Skully's '17 Caddy Maxi

[Skully]

Axle flip done and dusted. Set the rear on the second lowest hole for a 70mm drop.
Took me two and a half hours to do the job.
Pretty chuffed at the outcome.

Before:



After:



Looks pretty decent now, methinks. Not stupidly low. Went for adrive and no strange noises, no catching on speedbumps, etc.

[Giddy]

Well done, looks good

[Skully]

Thanks mate.

And front bumper has been colour coded and a small custom touch in the form of a gloss black top and bottom grill and spot light covers has been done.

Looks stunning and I am collecting it tomorrow from the painter

Video he sent me:
https://youtu.be/rTSu58coz_I

[brooneye]

Looks much better now the backs been lowered and the front bumper looks


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[Skully]

Thank you Sir Brooneye

[Skully]

I collected the bumper this morning and just finished fitting it.
Whole process of removing the other bumper, fitting the foglight grilles, swopping the top grill trim and badge over, and fitting the "new" bumper took about half an hour.

But it looks freaking stunning now, and the gloss black just makes it look perfect.

[brooneye]

That looks a lot better, especially with the gloss black. But then I’m biased when it comes to gloss black


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[E-Bagge]

Hmm think you should leave the badge in chrome, otherwise it gets a bit "black-dulled"

[echomadman]

Looks tasty, I'd like to lower my Maxi life a bit but I use it to haul trials bikes and can end up on some really terrible roads up into the forestry

[RobbieCT]

Your van's looking sweet Skully. How has the ride been with the JOM's? I'm looking at getting a set next week. I do off road rallying so I load the van with spares and do quite a bit of driving on gravel roads. We going from CT to PE in July for the VW national so I want to do it before we go.

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[Skully]

Haven't updated in a long while...... will do so later tonight.

I have been on some gravel roads and sometimes it scrapes a bit over speedbump sized bumps, but nothing scary.
Ride on the JOMs is actually pretty comfortable in normal driving. A lot firmer than the stock suspension, but not so firm that I need a kidney belt or a chiropractor. Handling has improved drastically as well as it is not a cruise ship in corners any more.

Been to three track days since lowering it and I need to firm up the rear leafs as the rear sags quite a bit with the bike and gear in it and the rear tyres catch on the fender wells over bumps.

[Skully]

Update on what I have done so far.



So...... this happened a while ago:






I love Porsche and their carbon ceramic brakes which are identified by yellow calipers, so I did this.
It gives a nice contrast to the silver and black all over the Caddy.

Done with Duplicolor caliper spraypaint.
Cleaned with Prepsol, then methylated spirits, primed with VHT Flameproof primer, then three coats of Duplicolor and dried for four hours before refitting.

Had the roof wrapped with gloss black vinyl at a local wrapping spot called KNS Customs (same place that did the remap on it as well):








I did some granny driving to see how far a tank of diesel would get me.


OK, so some proper calculations......
Last time I filled up from reserve warning, the tank took 62 litres and it was right at the filler cap.
Tank is 55 litres.
Reserve is 10 litres.

62 litres minus 10 = 52 litres.
820km on 52 litres = 6,34L/100km or 15.77km/L.

That is brilliant consumption in my books.
And again, this is normal everyday driving including highway, stuck in traffic (sometimes crawling at below 20kmh), just normal every day use.

Used this:


Before:


After:




Still some minor marks, but looks a hell of a lot better.

And finally got around to doing the sun visors.....

Before:








Yes.... that airbag warning label is printed on both sides of the passenger sunvisor. Looks ultra crap and irritating, but not for long....
Got some of this:


Then carefully cut the flap things off both sunvisors:




Then cleaned with methylated spirits, then given two light coats, then left for 10 minutes, then 4 proper coats.

Much better and not f***ing beige anymore:








I will go look at scrapyards and see if I can find a nice mirror for the passenger side (for certain other people....)


I was always irritated by the light coloured sunvisors, especially on very bright days. They were simply to light in colour and was more of a distraction, especially since I covered the parcel shelf. The contrast in colours was crap.
But now, they are literally perfect to use for what they were designed.

Randoms:
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And had to spend some more money..... brake discs and pads are not covered by warranty and I did it myself after a visit to my local Midas.
And was not willing to have VW do it at some rip-off price either.
Passenger rear started making some noise and turns out the outer pad was finished and started damaging the disc. Not a nice thing to happen when I was very far from home and on my way back.
Oh well, damage done brakes are fixed.

The front discs both had a ridge of about 2mm as well and I decided to do all the discs one shot.
I have never had discs skimmed, always replaced if they get worn down to that level.

New front and rear Ferodo discs along with new rear pads (could not get Ferodo pads, so got the Safeline), and a proper brake caliper tool kit:


Front discs:


Rear discs:
[url=https://postimages.org/]

Rear pads:


Brake caliper kit:




Passenger rear disc:
[url=https://postimages.org/]



No pics of the fitting process, but brakes are 100% again and MUCH better than the stock VW stuff.
Ferodo discs + Ferodo front pads + Safeline rear pads = better the OEM, end of story.

I did the bedding in process late one night on a local highway that was quiet and this Van stops waaaaaaaay better than it used to.

Just some crappy cellphone pics of the headlight beam pattern. I got home half an hour ago and will try get some decent shots using my camera sometime soon.

First two facing a wall at a distance of about 10 metres -
Dims:


Brights:


And facing the fence at about 15 metres -
Ground slopes upwards towards the fence and the lights look like they are set very low, but they are not.

Dims:


Brights:


Cut-off points on these LED lights are almost exactly the same as halogen globes.
And as you can clearly see, they are plenty bright enough.

I am more impressed with these LEDs every time I drive at night.

All the online reviews I have read praise them because they work properly. I have seen quite a few cheapy LED headlight bulbs and quite frankly, most of them are worse than HID kits in reflector housings.

I will get some pics of how they look in the housings and get better pics at night. Just been way too busy.
And they don't throw any CANBUS errors either. Quality stuff. Thanks Philips.

Some more proof that these Philips LEDs are the ****:











I have to adjust the drivers side up a small bit, but as can be seen, these things are just amazing.
I have driven at night many times since installing the LEDs and have not been flashed once from the front.

Driving at night is actually nice now. I used to hate it with the halogens.

And some more:













And another 800+km tank of motion lotion:


Rear bumper skin and side rail covers are off and Aldo now has them to do some Reflex Silver loving on them.
I am going to clean the Caddy just now (you can see the wheels have been cleaned.... Priorities, man. Priorities).
The joys of doing a job on a farm road. Dusty as hell.









We are leaving for France on the 18th (next Tuesday) and getting back the 28th. Will update if Aldo the paint guy sends any progress pics.

[RobbieCT]

Hi Ryan Can I ask you got your coilover kit from and what you paid for them. I'm struggling to find a complete set in CapeTown.

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[Skully]

Robbie, got them from IS Motorsport. They can courier them anywhere in SA. Speak to Moe if you can, he organised the kit for me.

And.......

Caddy needs a decent bath, but here it is:

[Skully]

Darkside hard pipe kit ordered and should have it next Tuesday. Will try fit it during next week, time permitting.