DAD

Long overdue update. Essentially I've just been driving this on sunny days. It's great, it's been very well behaved so far, and I love it.

Plans over winter include a head-off tickle up with new valve stem seals, a thinner 0.8mm TRD metal head gasket, and a new VVT pulley (the old one is worn and rattles like hell).

Chuffed really.

8 hours ago, ajg193 said:

You are a sick man having two 1984 cars of the exact same colour scheme. Please put Sprint rims from a Starlet on it.

I won't argue with either of these sentences.

1 hour ago, Goat said:

You guys are doing it right!

Doing it well enough, at least (I hope)

17 minutes ago, Seedy Al said:

Time to get the drills out and that motor apart. 

Brapbrapbrap. Gonna see how well it drives stock first, but porting not out of the question when its roadworthy.

Hi Al.

Discuss at leisure.

Hi all, 

We weren't back in the UK long before everything got a bit daft. The Starlet arrived from NZ, and Meg started craving a project car of her own. This popped up about an hour away from us, on FB marketplace. Low mileage, UK market S3 FB that had been (garaged) off the road for 12 years, following an MOT failure for rust (obviously).

Here, have the shit picture that made me drive out to see it.

Allegedly a runner, the chap couldn't get it running when I arrived. Had some nasty areas of rot, particularly on inner/outer sills, and some annoyingly crusty non-structural cosmetic holes, but the majority of it was not to bad for a UK-living 80's japper. 

Paid 1500pounds for it to be delivered to my door, and the detective work began.

Body - tired and sad, but has potential.

Interior - mint (brown velour!)

Engine - managed to get it running nicely from a 12v pump/jerry can. Either needs a fuel pump or just filters changing. Result.

Driveline - unknown, seems to work at low speed

Brakes - fucked

Suspension - probably quite fucked

Wheels + tyres - bent and perished, respectively.

Plan:

Repair rust, fix brakes, fix fuel system, weld on coilovers or superlows, doorts.

========================

A few months pass

=========================

Current progress:

Meg loves rx7

Remove bad, add good

Valance back on

Fixed some pinholes in tank, rust repairing this week, outside protected

More to follow.

30 minutes ago, kyteler said:

We get jacked on plug prices here thanks to the distributor.

Was that an ignition system pun?

Pipes were AliExpress sourced iirc, unsurprised that they didn't bother packing them with anything 

Amaze, so glad this went to a good home, Meg will be stoked that you've been cracking on. Looking forward to seeing your progress with the big block 

Doort.

I painted up the rear spoiler before this show. It was a plain aluminium one from T3 originally, but I wanted to make it look like it belonged on the starlet. I built the paint up in the same colour layers as the original, age worn paint, then rubbed it back to try and get it to match the rear hatch. Pretty pleased with how it turned out.

Got papped at the Bicester Sunday Scramble last weekend. Awesome varied turnout of cars at an old ww2 bomber airbase. 

Have a peek here for more pics, really good show! http://www.speedhunters.com/2018/04/the-perfect-spring-at-sunday-scramble/

DVLA blew the deadline, hoping to take it out for a buzz tomorrow night.

On 22/01/2018 at 08:49, Seedy Al said:

@DAD

Hes just taken his car back to the uk. Might have some info handy to you.

I don't know if there is actually any difference between Ireland and England.  But its all the uk. So what ever

Humm, bit slow responding here, apologies.

The bits of paperwork I had to supply that related to the vehicle were the certificate of registration, purchase receipt (or something equivalent that gives an idea of value), and a couple of declaration forms about the vehicle. I went through a transport agency and they helped with the paperwork that needed doing.

Export paperwork was reasonably easy, import stuff seems trickier.

ROI may well have different import hoops to jump through, if it's your first time importing I would go with a car shipping agency so they can navigate you through the pitfalls. 

Yep, only *need* to hand in plates if you want a part refund on rego. Mine was on hold anyway and I'll be damned if I'm giving up those rad plates. 

Ha, awesome. I've lived in Masterton for the past few years and have seen you driving about in this all the time. Sounds brilliant. Didn't know you had a build thread here. Good work with the a14 on Dell'ortos, I like. The homemade engine cradle is a nice bit of kit too, I'll remember that for future projects. 

42 minutes ago, ajg193 said:

Best of luck with the transportation to the other side of the world. I expect to see footage of it going sideways on some english country roads before the end of January.

You're on! 

Sorry @Sparkle me ol' muck, I was chipping away at getting the transport stuff sorted last weekend, aiming to get her away early December. They replied with "okay sweet, we'll be through to collect her on Tuesday, will call you with a time". Sheeeeeet.

Last weekend was a blur getting everything sorted. Bye bye Betty! 

If you ever find yourself in the UK hit me up for a drive!

Also saw this on TM, cool car, keen to see it getting spruced and de-Barry-ed

Done! (for now...)

This thing is starting it's journey back to the UK tomorrow, so a last push saw the final jobs sorted. Took it for a buzz down the road, and other than sketchy (not bedded in yet) brakes, it was good!

Nice to see it in sunlight, now to seal it in a box for a few weeks until it pops up in England! 

Awesome chatting to you today man, Celica is cool as a penguins todger. Such a rad car.

Can't really add much to the gearbox discussion, but just wanted to commend you on such an admirable idea. Have lost friends to depression/suicide in the past, seems to be one of those issues that often doesn't come to light until it's too late - this sort of exposure is great. Best of luck to you. 

Bellhousing off

Tailhousing off and casing split - it was this join that was leaking. The surfaces look nice, no obvious nicks or cracks. Gave  them a good clean up and RTV'd the shit out of everything... 

Sweet. 

On 10/2/2017 at 14:04, DAD said:

"...so I'll need to take the box out to sort the leak, so I'll probably just do that when I get back to England and use a lift, rather than scabbling around on the floor."

Changed my mind. Shit I'm an idiot, that was a horrible job.