- Joined
- Feb 20, 2005
- Location
- Mountain View, CA
Well I had planned to have more done on this car before I created a project thread, but here goes. This will be my 10,000th post here on tbricks (sorta), so I'm making it count!
The purpose of this car is to be very reliable, comfortable, quieter than stock, get good gas mileage, handle awesome, and look pretty good at the same time. Notice I didn't say it needs to haul ass. Eventually it will receive one of the engines I have laying around, but this car will not be turbocharged. My focus on this car is what I outlined above, and I will be completely content with 200HP from an NA engine. If my life goes according to plan, I will be moving to Sweden to go to school in about 8 months, which means I'm going to need to sell my Evo because it would depreciate too much in the 2 years I will be gone. This car is going to need to take the place of my Evo in every way possible except for the power department. The budget I have tricked myself into believing is the limit for this project is the amount which I gathered from parting out my 744: $5,000.
The story of this car coming into my posession goes like this. I had just finished parting out my 744 (see thread http://www.turbobricks.com/forums/showthread.php?t=122427), and I wanted a daily driver that I could use besides my Evo for hauling stuff around, going to the junkyard, etc. I searched on Craigslist a couple times and saw this '83 245 DL for sale for $600. It looked good in the pictures, so I called and got some more information on it. Turns out it was a one owner car with around 235k miles on it, had an M46, great exterior, and pretty decent interior, but needed an engine mount and heater core hoses. I knew the deal wouldn't last, so I called up my friend Tim (superchargerman) and we drove down in his car to check it out. It looked good, drove it around the lot and it seemed to be just fine. Everything worked but the broken engine mount made it almost impossible to drive. I paid the man, then installed a ratchet strap from the exhaust side to the strut tower. It started to rain, so we didn't end up replacing the heater core hose right there on the spot, just topped off the coolant and decided to stop to check on it a few times on the way home. It didn't leak a drop that I could see the whole 40 miles home, but I found that the heater blower motor would squeal at anything above 2. That did not make me happy. Here it is sometime shortly after I bought it:
I got it all registered and insured and started daily driving it. I replaced the broken engine mount with one of the cheap ones from FCP. What a mistake that was, it didn't make any difference at all, so I put the ratchet strap back on and ordered a set of OE diesel mounts that I have yet to install. I'm guessing the transmission mount is also totally broken as well. I drove it for work and for picking up parts, hauling stuff around, etc. Within the first two or three weeks after getting it, I had already used it so much that I was just really happy that I bought it. My friend and I found a 75k mile 2JZ-GE at the local Pick-n-Pull, so we pulled it and put it in the trunk:
I also drove it down to the IPD Garage Sale with a whole bunch of parts to drop off/trade and sell.
I picked up a lathe from Grizzly up in Bellingham too:
One of the first modifications I did to the car was install a super sweet tan Recaro SE seat that I bought on craigslist. It matched the interior almost perfectly:
It got great MPG too with the 14" wheels, 31-33 on a trip to Idaho and back. A couple pictures from the road trip:
By this time I had remembered how much better wagons are than sedans. I laid out some plans for the modifications I wanted to do. After building the 744, I knew there were some things that I wanted to do differently for a daily driver. I wanted the car to be comfortable, I wanted it to be a real daily driver, not just something that could be daily driven. With this in mind I wanted to tackle the suspension and interior before doing any engine performance or exterior modifications. I was able to work out a deal with Cameron to buy most of the suspension and black interior from his 245 when he parted it out.
I also still had the lightweight 17x8 wheels and wheel adapters from my 744, as well as an IPD 25mm front sway bar that I picked up at the garage sale. I also had purchased a set of quick steer roll correction spacers from Kaplhenke Racing to put on the car, but those didn't come until later. I had all the poly bushings I needed for the front that I thought I was going to use on my 242 just laying around, as well as some Yoshifab control arm reinforcement plates, so I made good use of that stuff:
I guess I forgot to take a picture of the control arms all painted gloss black with the bushings installed, so you'll just have to trust me that they look sweet. I also installed new balljoints at the same time.
