Leaderboard

Day 3: Sundsvall So after the morning thrash with the wheel bearing we were pretty keen to get a run on the board and then re-evaluate the situation, maybe even take it easy we were in 2nd overall in the class so no stress right... We were a bit late after the drive and seting up the pits etc but no worries, got everything sorted, even ended up zip-tying a rag in the drum to catch the oil from the destroyed axle seal. got queued up in a mint Swedish summer day. First pass went well, around a 9.13@125 with an ok 60'. Good enough, or was it... I had the crazy idea to rearange the boost lines and put some boost onto the top of the wastegate to help it stay closed, up until this point it was just disconected and using the emap to blow it open. To aid with control I wired the wastegate on the hx40 closed and routed the boost to the top of the gate throught the boost control solenoid so I could have some control over it. To start with I ran it at 50% duty cycle, lets see what happens... As a side note you can see the dump valve stratergy still working a cham. Turns out that was the right thing to do, it cut a 8.76@130, with a 2.0 60'. I came back around and the lanes were empty, so I had a quick squiz at the logs and everything was GOOOOD, so I bumped the duty cycle up to 75% 8.63@131 2.0 60' , ripper, that put us into 1st place in the class. But the lanes were still open, and there was more duty cycle to be had. lets see what 100%can do... This is how I ended up being towed back to the pits... This is the diff over leaf kit i was using, and due to the funny laws in Denmark around modifying cars I hadn't welded the leaf mounts to the diff, they arent ment to be, but then they aren't made for drag racing either. Turned out that on the launch the axle had rotated in the u bolts and torn some of the spring perches off the axle tubes and munted the cups, broke the rear driveshaft u-joint, which then broke the front driveshaft u-joint, all in all a big mess. The mercedes part of the driveshaft was the difficult part to source, so we got to work asking around the pits if there was any local driveshaft shops that we could coax into action, we got a few leads, but upon walking through the pits, I saw Frederik, one of the other diesel class competitors, who to be quite frank was having a shit of a time, he was runing an old Mercedes with a nastier version of my engine and trans combo. the first day he broke his diff, the second day he had the same issues as me with the timing light, and as it turned out he had broken his gearbox on the drive and had spent all day fighting with it, he was beat, and out. I politely asked him what he was doing with his driveshaft, and he said that if it would help me finish I could have it, so the difficult part was sorted, then I rolled up to the gibb performance truck and after a few trips back and forwards to figure out exactly what it was I was running, I got all of the bits I needed, ok so time for dinner and then get into it. So this is where things got a bit tricky, I had my tig, and I had a generator, but the generator couldn't run my tig, so I hit up Martin in the Hotrod next to us and I could use his generator, but it had swedish plugs on it so I couldn't plug in my tig, so then I borrowed his tig, and his generator couldn't run that either, but luckily the team to the other side of us had paid for power, but that was 50m away so then I had to scrounge 50m of swedish extension cords, which we managed, and so finally the whole operation was under way. btw because of the late start time this all occured at around midnight, thankfully we were so far north in Sweden that we basically had the midnight sun, and there was only a period around 02:00 that we needed torches. But we got after it, beat the spring perches back into shape, welded them on, reset the sway bar and caltracs, assembled both driveshafts and got it back on its wheels, we finished at around 04:30, I had the bright idea that we should have the first hot shower of the week and so we hit the sack, set the alarms for 09:00. After the most peaceful 4 hours of sleep in my life we woke up, packed up camp and hit the road after the days checkpoints.

OS 2024 DRAG DAY QUEST! I am running behind schedule of where I'd have hoped to be by now. The last month has flown by without much progress. Due to concentrating on getting my new garage up and being away from home a lot for work. Some other people have helped me though which I am very grateful for! @flyingbrick helped me with getting the radiator patched up properly, many thanks! Now it will fit between the rails and hold water. I'm not sure if he is a member on OS but Dan from Taupo helped me to machine the fuel rails. Although I thought it was a cool idea at the time to make these a derpy shape since they are printed. I guess I kinda forgot that it would be a total prick to hold them in place later on for machining. Dan desinged some soft jaws which I printed. Then he drilled injector holes to correct size, and tapped the threads for the end fittings. Thanks Dan! Much appreciated. Hindsight: I should have added a hex shape or some flats onto the very end of the rail, so there's something to hold onto with a spanner when tightening the end fittings. I've sourced one of the tiny dual diaphragm KE70 brake boosters and master cyls, this will give me a heap more clearance to the drivers side bank. I wont fit this till later though. As per usual my scheme for the extractors on passenger side didnt quite go to plan. There just wasnt enough room for the 3rd runner to work nicely. without hitting the chassis rail. So I have a bit of a dorky shape on 3rd runner but if it gets me going then thats cool. They're all fairly even lengths. What's left to do, to get to the drags? -Finish building garage -Finish extractors -make rest of exhaust fit -fit mufflers -hang exhaust -make battery box / battery wiring -wire up radiator fan -redo fuel lines at back of the head -add charcoal can and extend the line from under the car -Make top and bottom radiator mounts -Test start up? -Test drive? -Pull motor and box back out, crossmember out -properly weld engine mounts and repaint crossmember -Remake firewall -Swap to KE70 booster and MC -redo brake lines I've got 8 1/2 weeks to get all of the above finished, put some miles on it, shake out any unforseen issues, and get a tech inspection. So I'm kind of at the point where it's doable, but I need absolutely nothing to sideswipe me between now and then. Which is highly possible. Kind of exciting. See how it goes!

Made a gear stick extension. The Torana box makes it a bit of a reach from the HQ driving position. Shifters are available from Aussie, but for over $1000 bux ill give this a go first. Used a broken chromed tire iron i had been saving for just such an occasion, plus a 1/2"x20 UNF bolt, and 3 matching nuts. Welded the bolt on one end to give the threads for the knob And 2 nuts on the other other end to attach the extension on to the original shifters threads + the last nut threaded onto the shifter as a lock nut to hold it in position. The gear stick falls to hand much nicer now its about 4 inches back and about the same higher. Torana centre console plus the gear stick gaiter from the Croma Turbo i wrecked (still have the engine in the stash for one day) Then moved all the cars. 2300 wagon looked like a barn find Even pushed the Dio ZX out into the light for a hose down! (oil tank had leaked down and hydro locked the cylinder! It was pretty smokey once it fired up!) Then Kisrty fired the old dog up and rolled it into the sun for a wash *Somehow* it got turned around and it now faces the other way. Can confirm the brakes, clutch and gearbox works fine, exhaust is not too loud while driving and she rolls along pretty happily. Back end with the new exhaust and tank looks great! Drivers side, ehhh, not so much, but pretty much the same as the other side, rust in the plenum corners, whole sill front to rear, corners of the doors and rear arches. Took the opportunity to sweep and wash out the garage, lots of rust, mud and old greasy smeg Then poked it back in, this time with the drivers side facing the workbench/welder.

