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Mar 29, 2021 14:40:33 GMT
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So I’ve been an avid lurker on this site for a while so I may as well get round to documenting my first build log my 1994 eunos roadster 1.8 which I picked up early October, be warned this is gonna be a long post so strap in. So I bought this blind off online and got a recovery truck to bring it back to me (covid rules and all). I should have learned when someone says no rust it means rust or just clueless. One saving grace this car was stored in a garage the past 5 years and not driven prior to me as the previous owner had health issues then the seller was a family friend, saved the rust from getting worse than it was. This meant it needed a good service and most of the rubber door seals replaced (which I did thank god) How it looked when It arrived:   Noticed this Japanese keychain, turns out it's a dealership keychain, the number on it relates to a Toyota Dealership up in the Tochigi prefecture, trade in vehicle i presume way back pre 2001 before it landed here. Would love to find out the history of this prior to the UK, anyways the rust not an mx5 without it right...    Mmm lovely natural weight saving, anyways that was the least of my worries at that time, when the car arrived I noticed a gash and rip in the soft top and the fact that my driver's side window won't stay up, noticed that one of the metal cables for the regulator had snapped, the easiest solution was to replace the bugga  Temporary bodge to keep the window up whilst new window regulators on both passenger and drivers side would arrive from autolink, annoyingly didn't take any photos during the swap (damn), since I was too focussed on making sure the interior was dry with a dehumidifier quick. Whilst the weather was dry and my new hardtop arrived as a fix other than replacing the soft top during the colder months I managed to swiftly get the hardtop fitted and removed the softop and the rails whilst I had the opportunity.    Quick polish and it came up pretty damn good, and the blue hardtop was growing on me. Since the hardtop was on and the window regulators replaced, gave me some time to sort out some niggly bits and buy pointless JDM trinkets, off to the interwebs I went.   Noticed my car had the flare holder, so I had to do the right thing and buy one off ebay, even came with a packet of haribos get in! During this time noticed that my immobilizer key absolutely packed in and nowhere would be able to get it fixed so I had to do the annoying job of ripping the whole system out, 3 hours of swearing and tracing wires I removed the rats nest that was under my dash, may have saved a few kilo’s too, good bit of weight saving  One thing I have noticed is Payday and yahoo auctions don’t go together since I managed to source a patlite and a set of lightweight Bridgestone zone stage 1s from japan and scored some vintage shelf speakers of shpock of all places for that late 80s early 90s vibe, Nothing like overnight parts from japan right?  Looking pretty damn smart if I say so myself, just need to wire those speakers up or see if I can turn them into a bluetooth portable speaker so I can use them in multiple cars without much effort.  However in the past few days before writing this, I sold the Bridgestones as I had a change of heart that since they were 4x114.3 I really didn't want to faf around with spacers and bodging and rolling the arch lips, instead got my eyes set on some magnesium lightweight steelies or hayashi racing STs, they were sold to a fellow forum member @paulwooley91, couldn’t have gone to a better person.  Since winter was a drag and I had nothing better to do, managed to get round to sanding the rain rails which I removed whilst I ditched the soft top, a good sand with 400 grit sandpaper and a bit of autosol as an abrasive and they were silky smooth, looking back I think that was moss not rust but hey ho it was removed. Quick nip to halfords for some rattle cans and they were sprayed up and installed back in the car with the carpets attached.  Looking much nicer now that the rails were cleaned up    One thing which let the car down was the state of the wheels, I need to spray them up properly at some point but a quicksand down with abrasive sandpaper going through the grades and a good clean they came up better than I expected, completely transformed the car  I honestly spent so much time sorting the car out that I never gave it a proper first drive, and what a first drive that was, ending up coming across another mx5 on my way off to halfords, it followed me parked up right next to me and we had a good proper chat, one of the reasons I absolutely adore the mx5 community, everyone is so friendly, reason I was glad to be back in another 5. January 2021 rolled around and managed to sort out the bloody rusty sills and arches, they are gone no more and I manage to get them undersealed for added protection. Whilst at it managed to colour match the hardtop and boy looks like a totally different car. Really do need to sort something out with the ride height though, on the hunt for some Meister R zeta CRDs , ran zetaPROs on my old mk2 which I stupidly sold 6 months before picking this mk1 eunos up, he ho hindsight is a wonderful thing.   