5 GT Turbo Pink GT Turbo Restoration

[richw]

Hi All,
Having grown up watching these things rule the mean suburbs of Plymouth I have just got myself a fairly knackered GT Turbo to get running and slowly restore to the awesome machine it should be. It's this one:
Ebay listing

The winning bidder didn't collect so it ended up being mine for £600. Not sure if I have a deal or not. STuff I know it needs:
-Radiator
-Welding (sills, arches, and a few holes in the floor at least, but plenty of suspicious rust dots about and the odd dent)
-Turbo re-fitting and repairing
-New hoses
-New Battery
-Touch up paint (how the hell do you touch up pink with what looks like sparkle laqueur?)
-A lot more, but I'll have to explore

Does anyone have a suggestion of where to start? Is there some things I need to check first that could make the whole thing a waste of time potentially?

Also If anyone has any more info on the car I'd love to know. Last registered to a chap in Lostwithiel, Cornwall, and apparently it was featured in Max Power at some point? Any bits of info would be cool!

Plenty of questions to follow I'm sure!
Cheers, Rich

 

[DaveL485]

Some of the GTT chaps like @Mart @Big Steve - Raider @Brigsy et al will be along to ruin your life shortly, but best of luck matey!

 

[Big Steve - Raider]

First you need to watch this for 2 reasons

1. To see a very much younger me in my Renault F1 shirt and Shades (i'm the first guy Mike walked past during the intro) actually you can see me in the picture below
2. To see if it's your car featured (can't be many pink GTT's?)

:i-m_so_happy.gif:

 

[Rob]

First you need to watch this for 2 reasons

1. To see a very much younger me in my Renault F1 shirt Sunglasses and Shades (i'm the first guy Mike walked past during the intro) actually you can see me in the picture below
2. To see if it's your car featured (can't be many pink GTT's?)

:i-m_so_happy.gif:

It's quite horny I like it classic line

 

[James5]

I know that car a good friend bought it of Bob (CGB quite some years back now for his wife to drive, to be honest my friend drove it more. When he got it the engine was standard it didn't have the gttuning bumpers it has some skeete stuff on, had a slight rear ender and I do mean minor in which my friend got the rear boot panel replaced and fitted the front and rear gttuning bumpers and the prima spoiler.

Some pic's attached, as said he had some part's sprayed up so he clearly knew or may still know what the colour is but any good bodyshop should be able to match it

 

[richw]

Ha awesome pics!Any idea what year those were taken?

I've got it locked up but hopefully I'll roll it out and have a chance to take some pics to show how it looks now.

Is it generally best to tackle engine or bodywork first? My Haynes manual arrives in a few days and I figured one basic thing I could do is empty the interior and scout out all the easily visible rust spots for a start.

Thanks for all the replies.

Rich

 

[richw]

Cool vid too! That pink one is definitely mine as I know it was silver originally as mentioned in the vid. Very cool! Cheers!

 

[James5]

Ha awesome pics!Any idea what year those were taken?

I've got it locked up but hopefully I'll roll it out and have a chance to take some pics to show how it looks now.

Is it generally best to tackle engine or bodywork first? My Haynes manual arrives in a few days and I figured one basic thing I could do is empty the interior and scout out all the easily visible rust spots for a start.

Thanks for all the replies.

Rich

I'll see if my friend (Steve Light) has some pic's. The pic's must be from around 2008

If it was my car I would be emptying it out to see what you have got and have a proper look at the car, I would be doing the shell first and if your not welding or spraying yourself then rebuild / the engine.

 

[Haz]

That's cheap. The bottom line is how good the shell is. Resprays can be done several ways, most of which don't tackle the problematic areas.
It's possible to check behind the kit from inside and underneath to save taking it off.
See how much bodywork is actually required as that's the difference between saving and breaking.
Anything you can do yourself will save you some cash and at least you have an idea of what's involved.
sills can end up being inners, pillars and floor. Arches can end up wings, qtrs and bumper mounts. Floor can end up having to remove most of the interior and all the stuff underneath.
Colour matching shouldn't be that difficult but returning to oe colour will easily double its value over pink when the time comes to sell.

 

[DaveL485]

That's cheap. The bottom line is how good the shell is. Resprays can be done several ways, most of which don't tackle the problematic areas.
It's possible to check behind the kit from inside and underneath to save taking it off.
See how much bodywork is actually required as that's the difference between saving and breaking.
Anything you can do yourself will save you some cash and at least you have an idea of what's involved.
sills can end up being inners, pillars and floor. Arches can end up wings, qtrs and bumper mounts. Floor can end up having to remove most of the interior and all the stuff underneath.
Colour matching shouldn't be that difficult but returning to oe colour will easily double its value over pink when the time comes to sell.

This makes sense.

 

[richw]

Cheers for the replies,

I'll try and get in to all the corners from inside the car and engine bay to see what the damage is. The engine bay is pink too so I'm hoping that the shell was bare when resprayed which should have given things like window frames and other nooks and crannies some better protection than only spraying the visible bits. I notice that a single wiper is not standard so that must be a mod. The current wiper has some rust bubbles around it so that will need exploring and I may be tempted to put it back to standard if the middle wiper position is rotten and the originals are fine but filled.

Colour-wise, I am tempted to bring it back to original looks, but I'd be keen to try a different original GTT colour as silver isn't my favourite. Is there a list of original colours somewhere? How would this affect value compared to silver? Is returning to original spec much more costly than aiming for a restored version of it's current modded form?

Cheers,

Rich

 

[Haz]

It's not often resprays are bare shell, just more noticeable when not the original colour. Would be good if it is though.
Single wiper usually uses the ns wiper hole anyway.
Silver, negro noir black, glacier white, sport blue, electric blue, tungsten grey, rouge vif red, erm think that's it. Various shades of each.
Any original colour should add more value but that's a seller/buyer thing but you will have a wider audience when the time comes.
Apart from bumpers, bonnet, spoiler and grille it's not far off so an extra few hundred I guess, everything else involves the same work

 

[Norwich Nick]

I say keep it pink (it has a bit of history, I knew who had it previously as would a lot of others)

As you say, everything is pink so a lot of work for a full colour change, I'd clean it up and change bumpers ect to your taste.
If it's not a rot box use it to cut your teeth as they say, mini resto and see if you catch the bug. You're not going to make money on it, you'll lose a lot.
If you can't live with the pink, sell it on and buy one in the colour you want, will save you money and at least you'll know you have the motivation and commitment for a full restoration, which a full colour change will no doubt turn into.

Good luck, don't forget to keep us updated with plenty of pictures :i-m_so_happy.gif:

 

[Bob]

Yes - that was my ex wife's car. I bought the car and her Dad sprayed it for her as a "treat" when she was recovering from cancer.

 

[richw]

Hi All,
Finally a few pics of what has become of the GTT since the previous pics were taken. As you can see it has lost a bit of its sparkle. first up are its best angles.... It'll get more gruesome in the next post.
Rich

 

[richw]

So things are looking slightly less than ideal mechanically.....

 

[richw]

.....And just when you thought it couldn't get any worse:

 

[richw]

Is it a total waste of time? If not, where do I start? I'm thinking sills, arches, and floor repairs for a start, but does the damage look too bad to fix? Thoughts and comments welcome. Unbelievable compared to the car in its prime seen in the previous comments...

Cheers,

Rich

 

[Haz]

Looks like it's been repaired before the spray and someone has started to do some re-work then gave up?
Tbf, that's not bad.
Edit : I've paid more than that for worse and fixed them.

 

[richw]

Good news Haz, cheers. Any idea if there has been a thread here on on another site about replacing sills on a gtt?
Rich