Soon after that, I happened to be browsing one afternoon and saw a new listing with the "Listed just now" written under it. "Running when parked" etc. I didn't think it would be the car for us, but messaged the seller out of curiosity. He was super helpful, quick to respond, and happy to send as many photos as I wanted. The seller himself, was a huge selling point for this car. So more photos and details came in. Its a 1967 Country Sedan, 390FE and C6. Power steering. Power drum brakes. Complete and original except for the front bench seat. Now I'm a terrible optimist, so in my minds eye, I can see this with an original front seat, new carpet, and a steam clean, as being not too bad of a car. There's a rust hole in the left rear guard, but the seller says its the only one. Yeah sure, heard that before... More photos please: Hmmmm OK thats actually straight as an arrow... And how's that patina! The price was right on this car too. So we ordered another Lemon Squad inspection, and it came back with everything pretty much as expected except that the windscreen was broken. A crack on the passenger side that the seller hadn't even noticed before. Just the one rust hole in the rear quarter. I poured over the photos, put together a spreadsheet of everything I thought it would need, and quickly priced up all the parts. It adds up to be pretty much the same price as the "ready to drive" cars I've looked at, plus my time (probably lots of it...) but this seems like an honest survivor car, so once I've got it on the road, I'll know what I've got. And best of all, the seller was a GC. If he ever reads all of this, I hope he knows how grateful I am. Money changed hands, and I got sent this yesterday. Over 6 months after looking at the first car. So as far as ticking the original boxes: Small block v8, ideally manual, 10 seat option, power steering, power disc brakes. Hmmm close enough. Auto is fine, and I'll likely sub out the 390 for a 302W in the future. Supposedly its only got 6 seats, but the VIN tag decodes to a 10 seater, and the panels for the fold up seats are there in the photos, so hopefully its not a major to make/fit some. Hmm yeah that. Well, I figure usually when importing an old car, it needs brakes, shocks, ball joints etc. So just add carpet, seat, headliner and wheels to that list and its sorted. If I'm lucky, it will be less work to get on the road than the rust repairs on that really nice 66 that ghosted us.

So at this stage I'm busy trying to round up all the parts I need to come over with the car. The key things being the windscreen and a front seat. The seller reckoned he knew where a good front seat was, and tried to arrange to buy it, but just couldn't get hold of the guy before the car left I managed to find a front seat frame in Southern California, but they're not sure that they can get it sent to where it needs to go in San Fran. Fingers crossed I manage to pull something together... The windscreen is very hard to find for a wagon, but I found a place in Arizona that does classic car glass and has one in stock. They are getting it crated up, but their crating/freight place is busy, and they have a 3-week wait! They're gonna try and hurry it along. Hopefully that doesn't miss the boat either, or things will start to get expensive! I also came across a good Trademe score and got some 15" wheels and near new tires for cheaps.

With some advice from a mate and against my better judgment as I've never played with an ld28 ...I stripped the head off to check surfaces and look for cracks Even the head gasket looked in great shape . So I ordered a full gasket set , frost plugs ,oil filter , thermostat and watetpump.. Wet stoned the face of the block and head ...and then out it all back together...even managed to get all the timing marks in place and bottoned down... turns over with no interference.....huge win for ...qas shitting myself ...bit of black paint ..and she's going back together And Thats this thing upto date.. cheers

Day 1: Mantorp Park We woke up to the sound of methanol big blocks and sunshine so all was good. We showed up to the drivers meeting at 08:00, which was in Swedish, so I didn't catch any of it, and then the track opened for racing. Leading up to the event Philip and I had spent a lot of time speculating about the other cars in the Diesel class, we all got a magazine before the event and in there we were clearly the slowest diesel car out of the 5 entrants. But between ½bad luck and poor time management only 2 of the theoreticaly fast diesel cars showed on the day, and one of the had only been started for the first time ever the day before, unfortunately the diesel class turned out to be a bit of an overflow for the other classes when the real racecars didn't get finished on time. Due to running out of time there were a few items on the to-do list which needed to be completed, one was an oil change, I hadn't changed the oil since I had done the motor swap so that was a must have, the second was I needed to change the plumbing to the line lock solenoid, unbeknownst to me, they are not solenoid activated valves, but rather solenoid activated one way valves, and as I had plumbed it into the rear brake line instead of the fronts I needed to plumb it up backwards. So with those two taskes complete we set to putting the slicks on and setting the preasures. This is where things got a little funky, I went to set the tyre pressure and one of the drag slicks had no valve in the valve stem... Weird, but anyway, went to the race directors office and bought some of the steel valve stems we needed anyway and stole the valve out of that. For reference it had 15 psi in the tyres, 15 psi in the airbags, and the Caltracs were set to light preload. So with the Truck setup as best as I could guess I queued up. The first pass was notbad.jpg, going into it I thought running under a 10 would be a good starting point and off the trailer it went 9.15@118 with a 2.0 60' So I queued back up and ran again, this time with a much better burnout. This resulted in a 8.81@121 with a 1.90 60',we were stoked with that and packed up for the day, got the check points and rolled out. at 21:00 we looked up the days results, and we were in 2nd place in the Diesel class.

Recently I was lucky enough to purchase this fine machine which has a little family history. It was the first car built by GT40 Replication Ltd in Auckland. One of my grandads mates was the man behind GT40 Replication and so my grandad did some of the mold work for these cars. I told my self 16 years ago when I heard about this car (when I first got interested in proper cars) that if it ever came on the market I would buy it. 15 years later luckily enough it came on the market and I was kind of in a position to buy it (you may have seen all my shit for sale here and trademe). Anyway, here we are and its in my shed. Its an interesting concoction which i'll discuss once I actually start working on it, but I plan to just drive it and enjoy it over summer. It needs quite a lot of maintenance, but the bones are good. Has Rover V8, Renault Transaxle, DBA/Holden fronts brakes, seems to go pretty good. Have found lots loose on the induction side and it looks like the cap,rotor leads and plugs are the same from when it was built so I will do them all shortly. Air filter was coozed, has a Holley 600 on it unsure on jets etc yet but it drives nice, slight flat spot if you punch the pedal down but I havent fault found it yet. It needs a gasket kit but that will likely be next winters job...

