yoeddynz

I've got some pickling paste that I use on furniture stuff but those welds deserve it/customers don't want grey scale (my welding on thicker stainless is much much neater, also because not round tube... )

My amps are pretty low. My big issue is purely skill and speed. I hover for too long and it gets too hot because I'm just too slow and unco. I know exactly the technique I need to follow and I know exactly the technique that I'm doing - which is wrong So I've tried my best but it's a hand eye co-ordination thing that I just need to keep practising at. I'm fully aware that I might well never be an amazing welder, creating weld porn that I can show off. But ho hum. Hopefully in time I'll improve enough. Oh and I was using 1mm wire btw. Just need to practice In fairness to myself, not a proper excuse but something that I'd change if I could afford it. My old jasic welder ain't that smooth at low amps. This I've had other owners of the same model machine tell me as well. Plus my torch is quite a hefty old thing and a bit awkward to hold when doing tricky bits. If I was to get into doing a load more thin tubing work I'd look to upgrading equipment but at this point in time that's not something my bank balance allows.

And what's cool about it is that you'll in time be able to have injecting it and improving its efficiency. But yeah- just drive it for now. Its summer, you've put some hard effort into getting this far, entertained us all with your brilliant thread as usual so you deserve a break!

Yeah a neat heat shield on each side, mounted on brackets which would be bolted to the exhaust studs is one idea floating in my head. Easily removable because being horizontal they would accumulate dust and oil etc. I'm really only concerned about rising heat up into the cam covers. Not fussed about heat anywhere else because they'll have quite good airflow over them once moving. Luckily my not so 'arty' welds are hidden from view But yeah- I'm happy with the overall look. Bends could be smoother I know but fuck it- they'll get the hot gases hot from the heads. If this engine setup proves to work well without exploding I could always look to getting the headers scanned one day down the line, let someone magical on cad improve the curves and then get the likes of auto bend to try to cnc bend the runners. If they can do such small tubing that is? But for now they should be fine.

