WhangareiKE70

Thanks for that, turns out I had joined that last one already, but the other 2 should be helpful.

Nah, just the Northland one, let me know what the good ones are and I will join up.

Not even off page 1! Another lockdown project I had was to make the spare mount. Very little outlay needed, I had the materials, and something that needed to be done eventually, so lockdown was the perfect time to attack this. I have 33x12.5r15s on here at this stage, and that is likely to stay the case, but I made it with enough clearance for a 35x13.5r15 wheel and tyre as that is the biggest size I would ever consider putting on this. This also leaves me with a decent amount of rear vision which is nice. Will put some insertion rubber between the bottom of it and the tray, it's spaced off the tray a little bit (exactly 1x SS nut and 2x pcs of insertion rubber worth) to make sure it doesn't sit in water. Also put my canvas trash bag/spare cover on which you can sorta see in the last photo, but not properly, because once again I forgot to get a proper photo. Need to actually get a spare still too, the drivers front is currently on an axle stand just so I could make sure all my measurements had worked out haha. Have also done some more work on the front bar, so that's almost ready to go away with the sliders, side bars, and roof cage for blasting. But I will save that for another update once it's all finished and I have the photos. Please feel free to come on over to the discussion thread and let me know that I am a crazy person.

There is a pair on TM atm for 3k that I just found, so 5k is a stretch. Not that I have the 3k at this point either. I was hoping they might come back with like $1.5/2k and I would scrape the money together, but no such luck.

@ThePog Wreckers in Whangarei has a GU they just got in stock, I asked how much for F&R diffs, they said $5k Is that anything close to what you paid for yours? Or are they just being ripoff artists?

One foot in front of the other and all that. I am going to make a to-do/shopping list in here at some point soon, and then others can point out all the shit I have forgotten. Main expenses I can think of now are ECU, gauges, injectors, fuel system, paint, and potentially GU axles to get the bigger brakes (depending on brake test). So if anyone has hookups or suggestions for any of these parts, let me know.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha But seriously, ready for Nats 2022, right guys?

Page 7 thread dredge... What has been done to this? Mostly, not much. I bought a house, rewired the shed, built a 16m long retaining wall, redid (full gut and reframe/line etc) the kitchen, redid the laundry, lots of landscaping, etc. Still a lot to do on the house, but through the bulk of the urgent stuff. So safe to say my spare time has been spent elsewhere. BUT! Lockdown 2.0 happened, and between sleeping in every day (how good) and just generally trying to give myself a bit of a break, I managed to (mostly) fully organise and clean up the shed, including the Datsun. I have had reason to look at reducing my stress load recently via a trip to the ol' doctorino, and I realised of all my projects, of which there are many, the Datsun is one of the few were I actually enjoy the process as well as the result. So I thought, screw it, I am going to start working on the Datsun again, even though it is by no means the most urgent project on the list. Just letting you know that I am missing some photos, as I got into a bit of a groove and just kept going, forgetting to take photos. So yeah, I cleaned and tidied the shed (as seen in the shed thread): Luckily I had had intended on doing this for quite a while/started and not finished many times, so had a good stock of brackets, hooks, rolling boxes etc. So I ordered some parts from some fantastic suppliers that were shipping in Level 4 (shoutout to Sticky Flanges in particular, very helpful), and got started on my exhaust system. Everything is tacked together atm as this was my first time ever actually firing up my TIG, and I have zero skill to put all of this together properly. Already had a 3" stainless cat (required for scratchbuilt cert/keep the planet happy), the Adrenalin R hotdog muffler, exhaust rubbers and some CNC cut stainless brackets for the mounts. Got a few metres of tube and some bends, plus a tractor flap: Aaaaaand, I completely forget to get any photos of the (semi) finished product. It comes up behind/beside the cab, just in front of the headboard, snakes down and under the cab and points forward to the dump pipe. I need some stainless v-bands and a couple more 45" bends to finish it up. Looks pretty cool IMO. Will have more photos up soon now I realise what photos I am missing haha. So that's exhaust sorted until I can afford more bits, thought I should do some intake while I was on the stainless train. Wanted a 4"' stainless snorkel, but nobody sells an off-the-shelf 4"staino snorkel for a RB swapped/Safari chassis swapped Datsun 720. Rude. So got a 4" snorkel kit, mocked it up: Good masking tape and packs of sanding disks that happen to be nearby make fit up a breeze haha. Only had to slightly trim the one 45" piece before it went up the pillar to get the angle right, pretty simple, masking tape in place, mark it, chop saw, clean up on belt sander and Bob is your father's brother. Big advantage to the boxey shape of the 720. There is a custom airbox inside the engine bay that it is pointing at, but that can be a future update as I forgot to get photos, but also I still need to replace the piece of inner guard I hacked out to make it fit. Anyway, made some brackets with some dimple dies, and just tek screwed it in place for now, will be riveted. Tack it together and voila: As you may have noticed, the roof rack/cage and front bumper have come off, there was a bit of downtime between the exhaust and the snorkel kit turning up. Essentially, one of the big next parts is to get the body blasted and primed, but a big part of that is to get as much of the major sheetmetal work finished as possible. If there is a few minor things, I don't mind doing them and spot priming, but I'd like to get the body sealed up mostly soonish. But part of that process is taking apart all the bar work to allow the body to come back off, so I may as well finish all of that up while I'm at it. Firstly, I took off the roof tray and side bars, finish welded all the bits that I couldn't get to in place, and flapped them back to a rough shape. (I will be going over all of the bar works welds/joins with the sander before it goes off to blasting) Then looked at mounting the winch into the bar. It's slightly offset but should be ok. If not I will just have to reweld the fairlead mount further across, then cover it with the number plate to keep me sane haha. It's just sitting in there for the moment, drilling holes and bolting it in is on the list for this weeks jobs, along with taking some meat out of the mounting plate, not too much as I used thicj steel to make it nice and strong, but it doesn't all need to be there, it's quite heavy haha. Also fully welded all the bits I couldn't get to while it was on the vehicle, and then flapped back the welds, other side pieces will go in shortly. Changed the side flare design too, a bit simpler and hopefully it works well. More to come soon hopefully as work is ongoing, I just need to remember to take photos. I am coming up to some parts that I know are beyond me (moreso than normal) when it comes to the actual mechanical side of things, hopefully I can con my old man into giving me a hand and get it done.

