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Installed sparkplug cups. Theyre about an 05 interference fit on the smaller boss and a fraction over size:size on the larger diameter. Large diameter is oringed but have used rtv on all faces. Got advice from the guys who 'know what theyre doing' so should be good. Will install them in all blocks from now on.

Well bugger me. 2 days and it’s pretty much spotless.

Installed it, lowered engine, reconnected everything and it started up nicely and non-exhaust leaky. Filled with water and antifreeze. Took it off the hoist and tested the clutch install actually worked. It moves under it's own power again. Moved it outside. Old wheels vs new wheels:

Done a few races, had a lot of fun and managed 2nd place in one fully crewed race. Did snap the backstay tho. My 'temporary' arrangement using old leftover rope found in the bottom of a locker failed under tension just past the finish line. Rebuilt the whole setup from Dyneema which is a magical rope I love working with. Weave the rope through itself twice in a 'brummel lock' Bury the tail in the center of the rope core and taper it to a smooth end Smooth it all out and you've got an eye spliced into the rope which doesn't reduce its strength like a knot would. Once all the bits are done, we have a beautiful new backstay cascade with an expected max working load of 400kg ish. Breaking strain of that 5mm Dyneema is 3000kg. De-rate it by 20% to account for the tight radius in the eyes, de-rate another 40% to account for 5+ years of UV exposure and we're still well above what it needs to hold.

And finished the Dax, huge thanks to @64valiant for his skills. Otherwise it'd still be sitting there feeling neglected.

So I welded the whole up-pipe to a big bit of square section to keep the flanges in the same place. Then cut out the cat. This must really slow gas flow before the turbo: I wanted it done so I found some tube in the right size and welded it in. I welded the flexi's cracked section too. But this kept leaking in random places (air and bubble test) so I gave up and cut that out too. New flexi: Tested for leaks, all sealed. Wrapped again: New gaskets:

Also got this awesome period style trunk for the rack super cool

Has been too cold and miserable out in the shed lately so yesterday i brought my trays of parts inside and got back into the carbs. All back together as a set now, no major issues, and only one minor one. Well two really as 2 of the 4 float needles had stuck springs. Managed to grab the pin with 'definitely not the wives' toenail clippers, and with a bit of twisting back and forth eventually cleaned all the rust and smout out of them. Set the floats to 15mm as per the jet kit instructions. Used the 120 jets from the kit and set the jet needles on the second slot to start with like the cheatsheet suggests as a starting point.

So while that brews I can get on with other stuff like, oh I dunno, patching more rust

More goods from ROCKAUTO.. heater hose and some cheap universal exhaust hangers that were on clearance. Rose-tinted glasses backhanded off by reality of 68 year old car, lol. What id envisioned as a couple of hours in the back corner spiralled to 2 days and more to go… You don’t see this bit when it’s on the chassis… Hmm this corner is soft. No wonder, there’s practically a scallop directing road splash into a wee nook..it was full of heavy bitumen but didn’t suffice. Had to sandwich a layer in there for the future trunk floor (This bit does taper towards the latch, I didn’t F it up) The weird transition in the corner was seam sealed to hell but let go from behind the lead join on the outer I’ve yet to whip out. I’ll seal it up again because it looks goofy uncovered In other news, $3885 for a windscreen delivered here. What in Tarnation!! Have a couple of others quoting, hoping to scrape something back from that. I’m in no hurry at all and with their stock order would be fine, but didn’t seem to translate on the bottom line! Onward

If only it was a model engine! Would have been done a decade ago! No idea on hours. 1000s and 1000s. Generally expected/accepted that a full car like this would be 16-20k hours.

Yeah that’s not great. This one’s not perfect but it’s a shitload better Easily the most tedious task in all this is getting the rust off pieces I want to use. All the abrasive type methods soak up hours on end and I don’t have hours on end so I’m running a chemistry experiment with the citric acid and sodium bicarbonate solution that seems to be the current hotness. Probably should have used something a bit more hardy as a liner but yeah. 1 day in and it’s looking promising

At least its not trains. Most autistic people like trains...but I don't have enough shed space for these...lol

As I've always said, why finish something when you can start a new project.

So during this I tried to source a Tactrix cable but genuine ones are not sold anymore, so I tried a clone from China. Risky I guess. These have been around for almost 20 years and used to tune factory ECU's on Subaru's and Mitsi's etc. This is where I found that even with genuine Tactrix cables (version 2.0), heaps of people have trouble connecting to early 2000's wrx ecu's. Yay... apparently I would have better luck with a version 1.3 but these are hard to find too. So it currently is in limp mode because I violated it's Tumble Generating Valves. This was expected, but the cable not working was not expected. There are hoops to jump through and internet rumours to decipher. But it should just be a case of connecting the green 'test' plugs under the steering column and also shorting the white 4 pin plug next to it (some have 2 pin white plugs). With that cable connected to the ECU it should be as easy as disabling the code(s) for a TGV fault. But it won't read the ecu. So the plan is to try another cable and in the mean time I found someone selling unmodified tgv's from an '06. So I'm going lengthen the wiring and connect these 'dummy' tgv's and see if it comes out of limp mode. All it should really want is a signal from the TPS's on both of them to say open/closed. I did try everything to get the clone Tactrix to work. I even set up a Windows 7 laptop as well as a Windows 10 one. Found someone had save lots of different versions of ECUFlash, none made any difference.

