1998 Dodge Neon Modified class rallycrosser

Removed the driver's seat and center console today before I ran out of steam. Just need to figure out the cable routing. I think I'll tuck it under the carpet and run it along the left side of the console, then run it across under the carpet at the front of the seat mounts, then up the left side of the car, and through the wiring harness grommet. I am hoping that'll keep it out of the way.

With the console out, I can also make some adjustments to the shifter, but before that, I should probably redo the motor mounts. I may try filling stock ones with urethane, guess I better read up on that.

eastsidemav wrote: I may try filling stock ones with urethane, guess I better read up on that.

60-80A shore urethane from McMaster Carr, mix per instructions, duct tape one side of mount, pour slowly until full, wait until dry.

I used energy suspension inserts and a solid bobble. Far too stiff for the street, but fantastic shifts. Under 30 bucks if I remember.

I think I actually have the inserts somewhere, but the last time I switched out motor mounts, they didn't fit. I suspect the rubber in the generic mounts wasn't in the same configuration as OEM mounts. When I order new mounts, I'll have to check to see if the inserts fit this time.

Got some time to work on the car this past weekend, and since the weather was nice enough, I went ahead and decided a little welding would be good. The skidplate mounts in front to the holes used for the airdam with sheet metal screws, and over time the holes had gotten a bit bigger, and I'd been using tape to keep the screws from vibrating out.

First, I drilled the holes out a bit, and cleaned off the paint around them so the weld nuts could be fitted:

Then, I proceeded to do a horrible job of welding, since I was lying on the floor, had poor visibility, and needed to use one hand to hold the weld nuts in place. That's my story and I'm sticking to it:

One reason for the poor visibility turned out to be a very well aged face shield lens, that I had to change out halfway through when a sticker from the welding helmet came off and stuck to the lens. That was kind of a weird thing to experience while under the front of the car:

Once they cooled, I filed high spots down, and hit them with a quick shot of epoxy spray paint. No need to look good, just slow down the rust:

Still had a bit of time, so I started working on routing the battery cable towards the front of the car. I still need to make sure I can keep the console and/or seat frame from pinching it, which may require a few minor cuts to the console plastic. After that, It'll probably go up the firewall, and through a couple holes I'll cut in the grommet for the main wiring harness.

Went ahead and filled some new motor mounts with 80A urethane. Two were mostly good, but it looks like I did not do the best job in the world of taping up the passenger side mount, as it leaked quite a bit. I think it's still going to have enough material in it to help, though.

Probably won't get much done for a bit, but hopefully in a few weeks, I'll get wae to take care of my gauge cluster, and I'll swap the mounts in. I want to wait to adjust the shifter and shifter cables until the new mounts are in place, just in case.

Well, it took all day, but I managed to install the motor mounts. Since the transmission mount tends to be the hardest, and requires the motor/trans to move the most, I figured I'd start with that one. It was a bit of a bear, and would have been a lot faster with two people, but I managed.

The hardware holding the front mount had gotten pretty rusted and solid, despite my tendency to use antiseize on bolts. Took some effort, but got the old one removed, and mostly installed the new one. At which point I realized the big damping weight that bolts to the mount would not fit. So, pull it off, and it turns out a brace had been welded onto it in the wrong place. Thank goodness I did this on a day the weather was nice. Took the mount outside, and ground the brace down a bit, until everything fit fine. Once that was done, installing it was a breeze.

Then, it was time for the passenger side mount, which is also usually pretty simple. Unbolting it from the engine was not a problem, but when I tried to remove it from the car, no dice. It uses two bolts, one of which I could remove, after moving some stuff out of the way, but the other one was not going to come out easy. The metal part of the mount had deformed to the point where a socket would not fit over the bolt head. I tried every socket I had, then started hammering on the mount, but with a very limited space to swing, I couldn't get it clearance. Eventually, I dug out the bench grinder, and a spare socket, and just ground it down to make my own custom thin-wall 15 mm socket. After a lot of finagling (there's no pilot area on the engine mount bolt, since it's from a swap kit, not a factory part), I was able to get it all back together.

What should have taken 2 hours took about 5. I'm really missing rear drive cars, where it seems like the engine just always settles into the mounts on its own.

In the last week, I swung over to wae's place, and since I am afraid of soldering irons, he fixed the gauge cluster for me. Hopefully the cluster will work fine now, instead of randomly dropping out.

Over the weekend, I took the time to re-adjust the short shifter, so 1st to 2nd shifts should be more reliable, which will be nice on the rallyx course.

Also, it was time for a new oil catch can, but I'm a cheapskate. The old one was a pill bottle, and it had a tendency to overflow on course, and spray oil all over the engine compartment. First, I needed to hack up the battery tray a bit more in order to come up with a way to hold it:

I'm building the new one out of a stainless water bottle I found in the kitchen cabinet. It's a bit bigger than the old one:

A quick test fit in order to confirm it will work with the new air cleaner setup:

A couple of brass fittings, a drain plug meant for a lawn tractor, some JB Weld, a small bungie cord, and the filter from the original bottle:

I still had a bit more time, so I cut some holes in the wiring harness grommet (hopefully I won't have any problems with water getting in), and ran the battery cables up under the dash and into the engine compartment:

I also put some terminal ends on the cables, connected them to the original cables, and taped the positive cable up. This week, I'll get the battery terminals on, do a few other minor things, and the car should be ready to drive again. At that point, most of the work will be reassembly, and setting up the suspension for the season opener in March.