After the major rust repair just been slowly ticking off the list of jobs I needed to do, one of them was sorting out the damn headlights, replaced the bulbs since they were awful at night and gave them a damn good polish during this time was a perfect opportunity to install the MX5techs winky eye mod (pointless but fun), this allows me to make the headlights wink and do a Mexican wave either with the headlight button or via Bluetooth on my phone, stupid dumb fun to confuse people and the postman.    Quick clean with soapy water and an old toothbrush and finishing off with some armor all interior polish, jobs a gooden   Massive difference a polish of the headlights made  Applied the clearcoat and let it dry out inside   Crazy was a little tlc can do, looking way nicer and looking happier than ever  My usdm spec license plate arrived whilst writing this up, thanks Mr postman. Not sure how to go about fitting it, my original plan and make a centre bracket that fits in the OEM bolt holes under the top lip of the bumper like the OEM bracket but angled down or what Zoom Engineering offers over in Japan. This may hide the dreaded bolt holes and saves me prepping and spraying the bumper  or I could just install my Jass performance side bracket which I have spare from my old mk2 mx5 and get replacement lightweight baby teeth since mine were removed by a past owner I'll keep this log updated on any progress and changes made in the next couple months, hopefully, be ready for a convoy down to retrorides gathering in this or the mk2 escort if I get round to sorting that. |
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Last Edit: Oct 1, 2022 20:09:47 GMT by blawrence
// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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tom13
Part of things
Posts: 571
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Mar 29, 2021 15:25:04 GMT
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Real smart with the colour coded roof now. Nice to see such a clean one, I quite like the standard look of it as well. The Daisys look smart as well. I have a rays/rota grid copy on mine at the moment but I also have a spare set of Daisys. I did have a set of hollow spokes on my previous one that looked good but 14s were a pain to get tyres for.
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I agree finding decent 14s are a pain, preferably would prefer sticking to 14s on meaty tires as I want to go for that classic 70s-80s look, for now daisy's will do the trick. Got some tartan on order to redo the door cards, budget singer
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// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Not sure what your centre bore is but there are plenty of 4x100 in 14 from the vw world. Loads of vw's are 57.1
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Main issue is tires however I fitted Uniroyal rainexperts as soon as I got the car and they seem pretty good so far especially in the wet, mx5s are 4x100 centre bore is 54.1 from memory, and have been looking around at some of the VW and BMW wheels of the era, quite fancy a set of BBS mahle's to be honest, ironically did Photoshop vw pslots on an mx5 since I have a friend with a set they don't want  |
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Last Edit: Mar 30, 2021 9:15:49 GMT by blawrence
// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Jun 22, 2021 11:27:13 GMT
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Not much has really happened in the last few months since my first post, struggling to find time to work on it, mainly been planning and waiting for certain parts to crop up for sale, the joys of wanting rare period correct JDM parts and them hardly coming up on Yahoo auctions. Missed out on rare bumpers for less than £50 since shipping is 10x that, I do wonder if it would be easier to find someone importing a minivan to the UK and dumping all my parts in the back to save on shipment cost, anyone want to help a lost soul out? 8th April: When I first picked this eunos up back in October during the worst time of the year I noticed that the boot carpet was slightly damp, realising that the 3rd break light seal was perished and required replacing as soon as possible, fast forward to half a year later I managed to find a new genuine replacement seal direct from mazda, better late than never I suppose. The seal was fraying and with every wash with the hose pipe it was spewing hard black rubber everywhere so it had to go quickly   It was an absolute doddle to remove just 2x 10mm bolts which had to be unscrewed and unclip the light from its housing and it was able to be removed and slid out. As you can see from the comparison how bad the original one was. Now the fun begins in removing the old rubber and any glue residue left   I soon found out how bloody stubborn the residue was, luckily had a can of mitre bond activator laying around and squirting that and using a flat head screwdriver to scrape the hard rubber/gunk off seemed to have done the trick, all nice and clean, now that I managed to clean the surface and got it to a point where the surface was level and ready for the new rubber I pealed back the film and stuck the rubber down ready to be installed.  All installed and no more leaky boot, what I didn't mention or take any pictures of was accidentally letting the 10mm bolt get stuck inside the nooks of the boot lid and had to fish it out with a extendable magnet wand, idiot! 