Slow progress is progress nonetheless. I have made the sensible decision not to stress out and try to get this engine swap in for oldschool nats. That was a big carrot to aim for but its not realistic now. There are far too many other jobs going on with our landscaping etc plus several family members are coming to stay over the next couple of months and we both want to enjoy some holiday time. I think the main reason though is that I know how stressy its can be trying to rush a project and suddenly the fun has gone and corners start to get cut. If I take my time and work on it when I really want to then it'll be better for it. All that aside- I have still been plugging away on it and today it rained all day so I had no excuse but to stay inside and finish off a long tedious, but satisfying, part of the conversion. The exhaust headers. But before I delve into that part there's some other bits that have happened. I blew the dust off my bank card and bought an spendy shiny part of the project. Yay. I got it while they were still on sale and it can now sit in the store room to collect some dust. Another thing that I had to spend some money on, as mentioned in the last update, was to get this lot balanced.. I made some inquiries about and found an outfit very well recommended by many down in Christchurch way - engine reconditioning services. The owner Evan was very helpful and managed to fit the job in to suit my brothers trip south - saving plenty on postage! I whipped up some sturdy wooden boxes to suit and away they went. A couple of weeks later my brother returned them to me with a properly balanced assembly. They'll stay stashed away safe until I can assemble the crankcase- which really is just waiting on me to give the pistons a clean and make some custom ring compressors similar to the honda items for assembly of the two halves. More on that later. Back to that exhaust thing. I looked at various options for how to go about making some headers with compact enough bends to suit. Kept coming back to getting some bends and piecing them together bit by bit. I decided that with the tighter bends I knew I'd end up with that I would go up one size, 28mm, on the header tube diameter to help keep the flow nice. The maths works in my head so I'll go with it. Really all I need to do is get the hot stuff out of the heads and out the back. Priced up various bends within all the NZ suppliers I could find. Horrendous prices. Did an order through Ali express for a load of stainless bends of which arrived 10 days later - a nice surprise. They'll do fine. Plasma cut some flanges to suit a jig I was going to make - exactly like I did on my Viva V6. Machined a little sleeve so my holesaw would take a tiny drill bit. Then I made lots of holes. The bits that the holes gave up (wooden marshmellows) were pushed onto equal lengths of tig rod which had been welded to the centre of each exhaust outlet area on the flanges. I was then able to bend them to suit and mock up my exhaust header runs. From what I have read it was not strictly needed to try and match the primary lengths on a flat six as there is nothing really to be gained. But it cant hurt to keep them matched so that's what I did. I wanted them tucked up away with no chance they can get smacked on anything and made sure I could get to the oil filter easily. Now I knew what I was going to build I had to copy them with this lot.. I cut the remaining stubs off the old header flanges and tacked in some short bits of stainless tube.. I started to tig them in but the steel on the flanges was really odd and did not tig weld at all nicely. The arc was all over the place. Maybe magnetic? What ever it was it had me stumped. I ended up mig welding them - heaps of weld which I then ground down with a flap disc. Now onto building the runners up. This is the first time I have made any headers from stainless steel and I wasn't going to take any chances with oxygen affecting the back of the welds ('sugaring') so leading to potential weakness or cracking. So I would have to purge the inside of the tubes with argon. I didn't have a suitable purging setup and buying the bits was a bit too spendy for my liking. Instead I rummaged through my box of old brass fittings... dug out an old argon regulator and removed one gauge. Bought some vinyl tube ($7 ...big spender) and cobbled together something.. I needed something to plug the tube ends quickly and easily. I'd seen many people using tinfoil but it looked awkward and leak prone. I made a mold using a bit of tube the next size up, a bit of wood, a bit of copper tube and some grease. Filled it with budget bathroom silicone sealant. out popped some plugs which I shaped to a taper in the lathe with a flap disc. Hey presto- heat resistant tube plugs... Tee'd a line off the main feed to the welder. It worked a treat. I'd set the main regulator on the bottle to flow a bit more and then set the extra reg to flow just enough. I would then set the actual flow rate through the tube using the little brass tap so I could just hear the gas flow through the tube.. I was very happy with the way the welds on the inside of the tubes stayed so smooth and clean. No yucky porous flaky crystalised welds. But there was nothing I could do about the appearance of my welds on the outside. I really can't make any excuses - I'm just not not experienced enough at welding stainless tube. So my welds here I shall call functional. I'm not even going to bother trying to clean them up. All I wanted was decent penetration and strength. My welding did improve over the duration of building these. There were glimmers of neatness... I had to use a foot pedal again- something I had stopped using years ago because its a hassle when building awkward furniture, kitchen framework jobs etc - which is the most common thing I use the DC for. I got used to the pedal again and started spotting where I was going wrong. Mainly my speed and feed technique required was too slow- (the tube I'd bought was 1.2mm - a bit thin perhaps but all I could find in this diameter). I bought a bigger shroud for my gas lens which helped too. So yeah - I'm afraid there will be no welding porn with these headers. I will cunningly take my photos from a distance I got tired early on of trying to hold bits of tube awkwardly in the vise to weld them so I built this little tool.. and bits of wood turned down to locate tubes to bends for mocking purposes.. plus a jig on each side to build towards and make sure the ends align with where I wanted them to head.. things took shape and I enjoyed the process... Finally today I finished the last bits. I will now have to make up a couple of reducers/collectors to suit. They will feed into a V band flange, then a flexy joint on each side, then straight back to a large silencer assembly mounted across the back, pretty much like an early 911 has. For now though I'm just very happy to have some headers built that from a metre away look quite fancy ... They sit nicely on the engine. I'm not sure if I'll use any heat wrap as I have always done in the past - I'm a big fan of it (opens up a pub debate..) I'll have to see how they go. Next thing to look at is finishing the water pipes. I'd also bought some smaller stainless bends for that but now realise I'd not bought enough. Ho hum. Maybe I'll find some under the xmas tree (red and white striped ones)

Still whittling away at this new bbq area. We had stashed away a pile of old power pole hardwood cross bars that were left on the land when we bought it. For the last 8 years they've been hiding behind the water tank waiting for a use. Moved them out and propped them up for a wall. Tried it out for a morning coffee.. Then sunk some treated poles into the ground - again - left on the land. The same stash has been used for the boat shed and all four wood sheds scattered about the property. Bought some timber and along with some douglas fir given to us we started a framework for the deck. Removed all the old screws from some old decking we had down next to the housetruck when it was parked up.. Bought new decking for the longer runs and then it was time to get baked in the sun and use roughly 600 screws. Kevin watched but did not offer a paw to help.. Was the longest day yesterday - nice to day to get the deck down. Next step will be steps. Oh and some handrails to suit.

You are the boss my man.

Wow. Fuck this is cool. I love these sort of build threads and this discussion thread is already super interesting. Man that 2 wagon is cool too! I just looked up the sizes and according to the wiki gods this little car is close to 100mm narrower then my Imp! But longer. So tiny then. Gonna follow your thread with much interest! And yeah - If it were mine I too would be keeping that patina intact and just get the car safe and reliable + lowered on some widened steelies.

Cheers Ben! I showed it to one of our farmer neighbours the other day. I don't think he quite understood the humour and sillyness behind what I've done. So with that reaction I really can't what to see what the various barries will say at car shows/events in the future

Sounds like you are richer than us paupers

Phew! What a day. Started out full of beans but man it was hard work.. I'm sure I've burnt some fat and bulked out a bit. Started off digging in here.. Sun was intense but was getting into it. I changed my outfit.. But the end of the day I was pretty wrecked and my muscles felt pumped!..

