Wow, 2.5 years since I updated this thread!
So, in between my 2 year old son is now 4.5 and I now have a 2.5 year old daughter, certain death to any car project!
Despite these handicaps and a wife who would rather I didn't tinker with old cars I've managed to achieve some big targets, actually I have achieved quite a lot for me:
Some minor welding to the rear nearside sill end was done by PBCM and while they had the paint I got them to spray my front and rear plastic bumpers that had begun to flake and colour code the black strip at the base of the car. Unfortunately they didn't fade match the paint well so I was a bit gutted at the result but it actually helped me realise a dream.....
This shows the colour match issues, I gave up reassembling it and lost a lot of enthusiasm...excuse the fully raised ride height.....
The body shop had done a lovely job of the new paint and so a deal was struck for the rest of the car to be sprayed with glass out and strip down done by me, i have no complaints as the price was excellent and they did a fantastic job to cheer me up spending 3x the allowed hours on the car. So a massive job started to unravel in stripping down.....
Whilst at the strip stage I got the rear arches rolled to prevent my Toyota Supra spec Tom's Racing C7r split rims (I have more sets of wheels than shoes) rubbing when I eventually get them refurbished....
.....The day came to make the hours journey to the body shop with all but road legal bits stuffed in the passenger area with seat removed....
Some local asked what had happened to the car and made some funny comment about it needing more than just a respray, muppet!
Here it is stripped of all non structural bodywork going into the workshop and the sun fade of the original paint.....
The flatting and base coating that was necessary....
Then the good stuff that I've dreamed of for years (other than Taylor Swift)....
Then loaded onto the hired trailer a few days later after curing, flatting off and polishing to a superb finish with the help of my folks and their Discovery once again....nose cone and rear bumper temporarily tied into place......
Back home......
Before letting the parents escape I got my mum plugging holes with gaffer tape patches and my old man holding the quarter panels while I bonded them in with special sticky stuff and installed everthing i could to get it watertight as i would be working on it a couple of hours a week maximum out on the drive witout a garage. .....
Then I made best friends with my local toyota dealer parts guy....repeat for about 5 weeks of small parts orders until he actually asked how the car was coming along....
The boring stuff, sealing in body plugs for watertightness and putting new galvanised and stainless fittings on....
Then used a grinder, Bilt Hamber rust killer and epoxy mastic to paint the rusty old crash bar before putting the nose on properly....
Before:
After:
Used the heat gun and lemon juice technique to bring back the blackness to plastic parts faded over 23 years....left fog surround treated, right untreated.......
Then as things were coming back together, I started to look at subtle mods. I had asked for the nose badge and plate holes to be filled so I could change badges if I wanted and for a cleaner show look but I needed plates for road use so I used hidden rivnuts and made some brackets up to bond to the plate holder alowing easy plate removal with no visible holes...
After years of searching I finally got hold of a complete pair of jdm turbo denim blue side stripes in the correct colour for my main body colour.....this replaces an ok looking diy turbo vinyl sticker and the factory one is encapsulated in clear coat with a nice defined edge to the text......
While all the arch liners were out I degreased and painted the arches, front rad recesses and rear pan area with black epoxy mastic paint...you can see also that there are some very old but extremely high quality and fully re-valved and re-sprung Ohlins pcv coilovers with Cusco pillow ball top mounts that I installed with front eibach camber correction bolts to match my rear ones. The Ohlins are height and rebound adjustable and ride beautifully. This was all liberally coated with the amazing acf50 spray and waterproof grease......
I got a bargain very period Tom's Racing steering wheel in absolutely mint condition considering it is about 25 years old......
Just the rear rebuild to go, slowly getting there.....
MOT day came after 2 years of sporadic work and it passed with flying colours....
I added a usdm turbo badge which i left black to match the centre panel....
Then after 4 years of looking sorry for themselves in my shed I got my rare 17" forged lightweight Desmond Regamaster Marquis Promada wheels refurbished in Lexus Starfire white pearl with Federal 595 rs-R semi slick tyres. Fitment is tight but I love them......
Reportedly they were made in a former Soviet tank factory shortly after the fall of communist Russia as they had the large presses required for these particular wheels and were sitting redundant, they are the only jdm wheels made in Russia.
The centre caps are a plastic work of art.....
Trial fit before geo setup and a poor phone quality pic...but helps to put these mk2 SW20 chassis MR2 into scale against modern cars, they are tiny and this one weighs about 1100kg.....
Finally, if you haven't dropped off to sleep, after another successful MOT 3 weeks ago, here is how it sits after I went full jdm amber sidelights and indicators....
Thanks for reading!