Day 2: Dala-järna We rolled into Dala-järna around 00:30 and set up camp, had a kip and woke up fresh for a day of racing, on the drive I had given the fuel and boost tables a bit of the old page up action and I was keen to see how this would play out on track. Dala-järna is an unpreped airfield so I knew that we wouldn't be as fast as the day before, but never the less, I riding high on the success of yesterday. I queued up and did a good burnout, things felt good and I stalled it eup, let rip and it felt good, easily as fast as yesterday, so you can imagine my disappointment when Philip handed me a time slip for 11.35... So I queue up again, Dala-järna had a weird system where it was a single line and split into two right at the burnout box, so it seemed to be hugely long but it went quickly. This run it was a red light... So I queued up again, 10.87... and again, red light... By this point I was extremely frustrated, I even call on a few of the other races to help figure out what was goin on. I queued up again, and another red light... This time though Phililp videoed the whole thing, and it became immediately clear what was happening, the 4" exhaust that exits behind the front passenger tyre was bellowing black smoke and tripping the beams. So i jumped on the laptop and changed the control stratergy so that the dump valve would only open when the undriven wheel speed was 3kph. Queued up again, but this time it pushed through the beams and we got a 10.30, better but still not good. One more time, 9.41@127 with a lousy 2.25 60' good enough for 3rd place, and after the shit fight we had we were more than happy to pack up. By around 21:00 we were ready to hit the road, we got the check points and put them into google, we were in for a long night... Basically as soon as we left we could hear something wasn't right in the diff, there was a metallic rubbing noise, but due to the distance we had to cover we ignored it for as long as we could. After about 45 minutes we pulled over next to a lake and inbetween being eaten alve by mosquitos we figured out that the cage in the drivers side wheel bearing had left the chat. We tried out life lines, and got the nummber for Lennart from Gibb performance, who was following StreetWeek around with a truck full with rear end components, but the time was around 23:00 at this point so I guess he was in bed already. At this point we were around 40kms outside of Mora, so we made the call that we were going to limp there, travelling at 30kph gave us time to figure out a plan, and we made the call that we should park at the tyre shop, as they opened first in the morning and their facebook page had some photos of race cars. We got there, parked up and set the alrams for 05:45. We got up in the morning and met them as they were coming into work and whist helpful they didn't have a lead on a bearing. The did suggest that 50kms away there was Proshop which dealt in American junk so not all hope was lost. There was still a bit of time to kill and seeings as the wheel bearing was just a skf ball bearing, we decided to drop into the John Deere dealership and see if there was any luck there, but to no avail. The guys at the tyre shop had pointed us to the Swedish equivilent of Repco, so we started making out way there, on the way there we stumbled upon a place called MECA, which turned out to be a bit like BNT, more aimed at workshops with tools and parts and things. So at 7am, fithy, running on instant coffee an around 5 hours sleep, I rocked in there and asked in English ( Swedish is NOT Danish) if they had a wheel bearing for a Ford 9", to which the old guy behind the counter replied "The 80mm one?", it was at this point I knew I had my guy. After a bit of computer work, some looking in the physical parts catalogue, back to the computer, it turned out they had three, a pair and one other brand, I was a bit scared that this might be an ongoing thing so I bought all three. I asked if it was fine if we changed it in the parking lot and that was ok by them. So we got to work. I cut the old bearing off with the angle grinder and using the armco as a work bench I started hammering the new one on. After ½ hour I decided to ask if they had a press, and it turned out that the old guy had a tractor workshop 3 km away, so I grabbed the axle and jumped in his car. it took around 3 minutes to get it fixed up and ready to go. Turned out old mate only worked part time at MECA to keep the tax man happy and from 11-late he worked under the table fixing tractors for the local forestry industry. If you ever read this Neils, you saved the day, thank you! We jammed the axle back in and hit the road, it was around 10am and we still had quite a journey ahead of us. We made it to the first checkpoint just in time for lunch, so we had food with some of the other StreetWeekers and carried on. We made it to the second check point and everything was still good. it was about here that it started being very mountainous, and I began wondering where they would fit a drag strip... Turns out Sundsvall Raceway is an old coldwar air stirp that is on the top of a mountain, the gravel road leading up to it didn't really let on to the excellent track that awaited us.

OKey Dokey folks, buckle up, I've finally pulled finger and have decided to share my tale of StreetWeek 2024. Be warned now, this will take some reading, and, due to the nature of drag and drive, not a lot of photos got taken. For those of you who don't know StreetWeek is a 1/8 mile drag and drive event held in Sweden every year, it encompases 7 days, 5 drag strips and around 1500kms of transport. This year was the route called "The Central Swing". Coming into the event we knew which race tracks were on which days but the transport route is set on the day and so you dont really know where or how long the drive is. StreetWeek differs a little from the American drag and drives in that, aside from the first day,the racing is from 14:00- 21:00 with the days checkpoints being released at 19:00. as opposed to dragweek et al running day time drags and afternoon drives. Aside from the hell week leading up to departure, where everything was pushed to the last minute, everything went to plan, ish... We got around 80-90% of my to do list completed, but kick off is kick off so we had to go. Day 0: Getting There... The first race day was at Mantrop park, and I live in Sorø, so the first I had to pack up the camper and roll out, drive through Copenhagen and pick up my Co-Driver for the week, Philip was the dude that was in the truck with me for the last adventure so all things considered he knew what to expect... ish. I left home at noon, scrutineering closed at 21:00, we had at least a 6 hour drive, things were tight... So aside from fixing the exhaust manifold leak, one other notable modification we completed was the fabrication and installation of some homebrew Caltracs, this also ment thay navigation of inner Copenhagen with their perchant for bus sized speed bumps tricky and I ended up getting beached on one, and at the same time the shifter linkage fell off the side of the gearbox. So here we are, stuck on a speed bump with no ability to select reverse to get off it, in the middle of a busy street in downtown Copenhagen. My stress levels were peaking, this was not the start to the trip I needed. Luckily We had all of the tools and everything we needed, so I pulled out the jack and got to work, not without being told how I wasn't allowed to stop in the middle of the road multiple times... Anyway, a bit of safety wire and a boot full of throttle and we were free to carry on our merry way. From here it was acutally pretty smooth sailing, apart from getting laughed at by the Swedish boarder guard when I told him that I was going drag racing in a campervan. One big plus to the camper is that at highway speed you are basically an inertia dyno, so tuneups can be easily adjusted as needed! When we were within 1½ hours of Mantrop this happened... We ended up getting to Mantrop at around 20:00, in the pissing rain, with only one hour left to get the car scruitineered we husstled the sign in process and got in the queue. This is where our luck begain to change. because it was raining, and we had the camper on we couldn't fit in the inspecton hall, and the scruitineer wasn't all that keen to lie in the puddles to check the car we basically got teched without issue, he did pull us up on the rubber valve stems in the drag slicks, which is apparently an old rule, but he let us go due to being slow. we were teched to run up to 140 kph in the 1/8, faster than that an we needed a engine diaper. With tech completed we got our armbands and stickers and found a spot to sleep for the night.