The suspension on the car at the time was:
Front:
Kaplhenke shortened strut tubes with Koni 8610RACE strut inserts, set at 1.75 out of 2.5 turns
500lb/in x 7" springs
5Zigen FN01R-C 17x8 wheels with 255/45ZR17 Nitto NT05 tires
Stock sway bar
Rear:
250lb/in springs on ride height adjusters
Bilstein HD shocks
5Zigen FN01R-C 17x8 wheels with 245/45ZR17 BFG KDW tires
Here's a STANCE shot:
I drove it like that for about a month before I started trying to find a better solution for the rear shocks. The car handled good, especially the front of the car, but the rear was just bouncy and uncomfortable over dips in the road. Bumps were usually fine, but dips would just set the rear of the car into 3 or 4 bounces before returning back to normal. I did a bunch of searching catalogs, comparing lengths of shocks and valvings, and finally decided on a Bilstein shock from their offroad catalog. I made a thread about that here: http://forums.turbobricks.com/showthread.php?t=244367
Ordered those shocks and put them on the car, and the difference was amazing. I convinced Adrian to get a set as well, and last I heard he was very happy with them too!
My only gripe with these new shocks in the rear is that they use spherical rod end bearings and transmit a LOT of noise into the car that was not there before. I have purchased a pair of polyurethane bushings that I am going to install in place of the bearings, but I have not had the chance to get that done yet.
Somewhere around this time the u-joint on my driveshaft totally destroyed itself, but luckily I had a spare 240 driveshaft sitting around.
This summer we had was hot. One of the hotter ones we have had in awhile, and driving around in a dark colored greenhouse was absolutely awful. I made the decision that I was going to install air conditioning in the car so that the next hot summer I would be nice and cool driving it around. I ended up spending one of the hottest days in the Pick-n-Pull pulling the complete HVAC system out of a '93 245 to transplant into this car.
In preparation for swapping Cameron's black interior into my car, I also ordered a bunch of RAAMmat sound deadening and Ensolite foam for the car. I wanted to make the car much quieter than stock, and from the research I did it sounded like this stuff was one of the best performance per dollar products you could buy. The guy that runs it seemed very knowledgeable when I talked to him on the phone as well. I also sold my super sweet tan Recaro SE seat to Travis (F13ND), and swapped in one of the gray cloth seats I bought from Cameron:
I needed some good seats to match the black interior, so I found a set of JDM ITR Recaro seats in black with red stitching on craigslist and bought them:
Then I tore everything out of the car so that I could install the 1993 HVAC box in place of my tired stuff. Also at this time I replaced my wiper linkage that had bound up and destroyed two wiper motors with the linkage I got from Cameron when I bought the rest of his stuff.
Then started putting down the mat and foam:
And did a little rust proofing while I was in there:
And modified the seat brackets on the new seats to bolt into the factory positions:
And the half-way finished product:
At this point the car was a lot of fun to drive. Until I bought my Evo I never realized how important good seats were, so I knew that was one of the parts of this car I needed to drop some coin on. The JDM ITR seats hug you nice and tight, a lot better than the Recaros in my Evo do! I was waiting on doing the door sound deadening and installing the nice gray door panels until I purchased some speakers for the front and rear doors, which I haven't done yet, so that part of the interior project is still in progress. For the rear/trunk area I am going to line the floor with some black ABS sheet so that it is nice and easy to load and unload heavy and dirty parts back there.
Shortly after that I dropped my car off at the shop Adam (Atom D&D) works at to get tinted 15% all around. The result on a dirty car:
And sometime in there we had a mini tbricks meetup:
Used the car to pick up a set of wheels for my 242:
Sometime after that my Kaplhenke Racing QSRC spacers came after they were done being manufactured, and I went ahead and installed those, the IPD 25mm front bar and poly bushings I had laying around, and new inner and outer tie rods, and tie rod boots:
At first when I installed them using the middle setting, I had about 3" toe out with the tie rods adjusted in as far as they would go. I had to cut about 5 threads off the inner tie rods just so I could adjust it in far enough. I guess this depends on which brand inner/outers you go with. I think mine were Moog. Other than that hangup, this was for sure one of the best modifications I have done to the car. The steering feel is so much better with the ~2.5 turns lock to lock, it's just amazing.
A couple weeks ago I switched back to daily driving the Evo now that it's ski season, and at the moment it's actually snowy here. I'm guessing it's going to be a little while before I get anything major done on the car because of the cold weather. I have the whole project planned out in my head, but I think instead of laying that out here in the first post I will just let it unfold as I get it done.