16th April:New fuel filter ordered as I soon realised it was long overdue plus who doesn't love nice shiny parts   Fairly straightforward to replace, opening the fuel filler cap, tightening back up and getting underneath forgetting to put goggles on and getting crud, dirt and 90s magic flying in your face as I removed the plastic cover and unslackened the bracket and slid the old filter out and putting the new one in making sure I don't end up with fuel over my face, I mean it might help moisturise my skin and make it glowing so there would have been an upside, a new product by Loreal London, 97 ron.    5th May:  Some goodies from Japan arrived, a zoom engineering license plate bracket and metal side indicators (still need to get round to fitting these, I'll make sure to before gathering in august  Also what I consider the parts bible came too, 1994 issue of hyper rev, some light reading whilst I research what period correct catback exhaust I want   The exhaust by Wizard looks absolutely insane/bizarre I might have to try and hunt one down 7th May:I've been holding off on this job for some time until realising how easy it was to the point where I did a captain Picard facepalm. When I got the car the HVAC slider to recirculate the air was snapped off so a replacement had to be found as a result during winter the car was fogging up pretty badly. I removed the tombstone and my old radio, unscrewed the HVAC panel and reached in the back and I clipped the clips to connect to 12v power, since I had the steering column plastics off when I replaced my speedo cable this made the job a little quicker when reaching it and sliding the wired hooks of it's position      Now all I had to do was the reverse, put the new HVAC unit back in, clip the electrical connections back in and route the cables to the respected position ready to be hooked over, very much like a dire hook a duck  Looking much better now that's it's fixed and actually functional, once I get the chance I will most probably buy a new faceplate from revlimiter to freshen it up Since I had the old radio out it was the perfect opportunity to get round to fitting the one which I bought weeks after buying the car that I managed to score on ebay minutes after it was listed for £40, it was a period correct 90s Kenwood Mask with a motorized blanking plate, complete in box (used) with the all important radio code key fob and also came with the radio cage which I managed to slot into the hole in the tombstone and use that to securely install the radio snug.  |
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Last Edit: Dec 31, 2021 17:37:06 GMT by blawrence
// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Jun 22, 2021 12:34:48 GMT
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Managed to get meister R zeta CRD coilovers fitted, never got round to taking some photos of the installation but surpsingly nothing went wrong which usually isn't the case to my surprisement. I will say they are a must to any mx5 hands down, I've learned from my experience never cheap out on coilovers buy nice or buy twice , feels much stiffer and much more planted especially through the twisty bends after messing around with the damper settings, I used to have a set of zeta S on my mk2 and I highly rated them. I kept the height out of the box which dropped the car 2" front and rear compared to the mk3 monster truck look of the original height. Once I manage to find a decent set of lightweight wheels I'll adjust the height a fraction lower, just difficult to find a set of 14" 4x100 wheels that have decent offset are unique and weigh less than 5kg.    Recently I decided to test out the meisterRs in a more scenic environment so I took the car out and met up with a couple friends at the cat and fiddle inn with their 90s shitbox rovers, one with a 1.4 rover 25 with your typical coolant issue (least this time round it wasn't bubbling up like a cauldron) with a bodged brm grille and the other a rare sight on UK roads a 420 gsi tourer that I absolutely adore  |
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Last Edit: Nov 21, 2022 11:53:13 GMT by blawrence
// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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tom13
Part of things
Posts: 571
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Jun 22, 2021 18:50:42 GMT
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How come you are sticking with 14s?
I like the Daisy's and I personally have a set as well but on my previous car I had 14inch enkeis hollow spokes and rain sports were the best tyres I could get for sensible money. I went onto 15s before long as the choice was better and the fit was perfect. If you can get the e30 bbs they fit perfectly but they never come up with center caps.
The one I have just bought has mk2 enkeis on and they are a great wheel, really light and look good on a mk1 I think.
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tom13
Part of things
Posts: 571
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Jun 22, 2021 18:51:24 GMT
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Should also mention that the car looks great by the way.
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Jun 22, 2021 20:55:22 GMT
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I guess I've always loved a small wheel with a thick tirewall bit biassed as I have a mk2 escort running 13s on a 70 wall, especially with the whole vintage / period correct inspired look I'm trying to go with this mx5.
I've been looking into 14" ATS classics as they remind me of the oem wheels from triumph stags.