Its a 1966 Country Sedan. 289W and 3 on the tree manual. Power steering. Power disc brakes. Only 6 seater, but at this stage beggars can't be choosers, I'll retrofit the fold up seats. Its got nice 16" Torque thrusts (one of my fav wheels), a really tidy original parchment (cream) interior, and we love the colour. Its in a small town in Oklahoma. Its quite a bit more than we were planning to spend, but its on par with the mustang condition wise, so that seems like a good move. Being in Oklahoma, its too far away from the man in California, so Danny ordered a 3rd party inspection from a crowd called "The Lemon Squad". They sent someone out to inspect it, who sent us back about 100 photos and a report on the condition. They were pretty thorough, A+ would recommend. Now lots of the cars we had seen, even the nicer ones, all had one thing in common. Rust in the bottoms of the doors and the tailgate. That was really the only fault with this car, and we had resigned to the fact that this was just how things are. So all good, lets take a brave pill and pull the trigger on this one. Its pretty much bloody perfect for us. FINALLY!! Stoked!

After driving the car a couple of times I decided it was unbearably loud so I had a new rear section slapped on getting rid of the "96db" RSR muffler. Fitted my steering wheel, and put on some hatch decals. Couple of bits on the way from Japan. Still trying to get my hands on some tail lights for a not so exorbitant price.

All done and back in action Pan is still quite low but at least the little bump & drain plug are not hanging down as something to get caught on things I added a drain at the back of the pan , it's only a 6mm bolt and not at the bottom but it's not like changing the trans oil is going to be a regular event, it's not that hard to drop the pan off to drain it completely Side note it takes 10l of trans fluid

The time finally came. After many years and countless hours of work, it was WOF time. Before the WOF, the first thing to do was to replace the failed Lucas washer pump. This was completely dead, even when powering it straight from the battery with a test probe. It turns out I bought the pump about 3 years ago, and only fitted it in Jan this year, so way out of warranty now. I sourced a cheap unbranded replacement locally. This didn't even get the honour of arriving in a box, just some bubblewrap with a part number sticker on it. Other than the label, they're almost identical. No surprise. Both from China no doubt. I quickly screwed it into place and rejoined the hoses Finally everything was working again. The new Tex wipers were a bit disappointing, with a very average effort clearing the screen, but hopefully they just need some time to bed in. I've been doing some closed road testing recently to make sure everything is working well, and trying to bed the brakes in a bit too. It turns out, I had done almost exactly 10km since getting the car. As bought, back in 2021 The day before the WOF, 2024 In my travels I did notice two things. First, the ignition timing was just a smidge too spicy, and there was some pinging noticeable at lower RPM. Not good, so I wound the timing back from nearly 15deg to 10deg, and that seems to have fixed it. It's a little less keen to boogie now, but it's still 100x better than it was before I set the timing the other day. Plenty of time to play with that once we're on the road. Secondly, the front bash plate that protects the alloy sump from getting its face smashed in, was scraping a lot coming in and out of my driveway, and I noticed how close it was to the road when cornering in the video the other day. So I wanted to raise it just a smidge in the front. Sure, it looks cool as heck that low, but I don't want to smash the poor thing to bits. After MUCH fiddling with the torsion bar trim adjusters, I finally got it to settle at about 10mm higher than it was. It's lost the forward rake it had, and the sill is about level now, but it brings the bash plate just high enough that it's not hitting things now. Finally, just to be cocky, I jacked the rear of the car up and fixed the exhaust leak I had at the join above the rear axle (with lots of paste), and adjusted the handbrake just a little bit tighter. Maybe, just maybe, it'll pass with no issues now. The next day I got up bright and early, played musical cars and fired the Marina to life. It was pretty cold this morning, so the engine was a little grumpier than in my previous testing, but quickly sorted itself out. I backed out, closed the garage, got to the end of my street and turned the corner.Right into the path of a police car full of officers. To say I puckered a little is an understatement, but they didn't even give it a second look and I spent the rest of the drive to the workshop laughing my arse off at the odds of that happening. I arrived, parked up and then the waiting began. For the first time in almost 30 years, the old girl was waiting for a checkup. After a bit of a wait, the tech hopped in, fired the old girl up and took it for a quick road test. Here we go! Seeing him coming back up the road really hit me, it's such a cool looking car to see driving around. I hope when I drive it around, I can brighten the day of people on the street too. He rolls it onto the hoist and proceeds with the checks. TOOT, yes the horn goes. All the lights worked (a miracle), and the wipers and washer worked. They have a good look around with a torch, checking all the nooks and crannies, near hinges, down pillars, inside the boot, everywhere (I'm not sure they're usually this thorough on my other cars...) The hoist goes up, and my heart is in my throat As it was in the air and being checked over, a young couple picking their car up walked by and the girl commented to her partner "oh wow, look at this beauty!" pointing at the Marina. The tech is poking around under the car, checking all the usual things. Bearings, suspension, steering, etc. He also did some poking with a big prybar. After a long wait, I got the news. It's not going to pass. Long story short, he stopped the inspection and basically changed it to a pre-WOF check instead of an actual WOF check. A variation of my worst case scenario had happened, he wasn't happy with the underside. To clarify though, he made no mention at all of the work I had done. The issue he had was the old shitty lumpy tar-based underseal all over everything. In places where it was chipping off, there was surface rust, and for the rest he wasn't happy with what it could be hiding (nothing, I've seen the other side of the metal, but he can't check that). The stuff covers literally everything under there Very old photos from when I got the car There were also some other stupid things that I'm beating myself up over for not sorting, like the chassis rails having some rust flakes still in them, visible through the drain holes (from the old floor and rear panel rusting). Despite trying to clean them up at the time, I didn't do a good enough job. The other spot he was concerned with was inside the boot, near the hinges It's all surface rust and will clean up easily, but I guess since it's near the hinges he wasn't happy with it being like that. There were some mechanical issues, but he wasn't really keen on going into detail on them after showing me the bodywork issues he wasn't happy with. He mentioned the RH Rear wheel bearing was noisy and there may be play in the rack. Overall, I was devastated. It really crushed me, after all that work, for it to fail on bloody bodywork issues. The only positive of it was that it wasn't the work I did (as I feared), it was the work I didn't. I have always hated the underseal, it's on everything, it's really clumpy, and it's uneven and chipping off. It covers all bolts, nuts, threads etc under there too, which sucks to work around. If you try to lubricate anything with CRC, it melts the tar and turns to a hell of a mess. I should've really removed it all when I did the floors. Because he decided to not proceed with the WOF, it also means he hasn't entered it into the system as a fail, and I don't have to fix it within the defined 28 day timeframe. I'm thankful for that, because it'd be a pain if the workshops were busy. So, where to from here? Well, he explained what he wants to see; he wants all the underseal gone, and any surface rust and any uncovered issues to be sorted. He suggested having it sandblasted, treated and then undercoated again in something modern. I've been mulling it over and looking at my options, and I think from here the best option is indeed to have it sandblasted, to remove the underseal I hate anyway, and then have it zinc coated by the blaster. Once I get the car back, I will then paint the underside in a hard wearing single stage paint (yellow, of course). I'm not really interested in undersealing it again, I'd rather have it painted (unless anyone can convince me otherwise? This isn't a daily and won't often see rain). I have some calls to make tomorrow, to see what options are available to me, and the costs. I'm not made of money, but this car has cost me less than any of my other projects (monetarily, it's a complete time hog though) so it deserves to have some money spent on doing it properly. We ain't done yet, there is no option other than pushing forward.

