piazzanoob's Isuzu piazza

[piazzanoob]

Hey guys ive got myself a Isuzu piazza as a project car
specs: 1984 2 litre G200z SOHC Engine fuel injected 
everything standard 
pics of when i got it:
 

 
 
 

 * old owner painted the two rear alloy wheels and rocker cover silver why? stupid idea
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
bought it in may 2012 with no wof or rego with the intention of a quick 6 month fix up/tidy up job for a wof 
but nooo 
done a hanger bearing in it for wof had to cut it etc for it to fit
then found out both front and rear windscreens leak and broken window plastic holder so window wouldnt stay up 
so then i took it to a mates and washed all the oil from under car and engine bay and ended up putting it in their storage shed 
where it still remains 
then i figured as windows need to come out and different coloured gaurd cos old one had rust and dent i should paint it and after mucking around for 6 months getting quotes etc i decided to do it myself to do a proper job as it had some rust that needed to be treated in some places.
 

[piazzanoob]

some pics of before car being stripped for paint: *white piazza is a mates one*

 

[piazzanoob]

my car all road worthy 

 

[piazzanoob]

Thought i would update this project thread abit. 

is about 18 months ago now that it got painted on the road etc 

At that time i was still currently in high school with no job but had holiday jobs etc so i pissed around getting quotes etc and ended up with 5 grand and 6 grand quote figures and was way out of my budget and then i thought why not just do it myself with some assistant from a painter/panelbeater who had done his trade 50 odd years ago 

 

so it started with just a basic respray but quickly got out of hand

At this point it seem like we had been sanding for years as we had been using wet and dry the whole time

but once i had done a full strip down except the bonnet it appeared it had some minor rust in different

places than my mates one so we did a few rust repairs on the roof the doors on the bottoms behind the blackplastic covers etc

unfortunately i didnt get any photos while it was in primer but on arrival after work i found it was

painted cheers to my old man in a big workshop with wet floors roller doors up with big extractor fan

by roller door etc we ended up getting a mint finish when applying the paint but when it came to

applying the clear coat my old man hadn't sprayed clear in 20 odd years we had ended up with the wrong

lighting while applying and lack of experience it ended with sand and dust in the clear and runs in the

clear.but i was amazed at the final product and others said aswell of the job done in a dirty old high

stud workshop off the gun finish.

then went and got my dashed recovered and painted because it was cracked and falling to pieces

cheers to dashboard restorations out west for the mint job

after about 3 or 4 months of assembly it ended up like this

with a clean sheet wof also!

[piazzanoob]

I thought i better stop being a slacker and update this thread

It was only feb last year that i did some major work on it 

It needed the headgasket replaced as it was using and leaking coolent and general tidy up in the engine bay  

i had been putting back doing the head gasket for long enough as work etc

untill my boss told me to take some time off as i had a few holiday days owing

so why not do my headgasket right? 

then my boss offered for me to chuck it on the hoist and do it 

so deal was done 

basic headgasket to do and a week to do it easy job right

nah bro!

 

 

started off with just removing the head etc

then thought why dont i do the noisy gearbox and leaking steering rack and rack bushes while im at it 

so i did that too 

then i had a closer look at the block and thought ahh it needs a good lick of paint but do i really need to do it 

fuck it lets make this a big job 

 

 

 

 

 

Things quickly escalated to a big job but owell 

also for some odd reason from factory the left hand engine mount bracket is white and the right hand one is black so i gave both a new lick of white paint 

also gave the block a lick of VHT black 

and sanded down all the other brackets and pulleys etc and painted them while i was at it 

now that was quite a long process in itself.

