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Time for a bit of a update; Welded the head plate, fish plates for chassis rails. Got green sheeted, had to tweak & alter a few things, lengthened the driveshaft. Took it out to a local black track for a run in, stopped, turned and seemed to go well, so rather than pull in and check I just went for it, went really rather well indeed. Made a few alterations after the test day.. Changed the diff head, radiator hose setup & fuel hoses. Near complete chassis Carby, Breather Setup Roof plate welded, hot work welding 10mm plate! Went to Woodford Glen for my first meeting in the car, had a fantastic bunch of people helping with the car which made for a stress free night, didnt have to worry about a thing. Proud to display RO Jones on the car, fantastic Job Scott & the team did painting the body, bonnet & dash! Stands out supremely well!! 33 cars fronted for the the night, I started all of them off the rear of the grid as I wanted to stay out of the way, whilst I get to grips with the car without pin balling around. First race went well in the fact I finished the race, 21st (22 finished), but the gearing was all wrong. Race 2 we put the RR onto the LR and the largest tyre I had onto the RR (225/75r15), instantly shaving 1.5 second off my best lap time from the race prior. Finishing 13th Race 3 we made no changes however the track was very slick and lots of people were spinning up. No faster this race, but managed 10th from the rear. Have a few changes to make again, and will try something with the rear end, but overall it handled well. Driver just needs to get up to scratch a little - more consistent. Big thank you to all involved who have helped along the way, advice, parts, time or materials. Thanks to the crew that came and gave a helping hand; Tim, Caitlyn, Crystal & Matt. - All made for a stress free first night. A few tweaks to be done, but overall very happy with the car finishing 3 from 3 races. Started them all off the back and went forward so that's a bonus! Especially big thanks to the Read & Blyth family's for their generous support throughout building the car. RO Jones for the painting of the Body, bonnet, Dash. Fast Blast - sandblasting wheels, components, advice, help in time & materials also Mag & Turbo of course for being on board right from the start, wheels, tyres

As you may or may not see in the video above there was oil on the cambelt. It was a bitter/sweet moment as I was wrapped that my wiring was good and the motor kinda ran, but theres an issue. This video was taken on the Monday before the OS Drag Day. At a quick glance it looked like one of the tensioner bearings was releasing oil/grease past its shield. So we gave up that night. I returned the next day and found a big pool of oil on the ground. There was a pinhole in a weld where the sump was modified. Unable to fix this in place, the motor had to come out. This was the Tuesday before the OS Drag Day. I was unable to work on it on the Tuesday or Wednesday due to work Christmas dinner and looking after kids. The Thursday before the OS Drag Day I had my good cousin Ants (owns the noisy VK Commodore) come round to help. He zapped and fitted the sump up, replaced a front caliper and fitted the motor back in the hole whilst I did the important stuff like fit the locked diff and fender mirrors. We fired it up again and still was spraying oil from somewhere on the front of the motor. I had the ol man help out on the Friday before the OS Drag Day and have one more crack. I bought some more oil seals (crank, oil pump and balance shaft). I say more because we had already replaced these during the cambelt replacement. As he started to unbolt items he found that on of the hydraulic tensioner bolts were loose. He bolted everything back up and sure enough, no more oil spray.....whoops. 9:30pm rolls around and he has the car running as best as he could. At this stage I havent even got it on the ground let alone taken it for a test drive. 10:00pm I take it for a drive around the carpark. I give it a mouthful in 1st gear and felt good. I get braver and hoon from 1st to 2nd and then it bogs and runs like balls! Like its in limp mode (no power, over fuelling) I then realise that I didnt hear the external wastegate open. I found that I didnt hook it up and the motor saw full boost which at this stage I think ive cooked the motor already...... 11:00pm I wash the car then load it on the trailer hoping that someone may be able to help me out at the strip. 12:00am Tow car home pissed off that I wont be racing. Managed to get home at 1:00am Saturday, the day of the OS Drag Day I dragged the car down to Meremere and try to start it to drive it off the trailer and it wouldnt start. We push it off and im thinking we should have kept it on. As I inspected the engine bay in daylight the problem was evident. An intercooler pipe had blown off. We clamped that back on and it fired up and ran good. Took it for a little test drive and all was ok. I managed to pass scruitineering and took it out on the strip to help dry it out which was a good opportunity to test it further. It was running great Photo credit - MichaelJFox I took it out for its first run and managed to get a 15.25 taken it somewhat easy 2nd run I ran a 14.39 - I was over the moon at this point. All I wanted was to get in the 14s. The car was running awesome. As the day went on the car performed very well. A massive contrast to how the car was running less than 12 hours prior. So all in all an awesome day. A lot of late nights payed off and I met the deadline. Many awesome people to thank Heres a vid of the fast time i managed Now to tidy it up and drive it over the summer

