Another restoration thread.

One front wing off. Not too bad underneath









Here is the majority of nuts, bolts and brackets from underneath the car.



Once they are fitted though they are all getting undersealed onto the car too, point being to stop water getting into the joins of where bolts meet metal.

My jacking points looked like yours, but still had some strength left to them. I used my hydraulic porta power to straighten them out, then I wire wheeled off all the surface rust, and welded some 1/8' reinforcement plates on both sides, hit it with Corrosealrust converter so it could seep up in the areas I couldn't get to. Primered it and covered with undercoating. Strong as an ox now

I reckon I will do the same, straighten it, rust convert it and weld it up for strength.

I did another bit of work this weekend. I finished stripping the back of the car and grinding the underside. Some pictures may be hard to see or understand what you are looking at but here you go.

Here is the underside after being cleaned up. There are some bits of the original underseal left on. These are in patches, when I started removing it, the metal was perfect, so I thought no point removing it. I found it very hard to get into certain areas and angles but a lot of the areas are OK. It might not look the cleanest but I made 100% sure to check everywhere, and get any bad patches etc... I was happy enough in the end to move onto the next stage.
I spent about another 3 hrs after i took the pictures hitting the small patches that can be seen
















I stripped the exterior of the arches too just to make sure there was no rust coming through under the paint.


Once I had the grinding done, I applied a load of rust converter just to double make sure nothing was missed or if there was any residual rust stuck in the metal or anything.

Rust converted surfaces

















I was a bit unsure when I spotted the colours things changed, It went orange (strangley like the colour of rust!!) and purple. Used Bilt Hamber Hydrate 80.

Now the Bad Bits, I was not fully lucky enough to avoid all the rot!
Behind the bumper bar and the inner arch sills.






Started to work on the passenger side from the rear arches to the front arches but at this stage my angle grinder started started to smoke then spark and finally packed up. Time to get a better quality one tomorrow at lunch time and get back at it tomorrow evening!!

You're lucky, looks way cleaner under there than mine does! I'm gonna start a thread soon with my rust repair pictures and you're gonna shit a brick when you see what I've had to replace.

Loving the updates, lots of attention to detail mate its great alot of that surface rust is coming off without any major spots, not surprising there is a few places that will need repairs though. Great work

Another bit of work completed.












I have not got everywhere under here, there are still a few bits more to tidy up. But that so far is 2 layers of rust bullet. You can see along the bottom where people have tried to jack it up various times in the wrong places. Annoying, but not really the end of the world.

Drivers side arches with some top coat on it.






I also got a billet shifter stabilizer and some energy suspension shifter bushings.
Got some keys too (I know it is not s GTR but i just loved the key!!) a keyring and finally a 3d printer GTIR badge.






I put in a new Kemso fuel pump into the tank and while I was at it replaced all the lines.

Also assembled some of the rear linkages onto the subframe.
Can anyone tell me, is there any bushings between the metal of the subframe and the rear diff? I was going to put it ll together but then though that there would be some type of bushing there.

Looks great mate.

Looks bloody fantastic! No, I don't think there are bushing on the diff itself, but I could be wrong.

Thanks, I didn't have any bushings lying around from the diff either so i assume you are right about it not needing bushings.

The kitchen table is the perfect place for doing greasy work



Can anyone tell me for a fast road setup where on the dial these bolts should be?




Tomorrow im going to fill the diff with oil, through the breather hole at the top of it, then mount the whole assembly to the car as well as the fuel tank. as the fuel tank has to go in first i believe.

I can't tell you where they need to be, that's going to vary for each and every car. You'll need to take the car in for a 4 wheel alignment, those are your toe adjusters.

For best tire wear the rear toe should be set at zero, but if you want a little more lively handling, a bit of toe out will give you some mild oversteer, at the expense of tire wear.

I forgot to take pictures of the underneath after i put a black top coat on it. I used black rustoleium and put nice thick layers on. Same as in the wheel arches as showed earlier.

I have been chugging along the last few days getting things put back together. I started with the interior. I sprayed inside the rear quarter panels with Bilt Hamber Dynax s80, before putting back on the inner trim panels, Fitted the carpet and seat belts etc, a lot of th plastics but i have not fully secured everything down yet.



I came across a few anomalies when re assembling the dash if anybody can help me out.