OK so the planned solution to the up pipe leaking was to cut out the flexi and weld in a new one, so I loosened the engine and gbox mounts etc again and jacked the engine up enough to get the aftermarket leaking up pipe out again. I bought a nice flexi from Max Fab. This is when I discovered I did not look at the after market (Redline Performance) up pipe close enough, I had originally only measured the ID on the flange that the turbo mounts to (at the top). But it actually has a taper welded in before this that I didn't see. So now that I had the up pipe off again I realised the ID is fucking massive at 63mm or about 2.5". From what I can find, even the STI type uppipe of this generation has an internal ID of 41mm which is tiny. General consensus is that going too big of an ID in the up pipe causes slower turbo response. This also meant the nice flexi I bought was too small to use on this Redline one. So I decided to cut off all of the heat shielding of the factory cat'd up pipe and see whats in there. Turns out there is also a flexi at the 'bottom' end, there was a lot of controversy over the last 25 years of forums as to whether these up pipes and the STI ones have flexi's or not (I did finally find a photo of an STI one with the heat shielding cut off (its welded on) and it also has a flexi but in the different place. Flexi at the lower flange: Turns out the weld has cracked all the way around and the only thing keeping it there was the welded on heat shields. I wonder how many subaru's are driving around with flexi's like this? I could not hear it at all, most likely due to being wrapped in heat shield material and then another metal layer. The next interesting thing is that the design of this flexi is that it has two layers of tube starting from inside the lower flange. The inner tube goes all the way through the flexi and is seals with some kind of steel wool looking stuff around a tapered section. Having 2 tubes there shrinks the ID down to 38mm-ish. I think it shrank down even more at that tapered steel wool sealed part as well. Crazy that you can make 250hp through this!? I then also realised that the factory metal gaskets inner ring has no surface to mount to on the aftermarket redline up pipe's lower flange. This is the double tubed section and the factory inner ring from the multilayer gasket. It didn't actually leak here, but it's not ideal. This pretty much seal my decision to not use the big diameter up pipe with the leaky flexi. It would more suit something with a big turbo, not this.

Bita progress on the ol girl last couple weekends front ends off to get it summer and sisters weeding ready New startermotor New waterpump Nexts to wire up lights and a quick wire wheel and rust kill couple spots that the guards hide nothing bad justa piece of mind thing And a good oll polish and clean inside

So we went back to look at the local cx sports on offer. When we arrived he made us some lovely strong coffee. Then we wheeled the 650 out into the sun and I had a better look over it. I asked him how set he was on prices and he told me he'd been thinking about this for while since we last visited. He'd decided he was going to give me the bikes on the basis that he could see I was going to be the ideal person to fix the potential tricky camshaft/water pump/weak oil control ring issues/anything else from being laid up since 2017. I was blown away by this and told him I would do the 650 proud. I still insisted we pay him some money anyway and that we did. He's since been around to visit us for coffee and is a true gentleman. He's now keeping and fixing up the GL500 Silverwing he'd been thinking of selling. I'll be more than happy to help him if needed. So we loaded the two sports onto my cousins trailer we still had use of, filled the van with boxes of spare parts he'd stashed away and carefully drove home - elated with the exciting prospect of having both a lovely original cx650E to restore and a cx400s to potentially use as the basis of a custom build. A lovely sunny afternoon to arrive home with new projects.. Unloaded them inside and that evening I could not resist but spend a few hours cleaning the 650 before snapping some pics. Its come up lovely and I'm looking forward to spending more time detailing it once its fixed and running ok. These models have a great proportions and fantastic 80's Honda style. It come with a black tank that he'd bought because the original white tank has some holes along the seam. He'd got the side panels too. Fork stanchions came up good after a polish.. Some books he gave us which will come in very handy!... A few bikinis.. There's a full set of panels on the rusty cx400 that I could re-paint for the 650. I have some colour schemes in mind. The 400 is complete but he'd stripped many of the parts off and boxed them up. The rust is localised to one area and luckily there's enough solid metal on the back that I wont lose any datum points when it comes to repairing it. The workshop was getting a bit 'bikey'.... So the 650 will be left alone until I clear out the other bikes. Starting with the 400 which I preceded to strip right down. But before removing the engine/forks/wheels I had to get these pics for future brain storming. Its really easy to see why these bikes, especially the single shock prolink models are so popular for customising. Such a neat clean powertrain setup, especially with the shaft drive. The 400 was stripped bare, parts given a quick clean as I went, then labelled and boxed up. We now had so many boxed up bike parts scattered about, along with many tanks etc that new storage was needed. So we bought some timber and built shelves into the beach bike/lawnmower shed... That original cx500 was robbed of a few more parts and I'll now pass it on to whoever might need it. So now I'm working at stripping the 400 engine down. I need the camshaft for the 500 engine and there's other bits that will be saved as spares. It appears to be in good condition inside.. I've made a few tools as I needed them plus Graham had brought around a clutch lock ring tool when he visited for coffee. Once I have finished stripping and boxing the 400 engine I'll get started on the 650 repairs. What I do know so far is that the water pump impeller splines have seen better days... Here's a good 500 impeller for comparison.. I can't just simply swap in a 500 impeller because the 650 unit is taller to move more water.. Sadly replacements are hard to come by. Before I commit to buying one the the beautifully machined alloy jobs available from Ralf in Germany I'll have a go at a repair I have in mind. I have yet to check the state of the camshaft but Graham had told me he thinks the thread is iffy. Again, I have some ideas about fixing that if needed. Its all part of the fun and I'll certainly post up how I get on, better or worse.

