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[RallyArde]

This will be a long opening post... but in fall 2021 I bought one of my dream cars:







Facelift saloon Omega with 3.0 litre V6 (X30XE), automatic gearbox and open diff. "They say you should never meet your heroes"- sentence kinda started to make sense, eventhough this was one the cheapest on the market, and mayde thatīs why it came with many faults:

-cambelt hasnīt been done for over 8 years, also the milage window was full
-cam covers were leaking oil
-minor issues with tempratures
-propshaft was wibrating
-handbrake didnīt feel right
-rear brake discs were gone
-brake lines were rusty
-dodgy repairs on the reardoors, also passengers side front had some corrosion
-and some other minor issues

Summer 2022:









Did the timing belt, water pump, auxilary belt&tensioner.





New thermostat and o-rings to water rail sorted out the heat issues



Installed a second-hand-prop shaft.



Added new hand brake cable. After adjusting brake shoes, feeling and bite was spot on 

Then I had move on the repair my daily driver, and I left this one to garage, yet Iīll had to sort out oil leaks, also managed to spun oil filter housing while changing new filter, which meant one oil leak more. Brakes were undone as well.

Spring 2023 I made VLog from oil leaks and solutions that I came up with:

Starting point:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amvIT1OBWx0

Cock-up:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nnd6VSu320s

Oil filter conversion:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ce5yOMPAcnY

Alloy cam covers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH20jkGqvJc

Result:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kh35Rqi9JI


Then it was time to fix those brakes:







New lines and hoses all round.





Rear calipers done, starting point didnīt look too good





Also front calipers rebuilt, brackets cleaned and painted.



For budget reasons I used old discs (which werenīt actuacllu that bad) and add only new pads. In some point I will buy more high quality discs and pads.

The radiator draining plug was leaking, with short search on eBay, I found new one:



So this was an easy fix

Before MoT I wanted fix exterior a bit, and here is a VLog which reveals most of work:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6z84KPX5KMg

And here is happy owner talking   :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hASh4IeA6uw










Rest of the summer I just kept on driving and enjoying. Despite having open diff, this is after all an Omega which means it does still go sideways, as long as you donīt lift an inch, outer wheel keeps spinning, cause if you do it bites and you en up having that inside wheel spin or "one tire fire"

The after market rims are quite.. horrible and for that reason I gotse of these:



I will get new tyres during on this spring.


Future plans for the car is to keep on restoring it, fix the underside, take the rear beam off and add new bushes, also new bushes to front as well. And propably I will replace orignal diff with an LSD.

If I had time, I would like to convert this to manual, I already have a C25XE flywheel, but I havenīt bought other bits yet.



 

[speedy_ns]

Excellent job
Buy the way, you sound a bit like Kimi on Youtube 

[Migv6 le Frog Fan]

Great work. 

[RallyArde]

Thanks!

Well, I do have a finnish accent or like we call in here "rally english"

[dave the builder]

Very nice 

One thing ....

you seem to have fitted the steering wheel on the WRONG side of the car        

[Stu.C]

Nicely done, and it's cleaned up really well ... 

[RallyArde]

Yeah thanks again By the way here Finland usually (except import cars) only the post office vans are right hand drives, Iīve actually driven few to garage lifter for tyre change at my daily job


I havenīt done much for this car recently, but... Iīve got lots of bits for it. New subframe bushes and semi-trailing arm bushes (orignal GM), new ARB bushes (FAG) and Mintex brake pad installation kit with pins and rattle springs, previous owner had lost them and had to fabricate temporately those from stainless steel sheet. Also I bought OEM upper water hose, cause there is a coolant leak left top of the radiator and looks like (?) itīs the hose.

[RallyArde]

I start to work on with this one again...





I fitted set new tyres and balaned the wheels during a lunch break   I got those tyres quite cheap from the company where Iīm working. Itīs chinese tire, but Iīve installed many set of those for customers and there hasnīt been bad feedback.

Iīve also started bodywork with this Omega, and those who had subscribed my Youtube- channel had propably noticed that there are two videos incoming today and tomorrow. I will add links here as well and later on lots of pictures

[RallyArde]

Here are those two VLogs that I mentioned in my previous post:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62qXN-lswuQ

Iīm not 100% satisfyied of those repairs that I made, but at least Iīm getting more life time to that sill, cause I will propably replacing it in some point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geYScx6oOPk

I wanted to separate the wheel arch replacement for another video, so thatīs why having part 1 and part 2


I got loads of bits and pieces in my other garage, new bushes, track rods, LSD with correct ratio etc. Obviously I need to assemble the car back together as well

[RallyArde]

Unfortunately I havenīt done much to the car, but I decided to made a little vid about how much wheel arch repair and paint job cost to me in terms of materials and other stuff that was needed for this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eYHnRHbTRM

Obviously these are prices here in "upper" Finland

[RallyArde]

Iīm a bit late with this post, as usual, but here are few pictures from the sill and wheel arch repair:





Cutting rusted sections off from the side sill.





Welded couple of patches down there and some strong epoxy brushed on all areas that Iīve been working on. Like I said in those videos it would have been wiser to replace the whole sill instead of repairing it, but I didnīt have a proper replacement panel on hand, so for few years and MoTs this is the way weīre going



This was the starting point for rear wheel arch repair.



The inner arch was quite crispy as well





Some cutting and grinding...



Fabricating the inner piece.







Innen section fixed.





Welding done.



Sanding, sanding and sanding



Masked up.





Some epoxy primer and acryllic filler.







And thatīs a job done!

By this day Iīve already removed the masking and put some bits back on, but the next big step is the rear axle rebuilt, which Iīve been working on yesterday. Plan is to put new OEM-bushes and replace the original open diff with LSD

[Doctor Gollum]

Shame to go to all that work and not remove the C Pillar trim to paint it

That said, looks like a good solid repair

[RallyArde]

Shame to go to all that work and not remove the C Pillar trim to paint it

That said, looks like a good solid repair

I actually did take off some the C pillar trims, that I could leave edge of the re-sprayed and original area covered underneath. Only "visible" edge was left lower to the sill (covered mostly by the plactic trims as well), and even that could be barely seen  

[Doctor Gollum]

Shame to go to all that work and not remove the C Pillar trim to paint it

That said, looks like a good solid repair

I actually did take off some the C pillar trims, that I could leave edge of the re-sprayed and original area covered underneath. Only "visible" edge was left lower to the sill (covered mostly by the plactic trims as well), and even that could be barely seen

Fair enough 

It looked like you'd simply masked over it, which is a bit lazy...

[Doctor Gollum]

Did you weld the inner and outer together, or use panel bond? From the factory, they're glued together...