, and I've no doubt that you feel the same.

Tom's GTE is feckin bonkers. It goes like fcuk, corners like it's on rails, sounds like it has the Devil's own orchestra shoved up it's tail pipe, and it even stops for hitch-hikers (although there's nowhere for them to sit!!!! ). Same can be said for Mark's Cav - except for the orchestra and hitch-hiker bits . I've never seen a Cavalier corner that well; the SRi I had a couple of years ago didn't go anywhere near that fast.

Did some great roads today, pretty hairy at times. most were new to me, but the best one had to be the one that dropped in to Bala. An absolute beauty. Loved it.

Only niggles are an occasional fuel smell from the back of the car and a bit of play in the steering. This is due to the flexi joint between the rack and the column.

Trying to get on with the dash. I decided that I was going to move the switches to a plate next to the handbrake. So I cut a cardboard template up. But I ran into problems with the amount of space available and the number of wires needed. So I decided to bend a plate up and put the switches just to the left of the dash. Not so keen on the looks. Going to ponder this for a little while longer.

On to July 2003