Super clean PS13

Dropped the front today. Ride height is alright. Tiny rub on full lock left on one arch, think it may be the arch liner. But might sort itself out once a bit of camber has been dialled in, which I'll get done when it gets aligned probably next week. Tracking is waaaaay out anyway.





Also, need to chuck a hicas removal kit on it. Does anyone know what you have to do with the any lines etc when you use the kit?

 

Had a few jobs to get done on Sunday. The car has been registered and on the road for a couple of weeks now. Wanted to fit my seat as my rail turned up. Change the oil and filter. And fit the DW hicas lockout kit as one of the ball joints was worn anyway, so two birds with one stone.

Started well enough. Out with the old..



In with the new. Really happy with how it feels.



And that was where the progress for Sunday came to a halt. I drained all the old oil out and got up to tackle the oil filter. This thing was on so fucking tight. Me and two friends all had a go with hands, with gloves on, and nothing. It was so tight to the block, that there was no possible way I could get room to try the old screw driver trick. So my friend popped to Cheltenham to grab a wrench off a mate. It was one of the strap type ones. Totally fucking useless. 5 minutes of flailing at getting it lined up over the filter, for it to have zero effect when you turned it. So we gave that up and I borrowed a proper claw type wrench from my friend's garage the next day, world of difference. 20 seconds later and it was off, put the nice new oil in, job done.






So today and a little bit of yesterday we spent a total of 2 hours probably trying to hammer the fuck out of the ball joints on the hicas arms to get them out. No dice. Even after clearing as much space as possible to get to it by taking off the shock and one of the arms. Huge ass hammer, huge bar to smack it... nothing. Blasted the fuck out of it with a blowtorch.... nothing. So we've settled on taking the hubs off completely.



Popping into my friends garage tomorrow to have the joints pressed out. And whilst he's at it, he can shave like 1 thread off each of my wheel studs as where they come through the conversion spacer, the stick out about a mil and foul on my wheels.

So we tackled the power steering pump and moved my air intake etc out the way. Took the back plate off the pump to take the little impeller blade/vane things out. I kickstarted a modular magnet pen about 6 months ago and it turned up the other day. Barely looked at it, but it turns out it's perfect for sucking these little bastards out.



Put all that back together and hopefully tomorrow will be a case of picking up the hubs, chucking the actual lockout kit on, which I imagine being pretty easy, and then just looping the correct power steering lines and deleting the unnecessary junk.

 

Also discovered last night that the car has solid subframe bushes. That with the 2-way and a couple of things just make me wonder what this car was like in Japan. It's so clean underneath, the two just don't seem to go together. Either way, not complaining. Really clean and ready to skid.

 

Hicas kit went in today. Picked the hubs up from the garage, should have just given them to my friend in the first place.

Just looped the lines at the back here so they stopped pissing fluid out. It had been raining all evening so we just left it at this for now, will loop the lines at the front tomorrow and remove all of the unnecessary lines/solenoids.

 

Boring non picture post. But got lots of little things done on the car.

Sorted out the hicas lockout power steering line nonsense.
Took out the front arch liners
Rolled the lips on the front arches slightly just to sort out a bit of scrubbing under cornering.
Got the car aligned.

All feels sweet now. Next week or so I'll be doing the turbo elbow, downpipe and de-cat, as the car has a posh RSR exhaust, but it's only catback.

 

So, spent the day taking out the old cat, downpipe and turbo elbow, and replacing them with shiny new Japspeed ones. This was a nightmare of a job. 25 year old, seized on bolts are not my friend. Anyway, after a little help from a friend for a few sparticularly stubborn nuts, all was in and sitting nicely upto the RSR cat-back exhaust.

Out with the old:





In with the new:

 

So set about fitting my new intercooler this week.



All went pretty well, if not taking me longer than it would most. Fitted a new battery in the meantime. Had some help from some friends including Chapman as to where to plug what vac line in, definitely helped me get a better understanding of it all. At the same time I banned the carbon canister, stock dump valve and the boost solenoid.



Had to make some custom little brackets for the core to fit. Bit weirder out by this core having one bracket on top and two on bottom, always seen it the other way around.



Went for a test drive with the bumper off. All was great, pulled hard and then something popped and I lost all boost and came to a limping halt. Got the car home and got my friend to take me back to the dual carriageway where we found the culprit. I forgot to tighten the hose clamp on this bung.



Sorted that and started putting the front back together. Will take it for a test drive later today, hopefully everything is fully secure now and there are no issues.