Been busy in the evening lately, but did run out and get the new battery terminals put on, and installed the battery. Still need to fix the oil leak, but I did turn the ignition on, and nothing exploded, so it looks like I've wired it up properly.

Got the critical work done over the weekend, and have had it out for two shakedown runs so far. Some significant improvements in driveability, between the engine mounts and the shifter adjustment. The starter sounds a lot happier with a full size battery, and it appears to no longer be leaking oil.

There are more vibrations, especially at idle. I'll deal with it.

Still needs the rear sway bar installed, and I need to align it. I took some measurements, and both front wheels have around 1.5 degrees of positive camber.

I couldn't get all the positive camber dialed out, so eventually camber plates or crash bolts may be in my future. But, the sway bar is install, and the car tracks straight down the highway. Now, the only thing it needs before next weekend's rallycross is for the skid plate to be reinstalled.

good to see you're making progress! Love the overflow bottle idea....never thought of a bike bottle cage (stashed away for future reference).

In reply to irish44j:

Thanks! I'm nowhere near as deep in it as you are in the E30, and probably won't be. But, it's a nice feeling to be at a point in a project that is pretty close to "done". From here on out, I'll probably stick to keeping it reliable, and maybe a little more suspension work.

I see someone just registered for WOR's season opener...

Season opener was today. It was pretty much a battle for traction today. Horsepower was useless. I managed a third in class and a mid pack overall finish. I don't feel too bad about the position in class, since the winner also had the overall best time, and second in class was third overall.

The car held together pretty good, got a noise in either the trunk or rear suspension to diagnose, but other than that, it just needs a good bath.

Had another event this weekend, and a minor scare headed there. The car had been fine the week before, at least after I got all the dried mud out of the rear suspension. When we left to head to the venue, I started getting some belt squeal. It calmed a bit during the drive out, but still would happen anytime over 2000 RPM. When we got there, I checked the PS belt, and it seemed fine. The alternator belt, on the other hand seemed to be way looser than it should have been. Of course, it's the one that's harder to get to Looks like two years of power steering fluid getting blown out of the system, and dribbling onto the alternator bracket allowed the adjuster and mounting bolts to slightly loosen. Took a bit of time with my limited tool set, but I got it all back to the way it should be. I think in the next off season I'll look into doing a 2g Neon PS pump conversion. It puts the reservoir with the pump in front, instead of in back, over the alternator and exhaust manifold.

The race itself went quite well. I'd been expecting more mud, but the rain we had in town mostly missed the farm, so by the end of the day it was pretty dusty, and in order to get a decent time, you needed to hug the cones to stay out of the loose dirt. I managed first in Modifed FWD (mainly because wae's car is still down), and somehow had the 4th fastest time out of 40 drivers. The only ones to be ahead of me were the 1st place finishers in SA, PA, and MA.

No major updates here, the car has been through two rallycrosses with 2 drivers since the last update. The strut to knuckle bolts in the rear suspension appear to have loosened up a bit at some point, and I did a very rough alignment job and retightened them down. They will probably need to be replaced soon, though, I seem to recall they used to have some ridges on them to bite into the strut a bit, and I think that has gotten pretty worn down.

A bit of video from last weekend's event. My wife has decided she needs AC/DC playing in order to be fast.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exggU9OUVC8

Wow, been 4 months since I updated - not too much to report, the car has been mostly reliable. I have had one exhaust failure, and will probably want to completely redo the exhaust over the winter/spring. Yesterday, I clinched the Western Ohio Region MF 2016 championship. My wife is in 4th, and is hoping to move up to third next month. I will probably see if any of my local friends want to drive, since I don't need the points, and it'll be a great way to hook someone else on rallycoss

A couple of other items of note - I ran a set of Indy Sport mud tires on the front yesterday while it was somewhat muddy and greasy. The grip was amazing, I had no trouble outpacing quite a few of the AWD cars. I highly recommend them for muddy events if they have a set in your size. I will warn you, they tend to run a bit larger than advertised size, so order carefully. Second item, I don't think it's likely I'll repeat next year for the lead - wae should have his car all back together and in prime shape by then, and be kicking everyone's ass.

In reply to eastsidemav:

The wife was looking pretty quick out there.

Jerry wrote: In reply to eastsidemav: The wife was looking pretty quick out there.

I think that was her favorite event of the season.

There's another one next month? Ugh.

Knurled wrote: There's another one next month? Ugh.

Yeah, I'll miss it for the PRI show. Maybe that's why I did pretty well this weekend, last chance for the year. That and the full racing suit that made me look legit, while keeping me fairly warm.

Been way too long since updating this post. Managed to take 1st on Modified FWD for Western Ohio Region and Ohio Valley Region in 2016. Haven't done much with the car since, as I prefer to keep it off the road during salt season. First event of this season is scheduled for Saturday.

In prep, I've changed the oil, and Jerry rigged some additional support for the exhaust. The skid plate took some good hits last year, and lost one of its bolts, so I need to bash it back into shape, and hit the hardware store for a new bolt. Also, it needs a new airdam, so I'll be making a few of them.

I'm hoping to put several people in the driver's seat this year, and maybe get some new competitors started in the area.

eastsidemav wrote: I'm hoping to put several people in the driver's seat this year, and maybe get some new competitors started in the area.

I've been in that seat and I'm telling you there's no way you're going to get more than one person in it. Corbeaus are a tight fit!