Ok so another few updates. Just trying to keep on keeping on while my bank account continues to recover from the engine and gearbox stuff. The good new is, is that that is done. Another poor photo, but here all is. Stroked to 1380, Keith Calver Head. It also turned out to be a Cooper S crank and Rods I had in the donor engine. Built for torque and acceleration. Should deliver the goods in a lightweight, low centre of gravity car. Plus all the gearbox goodies mentioned in the last post. I have late model Mini 8.4" Disc Brakes (Same as in my Rover mini) ready to go on, so it should pull up fine too. Speaking of brakes I grabbed some Brake rotors from Napa. $50 each, which is awesome. Now with that I have everything I need to get the car the car rolling, once the rust repair is done. On the rust repair side of things. We completed the rear tail light section On both sides Rear passengers side arch repairs And all the floor repairs (except for the front) are also complete Here you can see the bermuda triangle, which is basically the sill section that runs through both sides and where almost every moke I've seen rot out. All these rust repairs need to be left, so the repair inspector can approve them, when they're all done. I've just spat paint over them to protect them, as I don't know when that will be. So now we have the bottom of the passengers side outer, which we have cut off and prepped. Also The Rear of the front arches and the front of the floor where it meets the firewall and the front subframe attaches to. All these front bits are kind of intersected together for strength, so we are tackling them at once. One of the intimidating parts was going to be the pockets that the front subframe bolt up to. This patch panel wasn't available for ages, so we accepted we were going to have to make it, but weren't looking forward to it. A stroke of luck had me put in touch with a gentleman reasonably local to me, who has an early English Moke he is restoring. I managed to catch up with him yesterday and he is a little further along than we are. He's cut all his rust out and got a bunch of repair panels all clamped in place. After looking closely at his Moke he produced the exact panel we need. He had a play around and couldn't get it to work, so got another one but we reckon we can make it work. It will need a bit of trimming to suit, but its going to save us a heap of time and head scratching. Here you can see the panel upside down. So that was a really good score and we are super thankful for him to giving up his morning. As always, thanks for reading. There is still a lot of work to do, but we are slowly inching towards the finish line.

Finished machining the last two castings. They are dimensionally the best ones so far. Surface finish not as great. Need to tune the feeds and speeds since its a harder grade material. Did billet Cam boxes and Follow Fingers. The followers are from EN36A and need to go through a few more processes. I need to have cams made. Theres guys in the UK that have been working on developing cams for this engine for the last 20+years and have a good profile to use. So ill go with that. I also used their high lift follower profile rather than the original. Once I have cams I can line bore the cam boxes to suit. Ive sent out the Follow Fingers for copper plating. Once theyre back I can remove the copper from the running faces the send them out for case hardening. Then ream and hone. The 'Follow Fingers' are cool. They're not a rocker as such, theyre a 1 to 1 finger that is basically taking the side load from the valve. Seems to be what is done on sports bikes and F1 engines. I was originally thinking I could so Valve Buckets but once I got into it it was pretty obvious they would be too heavy due to the spring diameter. That would mean changing springs, how its oiled etc, it was starting to re invent too much.