Photo from the drag day (thanks Mrs OnTheTree): Finished the wheels earlier this week. Got some tyres and put them on. As a side note, does anybody else see a face in the drivers window on the first photo? Excuse the bit rubbish photos. I'm going to lower the rear by a notch later and take some better ones with a real camera.

AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!! Retarded I thought today was the 15th!!!!!!!! fuck!

Done diddly fuck for a while, took her for a WOF after the brake work and she passed _b Adjusted the rear brakes and that's been about it lately, have been too busy being a company man at the moment. For the thread, here's a pic during a spin around town the other day. Such good fun to drive.

my seat turned up today. 2015-12-16_04-09-50 by sheepers, on Flickr

Howdy Pard'ner A few more bits and pieces of progress: Powder Coated goodness. It's a nice feeling looking underneath and not thinking damn son, you nasty. Also replaced the front wheel bearings because yuck Had the front rotors skimmed. Looked like the pads have worn down at some point, I wonder what song they would play on an old record player. Also found an old WOF in the sun visor. Might be good proof for the plates? And the ones I know you're probably here for... All complete and ready for re-reg just waiting to hear from LTSA about the plates. Hasta la Vista, BABY Hoping to be ready to potentially take her to Nats if time off is approved

So, i just wrote a massive yarn about this then my computer had a meltdown so heres a summery. I brought this off guypie while i was in hamilton for work. I did skids then pulled it apart. It is currently at the powdercoaters. plans are, wide wheels, exhaust, slam, take the loom out, eventually drop a 125cc in it, then ride it. Pics.. How i got it: How i want it to look:

Had some rubbing issues at Puke so have spaced the rear calipers Back together Made up a new support for the handbrake as part of my rectification for the certification / MSNZ regs Getting a new brake pedal water cut so my pedal box can pass cert

Those Mirage hubcaps are pretty gangster. I think I will clean them up and put them on.

surely cutting to the middle of the pack on your 3rd race in a brand new car means its gotta be one hell of an awesome car/quick learning driver combo! this has been one of my favorite builds on OS Good work!

This. also applied to myself for last night's non-effort

I'm pretty sure you connect the ECU and the logger together with CAN, so no need to do extra wires for that. I wouldn't use any gauges, and just have a digital dash/tablet that you can cycle through to see specific things if you want/ when the warning light comes on. Well that is how I would do it, I dunno about you but I dont spend a lot of time looking at my gauges when I'm driving in anger hahaha.

Yea absolutely, well I haven't used one yet, but that is what it should be able to do haha.

A telemetry setup monitors what's going on with the car(g loads, speed, gps, wheel slip, shock loads etc), and driver inputs(accelerator, brakes, steering inputs, as well as gear), basically it gives you a picture of what the car is doing rather than seat of the pants feel. This is the one I was talking about. https://www.autosportlabs.com/product/racecapturepro/ The ones on eBay are legit, and you do t have to worry about compatibility as long as you get a data sheet that tells you x pressure = y resistance as you can input it into the ECU. Sweet as if you have a spare but it sucks having a $50 part put an end to a race day etc so worth thinking about, but like I said if you have the means, then go all out as it will make your days better and easier to find problems with you or the car hahaha

It is better to go crazy if you have the means, data is knowledge and knowledge is power. Especially as this is a race car I would look into a telemetry setup too, as there is a really good one on the market for about $500. But yea, all of those sensors plus oil temp, baro pressure, flex fuel sensor so you can run it on e85. You dont need to fork out tons for sensors either Russel, eBay is great for pressure transducers, and temp senders, and second hand flex fuel sensor out of a new Commodore would work great. I would also use ls coils and ditch the cop, as the heat will likely kill them. I dont know much about ca's but dont the factory cas die on them? I would look into running a toothed wheel on the crank as well, so that you can just use the cas as a trigger for sequential spark, that way you can change it to wasted spark at the track if it dies, no idea if that is correct but sounds reasonable in my head hahaha.

