A new year brings new pictures of the project - and what delicious pictures they are!

For anyone looking for the other project threads:
Project Naomi I : New Project on an Old Favourite
Project Naomi II : Giant Rotisserie Pictures Update
Project Naomi III : End of Summer 2010 Update
Project Naomi IV : Almost Off The Rotisserie
Project Naomi V : Finally PAINT!
Project Naomi VI : IT LIVES!
Project Naomi VII : Coming Home

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Before we get to the good stuff though, it's been many months since last update, so there are a few intermediate pics to get through first!

Last we left off, the final bits of metal work had been taken care of, the doors got new skins, and the body was being taken through the stages of filler/sanding/primer to make it ready for paint.

In one of my recent photo updates from Joe I found a great pic of the underside of the car that I didn't have before, and it shows a lot of the completed work there including the gas tank, lines, and all of the suspension, so I thought it was worth including:



After much work filing and sanding and priming and preparing, things started to look pretty good. Heck, for a while I was starting to like the matte grey colour! Here are a few pics from the end of the primer-and-prep process, and from the paint booth just before paint went down:

The hood


They had hung the doors and fenders to make sure they could get everything perfectly even with the body, though they'd have to come off again later for final paint


And finally the car was brought into the paint booth this past Friday, put up on stands, masked, and ready for paint!

 

That brings us to Monday/Tuesday of this week and what we've all been waiting for - PAINT!

Here's a walk-around of the car in the paint booth:








I thought that this close-up of the fender gave a nice view of the new paint




Joe had already done the engine bay, but was standing there looking at it one day last week and thought "You know, this looks good... but it could really look great if I gave it a respray with the rest of the body" - and so he did! Originally I think we were using a flatter paint for the engine bay that was basically the same colour but without the mica. Honestly, I'm glad he decided to do the re-spray, it looks awesome!

 

The doors also offered a good opportunity to show off the paint. The second image below is a close-up near the door-handle area. It doesn't show as well in the resized image, but if anyone wants the original 5mb image I'll share my dropbox link to it. With the full-sized one you can really see the detail in the speckle/mica if you zoom in and out.






And finally, another walk-around of the car now that it's out of the paint booth and sitting comfortably back on its wheels. There is still a huge amount of work to be done before it becomes a car again, not the least of which is the interior (dying the dash and seatbacks, installing the sound deadener, installing the new carpet). But this is a major milestone, and it really gets me stoked for how the project will turn out at the end









Good things come to those who wait.

 

Hatchback is capable of storing a nice Pizza Jon..!
Nice JOB man!
You should see what's in store over here..make ya cry!

 

its beautiful (Y)

 

Looks incredible. Great work.

 

Very nice work. I'm not generally a fan of silver, but that paint really pops.

 

Thanks!

Yeah, I know that some folks aren't big fans of silver (like a certain awesome, Cosmo-building fellow forum member I know), and that there are tons of silver cars on the road already, but I really like it and I'm quite happy with how it's turning out

The paint should pop even more once all the black trim pieces are in place to provide some contrast (drip rails, side molding, window frames, a-pillar covers, side mirrors, etc...). I even have a set of 83 LE rims that I will be getting refinished at some point soon to have gloss black centres and polished lips to continue the black-and-silver theme across the car.

 

Beautiful paint Job, Nice work, 1st gens look amazing in Silver..
Yours is not to dark and not to light, the factory silver is a bit too light.

Might I ask what the damage is so far in $

 

Looks great... Can't wait to see it finished!

 

So exciting to see it coming together!

 

Gorgeous! Congrats on the progress and I look forward to seeing it in person if you're in the Toronto area someday.

 

If you *only* count the work Joe is doing, that's about $14k, which should take it to completion give or take.

I also picked up about $3k of parts and misc things - a parts car for bumpers and fenders (that also donated a GSL rear end), new pads, rotors and calipers for that GSL rear, a full polyurethane bushing set, sound deadener, sound absorption matt, a new carpet kit, and a few other misc things that I can't recall right now. I've got a set of rims to refinish, need new tires, and will probably put a new stereo and speakers in it before the project is "done" this phase.

So when all is said and done I should still be under $20k. Most people reading this right now are probably doing a double take, then shaking their heads. Yes, I could have bought an FD for that. I could have done MANY things with that cash, and it probably wasn't the most "responsible" place to spend it. But do I regret it? Not one bit, especially after seeing pictures like this! This car obviously has a lot of sentimental value to me, and while I'd never get even half that cost out of selling it, it doesn't matter. I drove it for many years before, and I hope to drive it for many years after.

Well, I live in Ottawa, but Joe's shop is in Hagersville, just outside Hamilton. So if we're lucky there'll be a meet somewhere in the GTA around the time it's ready and I can make an appearance after picking it up. If not, I travel to the GTA at least once or twice a year just to visit friends, so it's possible we'll meet up somewhere, someday!

