When to Save Up and When to Post

I keep thinking "this will be cooler after the next step, so I should wait and post it later." But if I follow that to the extreme, I'll just post when it's all done. So here's the latest interim update. 

Starting to re-assemble the power plant frame. Here's the rear subframe with A-arms, hubs, axles, knuckles, and differential reinstalled. While apart I verified this is in fact a Torsen limited slip diff which was a pleasant to surprise to find included in a car's worth of salvage suspension parts.

The differential bushings are notoriously difficult to remove. I used a three part process assembled from different YouTube videos. One: drill out the centers of the bushings with a hole saw. Two: burn out the remaining rubber. This is the preferred method of removing very stubborn parts: Burn Them Out With Fire. It's not quite as satisfying as Dust Off and Nuke the Site From Orbit, but it's close.

Even then there's some sawing and cutting to do, to get out the steel sleeves that used to have the rubber bushings in them. The picture below shows the new bushing installed, and the skeletal remnants of the steel bushing sleeve laying defeated and dismembered on the wood block below.

Front suspension parts with new polyurethane bushings installed:

I did not replace the front upper ball joints, but I did replace the boots. Based on my encyclopedic YouTube research, this job looks like an epic ordeal when done with the A-arm installed on the car. But here out in the open it really was not bad at all.

Mix of old and new (rebuilt) brake parts, painted with black ceramic caliper paint.

The black paint isn't super exciting or fantastic, but the currently fashionable bright red or bright yellow would look totally wrong on a 1950s themed sports car - and I don't like the natural rusted iron patina. I think I will paint the rotor hats and edges to match.

The rear calipers are extra complex because of all the parking brake and self-adjuster stuff and they needed a full rebuild - the kit for which is about the same price as a remanufactured OEM rear caliper so I just paid Autozone for that job. 

The front calipers were in very good shape and honestly could probably have been used as is, but I did get the "light rebuild" kits for them so they'll get new seals.

Then these will rejoin their neighbors on the front and rear suspension subframes.

The other big job has been unpacking The Giant Crate and moving the stuff into the garage.

Above

Foreground/left: power plant skate rebuilding process. 

Upper right: bodywork. 

Middle distance: space frame.

Below

Foreground: space frame

Left background: bodywork

It was nice to see the bodywork out and get a look at it. This is the first time I've seen one of these in person. Looking at pictures I had generally liked the curves and proportions, but every once in a while I see a picture where something looks a little 'off' - like the sides are too flat or the nose is too long or something. I wasn't 100% sure whether the pictures I liked captured the actual shapes and those I didn't like were just unflattering photos, or whether the unflattering pics were more accurate. I'm very happy to say that the pics I like are the more accurate ones and this really is a shapely little car.

Not so little, though. The wheelbase is a bit wider than a Miata, and the nose is longer too, so it takes up a non-trivial amount of the garage space. 

Next big job will be rigging a hoist so I can keep the bodywork up in the rafters when I'm not working on it. This, and a number of other cleanup/reorganize jobs to create a functional work space. 

'Till next time.

I wonder if "Pimp My Brake Parts" could be a
reality TV show?