I know tires are a pain to find but I've pushed the Uniroyal rainexperts pretty hard through the peak district and they're not as bad as people say especially in dry but even better in the wet
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// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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tom13
Part of things
Posts: 571
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I guess I've always loved a small wheel with a thick tirewall bit biassed as I have a mk2 escort running 13s on a 70 wall, especially with the whole vintage / period correct inspired look I'm trying to go with this mx5. I've been looking into 14" ATS classics as they remind me of the oem wheels from triumph stags. I know tires are a pain to find but I've pushed the Uniroyal rainexperts pretty hard through the peak district and they're not as bad as people say especially in dry but even better in the wet Yeah I know what you mean. I much prefer a chunky sidewall as well. I love 14s but as I say the tyre choice put me off pursuing them. I'm feeling the daisy's though as well so its good to know it still looks ace on standard wheels. Is there any reason you don't run the caps? |
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I guess I've always loved a small wheel with a thick tirewall bit biassed as I have a mk2 escort running 13s on a 70 wall, especially with the whole vintage / period correct inspired look I'm trying to go with this mx5. I've been looking into 14" ATS classics as they remind me of the oem wheels from triumph stags. I know tires are a pain to find but I've pushed the Uniroyal rainexperts pretty hard through the peak district and they're not as bad as people say especially in dry but even better in the wet Yeah I know what you mean. I much prefer a chunky sidewall as well. I love 14s but as I say the tyre choice put me off pursuing them. I'm feeling the daisy's though as well so its good to know it still looks ace on standard wheels. Is there any reason you don't run the caps? I took the caps off and resprayed them just waiting to find time in a busy schedule to get round to spraying up the daisys to match and put them on, I got in contact with the 3rd owner randomly off facebook who sold it 16 years ago who told me he fitted the daisys, I know they are not the original wheels for the car as I should have hollowspokes since its a 94 1.8 after looking at the eunos brochure of the time |
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// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Dec 31, 2021 18:12:23 GMT
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Not much has really changed since I last posted on the eunos, little jobs here and there. First off, I ordered a oem replica front splitter, nothing too out there like the Garage Vary spoilers out there which make it look like a snow plow. I initially bought off BOFI racing, and lets just say that was a huge mistake, it arrived and the quality was not up to scratch, cheap WISH knock off, as evidenced that it was the exact same ones you get from wish by the serial number on the packaging. £110 it cost me with £25 shipping (included in the total), had to force them to send me a prepaid label after some back and forth on the phone as they wanted me to ship the item back to them for a refund; even in the end I was £25 out of pocket as they never refunded me the initial shipping cost. Rant over, I went with IL Motorsports front splitter whilst it was on sale on MX5 Parts, and oh my days, it was nice and day. I'll let the pictures do justice  Then came the job of fitting the spoiler, which in all honesty was fairly straight forward even if at times adjusting it was a bit of a faff, clamped it down in place, adjusting it when see fit, making pilot holes in the marked positions on the splitter and using the self supplied bolts and washers to tighten it in place, self tapping screws could have also done the same job but with the added possibility of it being ripped off (basically what happended numerous times with a rover 25 and a corsa C splitter of my mates)  Whilst the car was up in the air, thought it was best time to get rid of the god awful UK plinth (and sadly be left with some swiss cheese of a bumper, mmm lovely bumper holes, thanks Japanese license plate plinth and there so many screw holes)  Crazy how much dirt was trapped, just a bit of a clean and some t cut and it was looking much better  My USDM sized license plate was finally installed, honestly can't stand the side mounted license plates and wanted to do something a bit different, personally looks cleaner and more symmetrical, for the eagle eyed viewer you might notice that its screwed with some Moon Eyes black license plate bolts (which the metal washers have now rusted 6 months later, will give them a good clean or replace with plastic washer)  You might ask how on earth is it mounted, using an L bracket which mounts to the original Japanese license plate mounts in the top of the front bumper  |
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// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Dec 31, 2021 18:30:17 GMT
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Afterwards I discovered a company called "Japan Car History Check" , with an expensive sum of £200 I now have my cars Japanese Owner History and Car Registration Records, even though the car was imported to the UK in early 2001. With this information before show season this year I will try and find a company to reproduce my cars original Tochigi Licnese Plate as worn by its first owner back in 1994. Which I now know was some government animal research scientist. Tried emailing the company for details as I clearly see his last research paper was published 4 years ago, don't think they want some random British dude emailing about their colleagues old car which he sold back in 2000. Anyways, yahoo auctions is a dangerous game because I won this momo jackie stewart at a reasonable rate, far cheaper than what the ones on ebay germany were going for at the time including shipment from japan, I have a friend who bulk buys every month and cuts me a rate on shipment and tax so it works out cheaper. @thatbluejusty on Instagram is his name if ever you want some help importing stuff.  