 

 

[piazzanoob]

Now to the cylinder head saga 

I sent my cylinder head to our local guy we use for a valve grind,plain and clean all sweet

get a phone call later on and he tells me it needs a couple of exhaust valves as there burnt 

sweet get some 

calls later on 

i cant souce any mate what? have you tried STA parts? yup they got none dam

So i gave STA parts a ring to just confirm this and nah we got some just need to get them off our supplier Okaaaay

so i gave my engine guy a ring and told him what i had just been told and all that come out of his mouth was F*ck

this F*ck that little young C*nt from there 

so now i know not to let the young fellow there serve me (although i think hes left now)

so next morning the two valve's turn up 

and wtf there not exhaust valves there inlet 

so i ring them up and get them to send me exhaust valves

now ive recived the right valves and its friday the day its meant to be 

out of the workshop and done 

the block still out 

all the bits are off it still 

no gearbox or radiator in

and the cylinder head is still at the shop and not finished 

oops

so that day i finish off cleaning and painting parts on the block 

and receive the cylinder head back all done.

 

 

 

so theres as far as i got on D day 

 

[piazzanoob]

So now it was week two

And

back at work

And that continued for quite awhile

then i collected the cylinder head

and fitted that on one of my days off while still trying to tidy/paint other bits up.

ONE MONTH LATER.....

I then looked at the intake system on it

And while painting and tidying everything else up on the engine side of things

it would make the whole thing look bad if i just put it back on. 

[piazzanoob]

So i then looked at my options to what to do with it.

paint it?

blast it?

polish it?

get it done in vht?

well so i decided to get it bead blasted.

now what next

i needed a paint that would stick to cast Aluminum.

i thought about vht clear but wanted something that would last the heat and time.

so i fucked around and talked to a few people.

 I then ended up going round to a friends place where he painted all his engines in a caprithane paint.

he then offered to do mine free of charge but he would do it when he got time.

A week went by

so i popped round and spend a few hours masking all the bits up.

few weeks later.... 

 

I popped round to check for progress

He had brazied up a small piece on the water pipe that had a pin hole

 

 

 

And........

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Applied a primer coat on the intake pieces   

 

 

Mayte check out those masking skills

 

then a couple weeks after that he rung me and told me he had applied the final coat of paint and it was ready for collection.

but

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had to spend many hours spinning yarns before leaving with the finshed products.

 

 

 

 

 

[piazzanoob]

had some trouble uploading the photos the other night due to file sizes too big 

but algood now after reducing them online

 

 

 

photos don't really show how great they came out

they have a great sparkle in the right light

and best of all they were just painted in a dirty ol container with a cheap spraygun.

and you would never of guessed.

[piazzanoob]

well they did make it onto the car...

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[piazzanoob]

well 

ive had this car sitting around since september last year as went overseas etc

took it in for a wof in december and upon inspection we found rust in the L/R chassis rail and tyres worn as i haven't replaced them since owning the car 

so algood with knowing that and still no wof i took it home for it to be repaired.

month goes by so i pull the rear bumper off

and have a look to find it will need a patch welded in 

so one long weekend comes and goes then the next i figured i should fix the thing.

so in the shed it goes

 

 

 

 

 

 

[piazzanoob]

so here's the proof of the rust

Then as it turns out the R/H side also has some rust there

 

so now two patches are required

so in order for us to cut the old steel out the fuel tank needed to be removed

which turned out easier than expected

then the old rusty steel had to be cut out

so this was the L/H side

 

then R/H sides turn 

which ended up in this 

And R/H side

I then sprayed some rust converter in the chassis rails to slow down the process of other rust coming through

so made up a patch for each side using some thicker panel steel and originally made from

 

i also applied some paint to the inside of the patch panel to pervent that from starting rust also

i then cleaned up the edges for the panel to weld in nicely

and my old man got his safety gear ready to weld the patches in as i haven't done enough welding to be good enough yet.

