jackeo21

It's less sad now Screen in today and did a nice coat on the floor to seal things up. Carpet acquired too. Full set of new seatbelts on the way Determined and doing what it takes to get to Beach Hop come Novembers' end! oh and see you at drag day (if I don't break it!) Overall stoked with the progress and proud of what I have managed to achieve. Dad spent his youth mucking around with this series of Holdens and as a nineteen year old, hearing the many tales of different shenanigans that happened back in the day involving these things only makes me more determined to get it going. Old times seemed so much cooler. Next up is for me to install carpet, finish up dash install and fix wiring. Then a few suspension bushes, tie rod ends, test drive, wof. mint.

Work around the top panel is nearing completion, having painted my dash today. I also cleaned up the floors, and fully coated them in an epoxy etch primer to save them for years to come. I've sorted a driveshaft to get me moving, so now I need some inner guards to complete the car. Hooked up the heater, transmission hoses and a few other little things, it starts and runs nicely now. After I run a tank through it, it should really sharpen up as it has the odd miss from bad fuel. Pushing hard for Beach Hop and Drag Day in the coming months. My goal has been to get a warrant before Octobers end so I'm sticking to that, I think it's possible.

I've been working away at this determined to have it done before November. It'll be a stretch but to see that fresh wof sticker land on my windscreen will be a bloody good feeling. I repaired a small section of corrosion damage to my front nose panel (surprisingly good nic overall) and gave it a rough and ready base/clear paint-up, I'm not fussed getting an average finish because the whole thing will get a birthday next year anyway. I threw it back together and sat it on the car, now it awaits my inner guards to come back from blasting, and for me to finish working on the top panel, so it can be reunited with the front guards and bonnet. I've also re-co'd some bits to go back in once my floor is painted and the interior can go back in. I purchased a new ignition and keys because the old one was so worn it didn't actually need a key to turn so while it was apart I painted the column and cleaned my gauges. Next up, i'll be working on installing front suspension bushes, trans filter kit, and doing some mechanical maintenance to bring it up to daily driver standard. The points need doing, and I'll probably do the cap and rotor while I'm at it. Runs o.k, but with the worn points and sub-par gas it misses and coughs and all that carry on. Also swapped out the manual pedals for the larger auto brake pedal. The car was half manual converted (roughly too) so it's headed back to auto and will probably stay that way. Fitted up the 14x8 wheels to the rear. Unfortunately the rears don't take hubcaps but the fronts do, so it'll have a bit of an oldschool drag look to it. I'd also like another inch out of the ride height.

Cheers @Kiwibirdman for sorting me out with some wide steelies. These will be perfect for my wagon. Getting a balance tomorrow and that's the wheels sorted! Mint. He also sorted me out with a new 3 core V8 rad for next years motor swapping endeavor.

Was assessing the job today and decided to leave it for another time. Seems to be a bit involved but I should really do it, the fuel pump bowl is some orange/yellow colour

It'll be ready, this is just extra motivation!

discuss large golden vehicle just keeping it pretty much stock, probably with more low maybe this look? although I love this, pic taken from os somewhere ^

First things first, was to strip the horrid interior, and remove the front end to see what I was facing. It's been off the road since '03, where it appears someone had begun a teardown of the front suspension for a rebuild, but instead gave up, lost some important nuts, and roughly bolted it back together. Front steering joints had been unbolted, which made transporting it a mission. However this problem is fixed, and it only needs some new bushes/brake bleed to be operational. I sourced a brown ute bench seat (ute's have headrests and sedans/wags don't). Much harder to do than I had anticipated! But it's improved it 100%. I also found a premier wood dash facia, and a nice black dashpad that needs some straightening. I took the column apart and have restored all that, ready for reinstallation once my interior is black. Should give a much nicer feeling once I get it back together than mouldy, faded and split brown! Next up, I installed a 202/trimatic that came from an HZ ute. Runs nicely, and didn't take long at all to swap in as most of the engine mount bolts had been lost. The car didn't come with a driveshaft but I've managed to find one which is great. I took a look at my rad support panel to find that rust had gotten the better of the lower section, as they so commonly do with these. A replacement rare spares panel and a few hours later and it's as new. Spent today chopping away at the body, but also got keen to tackle the exhaust and get that setup. @MACKAZ did me a deal on a 2 barrel inlet/headers which is awesome, for now the 2 barrel setup will wait for the future but I thought to fit the headers as a start. However I didn't consider that these (probably commodore) headers may have fitment issues and found that they hit the firewall when I tried bolting them on. Some cutting and welding later and they fit and the exhaust is done. Fuel tank is full of 17 years of water/varnish mix and to be honest I'm not sure the engine enjoys running on it but nonetheless goes. Need to pull tank and drain, the lovely folk at holden didn't install a drain bung for me. The car as it sits. These come apart so easy, it's super good. Painted my steering wheel up and came out better than I thought. Hopefully it doesn't wear too bad.