I’m back, with another tale of scatterbrain and determination! Stoke the fire and Settle in with a choice beverage. With my whole life situation completely different to a year ago, having no decent old schooler to drive ( ‘82 isn’t my speed)..I felt I’d lost my identity. The late 50’s GM range had really taken my fancy lately. Not so big on the Chev range, but Oldsmobile/Buick/pontiac/Cadillac for sure. They are big, ostentatious and dripping in space-race atomic era mid century modernism. 58 was the year they could legally have twin headlights, which give them a meaner demeanour I reckon. The 58 Buick line had THE MOST polished trim you could get on a factory motorcar..just nudging past the Cadillac. Id been chasing 58-59 mercury and Edsel wagons but not finding much, and after studying the GM’s, the fords didn’t have the same edge I was after. Mopars are sick but stylistically a few years behind.. I needed a 195* this time. Marketplace scrolling start of June found me this 58 Buick special in Rotorua. Shit pictures, vague description. Its was 8k. Not looking too bad, don’t really want another project. Saved. I toyed with the idea of a 64 wildcat coupe that was local, complete and running. Needs some rust and compliance. Easy. Not the end goal, but something old and cool to cruise with a [for sale] sign on it. $13k and getting cheaper. But I couldn’t get past that 58. I did a deep dive and I couldn’t not have one now. Shame nobody had one for sale. One bloke had a Century but his neighbour had first dibs and ended up with it. However, he said he may know where a diff was. Start of august I Started asking questions about the marketplace 58, met with short unhelpful answers via the wife. Do you have any more pictures? Are car specific items Complete? Hows the chrome? … We’ll get back to you in a week or two. No rear seat, driveline. Best to get a container. Container hire and shipping $4k. And likely to turn up looking like a mixing bowl. Nah. End of august, how are you going with those photos? … Whole time I’m silently obsessing, looking for parts and generally in a frenzy with no decent info. Then I was searching random related things on trademe and found it actually listed on there, 6k and auction ending in a couple of days! No bids, one extra photo though! From the q&a section I found out the wheels were actually gone, gone too..bugger. More should I,shouldn’t I. Max Anxiety etc. With no bids the Auction ends, I’m thinking it will be reposted, no worries. Can always message the marketplace chat and sort something later if not. But Hot damn, now my shipping budget has squared up. I ring him and eke out more info, cracked screen…Totally stripped further than original photos. “Hire a container”. Ding. The seller has offered fixed price @ 5k’ A few days until offer expires and I’m searching the world for a screen now because that could be a deal-breaker for compliance. Found one, about $1500 landed. Looking like I’ll be running a small block chev and a 10 bolt as the Buick stuff is rare. September 1st, paid in full. Ok so I’ve got a few quotes from Wise Move.. I’ll fly up, drag it out and assemble it, fly home and someone will transport back to chch. I’ll have a wee tiki tour while there. The cars in a container on axle stands in a storage facility. The parts are in a house bus project at a transport yard other side of the lake. That’s fine I’ll rent a van and there’s a few towies in town. The big pisser is these cars were about the last GM to have a torque tube..the trans bolts to a tube containing a driveshaft that bolts to the quirky big diff pinion. Panhard bar and a couple of radius rods running forward to a mount on the torque tube itself. I’ll never find one complete and it’s common in US for people to do open driveshaft conversion with a Pontiac diff. I’m aiming for easy compliance process so want original gear or period correct..think 283/powerglide/10 bolt and make it look like factory? Same as a chev would have had. NZ got a fair few 58 checks. Message a few sellers, form some plans but still a bit early for this level of organisation. so I’m thinking marketplace again, change it to Rotorua with a 400km radius: get an old diff and strop it to chassis, buy some wheels which will be different front to whatever the back end would be. Doesn’t matter just needs to roll for shipping. Or shoot to repco for hubs and stubs and an engineer for some pipe.. make a trailer beam, some workshop will let me weld that quickly. I haven’t seen under a stripped 58 and don’t really know what to expect so won’t be able to sort much until Saturday morning. Maybe a couple of sack barrows from Bunnings to get it out of container and onto tow truck? Marketplace again fills me with hope - a lady selling parts from a 56 4 door special. She’s got a whole driveline,springs, radiator, refreshed 322 and a Dynaflow trans..it’s only 8 hours driving to get to levin & back but it will solve some problems. Much research revealed that it’s a pretty different setup. Have to run a smaller motor as trans won’t fit the 58’s 364, unsure if the tube will be too long or too short. Motor is 5k which isn’t bad but how will I get it in the van and out + into the chassis at the other end. Let me know when you are ready and I’ll book flights etc and come straight up: 2nd october “can do Saturday 11th” Turns out he’s actually crook so this wasn’t a priority despite being all I could think about. Woooo! Fights, accomodation, rental van, airport parking all booked in quick succession. Good ole oldschool, post asking about Rotorua residents gets me in