3 inch roof chop Mild rebuilt 350 cam head work etc Power glide, 9 inch viva front. end basic old school hot rod.

G'day. New motor vehicle time. I've had ae85/ae86 on my trademe search list for a while and a couple of weeks ago one popped up local to me at a reasonable price. Sent it to a mate with three of the things (including a Black Limited) and he reckoned we should have a look. The main selling point was the extensive amount of documented metal work that had been done only a couple of years ago by a reputable fabricator. Almost all the rust prone areas had seen work and an old repair had been improved on. Run down on it as follows. Tickled up Blacktop 20V, T50, TRD lsd. BC Golds, adjustable panhard, panhard support brace, traction brackets, adjustable trailing arms, cusco swaybars etc etc Its on Takechi project racing harts in 14x7.5 and came with a spare in the same size. Recaro sr3(?) confettis. Has a cert for 4AGE and adjustable suspension so is legalish. Pretty stoked to be fair.

i have been fucking around with a manifold design. i have been looking at the EFI hardware stuff, mainly becasue it looks like it might work. be keen to hear what your thoughts are on the different options for generic throttles. the EFI hardware stuff can give me a throat spacing of 90mm which i think i can get to fit. we have a rapid prototype machine at work now so i can probably print myself a test manny to see how things might workout. anywho, here's wonderwall.

So I haven't used the old girl for roughly 4 years (I think I stopped using it around the first COVID lockdown) and I find myself pining to hoon it again. I was going to give it a real big birthday, but have realized that now is not the time (shitty old house and young kids sucking up huge amount of time and resources) so I have decided to do the bare minimum to get it back on the road. I want to use it for Nats 25, so have roughly 4 months to achieve WOF status. It should need fairly minimal work to get a WOF really, but last time I didn't use it for this length of time (Took me 4 years to panel/paint it, and that was about 10/11 years ago) all manner of I'll shit went wrong with it, so who knows. So it defiantly needs: Cracked windscreen taken out, rust repaired under said windscreen, paint and then new screen fitted. It might need: Drivers side headlight has a small hole in it, but has clear tape over it, it was getting WOFs like this in the past. I have a replacement lens to go on, but in the past I reattached the lens with silicon rather than polyurethane, so might be a bastard to get the old lens off. I've always had trouble with the adjusters braking/popping off, so will try find a solution for that while its apart. Things I want to do/long term items: Change all fluids, bleed brakes etc. Send mesh wheels away to be re-barreled (lols, like that's ever going to happen) Fix up a few dents/chips/cracks and repaint the whole car again. It needs to be tuned again, its running crazy rich under acceleration ATM. It has a few fatigue cracks around the place than need welding up and painting. General clean up of lights/indicators/bumpers etc. FINALLY sort out rear main seal leak Sunroof mech needs a new part, which I think I have, just have to find & fit it. This list will get a lot longer when I actually dig it out of the shed, wash it and do an inspection. The chap that was doing my WOF's before I stopped using it has also moved back to the area and is back in business doing WOFS, so that will help my cause a little. Cars not dodgy, but helps to have a dude do it that knows the car kinda I guess. And a random pic of a very similar looking car for inspiration and to tart up such a dull post a bit. (dem USDM bumper though, yikes) Regards, VG.

Not great at the moment. Have been away for a work a lot, and then have also started putting my garage up. So although that's setting me back a bit on having time/energy doing car stuff. I'm hoping that It'll let me catch up once I've got some extra covered space and so can start burning the midnight oil! Hopefully get a few more trusses up today if it keeps clearing up.

There are no lvvta rules, and the wof requirements are very minimal for light trailers, by drawing a design that's not in crayon you are already ahead of most trailer makers

Monthlyish update.. have been pushing pretty hard up until today, that’s due to me having shoulder surgery on the left side (right was done last year) so progress will slow somewhat. Cladding all complete, preline passed, been busy insulating and wiring and plumbing all the things.. oh and hoist installed. Installed gutters and others bits and pieces Hazy photo from 6am this morning with moon overhead.. My boys demolished the little red eyesore of a storage shed that was out front over the weekend so it’s nice now to just see what I’ve built (just)..

Pretty much sorted the oil line dilemma. i will run a 180 off the front cover to a 100mm of hose to another 180 to get the hose to return to the cooler with a 90. everywhere is too tight to run a continuous hose. This route I believe will offer flex when needed. then I set about my list of stuff I wanted to try and tick off today. got the seat base mounts fitted (ready for the next step). then fitted the second 5 stud axle and front hub on the left side. She’s full 5 stud now. fitted the fuel tank and fuel pump. then started getting some final mock up of factory stuff (heater box, wiper motor assembly, dash panels). this way I can sort the wiring out. discovered that I need to swap the steering boxes over as the one in it is too long to run the steering wheel with the column cover. also mounted the park brake lever, decided to keep the factory unit as it’s ready to go, saves faffing about. now that the heater box and park brake is in, I can now design the centre console. ive had an upholsterer pop by to go over the design, just waiting on pricing now. measured the accelerator cable and speedo cable to get remade. marked out the shifter hole for the 12a turbo box. Then chucked the bonnet, grille and light surrounds on for a photo. loving it, but I do need to lift the front 15-20mm.

Well that escalated quickly...

The day it was dug out

Not too many plans. Chuck my Personal wheel in and find some whiteline tail lights maybe. Drive it.

There was more hold ups with freight getting a new lever out of the states so Eric from WAER pulled a lever out of one of his own boxes to get me going again Managed to swap it out without pulling the box. I was anticipating much swearing and for it to be a cunt of a job I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was, just needed a long 1/4 extension with a wobbly end to get the bung out that holds the band apply lever pin in The band anchor had fallen out so had to drop the valve body to get that back in the right spot Reassembled and bands adjusted Done for today, I'm going to mod the pan tomorrow, I've never been a fan of the drain plug , it's the lowest point on the car apart from the exhaust so I'll cut it out and make a new one somewhere else

So at the moment the car is parked up in the yard in California. I've been frantically ordering parts for it: Brake shoes Slave cylinders Carb kit Accessory Belts Ball joints Bushings Rockauto tee shirt Shocks Carpet set Sound deadener Headliner Windscreen Replacement headlight bezel for the crunched one And a nice leather period correct steering wheel cover But finding a seat has been a ball-ache. The boys in So-Cal that have a seat don't seem very motivated to post it. And its for a 66, which might be different. Apparently a 68 model could fit. Aside from that, I've not had any luck finding a seat in decent condition. I've phoned and emailed heaps of those 100acre dead classic kind of desert junkyards. Most of them are as useless at communicating as you would expect from such places. I have found one place that has one, but at USD$225 for the seat, then as much or more again for freight, its gonna run me close to NZD$1000 for what they honestly describe as a fucked junk yard seat. Good frame and rails, but will need a new cover. A cover kit is going to cost over NZD $1100. That's over $2000 for a front seat! It might be what it will be at this stage and I'll have to bite the bullet. But will probably leave the new seat cover kit and just rough something together at this end with some spotlight fabric/mexican blanket to save the wallet for actually getting it on the road.

