idrive_MD
New member
- Joined
- Aug 8, 2011
- Location
- Belcamp, MD
Well I have had my car for a good few months now, just driving it along and noting the "issues". I have actually only driven the car a few weeks personally as it spent quite some time at my parents house being put to use a lot because my sister has thing for wrecking cars, so I lent it to them while they were a car down. I get it back from them and drive to/from work for a couple of weeks and all of a sudden my starter goes up, so I figure I'd pull the motor and trans to do an overhaul.
Since the beginning of ownership I have been browsing and occassionally posting in the forum looking for ideas and deals and just generally learning about this new old car of mine. I quickly decided which direction I wanted to take the car in and have settled on a OEM+ resto-mod type approach. I am seeking a clean, stylish, reliable and comfortable daily driver for the short work route and for some long hauls for meets and such.
I have 2 general build phases with the car;
phase 1: OEM+ where I will fix, improve and clean up where I can.
phase 2: resto-mod where I will continue to modify stuff like the suspension, electronics, and performance...this includes an engine swap of sorts (right now I have a Nissan VQ40).
I have basically started phase1 with the recent engine removal and parts purchases. I have no real clue to set plans on when phase2 will start so I want the original B230 to be as reliable as possible and unfortunately the original owners got to a point where they just stopped driving it and caring for it, so it has seen some maintenance neglect. The car has a lot of original or OEM parts on it and it is fairly clean to begin with, so I can only assume this was a 1-owner car that may have been past down to someone in the family where the neglect began, I snatched it up at an auction.
Enough story, onto pictures and some more words to make sense of them.
The first meeting of my two prides:
The big interior clean out, just quick and simple really:
The tear down begins (this was initiated by a starter bolt I could just not remove and lost patiences with, so out it all came):
I've broken it down a bit more from the last picture. I have the engine and trans seperated and all brackets and pulleys removed except the hoisting mounts and the timing gear stuff.
I'm doing all of the work at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds Autocraft skills center (a DIY shop) for government civilians and servicemen. Its a great place and I have been going there since I was 10yrs old helping my dad work on his projects, I'm now 28 and I refuse to change oil lying on my back!
Anyhow, I am still waiting on a host of parts to come in from IPD next week, so in the mean time I am focusing on getting it mounted to engine stand, cleaning up what ever brackets I can and I will start painting things as I can. Right now I am exploring free options of cleaning parts via work through ultrasonic tanks and some parts washers, but I dont think I am getting the results I was looking for.
Additionally, the anal tendacies inside of me are beginning to rear up and I think I will start doing casting line removal on some of the brackets to clean them up even further. I just can't help myself even though I know most them will never be seen.
Since the beginning of ownership I have been browsing and occassionally posting in the forum looking for ideas and deals and just generally learning about this new old car of mine. I quickly decided which direction I wanted to take the car in and have settled on a OEM+ resto-mod type approach. I am seeking a clean, stylish, reliable and comfortable daily driver for the short work route and for some long hauls for meets and such.
I have 2 general build phases with the car;
phase 1: OEM+ where I will fix, improve and clean up where I can.
phase 2: resto-mod where I will continue to modify stuff like the suspension, electronics, and performance...this includes an engine swap of sorts (right now I have a Nissan VQ40).
I have basically started phase1 with the recent engine removal and parts purchases. I have no real clue to set plans on when phase2 will start so I want the original B230 to be as reliable as possible and unfortunately the original owners got to a point where they just stopped driving it and caring for it, so it has seen some maintenance neglect. The car has a lot of original or OEM parts on it and it is fairly clean to begin with, so I can only assume this was a 1-owner car that may have been past down to someone in the family where the neglect began, I snatched it up at an auction.
Enough story, onto pictures and some more words to make sense of them.
The first meeting of my two prides:
The big interior clean out, just quick and simple really:
The tear down begins (this was initiated by a starter bolt I could just not remove and lost patiences with, so out it all came):
I've broken it down a bit more from the last picture. I have the engine and trans seperated and all brackets and pulleys removed except the hoisting mounts and the timing gear stuff.
I'm doing all of the work at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds Autocraft skills center (a DIY shop) for government civilians and servicemen. Its a great place and I have been going there since I was 10yrs old helping my dad work on his projects, I'm now 28 and I refuse to change oil lying on my back!
Anyhow, I am still waiting on a host of parts to come in from IPD next week, so in the mean time I am focusing on getting it mounted to engine stand, cleaning up what ever brackets I can and I will start painting things as I can. Right now I am exploring free options of cleaning parts via work through ultrasonic tanks and some parts washers, but I dont think I am getting the results I was looking for.
Additionally, the anal tendacies inside of me are beginning to rear up and I think I will start doing casting line removal on some of the brackets to clean them up even further. I just can't help myself even though I know most them will never be seen.
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