touch with Gaz who’s got a spot in his shed just out of town. I met him once at OS nats, shitfaced. Fucking legend! This was a huge help, as I was picturing working on gravel outside in a yard or driveway I hadn’t yet found. A few messages with Gaz, They are out of town that weekend lol… but the shed will be perfect, there’s a couple of jacks and a set of wheel dollies under the cortina. YES! Teed up a towie, all is good I pour a bag of bikkies into several bowls for the cat, pack some tools, head torch, fruitcake + a gedder dun attitude and fly up Friday arvo. In the rental, straight out to grab the Dollie’s. Blown away by the facility and setting! Trying to dial in the towie and he says he’s off to ozzy, might be able to get a fill in. Scroll marketplace again for the millionth time: Nailhead, Buick, chev wheels, HQ mags, diff, 283 v8, 5x5 rims, whitewalls, wire wheels.. (There’s also the lingering thought.. these use wheel bolts, not nut and stud. Some online things say one side is LH thread. If I don’t have any/enough that could mean derailment of any plan! welding a rim on?) Had a bit of a look around, ran around Waiotapu geothermal place an hour from closing time. Wicked! I’m pining the adventure now. The motel is fuckin grimey. Cheapest non-hostel room available but the road noise is horrific, hasn’t been updated or cleaned properly since the 70’s and the water pressure is wack.. booked it partly cause There’s a hot pool on site. Trying to dial in the towie and he says he’s off to ozzy, might be able to get a fill in. Cun+y. Hours pass, hes ghosted me. Rang another place and got the after hours lady, was going to check in with the guy on call. He rang and wasn’t too put off, said he’d ring in the morning. Up early after a shithouse sleep, grab two post off-cuts from the garden of the motel to use as blocks, and meet him and his son at the storage yard. Fuuuu, shes definitely stripped out. Has parts inside it but most are his sons! Some tins with nuts bolts brackets screws etc which look imperial.. He puts some wheels of his on the front, a dolly with wood stacked on under the middle-back of the chassis. It’s moving well! Where’s that tow truck at? Gave that number another call and he reckons he can have a guy there in 20. Sweet as, sort through the parts..Japanese vs not Japanese. Finally get a better look at this thing, it’s actually pretty fucking decent! More rust than disclosed but nothing scary. It’s bloody straight apart from RH sill having an indent and the front of the 1/4 has been pushed in a tad. That wasn’t a surprise, could see something was up in the initial photo. I might have won here! Truck shows up, initial fears allayed ‘just send it bro’. It winches on the pull-out bed fine. Looking janky but secure, I follow him out to gaz’s and nothing falls off. ART IMITATES LIFE/ foreshadowing Disembarking was a cinch on flat ground. Now off to the bus to get the rest of the parts. Oh Lordy Hey fuck these panels are really good! Jesus, there’s a set of hubcaps! Van loaded, his GMC loaded and we’re off back to the shop. Everything but the inner guards is now scattered around the shed, I’m on my own and I’m a pig in shit! Umm nothing is labelled. Nothing is bagged or labelled at all Ugh I tiredly yet excitedly pinballed around all the boxes taking stock and making piles of related items. Started sorting nuts bolts screws washers into groups, then splitting into sets. Right, I’ll start with windows and doors.. that shits pretty generic. About 5 hours of putting together/taking apart/distractions/adjustments and I’ve got glass in and moving. Doors hung and clasping. The rear glass rolls down and then pivots back real stylishly to tuck inside the body..fizzing Shagged and dirty I head back to the motel for a golden shower-spec wash up and some cans. Hot tub? so I investigate and it’s locked.. no relaxation for me. I message that guy who had a 58 century he sold to his neighbour. The diff in question was still available. Has the tube and a trans x-member too. Well…. What are you up to tomorrow, I’ll come and get it? I made some ear plugs out of wet napkin paper and get a better sleep but Up early and on the road, weather sucks so not much sight-seeing happening. I arrive in Napier, meet up. Holy fuck this is a massive diff! Some weird wasp stings my neck but it didn’t come to anything thankfully. Spot 5 wheels in the corner, investigate, turns out they are chev 15” with massive balloons on, but the centre bore fit the diff so a deal was struck. He threw in an old air cleaner he had no use for too, rapt. Back to Rotorua and 4 more hours assembling before retiring again. Hot tub locked again. Dang Trunk lid assembled and on, shes looking like a veee-hickle. How rad that the dealer badge was still amongst the parts! I’ve always wanted one. Thats a place in Manitoba, CANADA! Must have been their summer car cause it’s way more sturdy than it should be! The title is Washington state. Monday morning I shuffle in and sling more parts on, add some wheels..WTF the hubcaps fit hahaha. Much fitting and unfitting and now the dash is complete and all the trims around window secure. Many of the trim clips are rusty/snapped or missing so I can’t hang all the cool shit on for transport unfortunately. The diff is now under the car. Would you believe, it’s the one sold out from under my car originally! The snipped handbrake cable and brake lines confirm. How good! stuff piles getting smaller. Do you even have a factory 5kg Sonomatic valve radio..thought so Peep the details in the side flash! I spend what seems like 2 hours