Hey guys just picked up a 1992 FD3S from a friend who was holding it for a friend to be imported to the states. Instead he was told to junk it and offered it to me. It was in a little crash with just the fame for the headlight assembly being bent up. It's been sitting about 2 years now. Been gathering replacement parts to drop it off at a shop to get fixed. Looks like the oil cooler broke the coolant tank and caused it to leak all of it's coolant. Me being dumb didn't check the oil levels so I don't know where it stands right now. I've been told it'll probably be needing an engine rebuild due to it sitting for so long. Can anyone confirm this or shed some light on it? Engine was rebuilt about 6 years ago by FAM Speed and only has about 40K km on it.

 

Breaking the coolant reservoir would not necessarily mean all the coolant drained from the engine. However, there seems to be sufficient damage that one of the coolant hoses to the radiator may also have been damaged in the crash, resulting in a loss of coolant.

Has the car been stored in winter conditions?

 

Basically where it sits is where it's been for two years. The coldest it has been in those two years may have been just under freezing though, but I'm not for sure. Doesn't snow very often, if it even does where I'm at in Japan.

 

If you search this site, you will likely find the topic of recommissioning an engine, that has sat idle for a few years, covered many times.

Prices for 1993 cars should start to rise as they become legal in the US. It may be worthwhile to have a completely new engine put in while the car is still in Japan, before selling on to the US.

Why not contact the custom engine shop that rebuilt the engine 6 years ago.

 

I've been thinking about doing that and seeing if they can fix the small damage to the headlight area. Sent them an email yesterday and I'm waiting on a response. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

So the original tuner shop got back with me with a price quote. They told me if they were going to fix the damage and rebuild the engine that it was going to be 2,000,000 yen (17,760 USD). So I guess that I'm probably not going to go with the tuner shop for that. Just for the damage to be fixed I was quoted 500,000 yen (4,440 USD). I don't see how the engine rebuild is going to cost roughly $13k.

 

Get a PM to Laujesse on this site. He is in Japan and channels a lot of parts.

 

Alright I'll look into it, thanks for that. Right now I should be getting it taken to a body shop on Tuesday. So far everything engine wise sounds decent, however I've only let it idle for about five minutes with a couple presses on the gas to get it up to about 3k RPM. Didn't hear any off sounds.Did stall a few times on start up today but I believe that's because it's cold here, about 40 degrees. Diagnosed a small power steering leak and have parts ordered for that. Gonna put new tires on tomorrow, tried today but lugs didn't want to budge so gotta break out the impact.

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress into the beautiful car it once was! Just picked up my first FD which is also rhd (1993). Good luck!