Kopps 1974 Manta build

[BennyTheKopp]

So, I figured I'd start posting up some of build so far... Although most of the stuff done to the car is more like an "un-build." As up to this point, I have been pulling the car apart. To start, I bought the car in the Oakland area a while back. I flew up there, took a train to meet some dude and then drove the car 500 or so miles home. One heck of a shake down drive, eh?

Here is what the car looked like when I took it home.

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After a bit of maintenance, I took the car out to an auto-x and here is a picture of that fine day...

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[BennyTheKopp]

After a while, I had a problem of me being stupid and I did not drive the car for a while. At first, I thought I was going to do a manual swap (the car was auto) then I got some crazy ideas and had to stop playing with cars for a while. After being parked for a while without an engine, I have started to work on the car again.

The first day of work consisted mostly of removing craploads of stuff. My friend and his girlfriend helped out a lot. We cleaned out the engine bay and started painting it. I removed everything from the front end. Front member, lights, grill, hood, wiring... everything. I also got most of the interior out of the car, then cluttered the crap out of it with random car parts.

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[BennyTheKopp]

The next day we did a bit more work on the front of the car, played with the trunk, and tested color choices. I also removed the rear end.

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[BennyTheKopp]

I flared the front fender. This was my first fender flaring on any car. It came out ok. I have a cheap dolly and a crazy hammer from the 60's. The crazy hand me down hammer works MUCH better than the mini-cheapo body hammers that you can buy at autozone. It was nice to actually start fixing things than to just be pulling the car apart.

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[BennyTheKopp]

I worked out the rear fender... first rear fender and second overall fender I have done. Came out pretty good. Considerably harder to pound around than the front fender for obvious reasons, but I would consider the day a success. I also did a little more removing of random things. We ended up painting the grill to get a feel for what it might look like when completed. People that are way purist might not like it, but I like it. I also got some more dismantling out of the way... mostly door and windows on the passenger side.

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Oh, and for those of you that may be starting to think, "Rabble, rabble why are you beating up and massacring a decent manta body??!? Rabble, rabble." This car has a lot of rust on it and I am finding new and exciting crap things to deal with on the body every time I get somewhere new. So bear with me, you might even like how it ends up.

[First opel 1981]

Originally Posted by BennyTheKopp Attachment 22101

OMG, is that a wrench in your eye? What a diehard opeler!!

[Aardvaark]

Looks like a solid car. What are your plans for it? Autocrossing?

[BennyTheKopp]

Well, my plans are for the car to be the most fun thing for me to get into, start up and drive off. In that, I may do some rally, some auto-x, and some of whatever else I find myself doing in the car. It won't win shows, it probably won't win many races, but it'll be a crap ton of fun.

I worked on it a bit more and decided to weld in the badge holes and make them be gone. So the car has no trunk holes, save for the Opel emblem on the top of the trunk lid. Then I put on a tiny bit of bondo to get rid of the little odd spots and painted it up again (just the trunk). I like the look of the paint so the color passed the test.

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I went to work on the drivers' side rear wheel well. It does not look too good. The car was damaged at some point. There was some bondo. I removed it... and the paint with some aircraft stripper. To my horror, the shop/person that did the work did a shoddy job and A) bondoed the entire dang rear quarter for some relatively small repairs and B) covered some holes with bondo and let them rust, so I will be welding in some repair sections. Never welded body panels in yet, so this should be fun. You can see the holes in this picture. Obviously I will have to repair the outer panel, but I think I will have to cut and replace some of the the inner one as well.

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I also got the intake manifold for the motor. It came from Greece (I am in Southern Cali). I can't wait to get started on the motor.

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[opelwasp]

Are you using the original 1.9L? cause that is not an Opel manifold.

[BennyTheKopp]

Nah, it is for a Mercedes motor. I had a 190e 2.3-16 that I ended up getting rid of, but I still have the motor. It is a nice 16v, cosworth designed motor. I've got some weber carbs for it (orig efi). This whole build is an experiment in fun for me. I have an evo x as my daily, so I can have plenty of fun with that while messing with the manta.

[DennisGardiner]

Looks like a fun project.

Need to get back working on my Manta.

[germanautoaddiction]

Wow, I hope you can work on this steadily, that's one of the coolest swaps I've heard of. I'm very interested to see it drivable.

[BennyTheKopp]

Thanks for the compliment addiction, that was cool to read.

I did a bunch of non-labor intensive work and some labor intensive work not worth taking pictures during. I found a place to get some shocks that look very decent. Once I have more info on ordering and get them I will post up a ton on them. I also grabbed a rear end from the junkyard today. It is off of a mid-eighties toyota celica GT. It only took a few mins and 160 bucks from a local wrecking yard. I believe there is a great aftermarket support for this rear end and it is real close to the right size. It is slightly heavier but not by much, loaded I can lift it by myself, so it can't be THAT heavy. Word on the street is the rear can hold approx 300~350 hp without a problem. I am not going anywhere near there, so I should be fine. It does have rear drums, but I am ok with that for now. I am not sure, but I think the pumpkin is the same as the toyota truck one I have seen swapped in on here, but the housing is shorter... more Opel size.

A lot of the footwork... or fingerwork seeing as most of this stuff was looked up online ...is done, I should be working on the car quite a bit next weekend.

[BennyTheKopp]

So, I got real busy. Then I moved. I had to get rid of all the Mercedes stuff. So I will not be sticking a MB motor in this thing as planned. I still have the carbs and will be throwing in a stock motor from a GT to get the thing running and out of my mother's driveway. I did some cutting and welding on the mess that is the rear fender and it is going but going slow. I have a new goal of working on the car at least 2 times a week. Hopefully it will be moving relatively soon.