It's happening, the Marina is finally booked in for a WOF. It's only a couple of years late, but better than never. I started the day with a checklist of things that needed to be done before the WOF booking in a couple of weeks. The first was to drain the fuel tank of the 2+ year old fuel because it stinks, and the car is hard to start. With 18L of new high-octane fuel in hand, I used the drain plug on the bottom of the tank to get as much out as I could. I underestimated how much was in there, so couldn't completely drain it, but the fuel coming out was definitely yellow, and stank of varnish. The new fuel can mix with whatever was left in there, it'll be fine. Moving forward I wanted to drain the filter, pump and lines too. I unhooked the feed hose to the carb and stuck it into a bottle. I disconnected the coil and fuel pump, and turned the ignition on. Using the handy dandy connection under the bonnet, I ran the fuel pump and pumped the fuel into the bottle. This is what came out It's much darker than what was coming out of the tank, and stank. I ran the pump until nice clean fuel came through. I tossed up wether to drain the fuel bowl on the carb or not, but in the end I removed the three screws and removed the top And I'm glad I did. The old fuel was rancid, but there was also an amount of sediment in the bottom of the bowl I used a hand vac pump to suck the old fuel out and used a rag and carb cleaner to clean the bottom of the bowl. Once I reassembled the bowl and used the pump to fill it with fresh new fuel, I wanted to check the spark plugs. I haven't checked them since I fitted them a few years ago, and with all the cold running, hard starts and bad fuel, I expected them to be pretty grotty. Surprisingly they weren't that bad. One was a bit darker than the rest, all had some degree of black carbon, but none were really fouled. I gave them all a quick clean with a wire brush and brake cleaner and refitted them. Since I was there anyway, I thought it was wise to have a look at the points. It's a good thing I did, as forget the points, this is what I found instead Yup, the center carbon post is completely missing and the spring has been wearing the center of the rotor down After some investigating I found the little carbon post down in the bottom of the distributor, under the points, sitting with the mechanical advance. I didn't want to leave it there just in case it jammed the advance, so using a small pick and a pair of offset needlenose pliers, I managed to fish it out I have no idea how long it's been like that, but it wouldn't have been doing anyone any favours. Thankfully I'm a hoarder, so I had a replacement cap and rotor in my stock. I quickly swapped them over and after a quick sand of the points we were good to go again. With the ignition back together, I tried to start the car, and despite the fuel being fresh, the ignition working, and the choke pulled out to its stop, it wasn't having any of it. It was then that it occurred to me to check the choke Sure enough, with the choke pulled as far as it could be, the jet under the carb wasn't pulling down like it's meant to (to let more fuel into the carb). With some gentle prying it slowly started to move At this point I stripped the top off the carb too, so I could access the top of the jet. Whilst there, I also found the same excellent piston lift pin that I used to tune the Mini I thoroughly cleaned the jet and gave it a little WD40 to help it move freely, and now the choke operates as it should. It should've been obvious that the lever in the cabin was only pulling out about half way, but it's been a long time since I've had another manual choke. I cleaned up the piston and needle, and refit with new dashpot oil Now the car started, easily. It's amazing what a functioning choke can do! With the car starting and running well, the next thing to do was an oil change. Of course I had to warm the engine up for this, as I did the last oil change cold and 20W60 flows real slow when it's cold. A quick trip to Mexico for a closed road test was needed It runs and drives really well. The brakes are terrifying, but more use seems to be helping, although a remote booster might be on the cards at some point. A loud rattle present on decel turned out to the hood prop rattling in its bracket and on the air cleaner housing. Easy fix. It was still flat and gutless though. I had wanted to check the timing for a while, but it's a pain in the bum to do on these, plus I needed the car at full operating temp, which I didn't often do. A normal car would have the timing marks easy to access and see, usually by just pointing the timing light down into the engine bay. Not the Marina though. The timing marks are on the bottom of the engine, accessible through the front of the lower bash plate I painted the timing pointers yellow and the crank mark white ages ago, so it was easier to see. The four pointers are TDC, 5, 10 and 15 degrees Before TDC. The timing when I started was so far off the scale I think it was actually after TDC, not before. The spec is 10 degrees BTDC. I slackened off the distributor clamp and gave it a tweak. The revs picked up and the idle smoothed out. It didn't take much, but we were sitting bang on 10deg now. I adjusted the idle back down to 500rpm, and tweaked it a little further. I'm running approx 13-14deg timing now, because I'm a spicy lad that wants more power from his 70s Sports Car, and I'm running high octane fuel. With the timing where it should be, I wanted to see what the mixture was doing. What better way than to use the lift pin on the carb that I just found? I lifted the piston and the revs rose significantly, indicating a very rich mixture. Using my handy little SU jet adjustment tool I tweaked the adjustment nut until the revs only slightly rose when the piston was lifted. Perfect. With that, it was time for another trip to Mexico and hot damn, the car boogies now! Previously it felt really flat, didn't want to rev and couldn't get out of its own way. Now it wants to rev, and properly hoofs it down the road (for a Marina anyway). Great success, can't wait for it to be legal and I can see how it really goes. Another plus is that although noisy in a couple of gears, like all Marinas (it reminds you it's doing actual mechanical things), the gearbox shifts lovely, even at high RPM and on downshifts. Back home, I put the car on stands and drained the oil. It wasn't that dirty, but it was quite thin and although stuff all Ks, it's had a lot of cold starts, and it's been in there over 3 years. Oops. I decided not to change the filter this time, since it's expensive, rare, and it's not really done that much work. I'll change it once the cars been on the road for a bit. 3L of Penrite 20W60 went in the top and didn't come out again. Yay Another quick fix for the WOF was to replace the wiper blades. The old ones are proper plastic, so didn't really do the job of clearing the glass. I grabbed some Tex stainless wipers with the bayonet fitting They fit well and look good. I gave the arms a quick scrub with some scotch pad and they look a lot better Sadly I can't test them properly as it appears the Lucas washer pump I fitted in Jan has seized and failed. Lame. I have a replacement on order which will hopefully be here this week. Lucas ain't what it used to be, and it wasn't that good to start with. The last thing I needed to do was to clean all the windows and then fit a high stop light to the rear. I didn't legally need one, but I hate how invisible classics are these days. The brake lights are small, dim and low down on the car, so hopefully this LED unit shining into the eyes of people behind me might give me a chance of them actually seeing me. I picked up this Hella Matrix unit and really like how it kinda looks period correct but uses modern LEDs. Fitting it was less than fun. Trying to line up the grey decal on the glass and get it centered and straight, took a lot of tries before I just gave up and sent it. I flipped the pads on my clamp and used it as a one-man brake light tester It works well Standing behind the car seems to be about the height for it to have the hot spot right in your eyes. Hopefully that's about standard modern car driver eyeline too. With the help of my wife, we tested the rest of the lights, which did initially show up a dodgy connection on the RH brake light bulb, but a quick reseating of the bulb fixed that. Thats it. There is only one thing left on the board. I guess the next update will be after the inspection, where I know it'll fail. What on, well that's yet to be seen, but having been off the road for almost 30 years, it could be anything. It's been good to finally be doing mechanical work again. I was sick of bodywork.