We having a meeting this month? Maybe on Wed 25/8? I am super busy outside of work atm so just trying to give myself warning a.k.a. less excuse to not turn up haha @bigfoot @rb drifter @MACKAZ @gibbon @ESKIN8R @ruff kunt automotive @cypressphil

That looks like a really good time, but would be pretty shit of me to not turn up to my own birthday party on the 7th. By coincidence though I may be in Palmy in 2022 on that weekend, so that could work haha

Didn't really know where to post, thought this was as good a place as any. I am in Wellywood from 31/7 to 10/8, I have birthday parties on both of the Saturdays but generally just taking a break from work and having a holiday. Is there any events or OS related happenings while I am down? No major if not, but just looking for things to do and would be keen to come along to anything that's happening.

I won't be able to make this one unfortunately, one of those not enough hours in the day or dollars in the bank tricks. Yáll enjoy yourselves.

I remembered! Haha Didn't remember to have money though so no warrant on L200. So will be in me normal car. Will likely be there slightly early as by the time I finish work/do gym things there won't be much point in heading home in between.

I'm keen, but damn if I won't completely forget about this. Got so much happening atm my brain is slightly fried. I will do my best to remember but if someone wants to throw up a cheeky reminder on the day that would be sweet, and very much appreciated.

Perfect, that makes sense to me. Happy days. I shall continue on my merry bogan way, flapper and all.

@cletus so for something like this, where the bottom unshielded part is un-contactable, but the top section is exposed, is that acceptable? Obviously with a stack style exhaust there will be a section which is exposed, but is it about limiting that?

That's the WOF requirements yeah? Are there any cert (specifically scratchbuilt) rules around this? Or is it one of those "talk to the certifier, each one has their own thresholds to be met for safe" type of dealios?

Interested in adding a truck stack style exhaust to my Datsun 4wd project, because I'm a bogan essentially (also for practical/aesthetic reasons, but who cares about them). Where do I find rules/guidelines on heat shielding and safety etc? It will be exiting 150mm + behind the rearmost window (I will double check that measurement but that's what I have in my head), have a Cat (because scratchbuilt) and be muffled enough to be legal. Just need to know about the safety aspects I am likely to be pulled up on. TIA

There has been a bit of progress on this, but not a whole lot tbh. The blasting mentioned in the last post as the guy from work who was going to do it took about 6 months off on ACC. He's back now though so I might go have a chat with him today and see what's doable for him. I have purchased some bits, but mostly all my time and money have been tied up in buying and now renovating my first home! The major plus side of which is I now have my own shed, and this got moved from my parents place to there about a month or so back. PFT that reminded me to do this, from 2012 when it was still on the road, transporting my mates trebuchet haha

Seems like this could be the go, as it is something I can source locally, and will be an upgrade at least, even if it is a bit more work in the short term.

Jesus, $20USD plus $27USD for shipping of that tiny bushing, but it's probably my best bet. Unless there is somewhere local that might have them? Any ideas? Other than being a tight arse, my other reservation is international shipping time, and (now I bothered to figure out what it is) I want to get this fixed ASAP, as it's raining a fair bit at the moment.

Done a few things to this, but naturally forgot to take photos of the good stuff. But installed a JVC bluetooth headunit I had out of my old van, and a dual USB charging point in place of the cigarette lighter, as well as some Pioneer components in the doors. Also ran an RCA/signal wire for a future slim sub while I was there because why not. And spent a lot of time generally tidying the mess of wires behind the dash. But now I need some help, the other day (now a few weeks back, but the "other day" makes me sound less useless), the wipers stopped going half way up the windscreen. The motor was still going, so I popped it off and the arm had popped off the ball joint/socket thing, and it looks like the culprit is the plastic bush that has deteriorated. I have talked to Mitsubishi and you can't get them any more, does anyone have any suggestions to fix this?

Sounds like a plan, will give me a good reason to pull finger and get the dash back in the L200, not that I haven't been driving it around anyway haha

Just did the maths, and I picked up a slightly generous quarter cube of builders mix with this the other day, and it tipped that well enough, so I would say its capacity is about half a tonne. Just writing it down for my own reference.

Sweet, it's first on my to-do list when I get home from work today, so I will let you know. All going well I will get lucky and just tighten something and it will go again? Unlikely.