Sold my GX toyotas and acquired this gold HQ kingswood, tastefully equipped with a 202/traumatic. Reg on hold was the main selling point, plus I decided it looked reasonably solid during a hastily organised nighttime inspection. Got it home and dug straight into it! First to go were the VC commodore plush front seats, I've never sat in something so comfortable in my life but they're definitely not staying. After looking it over a while, I've found a few areas that need reconstruction but overall it's pretty solid for what these are. Standard bog spots around the place but overall a great base and something I can have on the road reasonably soon. For the next year or so I'll be keeping with the 6 cylinder powerplant, however next year I'd like to go for a V8. I have a few ideas but not letting them get the better of me at this stage, hoping to have this down to beach hop in November/OS drag day in December. Plan is simply get wof, tidy paint, wide steelies (or period mags potentially), and a few other mandatory wag bits and it'll handle daily duties as work's close/why not. cheers Gross under the bonnet. Inner guards are at the blasters, and this motor has been swapped out in favour of a good runner. The interior, with a hacked dash and VC seats before I stripped it.

Still have this, had just been sitting idle for the last 2 years whilst other projects got all of the attention. Recently put my ass into gear and made something happen. Yup! It's all painted up and has come out amazing. Decided to keep the roof body colored as the paint turned out so nice. The little 850 has been running nice and strong. Next I need to finish installing my new brakes and bleed them up so I can safely move the car around. Assembly time now and then hopefully within a month or two she'll be out on the roads. Been a long process and definitley something to learn from, leaving projects sitting for so long gets to be a drain and motivation gets lost, but seeing paint laid onto this has inspired me to get it done and on the road for summer. It'll be damn near a brand new car when its done so I'd love to pull through and make it happen.

Like many I've taken some time during lockdown to sort out some work on the old girl. Got pretty tired of looking at the old rear bumper in its sad state, with holes dents etc all through it really ruined the car. Thankfully the sedan I parted out opened up the opportunity for me to modify a straight (sedan) rear bumper to suit my wagon bumper as they are NLA. So after some mixing and matching of bumper mounts and the careful hacking apart of the sedan bumper I ended up with a fairly reasonable looking bum. Tailgate is next on my list for a re-bog, just need it to last until I can really hack it apart and re-fabricate large amounts of it (it's very bad). Took the oppurtunity to tidy up my exhaust tip, too. It's a nice quiet car with no drone etc which is cool. But I'd like it more aggressive for the new motor. Also fitted factory grande head unit. It struggles to work so I've just wired my lights to work and I'll relocate my BT headunit under the seat for max functionality.

Completely forgot that I didn't update since before drag day. The morning of drag day I went right past the dragstrip and ended up in Hamilton, where a 2JZ-GE engine found its way onto the trailer I happened to be towing. It's been sitting around since I picked it up in December but this mornings purchase prompted me to get into it. These came up and I had to have them. They're a set of 6 40mm Individual Throttle Bodies to suit the 4A-GE engines, that have been adapted to a modified 2JZ inlet. It utilizes the standard fuel rail and injector setup, with a piggy-back ECU for fine tuning. Overall a pretty neat little setup. Hard to find stuff like this for the 2JZ as 95% of aftermarket is to suit the turbo engines. It'll prove to be a good learning experience with wiring and all that stuff, but I look forward to the challenge. Spy the 1G-E extractors Only on there for a mock up. I'll be on the lookout for the 1JZ stock tubular exhaust manifold to modify. I'll also need to find a turbo valve cover etc. This far, for my engine I still need: Alternator P/S pump Flywheel, clutch etc ECU Mechanical Fan (or do I go electric?) Overall it'll certainly give the wagon that extra bit of "unique" I've been looking for.

I've already got someone after them but if that falls through you're first in line. When my engine lifter comes back I'll be putting the JZ on a stand and getting into it. It's high kms but I'll be avoiding a rebuild and just doing your normal service items. Hoping the swap isn't super complicated haha. Seems it's just engine mounts and wiring.

Parting it was my last resort, I was hoping to sell it as a rolling body but with space and time constraints I couldn't get a buyer. Thankfully I'm able to use a majority of the parts. Cheers!

I did a thing. Well, quite a few things, actually. I jumped at the opportunity to buy an '84 Cressida up in Whangarei. The car had quite a bit of rust and was in fairly rough shape. However, it had a full manual conversion and 1G-GE, so I had to have it! A deal was done and I drove the wagon up to have a look at what I'd bought. Leaving it at a mates place in Whangarei I later had it transported down to my place in Auckland where it has now unfortunately met its demise. Thankfully, I've now got plenty of spares for my wagon and also for my X61 sedan project, so it's sacrificed itself to save two others. The 1G-GE heart has gone off to a fellow X60 wag owner so it can get out on the road. Anyway, ripped into the wagon Saturday morning. Old foot handbrake out (which involved removing a bunch of interior), new pull type handbrake in, auto out, fresh flywheel and clutch in followed by the W55 and driveshaft and we're back on the road. Night and day difference over the auto, that's for sure! It now has reasonable power, can get up hills etc without much struggle. So good. Also found that painting the brown interior parts with automotive 2K basecoat works a charm. It's all I had and it worked perfectly. I just need to find a nice blue leather shift boot to finish the console off nicely. Aside from the manual conversion the car has remained much the same since the last update. A few shock/spring changes is about all. Next up is to get the 2JZ on an engine stand so I can give it a good service and detail/prep to go in. - Also, ran a whole lot of 20 second runs at OS Drag Day last year. Hopefully I can chop that right down with JZ power. The car has come so far in the 10 odd months I've owned it. Excited to modify it more in coming months. Good fun!