Ever since I got into racing I've always liked the Supercopa's. It's appeal to me was principally that it has an engine which is highly tuneable, a chassis that can take power and great continued support from Seat Sport in respect of parts. So, I finally bought one. Not much to say at this stage, the car has been sensibly modified and is now running a TTE420 Turbo from Turbo Engineers in Germany with a custom map generating approximately 405bhp and 420lbft. DSG is running a custom map too with a short ratio gear set and the newer 9.5 inch wheels allow 265 rubber to be used. I have known the car for many years and know the former owner well. I know how well it's been looked after and that was a huge part of why I wanted to buy this particular car. It will no doubt be familiar to anyone who follows SMRC north of the border or NSSCC run out of Croft. Initial plans are to run it for a year, get used to the car and learn how to run it efficiently. First modification step will be weight reduction. After spending a lot of time reducing the weight on the Corrado and seeing the effect it has on drive-ability and lap times, weight reduction will always be the first port of call from now on. It still runs original Seat Sport factory spec panels and windows, some of which are glass, so there's an obvious route to go down. Trick will be keeping the balance of the car sweet. Longer term, I'd like to have a 500bhp, 1100kg car with a gearbox to suit but that's the end game and some way away for where it is now. In the meantime, here's some pics of how it sits now. Excuse the workshop lighting, it makes the paint look different colours. Oh, we got 52 tyres and 8 sets of wheels with the car so keep an eye on the classifieds! One of the tyre walls makes Scotty look a bit small.
It looks amazing! I was going to say i like the colour with yellow fading to green but they realised it was the lighting. Are you planning to keep it yellow?
Hehe Given interior is yellow I'll keep some yellow on exterior. Thinking a black/yellow combo of some sort, probably a carbon fibre effect wrap on the bits that become black.
Now thats one tasty garage selection of cars! Any idea how it will compare as it is to your corrado lap times?
Yeah, round Knockhill it's roughly 1.5 to 2 secs a lap quicker, albeit on slicks where the Corrado runs on 1B tyres. Corrado is quicker in a straight line but the Copa brakes like a proper race car and has better traction out of the tight bends, probably helped out by the slicks again.
Great to see you finally got one Mark, great car and always kept in top condition from Andrew. Has Andrew got a new car for racing in the SMRC?
after reading you thread about the Corrado I will be keeping an eye on this one, always had a soft spot for leons
I am glad to see you got the yellow one, always seemed to be very well cared for. I believe the previous owner has gone for the eurocup? It will be good to see them both out next year.
Yeah, after further dissection it appears very well looked after. The TTE420 Turbo seems very fresh too and from the look of the mapping/boost there's probably another 30bhp to 40bhp peak available in there but I think we'll keep that in our pocket for the time being. There will be 3 Supercopas racing in Scottish Sports & Saloons this year, another one's just been brought in from Hungary. 1 x 2016 Spec Eurocup and a 1 x 2016 TCR Spec Honda Civic too, should hopefully be some good racing to be had!
Not much more to add on this at the moment. Only really sat in it making race car noises to myself. Had a chance to remove most of the decals and have been getting used to the air-jacks. Playing around with bumper and floor removal just to make sure we know what we're doing when it's needed trackside.