 

so with the welding getting done a whole lot of smoking also was created

 

I now suppose you want to see the patches welded in right?

well here we go

so with that being done we both called it a night.

the next day i set about tidying up the patch/welds to make it look less obvious

 

 

i then mixed up some body filler to tidy the job a bit more as you would notice the patch with just some paint on it

i then applied some coats of POR15 over the patches to cover them and pervent rust coming back 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[piazzanoob]

i then mixed up some body filler to tidy the job a bit more as you would notice the patch with just some paint on it

i then applied some coats of POR15 over the patches to cover them and pervent rust coming back 

 

in the end the patches turn out okay 

wasnt 100% happy but that couldnt be helped as the replacement patches ended up being high than all the other steel around it 

and i also had some holes still there from where the welder burnt through so had to fill those

but not to worry as you only see that corner if you take your time with a light and take a look.

as i never knew in the first place it had rust there until the wof inspector took a close look in there but he had only noticed the rust on the L/H side and said he couldn't

see any on the right. 

[piazzanoob]

Right

with the rust patches all done the next step was to put the fuel tank back in

Easy job right!

Well heres where the next job started 

opon removing one of the fuel hoses off the tank fitting the fitting come off

the reason this had happend is that the tank had a dent on the bottom which had pushed the fuel pickup tube so it wasnt left with much strength to hold it in place.

A few hits with the handle of a hammer sorted most of the tank dent issue 

so now i needed a way to fix it

welding wasn't really an idea we wanted to do as fuel vapors etc  

so we went with the idea of a fuel sealant and some pop rivets to hold it down 

 

with that done 

i figured with the tank having some surface rust in places i should give it a lick of paint

 

gave it the hand sand treatment as it didnt need much sanding

one coat done

Number two coat

 

Also got my fan setup going on in the background which is a blower pump for a bouncy castle etc

blows hard for what it is

ended up coating the tank in POR 15

found it a great product as only used a brush to apply and when it dried the brush marks didn't come through only in a few places it did where i didn't do a great job with the brush

just don't get the shit on your hands took me about 7 days to get it all off

And that's when the tank went in

also gave the tank straps a coat also along with cleaning all of the breather box and hoses

then bumper went on afterwards 

 

 

[piazzanoob]

So with the rust and the Assembly done the next job would be a wof right?

nah mate 

drove it a few times to work and back with no wof etc

Then decided i would do a thing that i had needing to do on it for awhile

which is a good wax and general tidy up of the paint

so i spent one night did that

 

then another night i went through and buffed all the windows of most of its water spotting etc.

 

And then shit hit the fan....

it started miss firing on take offs 

knew it was the dizzy cap as i had never replaced it and have clean it up a few times too

dropped the cap and rotor off at Bnt so they can get me a new one 

and they give me an old piston mazda 323 cap and rotor to try as they looked close

gave the cap and rotor a go and what do you know now constant misfire

took rotor out as someone previously had tried it on their car and fucked the metal retaining tabs

tried out old rotor and new cap and no more misfire

so went back to Bnt too pay for the parts and...

NAH BRO THEIR FREE THEY WERE GOING IN THE BIN ANYWAY.

Like what?

YEAH BRO WE GOT THEM IN AS THEY WERE LISTED FOR OLD SCHOOL MAZDA PISTON ENGINE AND THEIR WRONG.

AND PLUS THEY HAD ALREADY BEEN TRIED ON A VEHICLE AND BEEN WRITTEN OFF.

YEEEEEAH FREE PARTS!.

Then drove it to work another day after this misfire was sorted and then drive it home after work 

and notice the exhaust tone is abit louder

so have a quick look underneath and can feel a leak

pop in back in the shed and place it on some axle stands and find this

 

The whole exhaust on this thing is getting abit past its used by date now...

second bit ive had to patch up now

got the old man on the welder again to patch it up

done

and made a new exhaust gasket too as old one was fucked and some newish bolts too as old ones were rusty n shit.

yeeeeah  

 

[piazzanoob]

soo with the exhaust and rust done the next thing on the job was the tyres

which started with 4 new kumho's 

 

got some mad camber going on

And while i did the tires 

A magic wof inspection sheet and label appeared on my dash

nothing was wrong i guess...

so with a wof and rego now she gets used a bit

Not just a show pony mayte

1 ton load of topsoil 

still pulls hard for what it is

probably because the trailer is the same year as the car with the same color combo