Gonna dig this whole bank out and create some sort of nice seating/eating/chilling area. Started this evening... I'll report back soon - with more muscles. And a sore back.

It was meant to be.

Get your vitz/echo motor complete with a mini shell and a spare vitz right here... https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/1450112115513943/?mibextid=dXMIcH

Awesome news. Yay for continuing well written updates. Do you know much about the history of this engine?

Inlet fun over and time to move on to some other jobs. First off was to start on the pipework for the cooling. Like I mentioned a while back the heads are symmetrical and each has a outlet for the hot coolant. So one ends up at the front and one at the back. Here's the back one... Both just visible in this shot... On the bike these were plumbed so they joined up near the middle and went into a thermostat housing and from there to the radiator. But I will be running an electric pump behind the engine so that's where these outlets have to be plumbed towards. I started on the front outlet. I gathered together the bits of pipework from the bike setup.. I chopped them up and using bits and pieces I welded together a pipe for the front. They are very thin- about 1mm so it was a tricky one for my tig skills but I did ok. I'll probably paint them and that'll hide the lumps Pipe went like this... Holes = whoops.. Bracket.. And that was all I could do for now as I had used up what bits of the old bends I could. I have ordered some 22mm bends from Aliexpress and so I wait. Better start sussing out the injection gubbins then. I went into the store room and dug out the box labelled 'electronics' and another full of various sensors I'd been collecting. Blew the dust off them and sort of like xmas day I carefully removed all the goodies within. Laid them out on the work table and this is what I had... The brains of it all is a second hand Megasquirt 3 with the expansion board. Apart from the faster processor, SD card slot, loads more ins and outs, canbus etc etc it also allows for fully sequential injection. I'll need to change some of the jumper wiring because its setup for a stepper idle valve and a hall sensor on the crank but otherwise its all good. I have a few VR and hall sensors to try out.. Temp sensors ... First thing was to plug in my megastim and power it up then test the ecu out. Its all working fine. Its been ages since I have used tunerstudio. Not used it since I sold my Viva. Now time to start on setting up sensors to suit. Starting with the crank sensor. The Goldwing came fitted with a 12-1 trigger wheel and two VR sensors (called pulse generators in bike world) to run the ignition module... I could have just kept the trigger wheel as is but for better resolution on a full engine management setup it makes sense to go for at least a 36-1 trigger wheel. I knew there would be nothing available even close to fitting my needs so I made one in much the same way as I did for the Viva. I cut out a disc with the plasma cutter.. Cleaned it up in the lathe and drilled/machined out the bore, ensuring it was perfectly concentric to the bore. The VR sensor needs to have no more than about .020" clearance. Made a jig for the drill and using the original trigger wheel I was able to mark out the teeth. I set the jig up with a locator bolt so I was able to turn the wheel one tooth at a time and drill it and then repeat... Then I carefully cut out up to the holes, gave it a tickle with a file and I had my trigger wheel. I have yet to remove the 'missing tooth' or tig in a nib in the centre that keys to the crankshaft. I'll sort that later. Now I had to sort out my second sensor wheel, for the cam or 'home' signal. This will be a single tooth or maybe a half moon. I'm not sure and have yet to work out what's best. The MS manual suggests a half moon type (like one long tooth). Other OEM setups just have a single small tooth. Either way I need a sensor to be mounted near one of the cam pulleys. What seems to be recommended as the better option for the home signal is a hall sensor due to the fact that the camshaft spins at half the speed of the crank and when the engine is being turned over at startup it could potentially be quite a low speed. So low that a VR sensor might not be able to produce enough of a pulse for the ECU. I had played around with a couple of VR sensors out of interest to see if they might fit in place but everything I had was too bulky or the wrong shape to fit under the cambelt cover... Anyway- they were VR sensors and not what I wanted. I looked about on googleworld and found a couple of hall sensors that looked like they might work. Another trip to my local wreckers was called for. I rummaged about in various engine bays and found what I was after in a 2003 Peugeot 307. It was ideal! I grabbed the plug with a length of wire attached. Once home I whipped up a bracket from some thick walled alloy angle, a hacksaw and file and had the sensor fitting where I wanted it. Once I have decided what type of toothed wheel shape to make I'll be sorting that out. After all this I stripped the whole engine down and removed the crank... The next day Hannah and I took the imp for a hoon and visited the big smoke, Nelson city, to do some shopping. I'm now sussing out where to get my crankshaft balanced up - without a doubt this is one job that has to be done. Imp looked great against the blue sky along the promenade in Nelson ...