Alternator wiring failed on the Volvo tonight this time the earth wire to the body broke and it stopped charging, its funny the first thing to stop working is the temperature gauge, I think that little fucker uses more amps than the headlights.

So i went to pick up my wellside but it didnt come back with me, unfortunately the trailer was to small. oh well. T he chassis is primed and ready for paint. also found out why i was getting orange peel, breather for the reservoir on the gun was blocked!! cleaned it out and now it looks mint! Also bled the clutch and adjusted gear linkages which has made a huge difference. i will get some pics up soon, have been working on the corolla a bit so this is just chilling out

Give darren at revolution a call 09 8184739.

Il be lateish, final inspection of new house. I have gift (badly) wrapped with duct tape and newspaper and a modern car (due to knee injury)

Nylon braided is sweet. I reckon it looks heaps better than stainless braid too

A bit of a late update I had seen a full set of XYZ adjustable suspension to suit a Mitsubishi Cedia on Trademe. They were only $100 so I thought id chuck a hundy on em and if I won them ill install them on the Mrs car (Cedia wagon) A week rolls past and I won them for $100. So I pick them up and bring them to work and then I started getting Ideas. "I wonder how hard it would be to put the fronts in the Mirage?" I pulled a strut out of the Mirage and put one of the adjustable fronts in its place. I was blown away by the fact that the lower perch bolt holes were exactly the right spacing. The only difference was that the gap was 4mm wider and the XYZ use a 14mm bolt whereas the standard Mirage uses a 12mm bolt. I could have drilled out the 12mm hole to 14mm but I wanted to be able to revert back to standard suspension if needed. So I got a length of 2mm flat bar and cut 4 bits into shape. I also had some spacers made. 14mm OD and 12mm ID For the top of the adjustables I had some new camber plates made to suit These are the original camber plates on the XYZ And the new plates fitted So all that was left to do is bolt it all in the Mirage For the rear suspension I went with the 1 way adjustables I havent got a decent photo of how it sits at the moment but I am super happy with the ride height now. The front springs are a tad stiff so will look out for some softer springs. I have been using this car daily and I love it. It also appears that maori fullas like it too. Its a daily occurrence for some to yell "Chur bro" at me which is cool with me. Will upload a pic later

should be able to barb fitting a FPR, the ones I have are all barbs. Pro's - no need to replace crush washers or O-rings and removal / install is pretty easy, can join a straight fitting where a banjo can't, tidy option to reduce/adapt to different size or metric threads. AN - fittings are hand tight plus 1 flat, if it leaks an additional 1/2 flat is an option. I like to use a drip of oil on the threads Risk of hose slipping out is probably only an issue if incorrect hose type or fittings not put together properly? I was also semi against them, but have used in a few places where stuff gets removed a lot and I do think they have thier place, and last well so long a no cross-thread action occurs. Just not those blingy blue/red ones with shiny ss braided hose, black fittings and fibre braid or black hose FTW.

Been a while since a update, but been working away on the car Now has basically no paint on it, and no nearly no bog or other fillers. Ive got 4 litre of Durapox to spray on, will mask it up this weekend, hit some bits with brunox and then work on some sort of spray booth or heaps of drop cloths so i dont spray my whole garage too. Ive managed to remove a lot of filler and panel beat the dents out to a more reasonable level, some im pretty sure will be all but invisible. Doors are on the bench getting the insides and window frames stripped of old paint atm, then final cleanup on boot lid and hood.