1) These 3 buttons



I have wiring for the fog lights (but no fog lights fitted), I have wiring for the hazard lights, but I have no wiring for the rear window demister. Is this normal or am i just missing the blocks for the rear demister somehow? Or maybe the buttons are labeled wrong. I cant imaging not having a rear demister.

2) The centre console.


I cant figure our for the life of me how to fit the Stereo and Cup holder into this dash.



Is there 2 different versions of center dash?


I took some pictures of the rear subframe fitted here. The only part of the rear of the car i didn't tidy up is the Sheet metal petrol tank harness, this is not a very important part of the car and I have a spare one, so if it disintegrates at any stage, I can just replace it. It does look a bit shabby under the all newly painted underside though. Everything is covered in underseal too as I sprayed it on when fitted.









I'm also going to cover the inner suspension strut in the last picture in underseal. and will cover the Meister R coilovers in underseal too when fitted. That is all for now.

One other small thing I noticed is with the powerflex bushings, the nuts holding the subframe on are very tight with regard threading onto the studs sticking down, I would guess the nuts are only barely fully threaded onto the studs.

Looks fantastic you've done a very good job there, however up to you but i would not coat the coilovers with underseal, lots of other stuff you can coat them with to protect the anodised finish that wont look horrible, last thing you want if adjustments need to be made is all that crap getting stuck all over your hands plus it will garm up all your threads etc making adjustment a horrible messy process

Thanks for the advice Bob, I didn't cover any threads in the stuff alright, but i had some already put on the shocks

Today I got the brakes on and everything bolted up








The checked to see how the wheels look.

How Criminal would it be for me to prefer my Rotas, and fit the Rotas over a set of Compomotives MO6s??













Also checked to see how the wheels look.

How Criminal would it be for me to prefer my Rotas, and fit the Rotas over a set of Compomotives MO6s??

looking good mate, I have to admit i like the Compomotives.

Personally, I wouldn't desecrate my rare Japanese machine with inferior replica Rota wheels. Compomotive all the way.

Not to mention those Rotas are copies of a Mugen MF8 and if anything, belong on a Honda.

Also, I'm not sure if you were just test fitting your sway bar end links, but I noticed you have both of the bushings on one side of the shock bracket, they're supposed to be one on each side.

I was just going to say the same thing about the bushes then saw your comment Ryan.....

The Rotas are a replica of the Rays ce28n.

I actually bought the compomotives for the very same reason, I thought the car would deserve "real" wheels. then I got the face of the wheels refurbished. But when I compare the wheels I think I just prefer the look of the Rotas.

The drop links, I just shoved them on, I never fitted a set before, but knew they were not right as they didn't sit good. But I wanted to go home from the garage so never fixed them.

I prefer the comps but it’s your car and if we all liked the same then every R would be the same

I just don't like replica wheels, I think it's an abomination and how these companies survive without having their collective asses sued off, I will never know.
What's really funny is people who buy "Japan Racing" wheels, only to find out they're made in the Philippines hahahaha

To be honest I don't think it matters wether they are reps or not half the time your just paying for a name just because it's a brand some things are a complete rip off as long as replicas are good quality that's all that counts imo

Replicas aren't ever good quality and when it comes to wheels, you get what you pay for. High quality japanese wheels are forged, replica wheels are cast aluminum and shatter like china plates. Forged wheels just bend. Big difference.  That's not my subjective opinion, it's fact.

I've seen way too many rep wheels broken into pieces from hitting a pot hole.

But enough of me hijacking this thread, back to the build.

I have personally never come across any Rota horror stories (in real life, not online) and know plenty of people that have them. I have Rays TE37s on my daily car, but they cost a fortune.
I do understand that they are of lesser quality, but they have met all the European safety standards and pass JWL/VIA testing so cant see them being that bad.
They are however just piggy backing on other companies spending millions on design though so do lose respect as a brand.

But yeah all the Honda guys with their stupid camber and $60,000 Civics have argued enough about this online, so moving on.

This week I plan to fit the Gear linkage back in with the new bushings, billet counter weight and B&M short shifter then get the propshaft back on. I'm not going to plumb the brakes or fuel tank as I think the engine needs to come out to fit all the new lines in?

If time is good to me I may get the front Antiroll bar, wishbones and front hubs back on.

I need to order another few cans of underseal though! Its a very expensive job doing all this!

Short drop links are for the front and the longer ones are for the rear also from memory.

Yea, you sure would have a hard time fitting new lines with the engine in place. Would be nearly impossible, unless maybe you removed the intake manifold.