Looks great! How is the ride-height with the BC's? The stance looks great but I remember reading somewhere that the coilovers come with an automatic 1/5" drop and I'm interested to know how that feels on SoCal roads.

 

IJWS,

The BCs have a huge range of adjustment on the lower clevis alone. At the maximum ride height (25mm of thread engagement) without touching the preload (3mm as per BC's recommendation, which equates to 47lb front and 59lb rear), it's about 1.5in higher than stock. At the low end, it's more than three inches lower than stock, which would be effectively undriveable. I'm sitting at what I believe to be approximately 1.4 inches lower than stock, and it's not a problem except on very steep driveways/parking lot ramps. The cheap, replaceable plastic front lip that Aston integrated into the design is a great worry reducer as well.

I currently have the adjusters set at 20 of 32 clicks from full soft in the front and 18 in the rear. 22/20 and up felt too jittery over small bumps and 18/16 and below didn't have enough body control. I'm pleasantly surprised by the overall performance for the price, but they feel to me like they have a little too much high speed compression and not enough low speed rebound, and being single adjustable, I can't quite get the balance I want. For a street car, they're more than good enough, but I wouldn't recommend them for track use.

 

I am so stupid. I completely forgot seeing the DBX Cabriolet above. MUCH higher than standard . I have long been tempted by the BC coilovers but am not sure if I should spoil the ride of my 2014 base coupe since it is very comfortable. I think an alignment will be a first baby-step.

 

Thanks for that valuable unbiased report on the BC coilovers.
I share your view on KW V3 they are superb for adjusting the handling with the individual low speed bump adjustment - but agreed, they are very expensive for the Vantage.
Keep on enyoing your Vantage and continue the great reports!

 

lmaooooo

Awesome project Conedodger. It's crazy how much better the cars look with their stock wheels.

 

Thanks for all the positive comments, everyone. The Vantage is very different from the type of cars I'm usually interested in, but I've really fallen for it, and aside from some frankly silly engineering choices complicating repair access, it's been fun to work on too.

Since purchase, the car has exhibited a whine from the engine compartment that only appears during hard driving on twisty roads. It rose and fell with engine speed, but didn't sound like belt slip or a bad pulley bearing. A quick check of the contents of the power steering reservoir turned up this:



That's... definitely not green any more. Also, it stank like a toaster full of plastic bags.

OUT WITH YOU, BLIGHTED FLUID!



Reminds me of distilling methanol from wood in high school chemistry. Yuck.

Ultimately, I was able to extract 300ml from the reservoir and another 450ml by disconnecting the return hose and cycling the rack back and forth. It took 50ml of Lubrizol and 800ml of CHF-11S to reach the full line after reconnecting and bleeding. The nominal system volume is 1100ml, so it had been 100ml low and now had 77% fresh fluid.



The whine has not returned since changing the fluid, but I'll flush it again in 500 miles just to be sure.

The Vantage performed faultlessly over 500 miles for a long weekend getaway with my wife, who normally has no interest in cars but declared it "special". I have to agree:



Now I just have to re-seal the rear window, change the transmission oil, change the ASM fluid, refinish the wheels, replace the spark plugs and coil packs, remove the fake "S" badge, touch up the leather dye...

 

I had the exact same whine and replacing the power steering fluid worked and is still working for over 5k miles. So fingers crossed you should be safe! Great write up!

 

This week I finally managed to check off the last two concerning jobs- changing transmission oil and halting the rear window's escape attempt. The former had been delayed by a certain distributor shipping me Redline MTL instead of MT-LV, and the latter by a perplexing lack of inventory of 3M 08609 glass adhesive anywhere in my area. Fortunately, both of those situations were eventually rectified.

The transmission oil change is fairly straightforward. The rear undertray has to be removed, and access to the fill port is a bit odd (I used a 4" extension on a deep socket and reached in through the lower control arm and subframe, but if you're less chicken about cutting yourself on the exhaust heatshield, you can get a closed end wrench on the plug easily enough).

Clean plug with a new crush washer:



I then removed the drain plug and filter. The oil stank, but in a normal gear oil sort of way, and was a dark amber rather than black, so it's probably been changed before. The drain plug magnet showed a normal amount of fine swarf and no big scary chunks. The filter likewise needed a clean but contained no metallic debris.




I cleaned them up and reassembled with a new crush washer and o-ring:




The transmission took 4.4 quarts to refill, and the removed quantity measured out at 4.3, so all in all it seems we have a healthy gearbox (whew).



Although it's not particularly complex or time-consuming, I was most nervous about reaffixing the rear glass, as it requires precision and you only get one attempt to get it right. My window had separated almost completely from the canvas and was being held in by the bond to the inner lining. Thankfully, this makes it fairly easy to align, albeit a bit tricky to prep.



I started by cleaning both the window edge and inside lip of the canvas with 70% isopropyl alcohol and a microfiber. Even I was surprised by the amount of contaminants removed.





