Because I re organized my photobucket... A good amount of my pictures are not visible on my old build thread. So i'm starting a new one.

No my name is not Manny.. it's Aaron.. and theres a story behind the name..but i'll get to that another time. Due to an excess of oil in my exhaust and 35-40k on the rebuild. I figured I would pull the motor and rebuild it to suit my needs. I plan to beat the living hell out of my car.. not in a bad way.. but this car was ment to be driven..and driven it shall be!! So this build is going to have a key focus on performance and the parts that go along with helping me achieve that feat. I plan to drive the car on the street as much as possible, but I also participate in canyon runs almost every weekend (thanks to so-cals beautiful mountain ranges) and track days/drift meets at my local tracks. I live about 15 min from Willow Springs.. and about an hour and 20 min away from buttonwillow and about the same distance from fontana. Anyways... On with the thread and pics!

So it started in the canyon... We stopped at a cafe and my buddy said that my car had started throwing black smoke. So I took notice.. cruised home and the smoking just got worse. Here is a pic before


A video of my motor... no exhaust mani.. black oil gushing out of the front Housing...


In the gorage ready for a motor pull

 

This is the first time I will be doing a motor pull on a rotary. So i've talked to a few people who've helped me quite a bit. And what started as a basic rebuild turned into a total over-haul. Thanks XLR8 for talking me into All new Pillow *****! Suspension set up will be Full Super-pro kit, New Pillow *****, Sand blasted and painted all Suspension arms/components. New Coilovers. Blasted Calipers/Painted..possibly Powder coated. New Wheel Bearings, Extended ARP Wheel Studs. This will be tackled first. Along with the occasional impulse performance part purchase haha.

Labeling is your friend getting everything sorted..

My buddy evan helped me quite a bit with this.. Its always good to have a good friend there with this stuff.

It was a lot easier than I had thought.. but even kinda knew what he was doing haha.

Everything was so dirty... So i decided to add heavy cleaning to the list of things to do..

 

Next up was all suspension... So I started the process of pulling it all out. My buddy BJ let me use his sand blaster and press. Sand blasting takes a while.. especially with the amount of parts i had.. But its worth it to get the stuff looking new again...

Also...we did a fair amount of work to get the 18 year old axles out of the hub.... holy SH** it was a pain.

Finished product...

and

I also picked out a custom spray can color.... It'll seal them up very well as its a ceramic based paint and dries really hard. Even though its not as strong as powder coat.. I still think it came out very well.

 

and rears..


Before... Old and Dirty

After.. Old and clean.. Amazing how well sandblasting works..



Then painted the hubs satin black

and pushed my ARP extended studs in..



Also pushed in new Rear Wheel bearings..as some of you know..this is a huge pain in the A**

I'm proud of myself because I rememberd to install the Snap rings!!! hah
Then finally put the whole rear assembly back together... retardedly leaving the brake dust shield on.. Gonna try to figure out a way to remove it soon here..

 

Looking good! I love builds that make everything look brand new.

 

Very neat and very clean. I dig it.

Also pro dread locks.

 

Looks great. I've found that Castrol Super clean and a scrub brush can make the suspension look new also. Blasting is a good tool to remove corrosion.

On the motor reinstall you might think about pulling the trans and wiring harness and putting it all together while the motor is out and reinstalling as a complete assembly. The engine, manifolds, turbos, DP, wiring, etc and trans can be installed together.

 

You will want to remove the paint from the face of the wheel mounting surface on those hubs to prevent the clamp from loosening.

 

ahh!!... thank you. I didn't really give that any thought. I'll make sure to do that before I mount anything.. Thanks fritts!

Also, i'm up for any constructive critisizm! let fly!

 

Now that i've spent a decent amount of time wrenching under the car... I've noticed that it is just absolutely filthy down there. There was an oil leak...and it has pretty much painted a hefty part of the undercarraige of the car. I'd like to clean it off. I'm actually thinking of coating the underside of the car with quiet coat. Theoretically it should do the same thing under the car rather than over right? But first.. it was time to clean up my wheel well's...
First I took a scrub bristly brush to the whole wheel well..which revealed some Rust. So I took the grinder to a couple spots on the bottom side of the strut mount. After that was done I used a sealer, and then 3M rubberized Underspray. Which is not only supposed to prevent rust...but also quiet things down as well. Even if it doesnt.. the rubberized spray makes it look new and will protect it from the elements...
before

After


I only had one other rust spot on the drivers side.. so I took care of that with the grinder as well. All 4 wheel wells got the same treatment.
"Do it once.. Do it right"

 

Took a little time out to hide some relays.. Used the bracket they originally sat on and bent it a little/hacked it up a little and pushed the whole thing forward to make a little more room for my turbo set-up. I think it looks pretty damn neat..and they're still accessible... which is a plus.

.....Might re route the main harness from going through the wheel well...to around the front of it. That way tire contact won't be a problem.

I'm also going to be doing a custom V-mount i've designed so i'll need the extra room up front here. Every 1/4 inch counts!!!

 

Manny it's looking good man! Keep us posted

 

That shot is poster-worthy IMO.

 

I told my buddy the same thing, That pic is awesome!!!!! Not going to lie, but I am totally going to copy you by taking a pic like it.

 

keep it coming!

 

While it was out.. I decided to clean up my Steering rack. Thought about doing the manual steering rack conversion but figured it wouldn't really suit my needs completely. Therefore it stays!! maybe in the future though.. Anyways..

All taped up for paint.

After paint, new Bushings and paited caps...And I do love gold...

All finished... Gold heat reflect tape.. Prob not the most idea place.. but decided to spice things up a bit.

 

I also got something in the mail...
Thanks Sake Bomb Gorage!

Quality is definitely there.. top notch! I'll install these things tomorrow morning, along with some suspension and the sub frame. I need to get the car rolling so I can move it to my new gorage. New Coilovers coming next week!!! surprise surprise!!

 

garage

not "gorage"

 

thanks for the correction..but when they gave me my BA degree they also told me I could spell things however the hell I wanted to.. i'll make a note.. A instead of O.

 

If only my BS and MS degrees would have allowed such shenanigans

I like the black & gold theme, very John Player Special

 

haha, well I commend you on your studies! May I ask what field you got your degree in? I wish I would have gone into engineering!!

But thank you.. I put the subframe in yesterday.. Not sure if I like the Gold on it... I might be painting it black... we'll see.

 

Excellent build pics!

It's always nice to see someone going through the effort of "restoring" the FD, by cleaning it, re-painting, etc..

Very VERY nice.

Keep up the great work!

:]

 

Looking good Aaron, keep it up!

 

Thanks guys!

so the process of pushing out all the stock bushings was and always will be a son of a B****. I had my buddy Evan help me out at first... and then tackled the rest of them. 3 days later and a whole new concept of respect for whoever invented the press.. I got them all out. The new ones were a cinch to get in. Used a little tool I made out of a long bolt and some heavy duty washers. I got the idea from someone on here.. it worked great though! Check it out!




I also took this time to replace a couple horridly worn pillow *****..

It's nice to know the car will be as "toight as a tiger.." haha

 

I also got around to installing the sub-frame and L/R upper and lower CA's. Not completely sure if I like the subframe being gold.. but I love the CA's.. they look great against the black rubberized under coat.. and the purple bushings add just the right touch!



Also...here's the 3m Rubberized undercoat I used. Got it at Autozone for like 9 bucks a can...