The purpose of this car is to be very reliable, comfortable, quieter than stock, get good gas mileage, handle awesome, and look pretty good at the same time. Notice I didn't say it needs to haul ass. Eventually it will receive one of the engines I have laying around, but this car will not be turbocharged. My focus on this car is what I outlined above, and I will be completely content with 200HP from an NA engine. If my life goes according to plan, I will be moving to Sweden to go to school in about 8 months, which means I'm going to need to sell my Evo because it would depreciate too much in the 2 years I will be gone. This car is going to need to take the place of my Evo in every way possible except for the power department. The budget I have tricked myself into believing is the limit for this project is the amount which I gathered from parting out my 744: $5,000.
The story of this car coming into my posession goes like this. I had just finished parting out my 744 (see thread http://www.turbobricks.com/forums/showthread.php?t=122427), and I wanted a daily driver that I could use besides my Evo for hauling stuff around, going to the junkyard, etc. I searched on Craigslist a couple times and saw this '83 245 DL for sale for $600. It looked good in the pictures, so I called and got some more information on it. Turns out it was a one owner car with around 235k miles on it, had an M46, great exterior, and pretty decent interior, but needed an engine mount and heater core hoses. I knew the deal wouldn't last, so I called up my friend Tim (superchargerman) and we drove down in his car to check it out. It looked good, drove it around the lot and it seemed to be just fine. Everything worked but the broken engine mount made it almost impossible to drive. I paid the man, then installed a ratchet strap from the exhaust side to the strut tower. It started to rain, so we didn't end up replacing the heater core hose right there on the spot, just topped off the coolant and decided to stop to check on it a few times on the way home. It didn't leak a drop that I could see the whole 40 miles home, but I found that the heater blower motor would squeal at anything above 2. That did not make me happy. Here it is sometime shortly after I bought it:
I got it all registered and insured and started daily driving it. I replaced the broken engine mount with one of the cheap ones from FCP. What a mistake that was, it didn't make any difference at all, so I put the ratchet strap back on and ordered a set of OE diesel mounts that I have yet to install. I'm guessing the transmission mount is also totally broken as well. I drove it for work and for picking up parts, hauling stuff around, etc. Within the first two or three weeks after getting it, I had already used it so much that I was just really happy that I bought it. My friend and I found a 75k mile 2JZ-GE at the local Pick-n-Pull, so we pulled it and put it in the trunk:
I also drove it down to the IPD Garage Sale with a whole bunch of parts to drop off/trade and sell.
I picked up a lathe from Grizzly up in Bellingham too:
One of the first modifications I did to the car was install a super sweet tan Recaro SE seat that I bought on craigslist. It matched the interior almost perfectly:
It got great MPG too with the 14" wheels, 31-33 on a trip to Idaho and back. A couple pictures from the road trip:
By this time I had remembered how much better wagons are than sedans. I laid out some plans for the modifications I wanted to do. After building the 744, I knew there were some things that I wanted to do differently for a daily driver. I wanted the car to be comfortable, I wanted it to be a real daily driver, not just something that could be daily driven. With this in mind I wanted to tackle the suspension and interior before doing any engine performance or exterior modifications. I was able to work out a deal with Cameron to buy most of the suspension and black interior from his 245 when he parted it out.
I also still had the lightweight 17x8 wheels and wheel adapters from my 744, as well as an IPD 25mm front sway bar that I picked up at the garage sale. I also had purchased a set of quick steer roll correction spacers from Kaplhenke Racing to put on the car, but those didn't come until later. I had all the poly bushings I needed for the front that I thought I was going to use on my 242 just laying around, as well as some Yoshifab control arm reinforcement plates, so I made good use of that stuff:
I guess I forgot to take a picture of the control arms all painted gloss black with the bushings installed, so you'll just have to trust me that they look sweet. I also installed new balljoints at the same time.