I then applied Dow 5504G (3M primer is no longer legal in California) to both surfaces using a 0.5" wool dauber. While the instructions for 3M 08609 specify removal of the previous adhesive, in the case of a canvas top this isn't practically achievable without damaging the fabric, so instead I made sure to get complete coverage of both the old urethane bead and the surrounding canvas (underside only, obviously). I also cut the tip for the 08609 to give a small triangular bead; in retrospect I would have gone for a flat bead instead, as the triangular shape was difficult to keep uniform in such a tight space.





Oh caulk:



After letting the primer cure for 10 minutes, I laid a 1/4" bead of adhesive around the full perimeter of the glass, then pressed the window up into the canvas using a mix of styrofoam blocks and an 8" inflatable ball. Once I had a visible (and at least semi-uniform) bead of squeeze-out all the way around, I weighted the canvas down with my press blocks (12x1x4 mild steel, 13.6lb each).





I'm happy to report that after a 24 hour cure, the window passed testing at 90 exactly the speed limit mph, multiple fold/unfold cycles, and the industry standard consumer hydration accident procedure (pouring a glass of water over it). It's not quite as perfectly uniform as I'd like, but considering a glass shop quoted me $800 to do what took me $55 in materials and under two hours, I'm fairly pleased.

 

This is my favorite thread. Following closely. Already ordered a colourlock kit and am looking forward to an alignment. Wish I had a garage so I could do the other steps on my own! Keep up the posts. Any insights you had on the colourlock application would be welcome.

 

Thanks IJWS! I haven't applied the Colourlock dye on this car yet, but I've used it previously on a Lexus with a badly neglected cream interior (awful car, long story). What I found was that it is very much like any other kind of painting- surface preparation is everything. For cracked or hardened areas, I used 300 grit sandpaper and a foam block to sand it back prior to dye application. I didn't completely remove the old dye, as I wasn't confident in how thick the leather was underneath, but i removed enough to give a smooth base for the new application. I then vacuumed the seat thoroughly and wiped it down with isopropyl alcohol to remove any residual oils from years of leather treatment products. You probably won't need to do anything that aggressive.

Depending on color, you should be prepared to apply at least one coat of dye to the whole seat to make it blend- the AM leather seems to change color significantly as it ages (probably due to being actual leather and not synthetic).

 

Conedodger650,

Thank you for the insight. I have watched like 100 youtube videos on Colourlock and nobody mentioned the need to cover the entire seat but that makes perfect sense. I have the sandstorm interior and it is definitely a shade darker than what you would expect. As soon as I get the kit I'm going to do some tests on the back of my seat and see how it looks. I'm interested to see what a mild or strong clean will do to the dash and other lighter-use leather surfaces. I will find out soon! Thanks for the tips!

 

The final two mechanical items needing attention on the Aston were common bugs- the Air-Oil Separator (AOS) and thermostat. I deviated substantially from Redpant's how-to here, so hold on to your hats...

We begin by removing the various breather tubes. Squeeze the tabs on each connector and they just pop right off.



Then undo two 8mm bolts and pull the PCV diaphragm out.





Remove the AOS hose. Small vice grips are the best way to handle these kind of hose clamps (pliers pictured were used for a different task).





Undo one additional 8mm bolt and pull the AOS out of the bracket. Yep, that's a leak.


Errr wait. THAT'S a leak-



Disconnect the bottom hose from the AOS and remove the unit from the car. You should now have access to two 10mm nuts holding the AOS bracket in place. Unclip the harness running across the top of the bracket and remove the two nuts, then lift the bracket out. I used man's best friend, Magnet on a Stick, to avoid dropping the rear nut anywhere irretrievable. At this point you'll also have access to check the upper part of the timing cover for leaks, inspect the belts, and pack the area with paper towels to cut down on coolant intrusion later. Fortunately, all looks to be in order here.









Next, slide a catch pan under the car and remove the two 13mm studs and one bolt holding the thermostat housing in place. For the love of all that is holy, do NOT cut the rear stud. I don't know who started the discussion around doing so, but they should have their wrenches confiscated permanently. All you have to do is fully unthread the stud from the engine block side, then lift it out together with the thermostat housing, then pull it out completely.

A lot of coolant will spill now, so be prepared. I measured the contents of the catch pan later and found it to be over a gallon.

Once the cascade slows, remove the old thermostat from the housing. Looks like I caught this one just in time.



I used a Motorcraft 2W9Z-8575-AB replacement thermostat. On the initial installation attempt, it was reaching coil bind before i could get the tabs tucked under. A comparison of the springs showed the new one was longer and had more coils of the same thickness, leading to the fitment issue. I swapped in the old spring and everything went together beautifully, complete with a new housing seal.









Assembly is truly the reverse of removal, albeit with a new AOS and fresh o-rings everywhere.





In with 1.5 gallons of the good stuff:



Bleeding the system is difficult- budget at least an hour and use a funnel bucket installed at the expansion tank.

And with that, the mechanical part of this project is complete.

 

Also, sadly, now up for sale:

https://www.6speedonline.com/forums/...ml#post4932991

 

Great thread. Question, is the AOS a bespoke Aston part or can you get it from Ford?

 

Unfortunately, the AOS seems to be Aston specific. I got the replacement from Scuderia.