Some couch based metal shaping… There’s an annoying little bit of rust on the radius corner of the trans tunnel that’s not part of the floor panel. So started on a patch to use when the floor goes in.

The motor must have sat for a while as it had plenty of rust in the coolant system and one of the front plugs had rusted out completely.. So I decided to strip things off so j could get to all the plugs.. knock them out and water blast the fuck out of the insides. And after an hour or so I managed to get all the shit out

Wagon is sitting a little lower in the front now and will settle down further, they reckon about another 20mm

Repost from spam: Replace the fuel pump the WOF man says, right, how hard can that be. Hmm, things are tight there, need to remove the power steering reservoir Oh the long capscrews that mount that also hold the water pump and coolant leaks when you remove them So, move the car out and drain the coolant. Now one of the long capscrews doesn't clear the water pump pully. Oh, to get that off I'm going to have to remove the radiator. Better take the battery and battery tray out first. Oh, need to remove the overflow reservoir to get to the radiator bolts The radiator retaining bolts are out except one, why won't it come out? Ah, there are some radiator bracket bolts that stop it lifting out, remove those. Now what? There is one retaining bolt that won't push back to provide clearance. Right, there are another five radiator bracket bolts, the heads of which prevent the radiator moving towards the engine. Unbolt those, after removing the two earth leads that are also connected which double nuts. Haul the radiator out with difficulty. Now I can remove the crank pully Now I can remove the PS reservoir, which leaks PS fluid on the floor. Now I can remove the fuel lines crammed in below the PS reservoir Now I can remove the fuel pump. Hmm, the carter one I got to replace it will work, but the body is smaller so I'll see if can get something better. Might as well replace the fuel lines and fuel filter as well. Radiator hoses probably need replacing. Better do the water pump bypass hose too. And better get some brakeclean spray. OK so got it back together, cleaned a few bits up in the process and managed to get some hoses that could be cut to work. This was still not the worst job.....

So ive had this for while now... (about 5 years) Been sat out side mine now (under cover ) for a year or so. And be for that it was a mates bedroom inside his shed.... basically been dry stored since 2011 when the last LD28 died and he gave up on it. I got given this by him as a way of saying thanks for me painting his Valiant hearse .... twice (long fucking story). I didn't ask for anything in return.. but he knew I loved the thing and one day messaged me to say he had put it on my name .... I honestly never thought I'd get it but ..he asked me if I was home one night a year or so ago and dropped it off.. It is reg on hold , original black plates and certified for an ld28 auto. (Had no motor or box ). But all ready converted to a camper on the 80s with gold porn style shag pile carpet. This is how it had been for 12 + years

The 1st thing we did last year was strip the full camper stuff out as my wife was not stepping foot in it till it was. (She know the.mate who gave it to us..... and was not going in there. I gave away as much as I could and we still dumped over 300kgs of shag pile and shit).. Then its pretty much sat like this till last week.

Thread dredge. I ignored this thing for most of the year but recently got a bit of spare time so ticked a few jobs off. DaveScienceTM @Roman kindly printed me some trumpets to replace all of the airbox - this may make it slower but it will look better! The more I looked at it the more I didnt like how the engine was wired - infact how the whole car was wired. Engine wise things were a bit "interesting" and rather than using the factory fuse box that Mr Toyota had kindly fitted with charge circult controls and relays for the coils and ignitor etc, they decided to ignore all that and use a NZEFI easywire board which wasn't so bad, but then they decided to use really random shit like having a completely seperate circuit open relay just sitting on the gearbox. So, out it all came. This is just the engine loom... Due to all the fuckery I also ripped out all the body wiring and swapped in all the factory wiring from the Si Limited mentioned earlier which was much neater and added a few body features not normally had. The original dash had a few bonus holes in it so that got changed over, and also fitted the facelift dash cluster. The facelift dash cluster had one of those super awesome ding dong speed warnings so I've modified the 12v feed to this so its on a switch if I want to drive myself insane while fanging around a track. Anyway engine wise I got rid of the NZEFI board and reverted back to using all the stock relays for injector power, coil power, radiator fan and the normal circuit open relay for the fuel pump etc. I didnt really take any photos of this but it became a straight plug and play deal nicely wrapped and out of the way. I wired in the extra dash gauges for oil pressure, water temp and volts, and also had some scope creep care of DaveScience and fitted some 1NZ coils for sequential ignition. Plugged it all in and it started first pop. Fitted a cheapy android head unit and upgraded the front speakers, plus ran wiring through to the back for some parcel tray sounds. Bought a few small items to tidy things up like a interior light cover etc The radiator didnt have a fan on it previously so made some mounts and front mounted it as there isn't enough space behind. It has 4 mounts, just didnt take a photo of it finished. My brother blasted the cam cover for me and I welded on a dash fitting for a decent catch can setup I will sort sometime in the future Also made up a front strut brace, a radiator overflow bottle bracket, and painted a few bits and pieces. Still needs heaps of tidying but its getting closer to being good enough. So with it driving again I towed it to @kpr to blow the cobwebs out knowing how much he loves 20v's and fwd's It made good noises but this happened: Which was actually just a loose radiator hose so easily fixed. Then injector duty cycle went through the roof and the fuel pump left the chat. I had a spare EFI tank so swapped in a new pump just in case then returned to kpr's to fit it. This is what was found when I opened up the original tank after swapping it over... The original builders had jammed an EFI pump onto the end of the carby pickup line and left it dangling loose in the bottom of the tank. The hose had split which was causing the lacklustre fuel pressure. After swapping to the new pump the idle AFR dropped into the 10s! So it works now and Ive left the car with kpr for a thrash when he gets a chance, but it makes good noise now even if it makes less than 100kw haha. Thats it for now, will likely update in another year.