The suspension on the car at the time was:
Front:
Kaplhenke shortened strut tubes with Koni 8610RACE strut inserts, set at 1.75 out of 2.5 turns
500lb/in x 7" springs
5Zigen FN01R-C 17x8 wheels with 255/45ZR17 Nitto NT05 tires
Stock sway bar
Rear:
250lb/in springs on ride height adjusters
Bilstein HD shocks
5Zigen FN01R-C 17x8 wheels with 245/45ZR17 BFG KDW tires
Here's a STANCE shot:
I drove it like that for about a month before I started trying to find a better solution for the rear shocks. The car handled good, especially the front of the car, but the rear was just bouncy and uncomfortable over dips in the road. Bumps were usually fine, but dips would just set the rear of the car into 3 or 4 bounces before returning back to normal. I did a bunch of searching catalogs, comparing lengths of shocks and valvings, and finally decided on a Bilstein shock from their offroad catalog. I made a thread about that here: http://forums.turbobricks.com/showthread.php?t=244367
Ordered those shocks and put them on the car, and the difference was amazing. I convinced Adrian to get a set as well, and last I heard he was very happy with them too!
My only gripe with these new shocks in the rear is that they use spherical rod end bearings and transmit a LOT of noise into the car that was not there before. I have purchased a pair of polyurethane bushings that I am going to install in place of the bearings, but I have not had the chance to get that done yet.
Somewhere around this time the u-joint on my driveshaft totally destroyed itself, but luckily I had a spare 240 driveshaft sitting around.
This summer we had was hot. One of the hotter ones we have had in awhile, and driving around in a dark colored greenhouse was absolutely awful. I made the decision that I was going to install air conditioning in the car so that the next hot summer I would be nice and cool driving it around. I ended up spending one of the hottest days in the Pick-n-Pull pulling the complete HVAC system out of a '93 245 to transplant into this car.
In preparation for swapping Cameron's black interior into my car, I also ordered a bunch of RAAMmat sound deadening and Ensolite foam for the car. I wanted to make the car much quieter than stock, and from the research I did it sounded like this stuff was one of the best performance per dollar products you could buy. The guy that runs it seemed very knowledgeable when I talked to him on the phone as well. I also sold my super sweet tan Recaro SE seat to Travis (F13ND), and swapped in one of the gray cloth seats I bought from Cameron:
I needed some good seats to match the black interior, so I found a set of JDM ITR Recaro seats in black with red stitching on craigslist and bought them:
Then I tore everything out of the car so that I could install the 1993 HVAC box in place of my tired stuff. Also at this time I replaced my wiper linkage that had bound up and destroyed two wiper motors with the linkage I got from Cameron when I bought the rest of his stuff.
Then started putting down the mat and foam:
And did a little rust proofing while I was in there:
And modified the seat brackets on the new seats to bolt into the factory positions:
And the half-way finished product:
At this point the car was a lot of fun to drive. Until I bought my Evo I never realized how important good seats were, so I knew that was one of the parts of this car I needed to drop some coin on. The JDM ITR seats hug you nice and tight, a lot better than the Recaros in my Evo do! I was waiting on doing the door sound deadening and installing the nice gray door panels until I purchased some speakers for the front and rear doors, which I haven't done yet, so that part of the interior project is still in progress. For the rear/trunk area I am going to line the floor with some black ABS sheet so that it is nice and easy to load and unload heavy and dirty parts back there.
Shortly after that I dropped my car off at the shop Adam (Atom D&D) works at to get tinted 15% all around. The result on a dirty car:
And sometime in there we had a mini tbricks meetup:
Used the car to pick up a set of wheels for my 242:
Sometime after that my Kaplhenke Racing QSRC spacers came after they were done being manufactured, and I went ahead and installed those, the IPD 25mm front bar and poly bushings I had laying around, and new inner and outer tie rods, and tie rod boots:
At first when I installed them using the middle setting, I had about 3" toe out with the tie rods adjusted in as far as they would go. I had to cut about 5 threads off the inner tie rods just so I could adjust it in far enough. I guess this depends on which brand inner/outers you go with. I think mine were Moog. Other than that hangup, this was for sure one of the best modifications I have done to the car. The steering feel is so much better with the ~2.5 turns lock to lock, it's just amazing.
A couple weeks ago I switched back to daily driving the Evo now that it's ski season, and at the moment it's actually snowy here. I'm guessing it's going to be a little while before I get anything major done on the car because of the cold weather. I have the whole project planned out in my head, but I think instead of laying that out here in the first post I will just let it unfold as I get it done.