It might even get an xjs heart while it's there...

I'm gutted for you but understand your feelings as some cars just do this to us. Best move on, put those efforts into the Marina (which as tatty as it is must be like a breath of fresh air with its simplistic design and layout compared to the rover) It's always a shame for us because we all enjoy reading your well written and documented threads. I too hope that whoever buys lucas realises and appreciates the amount of effort you've put into it.

- 11 years later - Wow Vinny the Hiace van is still going strong and used often. We'd be stuffed without this van as it does everything the cars do and soooo much more. Its taken us on many many camping trips, winter ones kept warm with that fireplace. Hauled all manner of trailers and loads. Shifted loads of timber for all the various builds that have taken place here- I'm amazed how well the cheap old roof rack has lasted. The low range option on the box really does help for some decent enough 4wding fun too. More recently it was visited by @Horse25 lovely 60 series camper with pop top roof... But it was getting a bit frilly around the edges and that green paint was showing its age. A mini rolling restoration was on the cards. Then another van came along. We bought a 100 series 2.8 high lwb 4wd - cheap because it had stuffed front pulley and broken bolt in the crank. Lovely van with a really great condition body and it had only just had its injector pump reconditioned. Lined some vans up (my mates similar 100 series that was in for work) Put the new van on the hoist.. Broken crank pulley bolt.. Machined up a quick jig so I could drill it out straight and not stuff any threads. Win... I machined out the stuffed pulley and machined a stepped shim to suit the flogged crank nose. It all bolted together with a brand new bolt from Toyota and worked fine. Much relief !! I also machined up some bushes for the drivers door which had comical levels of drop. I guess 600,000 kms will do that. The van was then cleaned it up, painted a few patches and it came up pretty sweet... We used it for a while. The 2.8 was a gem- it ran so smooth and has a good deal more ompfff than vinnys old 2.4. Hmmmm- which van should we keep. This new one was quite refined and much quieter. Almost felt modern! But we love our rattly old vinny, its classic looks, the fact its now a pretty rare van being an early high/low range 4wd model. Plus it's alot more nimble and handy offroad then the later one. Due to that extra long wheel base the new one cant even do a U turn on our road. So we started stripping down Vinny in preparation for a light restoration - the main priority being the rust removal. In pics. Rust be found,cut out and replaced with nice new steel.. funky old sticker.. We popped the new van (Vicky - since you ask) up for sale on trademe for $7500 and got a heap of interest. The mileage put most off but the exceptional bodywork was a drawcard. Its sold promptly and we were now stuck with no van - vinny still getting worked on. Big holes appeared and disappeared.. Hannah had fun remove several layers of paint and some impressive levels of filler hiding a few dents.. more rust cut out... Painting the bare steel in Durapox 2 pack primer as we went... We also had this old 60series darling come in for some serious rust work and it gave us an idea for a paint colour... Vinny moved outside for filling and sanding... Before top coats went on Hannah removed the headlining and foam by using her head... Then masking and top coats - no expense spared- we used the finest oil based enamel from Mitre10 First off a darkish grey, called Gothic Romance, chosen for its ability, we hope, to not show up too much of the dusty roads we have about here. Then it was orange. 'Pumpkin head' to be precise. Chosen because it matches a bicycle I had built last year which I really like plus after seeing the other van. Felt like a time for change from green. This is definitely a change... With bike.. We had scored this rare badge off a similar aged 50 series hiace from the wreckers ages ago and had been waiting until after the inevitable restoration to be able to treat ourselves and 'affix that badge' Its the little things in life. Looks perfect.. But its needed a partner and I had a badge in mind - found on 80's landcruisers of the same era with the same font as our hiace badges. I jumped on Aliexpress and this treat arrived in the mail in a record 7 days later! That's about it for the outside. I'll get some more pics of it now its built up. We will be breaking up the mass of orange on the tailgate with some grey and adding a white pin strip along the side but no urgency. Its back into service, fresh wof pass from a very impressed wof tester. The interior is next. We've already been to spotlight looking at various cloths and materials for the headlining. Mechanically we are after a 3L (2.8L) or 5L (3.0) engine to replace our 2l (2.4)* so we'll keep a look out. But in the meantime this old van will just keep trundling along... *Toyota really failed when it came to naming this series of engines with any sense of logic.

But imagine the kudos from Wayne and troy at the next rodders meet.

It's all good and that however I can't help but think that your open trumpets need some assistance and style...

Neat! What a cool combo. Engines and parts are so cheap in the states too. This bit... "Power is sent to the rear wheels through a five-speed sequential transmission reportedly sourced from a Honda Gold Wing" That would be the stock transmission then (saved them about 9,765,653 hours of work)

I'll have to do a road trip south and visit you then (and your cats)