First race weekend of 2016 under our belt, only our 3rd outing in the car. The week started off with a trip down to see Jabbasport with the intention of letting the mapping magician Kevin Glover get a decent map on there. Our plans were foiled when a couple issues were found but Kev put a safe map on which lowered the power and torque but would let me get out and race. A disappointing 800 mile round trip but gave me the time to forge some plans with Jabbasport. Stay tuned for more. Scotty and I finished off the car late on Friday night and turned up on Saturday for testing expecting to be left wanting more. Not the case, Kev had done his stuff and the car was driving well but noticeably lacking a bit of puff at the top end and going up the straight which was to be expected. Still, we set our fastest time in the car so far. We were greeted at Knockhill on Sunday by the usual fog and heavy rain which only heightened the nerves. Qualified 5th but stupidly abandoned a lap that would have seen us in 2nd place on the grid. Mistake. Race 1 was wet, very wet. My first race on racing wet tyres so wasn't sure what to expect. Confidence quickly grew as the grip became apparent and we held the drifts and avoided the stranded cars to finish 4th overall. Race 2 was held just as the track was starting to dry. Unfortunately, race was cut short due to badly positioned retirements and more fluid on the track than I've ever seen before. You'll see in one of the pictures what I mean, it was shocking. Anyway, race was red flagged with us in 3rd position, the first podium finish we've had in SMRC Scottish Sports & Saloon Cars Championship. Delighted. So much more to come from the car as we learn how to use it and can't wait for the next meeting. Videos Race 1: [video=youtube;RtwqhUS-WOM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtwqhUS-WOM[/video] Race 2: [video=youtube;iOKeZ96Rg0g]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOKeZ96Rg0g[/video] Photos
Distinct lack of updates, sorry folks, but there has been a good reason. Firstly, I got some livery put on the car to tart it up a bit: [/URL] [/URL] [/URL] So, that was back in the first weekend of May. At the time that I got the car, I wasn't 100% happy with it. There was an intermittent misfire which came and went with no obvious reason or cause and it just didn't seem to want to rev like it should but what do I know, new car and all that. I wan't happy with that so sent it off to Kev Glover at JabbaSport for a mapping session. This is where things stated to become a bit clearer..... This was apparently a 400bhp car with a dyno plot to back that up. Nowhere near it once on Jabba's rollers, clearly been run on questionable mapping and misfire popping it's head up again. This was put down to the valve springs in the 2008 BHZ engine being too weak for the boost the TTE420 Turbo was pushing out. Turns out they were the original springs which I understand were subject to a VAG TSB and should have been replaced with stronger items. They weren't. So, take the plunge and order up a new set of Ferrea valve springs and new inlet and outlet valves to boot. Sweet? Naw. After the bits took a few weeks to arrive from the States Jabba start to strip down the head. Now, I had done a compression test before on the car and knew Cyls 1 & 2 were down a bit on pressure. 150psi as opposed to about 190psi in 3 & 4. A small oil leak had also appeared from the head. When the head came off it was clear there were major issues. Inside of head was black as tar, scoring on the cam guides, blocked oil return and a lot of general nastyness, nothing that can't be sorted though and Jabba cracked on with that and got the head rebuilt. As we were half way there, may as well strip down the bottom end. Damn. Two cracked pistons in Cyl 1 & 2, scoring on the block etc etc. So, block re-honed, new rods, low compression pistons, bolts etc go in. Whilst I was at it, I got the very helpful and awesome guys at Pro Alloy to build up a custom radiator to help keep temps down. I had wanted a custom intercooler done too but fair play to Pro Alloy, they looked at the Seat Sport item (same as an 8P S3 i believe) and said they could do anything better than that with the space we had so saved a bit of dosh and inlet temps weren't an issue anyway. Fast forward some time and the new radiator is in and we're all built up again, shoved a new clutch pack and oil in the DSG and Kev is ready to perform his mapping wizardry again. Almost. Kev spent all day on the car and couldn't get the mapping right, fuelling wasn't consistent and causing an issue. So with a bit of playing around find out it's running RS4 injectors, one of which is not functioning correctly. To add to that, the fuel pressure valve could have been tampered with as it was holding 175psi when coming off the throttle. Should ideally be popping at 155psi. So, here we are now. New set of injectors are in and new 155psi valve is in too. Kev is very kindly coming in tonight to get the car on the rollers and hopefully that will be it! Maybe not, who know's!! Massive thanks to Jabba for putting up with my pestering over the past few months. If they pull this off for me I'll be at Croft this Fri, Sat & Sun, a race meeting I've been looking forward to all year. Fingers crossed and will hopefully report back positively soon! Thx for reading.