wrestling the torque tube through the frame and lining up internal blind splines 300mm inside the diff pinion. The uni joint is fuckin cooked and the yolk was flopping around so it was pretty shit for a time. There’s a hole for greasing; filled with a bung so I could get my finger in and try guide it some. Started with long bolts and pulled it onto the spline then subbed out the bolts to shorter and repeat until married! Talked some shop and assembled the headlights/buckets/rings/bezels. One side was like brand new, was bizarre. I get a call from the motel saying they are upgrading water system so wont have any hot water for the week and did I want to stay or transfer to another place in town. There’s also a takeaway right across the street so they are getting my money. TRANSFER ME BABY! I showed up filthy and he understood I wasn’t going to come right with a cold shower so I moved into town. Instant stink of durries when I opened the door (smoke free suite), it was tidier but not by much. BUT they had a fucking spa in the room so I filled that bitch and soaked away my pains, I was feeling it after a few days of rolling around in the car and under it. Would have been lush to have a dart in that spa but didn’t want to push my luck. Instead I messaged a guy from a hot rod classified page that had a motor and trans out of a 59 for sale for ages. Listed as stuck piston unknown trans @ $1500 id be a fool to pass that up now I have the rest of the driveline to suit. It’s a rare factory 4 barrel so it can Chong more gas and still be slow, moving 1800kg of Buick. Awesome! Now I could take the van up to Hamilton and collect it but that’s pushing myself a bit far. Plus 300kg of dirty old cast iron making its way through the side of the rental would be frowned upon. Also, hard to get it out of van and into the car at Gaz’. Tuesday morning First thing, I had picked up the inner guards from a bloke in town and grabbed some huge bolts for the bumpers. Went to town hanging the front sheet metal and all the bits and pieces, wrangled the rear bumper up and on, same with front. Put together the marker lights and grill..160 chrome squares influenced by the designer looking at knobs for his new kitchen Reno! Shits heavy. By about 4:30 I’m relatively happy with progress, 6 boxes are empty; flattened for recycling and the last bits condensed into a couple of plastic crates, stainless trims methodically placed around the car so as not to chaff on the journey south. Had a sweep up, back into town..spa time nigga. Going back and forward with the transporter guy the last few days wanting to know the earliest it would be ready and he goes cold. Said I’d have it ready about 11. That’s ok there’s other guys quoting around the same money. I’m peaking out a bit ‘cause the she is up a gravel drive and across a bit of paddock then down to a lush pad but car needs to come out on a bit of an angle. Wednesday dawns and I go grab a 4pack of strops, head to partsworld and see if they have any coil springs I can put under the back..I used those aforementioned fence post offcuts but there’s a stud coming out of the body at the top and a stud on the diff housing..both accept a retaining plate. The wood was harsh and it would probably shake the car apart again on the way home if it didn’t split it into kindling. First thought was a couple of rugby balls? But the stitching terminating on the ends, the studs would probably penetrate and pop. Mr. man at partsworld wasn’t as onboard as me with my ‘i need a pair of random coil springs’ request, said they only did Mazda but he went and had a look and returned with a set, including rubber retainer isolators and one end was progressive/tightly wound just like Buick! Fuck mate I’ll have em. Chur Well they actually turned out to be perfect! Might even run them permanently..time will tell if an airbag makes its way in there instead. Used my strops to hold hood on (old mate can’t find the hinges at the moment), another around the torque tube to the X of chassis, and one pulling rear end back towards the bumper..having no trans mounted means the whole assembly could shimmy forward and tyres chaff the body. Not a biggie but nice to try avoid it. Message transporter at 9:30, good to go. No response. Sat here writing this whole blurb until he messages to say hes been out of service, can’t do it but a towie mate will.. he’s on his way from Hamilton. Ok cool, this is something. Mate rings and explains he hasn’t got the winch trailer but if there was a vehicle that could help tow it up ramps it would be a go. Hmm an added level of fuckery but let’s do it. He arrives around 4, we push it out and turn a bit, he’s backed in on the rise. Planned to tow it up with the van and come alongside the trailer and truck. Van has no tow hooks and the plastic bumper is fair flush with the diff..flag. Go pinch the diesel side-by-side and it’s all go, car rolls beautifully and it stropped down. See ya in a couple of days hopefully! I do regret not taking more before pics but I was on a mission and it will come apart again. Most of the car is virgin and remarkable for age. The rust has entered the chat in the front of inner sills, front floor pans, spare wheel well, rear of trunk. Behind the trim on front of front guards, Plus oddball hole on side of hood and beside tail lamp. Has also sweat a bit behind the side flash’s. Might be deep enough pitting to need a patch. Quite manageable. I do need to concentrate on the besties Hakosuka so will try limit myself on Buick .. but we all know how that initial dose of enthusiasm goes! Discuss:

