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My DSM life: 92 White Tsi paper weight

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12secondtalon

Probationary Member
18
0
Jun 14, 2008
Boulder, Colorado
I have been a long time member and have had quite a history with Talons in my life, but I've never been able to be a participating member because a lot of this time I haven't had one running. Over the years I've had 4 Talon Tsi AWD 5-speeds. A white 91, white 92, my favorite black cherry 91, and newest black 92. All of them 3 bolts, except the black 92, its a 4 bolt and has tan leather interior with no sunroof :)

My first one came as I was graduating high school in 2001, it was the white 91. I was working as a shop hand in a local mechanics shop where the owner also built 7000+ HP race engines for his hobby. This very stock Talon with few mods came in to get a turbo replacement so he could sell the car, he upgraded to a 16g. I'm from the foothills of the Rockies in CO, so a lot of people have AWD/4WD cars to get to their mountain homes. As a side note, there has always been a decent amount of DSM's in CO over the years, its been wonderful to occasionally see another DSM.

Since he hadn't advertised it yet, I was able to swoop in an get it. I believe I paid $3500 for it with 190,XXX miles. I was super stoked. I got to play around a bit with it, it pulled hard at 14 psi. I raced on some county roads and found it fun. Unfortunately, I was young and dumb, and I let a friend of a friend take it out a handful of months after getting it and he put it sideways into the back of a truck with me in it. So, alas no pics were ever even taken of it. Still bums me out, it was a solid car.

Skip forward a couple of months, I had to work my way to getting the kid and his family to shell out some cash for the ordeal; finally got it. A few agonizing DSM-less years later in 2003, I spotted a semi decent white 92 all the way down in Tucson, a good 15 hour drive from CO. I spent a lot of time talking to the owner and finally took a quick (ha) road trip south and picked me up a rust free, slightly modded Tsi for $3000 with 125,XXX miles. A handful of weeks down the line, the oil cooler blew a hose and my oil gauge wasn't working... you know the rest. It was my fault and I was devastated again because I didn't have a lot of money to shell out at this point in my life. Luckily I had some space for it to sit covered in a garage for years, sleeping.

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In 2005 I was able to slowly start rebuilding the engine and found all kinds of mods and quickly got overwhelmed with what I wanted to do with the car. I got the engine done at my shop:

0.20 over bore JE Pistons
Eagle H-Beam Rods
ARP Head studs
ARP Main studs
Balance shafts eliminated
264/272 HKS Intake/Exhaust Cams
AEM Adjustable Cam Gears
Cometic MLS Head Gasket



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After getting the engine all in, I was very nervous for everything to work out. I took the car out after a warm up and put roughly 20-30 miles on it at varying speeds, trying not to boost it. It ran smooth and nothing seemed specifically out of order. My wideband was reading fairly rich after a while, so I returned home to figure out what could be the issue. Unfortunately this came at a crossroads in life and couldn't get things ironed out and didn't want to risk something on a new break in, so I garaged it once again in 2006. While it was garaged over the years, I started replacing parts that could be old and of replacing including many hoses and turbo related parts.

I became interested in upgrading my intercooler and working with a MAF Translator. I also periodically bought pieces for the BOV and piping hoping to make sure all leaks were gone.

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As it sat, I got itchy and wanted to try some fun DIY stuff. I relocated the battery to the trunk and was pleased with the outcome. I obviously haven't had a chance to try and see (if at all) what advantage that what actually have, but it at least powered the car.

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Soon I had to move some 60 miles away and could not take it with me, so it sat undamaged and out of the elements for another 6+ years while I patiently stock piled parts when I could. It would be a year sometimes before I could get up and see/work on it.

More to come as I get time to post,


Justin
 
I hate to hijack my own build thread with another one, but while I was a away I found a great car that was running!

After some time assuming I would never get the white one going again, I found a local 1991 Black Cherry (uh, still love it) for sale for $2000. It had 173,XXX miles on it and a bit of an oil leak. It also had a few mods, there was a nice B&M fuel gauge under the hood, exhaust, keyless remote. But mostly an unmolested Talon.

