Wisco Touring International

[Earl]

I am hoping for a nice package today=) Let's hope it arrives to keep my spirits high. I just got my RTAB sleeves back from being bored out. The manufacturer forgot to machine the ID, so my bolts would not fit. All is good now.

[killerkiyoshi]

This is cool!! would love to see this car in real life! are you going to be at any car shows this year?
here is my car
http://www.318ti.org/forum/showthread.php?t=38439

[Earl]

If I get it all together in time I will be at Eurowerks 7 and H20i.

[Earl]

Saturday was spent waiting for a package that needed to be signed for. That package never came=/ It was late in the afternoon and I didn't feel like driving 45 minutes to the shop to do a half hour of work.



I did end up spraying my air tank in satin clear to keep the textured paint from rubbing off.



I also ended up removing all of these suckers from the OZ barrels:







Hopefully the package that I was waiting on comes today. I will be ordering most of the engine parts I need to start throwing it back together after I get the timing cover off.



I'm hoping that wednesday I can assemble and install the subframe so that I can take the car to get the bay welded up=) After that I can disassemble it again to do the wheel bearings. Yay

[Earl]

Just placed a huge order on ECS tuning for all of the miscellaneous parts I will need in order to assemble everything=) Hopefully I didn't miss anything. The total was surprisingly only $365.

[Earl]

Well I finally have a somewhat exciting update=)

Tuesday I missed a package, but did end up getting my box from Germany.


And the contents (plus another set of tail lights)


Yesterday I tackled installing the euro glovebox. Here is a comparison between the two gloveboxes.


I removed the metal piece under my dash to find two brackets. One was welded to the dash frame, and the other was bolted to the radio surround. Getting at the bolts for the one on the radio surround sucked. After about 15 minutes of cussing I got it off.



I then covered my wires under the dash and broke out the angle grinder to remove the mount from the dash frame.



That orange piece is another melted crayon that I found under the console. That brings the total to 3.

Then I quickly installed the new glovebox.


It needs a little tweaking, but I love it=) I also installed a new handbrake handle, but I didn't take a picture since it is nothing special.

I headed home after this to see if my package had arrived. Let the pictures do the talking.





The 3.5" lip is wider than my phone is tall=) I am very excited to get these wheels assembled and fitted. I will be sand blasting my barrels today because a scotchbrite pad wasn't working as well as I thought it would.

Updates to come after Saturday.

[teetime4one]

Dig the new glove box. That might be the only one in the states. Cool man...cool

[Earl]

It's not=) Bryan (eurohb) had one shipped here through the same person, and I'm sure there are a handful of euro spec cars here.

[anassa]

wow, that looks great! and seems a lot more useful too.

Those lips look pretty amazing too, can wait to seethose wheels done and that rear setup of yours done too. Its going to be nice!

[Earl]

Originally Posted by anassa

wow, that looks great! and seems a lot more useful too.

Those lips look pretty amazing too, can wait to seethose wheels done and that rear setup of yours done too. Its going to be nice!

Thank you. I cannot wait either. I really wish my faces would have been back by now. I am trying to get my buddy to finish them by the end of the week=)

Small updates from Saturday. I had the barrels bead blasted on Thursday so I figured I would paint them. I used Tractor and Implement paint from Fleet Farm. It lays really nice and is pretty durable.





I missed a few spots and ran out of paint. I'll be touching that up tonight. I also noticed that two barrels have a few flat spots in the lips=( Looks like I'll be going wider out back this coming winter.

After that I decided to reinstall my RTAB's properly. I had the sleeves bored out correctly at work since Silver Project accidentally missed an operation on them. The funny thing is that the machinist at work didn't bore them all the way through=( Today I will be running a 15/32 bit all the way through so that I can bolt the trailing arms up. I decided I will do the wheel bearing while they're mounted on the car because the car really needs to roll to get the bay welded up at my friends shop. The bushing went in smooth as butter this time though=D




I then decided that since I got the euro glovebox in, why not tackle the driverside cubby. Of course there was yet another stupid metal pad.



Then of course a bracket had to be welded to the frame to keep me from a straight bolt on install. (That polkadotted rusty bracket)



I decided that a dremel was smarter than an angle grinder this time.



After that was off the piece fit well=)



I did notice that you can see through the opening below the column. I believe that is because the metal pad covered that a little before. I'm going to make a little plate to sit there to pretty it up.

Tonight I will be out at the shop painting the barrels more, installing the trailing arms, and possibly painting the CV axle shafts. I will also be doing a little fiberglass repair and shaving on some parts. I'll show you what I mean tomorrow=)

[Earl]

I got a tiny bit done yesterday.

My friend couldn't make it out, so fiberglass repair or shaving was done. Hopefully later this week, or sometime next week that can happen.

I did touch up the barrels and now they are finished=) Now I just need the faces and my wheels can be assembled.

I got the sleeves pressed into my RTAB's finally. The bad thing is that no matter how hard I tried, I always pushed part of the bushing out of the arm. I used a c clamp and applied even pressure to get them in. All would look great until I took the clamp off. The bushing would then return to shape but be pushed out about 1/16"-1/8". I didn't want to mess with them anymore and it shouldn't cause any issues. I then threw the trailing arms onto the subframe and placed the bolts in without tightening them. The ends were somewhat of a pain to get in due to the bushings being pressed out a little. Only one of them didn't go in all that great, but it will perform fine. I also attached the diff to feel accomplished=)



I think I might clean the bolts up when I put them in for good. While I was at it, I repainted the CV axles. The paint on the shafts was half gone and there was a good amount of surface rust. I cleaned all that up, sprayed on some primer, and then finished with black. They don't look half bad for as little time as I spent on them. They'll look good under the car=)



I believe I will be going back to the shop on Wednesday. My order from ECS tuning is delayed right now due to a few parts. Hopefully that ships soon.

[teetime4one]

Minty!
This thread is totally inspirational Earl. Great work dude!

[Earl]

Originally Posted by teetime4one

Minty!
This thread is totally inspirational Earl. Great work dude!

Thank bud=) I'm just trying to make a nice example of a compact. So far so good.

I just finally noticed there is a birthday cake on your posts....lol What's that for?

[teetime4one]

Originally Posted by Earl

Thank bud=) I'm just trying to make a nice example of a compact. So far so good.

I just finally noticed there is a birthday cake on your posts....lol What's that for?

This car will be a great example once completed.
Dude, it's my birthday. lol
The cake will disappear tomorrow...until next May 21st...when you'll see it again. (everyone gets it on their birthday)

[Earl]

Well Happy Birthday to you I did not know that. I was going back through my thread and even old posts of yours had it so I got confused.