I wanted to get as many GTA miles under my belt as quickly as possible. First stop, the local post office to reward her with 6 months road tax. I managed to go "the long way round" via 50 miles of back roads with a mixture of smooth and rough tarmac, straights and corners of all speeds and directions. Considering she appears to be on original suspension, the road manners are pretty impressive. There's the obligatory creaking of old bushes and what feels like a little bit too much play in the engine / gearbox mounts but in general the steering is fantastically communicative. If you take a little too much speed into a corner, there are signs of under steer but these subside if you ease off a little. Even on the relatively skinny 225 section rear tyres, traction at the rear seems unbreakable in the dry. I suspect, slow in, fast out is the way forward, especially if it's damp.
At first, performance feels a little benign. Trundling along with revs under 3500 and power the engine brings to mind a middle of the road family saloon, not much drama and quiet to boot. Everything changes once the boost arrives though, with the obligatory lag of a single turbo, the shove makes itself felt and things begin to get interesting. The car boosts well, with the in dash gauge heading just to the left of the black segment. Keeping the engine on boost and it's easy to reach 3 figure speeds (I would imagine). There's a few niggles to iron out on the engine and management. Tickling the turbo tends to invoke the orange filament warning and the service lights to illuminate temporarily without apparent reason as it seems to detract little from performance. I did notice that the boost wouldn't always achieve the same maximum on the in dash gauge so plan to fit a boost gauge in the near future before any fettling. The speedo is now working and almost exactly agrees with the speed shown by my sat nav. It can be a little slow and lazy to register in the first 20 mph though so something somewhere still needs a clean.
Considering the system remains untouched, still using the old fluid, pads and discs after 4 years in a field, the brakes make a good account of themselves too. Lack of mass is always a good thing for performance and braking, shame I'm not helping with the addition in the driver's seat! I've already bought, but yet to fit some braided hoses and track day pads and fluid ... jumping the gun a little on my decision of what to do with this car! The clutch and gear change also feel smooth and accurate. although once or twice, 5th gear did seem to pop out all on its own.
I can't help drawing parallels with the other cars I'm used to driving for fun. The GTA turbo begins to lighten at the front as speed builds, the feeling is somewhat like being in a speedboat and not dissimilar to the other rear engine car in my garage. You never forget where the engine is, for better or worse. This is not so in the current BMW e30 track car, but is perhaps one of the reasons I feel I've reached the end of the line with it. Front engine, rear wheel drive feels a little too easy to master, especially with modest BHP. My 964 on the other hand, through 20 years of ownership, always has a little surprise left if I ever dare to think I've mastered things! I expect, at full whack, on track, the GTA will require similar respect and be just as rewarding!
So I continued my back road investigations, gradually upping the ante on the engine, brakes and steering, moving closer to the decision on whether this would be a good track weapon. I always intended to do 100 miles of hard testing before hitting the track, it's just common sense as there's no point finding the car isn't up to it whilst on the day, potentially ruining the track for others and being stranded miles from home. In terms of point to point performance, the GTA turbo feels smack bang in the middle of the 964 C2 and the e30 325 track car. Before spending any hard earned on track oriented upgrades, the mission was to get the GTA to Brands Hatch and Snetterton 300 and match my e30 times of 1m 03secs and 2m 36secs respectively. By the the end of testing was near, I was almost certain the GTA turbo, in standard, aged condition would achieve this. Decision made then..... and as the evening was drawing in, just enough time for a few more miles to get me back home to rest after a tiring but fun afternoon.
On the last leg now and my head was full of bucket seats, BHP gains, roll hoops and racing decals. Throughout the afternoon, I had been monitoring oil pressure and coolant temperature as if by paranoid religion, and everything had been spot on. Coolant gradually worked up to 90C from cold when on the move. If stopped in traffic the temperature nudged above 90 until the front fan would kick in and bring things back to normal. Cruising at any speed above 20mph would also noticeably lower the coolant temperature. Excellent, all looks good, time to head back and book the track day.... ....... ......except of course, now, my guard was lowered.
Half a mile from home, a red coolant warning light appears on the dash. Sh*t, its above 130C!....... Sh*t, how long ago did I last check the temperature? ......... Sh*t, how quickly has it overheated? Sh*t, sh*t, sh*t. Nearly home, I'll just cruise it back to the driveway, yes, nearly there, 50m to go and then poooooffffff, a loud rush of steam from the middle of the car. I roll onto the driveway and jump out of the car, fire extinguisher in hand and watch as the car empties the contents of its rusty coolant system onto my block paving! SH*T!!
When things calm down, I get back in the car and notice that, somewhat eerily, the trip counter that I zeroed at the beginning of the test reads exactly 100.0 miles! I think le GTA gods are having a little laugh at my expense..... literally!
So, the car has failed "testing" at the last hurdle but my heart already appears to have made a rash decision to keep her and sympathetically create a track day car........ I had a chance to get under her today and it seems the weak link in the coolant system was unfortunately the steel pipes that run through the central tunnel. Better to discover this now than later. I see the pipes are available from simon-auto.de but it must be and engine out job right? Not sure this is within my skill set on the driveway so time to consider options. If I do chicken out and use a friendly specialist, I'm a bit worried about the inevitable "whilst you're in there" slippery slope.
As to the root cause of the overheat, I have to be optimistic about the head gaskets. I clearly didn't bleed the system correctly and there was still plenty of sludge in there to cause the problem. I wish I knew how quickly the overheat came on, but I just wasn't paying enough attention by that stage.
This was never going to be a short story, I hope I'm making the right decision. Tell me I'm doing the right thing?
as your footer says, you can't be half pregnant, so join the fun, man up, and go for it! 
.... be patient with me. 