Ok, so i completed fitting the turbo, and got it running. FAIL. No matter what i tried, it was getting really bad compressor surge in top gear at high load and low revs. So i pulled it all out again, and refitted the original setup to get it running for drag day. I did swap the exhaust housing with my spare, as i found a tiny crack in the one i was using. For some reason this supposedly identical part seems to be boosting and running better than it did before!? Ah well. ran it on drag day, and overall pretty happy with the results. Run 12 passes all day, and the difference between my slowest pass and fastest pass were a mere 0.27 of a second. Also managed to win the DYO competition again this year too. Best run was 14.26s @ 102 MPH which bettered last years attempt at 14.4s. I guess lesson learnt, if it aint broke, dont fuck with it!

Just before drag day, I took off my intake manifold and used Engineers Blue a vivid to colour the inside of the runners solid black as far up as I could reach. With the idea of being able to check the spray pattern of the outer injectors, by seeing where it washes away the pen marks. Interestingly near the base of the runners it was all still completely black, which would indicate that fuel isnt really pooling and running down, so much as maybe bouncing off the runner wall and then vaporizing. (this is good!) Cant really take a photo to show it but it looks like something like this must be going on. Next thing to sort out though is try get the fuel temps down, both of my fuel rails end up too hot to touch. One thought is that although the main fuel rail is isolated from the engine block temperature by plastic riser blocks, the bolts that hold them in touch both so will conduct heat into the rail. Otherwise could be that my fuel pump is just pumping the bejeezus out of the fuel and heating it up too much. I'll try adding some insulating washers to the fuel rail first and then go from there. If no luck I might look at options for slowing the pump down or adding a cooler.

A more "appropriate" load today, off to a TV shoot early tomorrow morning with another Mk2 in tow

Well hopefully this is engine in for the last time but something tells me it won't be. But got powdercoated bits back today. Just sat in place because waiting on auto sparky and spark plug tube gaskets.

You will be able to use it, but it will have shit consistency, be running all the time, and your water trap probably won't catch all the water.

Set up the roof rack, looks pretty good but I might need to chop it more to make it a bit lower. Shifter is now higher than the roof courtesey of some free reo bar from work

Sunday after Drag Day I set the tappets, installed the clutch and swung the engine back in the hole Hellloooww Strill have to get teh gear box in - Do you even lift Bro? Friends? -+-+-+- Just hefted the gear box in, went pretty well with a jack and two small furniture trolleys, and all my socket extensions, just the fiddly bits like linkages and stuff to hook up now. So thats the front 2/3rds of the running gear sorted, and half the rust. Just brakes, diff, and the rest of the rust to go, but that means chopping up the parts wagon, which means having a running van to store and move the bits which means rust repairs on the van, which ill do over the christmas break ahhhg bloody cars.

sooo i had a couple and needed to test something for end of year workshop duties arm was twisted a little perhaps as well https://youtu.be/bbrxLWiaR8A

i had a go at drag racing. never done it before but it was heaps of fun. did lots of skids, lots. even when i didn't want to do a skid. anywho the car is pretty fast and it behaved itself impeccably all day. 2015-12-13_10-55-45 by sheepers, on Flickr

Clearance might be sorted curtesy of _david_

So yeah, the Oldschool drag day today was dope! I didn't do great times; worse than last year. But the LSD was sweet and I did 2nd gear skidz up the strip which was awesome. I was having so much fun I monged out and snapped an axle during my staging skid trying to grab 2nd gear. But as luck would have it I had some similar Datsun axles in my shed and managed to cobble together a complete axle, so I'm back up and running, JEAH! The one in the middle is the one I made out of the broken one and one similar to the bottom one.