Can I have a prize for the creative title? Also it's kind of crazy to me that these are almost 25 years old. But anyway, I am always looking at what is on the market and this popped up, high km's, slipping clutch, reasonably cheap. What's not to love? It's actually not a 'WRX' its a JDM '20k', which was a weird trim/model in Japan that is really a WRX. So I went to check it out, test drove etc. Body is decent, needs some dents fixed and paint. Battery was dead but jump started ok. New tyres, recent wof. Not a fan of the 18's on it. Engine very oily but drives and sounds fine. 1st gear a bit shuddery but then smooth. Doesn't pull as well as expected. Only showing 7psi, should be 12-14psi. Thought turbo buggered or boost control issue. Idle drops and tries to stall some times. Made an offer anyway and ended up owning it. Life is short etc.

Probably not too different from most other cars of the seventies? This one must have been sitting in sand in a river or beach judging by the amount of it coming out of the sills and the way it’s rusted from the inside out.

Quick up date as it's nearly dinner time. Been working on finishing up and changing a few small things that I wasn't happy with. I did put some petrol in the tank and flushed out the fuel lines. Found a couple that just needed me to tighten my nuts. I will just be doing a few tidy jobs until I can get it into get the final wiring and start up. Anyway I found a little Hillman special vehicle sticker to add. Go figure.

The kids were happy as with it. My daughter kept pointing to it saying 'cool' and 'sick' hahaha at least it's got their approval. On the high of excitement I gave the engine bay and wheels a quick clean. Then I mocked up the front end. When I get a chance next, ill go through all the parts and make a plan to move forward. I’ll have a go at swapping the front end of the guards over (1300 front onto the 1000ute repro guards) and see what other rust work needs to be patched up. I'll also focus on the wiring, starting system and ignition and try get it running. Shouldn't take too much tbh but we'll see how we go. Maybe this will be the year hahaha. Chur

Heads back from shop getting intake seats cut done a diy head skim on the mill. this old junker head was surprisingly straight. .04mm pretty much cleaned the whole thing

Dragged home a replacement block from my engine rebuilder. Ive seen red motor passageways that look way shitter. Anyway into the garage it goes. First thing was to sort out the timing gear. I have been left stranded by the fibre one shitting the bed a couple of times in the past.

So the other side got the same treatment, during which the door was hung on the top hinge so that it wouldn't look silly before the channel was welded in place, we found that the door jams weren't far off but the tolerances were generous and once its in the place it can't go forward or backwards that much anyways. I was keen to get the shell out back home before last xmas and me going off to Nam. So I got my trusty steed and the trailer and I got it home.

Other sides done.

No doubt you've seen this. Hopefully some inspiration/motivation - shit it sounds fantastic.

The sumps came out of the molasses and were clean as a whistle. Exposed MANY patent numbers on the bottom of the trans pan, lol. Ordered black diesel-heater ducting for the other sizes required, installed sweet as. The Bailey channels showed up, was a perfect fit on the divider side, had to spread the latch side channel out as it was too tight but lush AF now. Ordered exhaust gear, one of the multi-bends is due tomorrow..never got close to chance to get started but was nice to have it for the long weekend? Right, rust time again. The sill was creased and with no good way to get at it, I had to chop it out. Thats the crummy stuff I can’t get at with the chassis under’er. Hoicked some pieces out of the rear wheel tub to replicate after work. Id say that should be dialled next weekend.

Next is the sill. Here’s a glimpse of the horrors awaiting. Spent the afternoon removing the sill from the other car which looks promising but that’s it for this weekend.

Weld it in Bit of work towards the front of the opening which I didn’t get a pic of except of the patch I had to make 4 times ffs First cause I made it in 1mm instead of 1.2. Second cause I made it inside out. Third cause it was 5mm too short. Forth to get it right. Sheesh.

Hmm well this bit’s pretty bad But before that I need to attend to this One of the reasons I took the roof off. Again from the other car. Clean ‘er up

Productive evening for a change. I must be part magpie because i love shiny stuff!

This had a loose sparco aluminium shift knob that I didn't like and the shifter boot was some after market thing I didn't like either, as well as the frame to hold the boot on wasn't connected anymore. Took it apart and found that most of the plastic mounts were snapped off. Decided to try MacGyver it. Heat gun to heat up some fine thread screws: Melt into trim: You can see the last two original thin plastic posts it is meant to mount to: Little nuts and washers: AliExpress shiftboot and surprisingly nice leather gearknob: I realised after this that the shift boot is meant to wrap around the plastic frame thing. Fixed it afterwards but don't think I have a photo. The shift boot is ok, I meant to get suede but accidentally order alcantara type fabric. Looks a lot better than it did though.