Was advised by a mate to have the injectors cleaned but fuck me that not cheap... $500+ to have my cleaned $690 for a serviced set But mine were bloody dirty But as with most thing.. I decided to pull 1 apart and see if I can do it myself. I found a nozzle in side with a part number.... few Google search later I had a set on the way from the states for less than $80. Once landed i stripped the injectors, cleaned them and rebuilt them with new nozzles Put them back on with new washers. *new waterpump on *oil filter housing on with new filter *inlet on ,*exhaust on. Starting to look like a motor again. And so far .the Bedford, motor, auto ,everything all up..owes me less than $550 and shitnloads of my hours but thats pretty sweet

Was planning on gutting out a FD RX7 gauge cluster to retro fit. however I looked at what I’ve achieved in the last 6 months compared to the time left til I’d like to drive it. yup, outta time to naff around with that idea. so, I found some gauges on marketplace and had them sent up. went with the typical Autometer sport comp stuff, which I did actually use back in the day. So period correct for this build. i only need to find out what speedo cable to use/have made. i also have the matching oil pieces and fuel gauges, will also get the overheating gauge

Last on the list was the transmission mount - the one there had gone a bit squishy over the years. How hard could that be? I ordered a generic Ford C4 mount - this seemed a good risk as they didn't have many different ones and it was only $30 or so and shared shipping with the fuel pump. Once it turned up I crawled under the car (still jacked up with the coilovers out) and it seemed roughly similar. Now luckily we have met a neighbour up the road who has some hot rods, and most importantly a 2-post lift in their shed which wasn't currently in use. After finishing up the fuel pump boondoggle last Saturday I arranged to take it up on Sunday, then proceeded to have some beer and G+T. Sunday rolled around and I was feeling a little dusty. We pottered up the road and arranged the car on the lift. Due to the chassis shape it took a couple of goes to get it well balanced and up in the air. The mount was easy enough to unbolt, just two lower studs though the mount plate (welded to the crossmember) and a couple of bolts up into the transmission. So far so good. The big problem was getting it out of the space it was in - not enough room to slide it forward due to the trans casing. Not enough room to go backwards due to the crossmember shape: No problem, grab a tall adjustable stand and life the rear of the transmission up, right? Well, wrong, it wouldn't move up far enough before the linkage hit the floor of the car. Even unbolting the linkage wouldn't give much more movement. At this point I was a bit over the whole thing. The crossmember is bolted in, but uses cap screws and some of those looked pretty inaccessible. Also the body is bolted down to the crossmember through the front floorpans. Rather than continuing I called it quits for the day and had a couple of beers with the shed owner. He was good enough to let us leave it up there so I went back on Monday after work to attack it again. First thing was to lift up the front carpet and deal with those body mount bolts. Hello? What's this? Hmm, a removable panel in the transmission tunnel! Well, that could be handy. I unscrewed it and chucked it out on the floor. This looks promising Now there is more room to lift the rear of the transmission up for clearance. So, back up in the air and give it a go. I lifted the trans as much as I could but still no dice, hmm what is hitting now? Oh the front UJ? Well I could get that out of the way by removing the driveshaft so that was the next step (and mess on the floor). Now I had enough clearance to get the old one out, and (with a bit of a struggle) the new one in. Pic of the old and new, I was a bit greasy so not the best on the camera. The new one had an extension piece out the back which I cut off, otherwise it wouldn't fit into the crossmember shape. After that it was mostly a 'reverse of the removal' process. I did tweak a radiator hose clamp around a bit as it was rubbing on the balance making a weird noise. So WOF acquired later in the week! I need to replace a spark plug lead that is burn on the exhaust, and put some coolant in it instead of water, then it should be good to go for the next few months.

The previous owner claimed the ld28 motor is a shit house and he had blown a bunch of them and I'm wasting my time to put one back in. But I know how he drives and I would imagine that combined with the weight , diff ratio and lack of power with contribute to him breaking a few. I did think about loads of different motors I could put but uts hot a cert for an ld28 ...so it was getting another. I had agreed to put Karl's mk4 together for him and asked him to find me a ld28 and auto box... he going me one that was in a car and had run ... so qas able to pull it all out myself and see whats what. (Never played/touched with an ld28 let alone ). He dropped off this weeeeeeee gem

progress on the brake adaptors, a few chunks of 4140 now match my 3d printed models and fit spot on thanks to Moose design for sorting the machining, there's even hope to keep the corvette wheels it's super tight but they do clear in the 16"wheels

Turbo's rebuilt and drivers side fitted - only snapped one manifold bolt ha ha.....waiting on a new set for the passenger side

My grandads wheelbarrow. Was a man that did everything by hand on a hilly property with the wheelbarrow. Had mixed up many cubes of concrete until he got too soft at 87 then he brought a concrete mixer. Was a little worse for wear and tyre was toast so disassembled for a blast and paint down the line, factory colour tub and frame in chassis black. Spent $10 more then a garbage tyre from M10 on a 3.00x8 Shinko scooter tyre, was a bitch to get on but now have a tyre even when flat that has a stiff enough carcass to be pushed around. Good for 100kg at over 80kph so good enough for home. Button head stainless cap screws because im shallow and like stuff like that Is going down to my sister in Gisborne so good to see it get another life.

Tuning the handling Barry style...

Took today off work and got a heap more sorted. Fuel tank, diff and mounts, all glass and all door insides are now removed. Rust repair cert has been arranged for next week, not looking too forward to the list but it will provide a good amount of direction for the panel beater and I. Few stripped screws causing some issue but nothing a drill won’t fix haha

Chipping away. Finished most of one side and plasma'd out the collector flanges, as well as got the other side reso welded into place and slung off its mount. Have to kinda joggle across from the collector to the resonator. The dogshit coby 2"mandrel bend I got was oval through the bend so I hacked it up to make a dirty template for section between collector and resonator. Any recommendations on where to buy decent u bends with long legs (around 200mm) would be welcomed.

Got all the welds ground down, pin holes filled and ground, and epoxy primered slapped some bog down. Sanded most of it off, did a second thin skim, sanded most of that off too, filled the little pinholes and sanded them too, finished it off with some epoxy primer it’s not perfect, but it is only a boot floor, next step is to cover it in stone chip and move onto the outside.

Turns out that 19x9 rims fit. havent found any clearance issues and the engine is in this as it sits. could do with going lower though, a little.

further down the money pit worrmhole... got the wheels stripped of the old crusty paint by alistrip, then off to ACP and had them trued up, lips repaired & machined , now to sort out paint & final high polish for the lips. looking so good even at this point in bare metal

I couldn't help myself, I wanted to know what the cold start was like now with a working choke, correct mixture and advanced ignition timing. It's very good. It has never started like that when cold. Usually it's ages of cranking, the starter kicking out a few times when the engine tries to fire, a couple of backfires out the intake and then eventually it would rumble into life, begrudgingly. Once it was running it wouldn't take any throttle until it had warmed up a bit, and the choke was a balancing act (particularly since it wasn't working properly). The engine is running so well I need to completely reassess how I use the choke. Apparently this time I had it out for too long and it started to misfire, but pushing it right in, the engine dropped to idle and ran smoothly, like it was already warmed up, and that was less than a minute after starting. I'm very impressed, for a 50+ year old car to start and run like that.