Purchased so far list, so i can try remember what I have already got; GT28R (Rebuilt) Adjustable cam gear SC40 SS Manifold 8 Gal Jaz fuel cell 044 Fuel pump SR20 Winged sump Turbo oil drain return flange -10AN 38mm Dump pipe with 3” V Clamp Exedy 5puk Clutch 3” zorst Flexi 2No. 3” V Clamps Silicone Radiator pipes RB20det AFM (probably don't need this anymore is someone needs one) SR20ve Throttle body Ignition Coils x4 (NEW) Timing belt (Gates race), seal and tensioners Water pump Lightened flywheel Fuel rail with -AN fittings Alloy crank pully Alloy alternator and radiator pully -10AN SS Sump fitting -AN6 Male to 9.5mm hardline adaptor (No.4) -AN8 Male to ⅜” NPT (lift pump) -AN8 Male to M18.5 Straight (044 inlet pump) -AN6 Bosch 044 fuel pump one way check valve -AN10 Blank for rocker cover 4No. -AN6 90° teflon bends 2No. -AN6 90° teflon bends 5 Meters 8mm teflon SS braided hose -AN8 Female to Female union for fuel filter 4No. -AN6 straight swivel 3No. -AN8 90° teflon bends -AN8 Straight teflon 2 meters braided teflon line 044 mount Spigot bush (Flywheel) CA18 Loom Custom CAS mount T28 Dump pipe SS gasket 2No. -AN10 stainless weld on bungs Clutch release bearing 3 inch muffler 3 inch 1.6mm pipe 2 meters 3 inch combo bends tube Aeroflow Micron AN8 fuel filter -AN6 Male Gauge Sensor Filling Adaptor ⅛” NPT (ECU Fuel pressure sensor)

So apparently, two years ago, I was getting this ready for a revin and cert. Well, that moist certainly has not happened, as I do keep changing my mind a tad on how far I want to go with this car. So I have been looking at buying another wagon, as wag nats is coming up in just under two months, and I need something And then, Like a bat out of hell, old Nathan puts up an Meu engine with factory clutch stuff etc. boom, that's my ticket. So out the 2jz is coming, and in is going a factory engine, so I can atleast attempt the shit out of trying to get a revin, and worry about cert on an engine and slam etc at a later time. So the plan, get car to my lock up, remove front, bumper, rad support etc remove 2jz, carefully remove and label wiring, remove 2jz bell housing, fit m motor stealing a bunch of shit off my crown sedan (is going to be my saving grace) jack it back up to factory, and attempt a revin at the very start of next year. I have a fuck load to do in reality So I'm planning on getting wagon down to garage before Monday next week (going camping this weekend) start on above list, picking up engine on sunday the 20th, so should give me a bit of time to get it in there, get an exhaust sorted out etc. I would like to have the car ready for engine fit by the 20th if possible, including having the suspention jacked to shit again. Just reminded me, I need to find some factory wheels or tires....... Anyway, so that's whats happening heres some silly pics from last time I abused this thing

joel has spent most of his day at the vw and upholstery shop today. mainly working on his vw. the end result has been this look at the smile on his face oh he got a wof as well. beam is out and off to get cut up for adjusters.

Use an electric fence, set up a camera, fun veiwing

Some more new tings. Got some wheels off Cul8r (yes, I got all 4 before someone asks): Stripped the paint: Now I'm sanding: The plan is to polish the spoke faces and lips and paint the center bits around the bolt holes and the spokes sides black. Also put in my Wolfsburg steering wheel. And check my new radio, how's that for period correct? I've got my ticket to the twilight session at Hampton on Wednesday which should be good fun. However the car has had a bit of an idle issue for a while and in an attempt to diagnose it the other day I started unplugging and replugging things and now it's worse. Haha. Let's hope a throttle body calibration at least puts it back to how it was, as that was what I unplugged when it when worse. Bloody new school electrics, I do miss a throttle cable. I'll be going regardless but would be nice if it's running ok.

Today thanks to help got a little done. Firstly i took the deck off so i don't have to worry about it when i get the wellside So that ended up being easy as F!@#!!! Then looked at the chassis and thought that needs to be cleaned up so a mate headed over and gave me a hand doing that. Got a little done but the wire wheel ran out... While doing that we also prepped and painted some front guards These were acid dipped then neutralised a few weeks ago only got this photo before painting. Sanded back and thanks to acid dipping it didn't require much effort First time really using a proper gun, turned out ok but the last coat went a bit sour.. orange peel looking.

A friend bought an old Delica in Auckland, did a fit out and shipped it to Canada. He is currently in Alaska about to turn around and drive to Brazil... to http://overland.dikastro.com/

Put the polished manifold on today. I tidied up the injector wiring by running it under the manifold and gave the fuel rail a quick polish. Hard to stop once you start. I also installed this cool carbon airbox I got. Quietened down the diverter valve a lot. I'll polish the ends of it later on when I get a chance. Will also do something about the throttle body which is letting everything down, I was going to paint it but got a bit impatient.