Another good bit of maintenance is to the replace the water cross over pipe o-rings. Basically impossible without removing the intake manifold. They were rock solid and had to be chiseled out. The engine wasn't THIS oily, it's mostly de-greaser. During removal of the intake manifold I soon discovered every single breather hose, and there are lots, was rock hard and cracked as soon as you try remove them. This is interesting because this must create air leaks, being a MAF car it must also cause chaos. There are so many breathers because it has essentially two separate breather systems. So there are 2 hoses coming from each cam cover, through complicated multi bend hoses to either the PCV valve for one system and the other to the intake tube thing before the turbo. So one in vacuum and one on boost. Plus breathers directly from the block etc. It is well documented that if the PCV valve is blocked or not functioning, it causes oil leaks, rough running and over fueling. So it's worth doing. I bought around 20 hoses which took a month to arrive from Amayama but WAY cheaper than buying locally. This is just one order:

Uppipe, up-pipe, up pipe... none look right? Fit new studs: The factory upthing has lots of heat shields and is close to rubber hoses so decided to wrap it, not the tidiest job but it'll do. Fitted with fancy nuts.

I had read that this was the generation where they added a catalytic converter to the uppipe, before the turbo. Apparently these fail, break up and go through the turbo. So I removed the uppipe and can see a cat and it is separating from the outer part. I can literally push it in and out. So I found an aftermarket up-pipe on FB market place: No cat: I originally refitted the EGT sensor which is only really there to check for a blocked cat, but I realised it doesn't seat properly. So I removed it again. Here you can see that the original uppipe inner diameter is quite small too. About 42mm. New one is much bigger at 52ish. From what I read, the removal of the pre turbo cat makes a big difference to turbo response and Subaru only did it for about 4 years then removed it. The bigger diameter is good in theory but pre turbo it might actually slow gas flow down. But it is what it is. I tried to swap the studs over but a couple refused to come out even with heat: I cleaned up the threads in the 'new' up pipe flange and bought some fancy new studs and nuts from Sinco.

Decided clutch would be best to take the engine out, but before that I'll do a compression test. While cold it came up 150psi on all four within a few psi, the amazing thing is it's done 311,000kms 😅 Happy with that!

No update just been doing a bunch of small cruisn

Got some mirrors A k and n filter and a water pump

Wow. First update for the year. So things have been progressing slowly. First things first we have a rebuilt gearbox. It doesn't look like much, but this is featuring a Close ratio straight cut gear kit that I got from the deceased estate auction. Straight cut drop gears from MED, and a Minispares LSD. Plus centre oil pick up to avoid oil starvation and a extra drain plug on the back of the gearbox to try catch as much metal as possible, as most of you probably know. Classic Mini's share engine and gearbox oil. Decked out with new bearings and baulk rings etc. And a few other little tips and tricks. So I'm probably overbuilt in the drivetrain area. Short of going to a dog engagement gear kit. It's probably almost as strong as you can get a Mini gearbox using off the shelf parts. I'm excited to hear it run, as if you've ever heard a Mini with straight cut drop gears, they're something else. The gearbox is patiently waiting in the corner of the shed under a cover, as the flywheel is still being worked on by the Machinist at my Dad's work. So once that is done, we can get all the engine components balanced and get everything assembled for the last time. On the rust repair front, we are making good, albeit slow progress. We fully welded the side section off the car Then attached it to the car Repaired the top section, which is now fully welded (couldn't find a photo unfortunately). Then realised we have to repair a bit in the front of the rear wheel well, so cut some of it off again and made about 4 patches as there was a bunch of overlapping seams. We also sorted the last edge of the floor part. The triangle is now complete and will get a hearty dose of cavity wax so it will hopefully last another 58 years. That piece is now fully reinstated and I started on an arch repair. Not the best welding, but for someone who works a desk job and started to weld 4 months ago. I don't think its too bad. Has since been ground back and painted as there is a factory metal flare type deal that attaches over the top. The latest repair is in the rear taillight section as this was full of bog, braising and a crappy patch panel. This photo is it half done. But it is full done now. Just need to reinstate the hole for the rear tailight. So that about brings us up to date. Lots of tooing and froing. Hopefully around the easter period we can make some more progress on the body. My friend has given my carb a bit of a birthday with a rebuild kit I sourced a while back. He just did his, so wanted to do it while it was still fresh in his head. Once the final bills for my balancing and engine assembly have been paid. I will look at start gathering all the other stuff I need to make it a car again and bring it back from the dead. Slow and steady. We will get there. Thanks for reading.

It arrived home Friday arvo, so I taped on the rest of the trim and gave it a scrub