Honestly who doesn't love a chonky steering wheel, I absolutely adore it, just need to get my tartan door cards made up and it will be a poor mans singer  Roll around to September 2021 right before the Leicestershire late brake show live I picked up this HKS Hi Power Backbox  it was honestly rammed filthy and I think I spent about a weekend straight trying to get the overspray off with nail varnish remover and giving the whole backbox a wet and dry sand before polishing off with a drill attachment and some of gods gift "autosol". Finding a midpipe to fit was the hard part, the OCD in me had to be a 60mm OD pipe and most places near me would mate one up and scale up and down from either 57 or 63mm in the grand scheme of things it would have been easier to do that but in the back of my mind I couldn't live with that. So off to japan I went, well by that with the help of jesse streester imported a midpipe from japan.  Honestly the backbox looked the business after I polished it all up however I realised with the aesthetic I am going for I think it would be a bit too asbo looking for my taste, so I regretfully sold it on. Currently on the hunt for what exhaust to go for. I have a racing beat 200cpi sports cat waiting here to be fitted to a system, toying between a racing beat 4-1, maxim racing 4-2-1 or a pitcrew 4-1, heard good gains from the racing beat especially as its cheaper, downside heard some reviews of cracking due to use over time which I am sceptical with. Backbox wise I am leaning towards either a Fujitsubo Leaglis R, Car Make Corns v2 (which is a flanged modular system so I can swap out silencers and exhaust tip) or an Rs Factory Stage. Roll on to December and some other goodies arrived from japan that I have yet to fit, quite a tasty looking zoom engineering filler cap  Just before Christmas rolled around I treated myself to a new set of wheels, only taken me over 14 months to finally get round to choosing some which I want, only caveat they will arrive late May early June due to all new watanabe wheels being custom order. Watanabe was having a 40% discount on all their stock before they hike the price up in 2022 so before I was too late I ordered a set of 14x6.5 et14.5 watanabe type Bs in Gunmetal, with the optional centre caps and lug nuts. Here is what it would look like:  When the time comes I will most probably have to remove my front arch liner and slightly roll my rear arches but will cross that bridge when we get there So what are the plans for 2022: - Give it a service (change engine, gearbox and diff oil) - Refurbish Shifter - Find the source of the rattling in drivers side door, more noticeable at under 1000rpm - Source Exhaust and Manifold - Wrinkle Paint my Valve cover and change gasket and Cas O ring Gasket - Obtain OEM optional front strut brace - Replace window cowling - Refurbish accelerator pedal and replace rubber clutch and brake pedal - Source some bucket seats (Recaro LX or Esqueleto Type 1/2) - ITB Build with aggressive cams (whether 4age silver/blacktops or Weber/Solex/Mikuni 45 carbs) |
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Last Edit: Dec 31, 2021 22:48:14 GMT by blawrence
// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Awesome project, love the attention to detail, the pace at which you’re going and the concise but informative writing style, as well as the fact your pictures are excellent!
Nice to see a rolling resto that doesn’t quickly end up with the car off the road and a dead thread (we’ve all fallen folly of that before I’m sure!)
Keep doing what you’re doing- I don’t post often but I am an avid lurker, and I’m sure there are many more like me watching with interest, even if we stay in the shadows!
Awesome car, awesome job, love the ‘period correct’ thing as well- you’re doing just enough without loading the car up with old accessory tat that people never even bought back in the 90s!
Love it! Keep up the good work 🤙
Alex
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Missed this, good work
Thanks
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LAndy
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,057
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Always liked these - even test drove the worlds shonkyest mk1 years ago and even in it's state it was still fun to drive! Really like what you've done already and the 2022 have me interested for more!
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Last Edit: Jan 3, 2022 13:58:37 GMT by LAndy
Previous retros: 92 AX GTi 92 Scirocco Scala 94 80 sport 87 Golf Cab GTi Current retro: 1965 Clark Cortez YouTube Website Instagram |
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Quick Update, in the last hour I came across a reddit post of someone with a tochigi eunos dealer booklet, and came to the revelation there was two tochigi eunos dealerships, of which which my car came from. (Left - Eunos Ustunomiya-east) (Right - Eunos Oyama)  Considering I know where my first owner lived, literally 5 mins away from where Tsukuruma Circuit Nasu is now (Sunrise Circuit), I would have guessed he picked the closest dealership which was Utsunomiya-East as its a 40 minute drive away, Eunos Oyama would have been over 80 minutes. As a result, I wanted to reproduce the original dealership sticker what would have come with my eunos  Some messing on photoshop later I made a quick paper template (Car needs a needed wash so ignore the grime)  |
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Last Edit: Jan 3, 2022 20:35:05 GMT by blawrence
// CURRENT //
1994 Eunos Roadster
1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport
Instagram: Retro_Law
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Jul 20, 2022 18:04:55 GMT
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I owned this vehicle around the year 2013-2014 :-). I paid just £100 for it.
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MiataMark
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,968
Club RR Member Number: 29
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Some interesting progress here, will follow with interest.
Although I've fitted a side front number plate I don't like it (even as a former Alfa Romeo owner) and want to change to a centre number plate without putting holes in my bumper (as they've been filled in).
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1990 Mazda MX-52012 BMW 118i (170bhp) - white appliance 2011 Land Rover Freelander 2 TD4 2003 Land Rover Discovery II TD52007 Alfa Romeo 159 Sportwagon JTDm
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