 

Sounds good. I need to get my paint done too, but I don't want my FD out of action (i.e., track season) for too long – it's a go car, not a show car.

 

Makes me want to post my paint job hahaha. Love the color! It really draws the lines and curves out of the body. Also makes it look a bit more modern instead of the older plain colors.

 

Is the goal to have a restored stock appearance or will there be other cosmetic updates (e.g. aftermarket lights, wheels, etc.)?

I read in one of the previous posts that the drivetrain will be a hybrid of various generations of RX equipment.

 

The goal appearance will look stock to anyone who isn't terribly familiar with the car. Those who know what they're looking for will find the small changes - the opaque corner and tail lights with the coloured bulbs, the '83 LE Rims with painted centres and polished lips, the smoked glass sunroof, the Racing Beat exhaust - things that the car might have come with from the dealership but you wouldn't be sure unless you asked. Everything else is going back to stock look - black side moldings, all new badges, and it's the original paint colour.

On the interior the carpet colour is changing from grey to black, and I bought a few extra feet to make sure we can re-do the detail pieces like the ones on the sides of the console and the area covering the taillights in the back. For a refresh the dash and seatbacks are being dyed black, and aside from whatever stereo I put in the centre console you'll be hard-pressed to find something that looks out of place for the car.

The real changes, as you already noticed, will be under the hood and under the car. Things I've already changed include the Sterling carb and ported manifold, the Racing Beat dual-long-primary exhaust, Mallory fuel pump, an aluminum rad, e-fan, ISCRacing air filter canister with K&N, RB Springs, KYB shocks, RB swaybars, Polyurethane Bushings, ReSpeed Steering Kit, GSL Rear End with Disc Brakes and Limited Slip Diff (was an upgrade for me), Hawk Brake Pads, etc...

The engine you mentioned is a future project, but one I've been planning for years. Grabbing all the "best bits" across many generations of engine, I'm aiming for a solid, reliable, higher performance stock-style engine. No forced induction or even EFI here. Fed by the same intake and using virtually the same exhaust as what I have now, the engine will be a 13b with S5 N/A rotors for their nice 9.7:1 compression ratio, Street Ported TII 4-port irons for their nice port size and port-ability, RENESIS e-shaft and stat gears for the reduced weight and added hardening, FD corner springs and oil pressure regulator, a 12a front cover so that my metering oil pump bolts up with no issues (which will be fed from a two-stroke reservoir), and a GSL-SE oil pan so that it doesn't get in the way of the stabilizer bar that sits where my original steering rack used to be. Upgrade from the "beehive" to a real front-mount oil cooler with SS hoses. Throw an RB lightweight steel flywheel and street/strip clutch on that and it should be a nice upgrade for the car.

So I've got pretty much all the major bits of my "vision" for the car thought-out, now it's just a matter of pulling them all together.

 

Thanks for the detailed reply. I love resto-mods, mostly, but I'll bet car collectors hate them.

My already-modified FD will be in a similar condition, someday. I'm going to add some Series 8 (1999-2002) bits and we'll see what else happens.

 

Joe does awesome work....he painted this car 10 years ago, still looks great today

 

Yeah, it took me a while to decide on a shop, and Joe's shop is just a hair over 600km away from where I live. It was important to get a shop that I trust for a project of this magnitude. It may be taking a lot longer than originally planned, but it's coming along nicely and I have confidence that it will be done right.

A buddy of mine did the same project a few years ago (full teardown, rotisserie, etc...) and the paint shop screwed him royally. In the end it was Joe over at ClassicAuto that picked up the pieces and finished the project. That experience with Marc's car, as well as the positive feedback from others on the forum here (Sam's green FB, Tony's FD, etc...) is what made me decide on a shop more than 6hrs away from my house for this build.

Glad to see we can add another endorsement to that list, and I think we can count IAN in the thumbs-up category too. His is looking quite nice from what I've seen.

 

You made a good choice in shops, Tony's car is a FC and is like a new car from top to bottom....you can also add in Ian's car as a total restore, Charn's FD, RD Turbo's FD, Gabe's FB and Joe's own FC....all amazing looking cars.

 

Ya all of Joe's work turns out beautiful! You can add my TII to that list as well. It didn't get a full on paint job because the original paint was still in pretty good shape. He just did some touch ups, minor mods, and a buff and polish. Still looked like brand new when I got it back. Keep up the good work! Can't wait to see the final result!

 

Love the choice of color! Looks good, great job man.

 

Car looks fantastic.

 

Right, for some reason I was confusing Charn's FD with Tony's FC... We should see how many of the cars done by Joe we can get together some time in the summer. It'd be awesome to see a bunch of them together.