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It ran so well and got an average 24-27 mpg around town and consistently 26-27 on the highway. I loved the color sooo much. Could do with out the public transit themed grey interior. Eventually someone smashed my front side and I never got a chance to get it fixed. The paint stared to finally fade, pretty typical for Chrysler and early 90's paint. I also got backed into in the other side in the front, breaking the clear running light. And at some other point got hit in the rear drivers side; the bumper is cracked and paint is chipped away.

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It was a bit ugly, but it still was my car and I threw my black spoked 17 in. wheels on :)

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As life was happening I was driving home from Denver in late 2012 going down the major highway and engine lost power...

I pulled over, car had all power and no liquids leaking under the car. I tried cranking it back over, it rotated and sounded perfectly normal, just wouldn't start. I got under the hood (on the side of highway sucks!) and saw nothing unusual. Then this small hot point in the back of my head hit me: S**t, I bet the timing belt snapped/slid off. The engine leaked oil all near the front timing cover area the worst, and I just couldn't get a chance to do an overhaul yet.

On a side note, all though it leaked oil pretty bad, up to the time the belt snapped I still got 25 + mpg and it was now at ~198,XXX miles. Although these engines have their quirks, they can be very impressive in so many ways.

Got it towed home and first thing I did was pull the cover off, sure enough the belt was toast. Damn.

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Living in a small town, I was able to get around by bike and bus for a year plus during school and the Talon sat in my parking spot. Then another DSM went down in September 2013. If anyone is unaware, the foothills got slammed with consistent and torrential rain for well over a week, basically 24 hours a day. Most of our town is in a flood plain coming right off the mountains. There was a major flash flood in the late 1800's and they always predicted "The 100 Year Flood."

Well, almost on cue a 100 years later, we had significant flash flooding. Some small mountains towns were almost completely washed down the canyon, and are just still barely rebuilding. Roads completely washed away and sights of cars and trees in the flood waters coming down the canyon (directly above our town) were reported (unsure if actually true). Regardless, our town was under water. I left my place, where I thought I was out of the flood path to see if my GF was ok near the creek, where the potential was worst. We rode the week long disaster at her place, where waist deep water surrounded us on the roads.

We eventually get home to my place so I could change clothes, I smelled. Before we saw the damage to my building, my GF pointed at my car in the lot and said, "Look at all the moisture in the inside of your windshield."

My first thought was, "Oh God, no."
 

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I quickly grab my keys and open the door and my stomach dropped down as far as my jaw did...

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All the stuff I stored in there were completely destroyed. The worst part was this water was dirty and real bad. In the pic above, the water was all the way over the center console and shift knob.

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There was still water in the little cup piece on the door panel; the waters went up to the arm rest part of the door panel.

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Still inch deep standing water in the floor. The waters covered the back seat, and evidence of standing water all the way up in the trunk, even though the car was facing downward on a decent incline, so it was some deep waters.

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Notice above, the subtle line on the radio bezel, in the area under the radio. There was water in the cubby under the radio.

So my first thought was to start stripping and cleaning to save anything, and I mean anything on this car. I never put power to the car until weeks later when the insurance company came down, in hopes of saving the ECU, but that is still to be determined. I instantly started stripping down the interior, trying to not snap any clips, connectors, etc. It was daunting and rather unpleasant because how dirty everything was. I spent significant time washing and drying and cleaning the seats and any cloth piece. The only thing I can assume I couldn't keep are the interior electrical sensors. I keep every single intact plastic and metal piece off the car, inside and out.
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On a side note, 15 cars alone in my parking lot were totaled. The first floor of my building was wiped completely out. And this red Pontiac was from down the street...

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I would often find little eco systems in the engine bay and subframes. Generations of the bugs that came over on the great flood. Over the next year I periodically would strip the car down to the frame, there was someone in the area who offered to take the shell. Eventually the car was down to the skeleton with nothing left but glass. I eventually snatched any clip and good retainer, all the bolts and mechanical stuff for a rainy day, no pun intended.
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So with another (and my most favorite :() DSM gone, I had a decision to either try and finally back track and finish the white 92, or find a decent car/project/shell that I could complete with my purple 91 stuff. I was able to get a decent amount from the insurance company and tried my luck on a black 92 Tsi from across the country.

Like a fool, I thought I could save the black 92 because it was obviously neglected and broken beyond most people's beliefs. The ad had been up for a while and it was missing some key parts to the engine, this wasn't a huge con for me. In December of 2013 and for a couple hundred dollars more than the insurance company gave me, I was able to get it home to CO.

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I still have the black 92 and will address it in time in a different build journal one day, right now I'm currently tearing it down to restore it from the rust.

Sometime earlier this year when I realized I wanted to change my build on the black 92, I decided it's time to finish the white 92. That will bring this build thread back to it's original topic.
 
Yea that flood ruined a whole bunch of cars! I live in Northglenn and seen all the rain also! Man that was a crazy time. That black cherry talon looked really clean, sorry it got flooded out . I am waiting for one of those to show up locally for sale. Good luck with the build man
 
The engine in the car currently is the rebuilt one from post #1 and currently just came out of the car to go to the machine shop. What I need done to the engine to get it back in running condition is:

Take current head off engine,
Take other good head (broken exhaust mani stud on lower corner) and have all parts from other head put in it,
Put new head on engine and get T-Belt back on,
Have new exhaust mani hardware put on head

Basically that should be all thats needed to theoretically get the engine back in running condition. It's been a long time since the engine was built and only had 20-30 miles on it in the break-in period, so hopefully the bottom end is still good. The car sat in a garage for many years, some with the VC off, so even though I tried to cover it I am almost 100% certain dust made its way into the head, which will be replaced anyway. I want to take several key items to the shop and have leak tested/bead (glass?) blasted/painted(?):

Intake manifold
Stock sidemount intercooler
stock fuel rail
egr valve
thermostat housing
A/C condenser core

After that I hopefully can continue on with the engine break-in.

In the mean time while I'm saving up to get all the machine work done, I figured I'd finally give the engine bay a much needed touch up. After years of a leaky battery, countless times of parts being removed and scratching the paint, several engine removals and 20+ years, with the engine out now is a great time to do this.

I don't have the resources to get it professionally done or an air compressor for a paint gun, so I have a plan to tackle this. I might save up to get an air compressor just to have for any car related thing, it would've been amazing to have during my 2 car teardown over the last year. Either way, I have some POR that I want to try so my initial plan is:

Find all places where bare metal is exposed, ie where the battery acid stripped the paint and POR, then paint
Find all rust spots, POR and paint
Sand/scuff all OEM paint places and paint

As stated, while the engine is out of the car, I began stripping the engine bay down almost completely to prepare for the prep :)

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Started getting all the wires and hoses out, and wiring harness from the passenger side unclipped and out of the way. Currently I haven't fully taken the harness out of the engine bay, I haven't gotten a chance to get into the interior to remove necessary connections.


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Making some progress removing all stuff coming from or going into the cab; shifter cables, speedo cable, acc. cable. Also removed the subframe/steering/suspension/brakes all in one shot. I can't wait to hit this bay with some fresh paint.

One question I have is what color should I do the bay, oem white, or black? White gets so dirty looking very easily, but I like the idea of keeping the stock color in the bay. I think the black (def. flat black) might really help accentuate the silver in the bay. I change my mind daily. Luckily I have some time to think about it.

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Before I can really tackle the engine bay, I have a couple of spots I'd like to get worked on, probably by a body shop:

I have a broken stud on the driver's side motor mount bracket on the fender rail
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Broken bolt bracket on the firewall for a bolt I'm not sure of off the top of my head
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Folded coolant over flow bottle bracket (I think I can bend this back to shape)
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Continued more on getting that bay looking naked:

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Yea that flood ruined a whole bunch of cars! I live in Northglenn and seen all the rain also! Man that was a crazy time. That black cherry talon looked really clean, sorry it got flooded out . I am waiting for one of those to show up locally for sale. Good luck with the build man

It was incredible to watch. By far the craziest thing I've witnessed. I'm a weather student, so unfortunately the flood was fascinating to me, but also a bit of a PITA. I was a lot better off than some.

I was living in Northglenn when I got the black cherry one, 104th and Irma area I believe
 
Probably not with car but yes. Doing some minor work on car. Maintenance and some small mods.
 
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