Slow moving build up

And rear unless you want it to handle poorly! Well, you still might have worse handling until you get some roll correction spacers on there.

Looking good!

klr142 said:

And rear unless you want it to handle poorly! Well, you still might have worse handling until you get some roll correction spacers on there.

Looking good!

Click to expand...

I'd love to redo the whole suspension, but I gotta decide how to divvy the money up between the cars, motorcycle, and house. Right now the house is winning. The +t will be the next chunk of money put into this car.

The other day the car wouldn't start. I couldn't get to it right away, so I put a space heater in it and walked away. I've had a water leak for years that pools up in the read driver side foot well. I use towels to get the bulk of it, but every once in awhile I run a space heater to dry it out. We've looked several times trying fix the leak, put silicone in a bunch of places that we thought might be it, and even paid a mechanic to look. After the space heater ran for awhile the car fired right up, then I remember it did the same thing a few years ago. So I've had enough and this water leak ends now. I started by pulling the whole interior and running the space heater for 24 hours. While the interior is out I might as well put in the sound deadner I've wanted for years and the power mirrors I have stashed.

We started by removing the factory tar mats. I hit it with a torch while my oldest used the oscillating multi tool to scrape. We did everything put the driver foot wells, since this took a lot of labor and we pulled 7lbs of material. Since I'm not building a race car I didn't think pulling the front area was worth the effort.

20211124_114341 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

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Now I have to lay in the car while a kid soaks the outside with a hose and hopefully I can find water pouring in. I already pulled the plugs and made sure the pinch weld drains are all clear. I didn't see any debris there.

Progress has been made on the Killmat. I'm heading out right now to cover the driveshaft area between the rear passenger feet, then I'm done from the B pillars back.

20211208_141403 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

20211208_151844 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

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20211210_105609 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

When a project snowballs you might as well let it roll....I upgraded to 1/0 wire running to the amp in the trunk.

20211216_115344 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

I used the factory wire pass through the John242ti taught me about.

20211217_131126 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

Little service loop just outside the firewall. I also sealed up the pass through at the firewall plug with silicone.

20211217_131330 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

I found one source of water coming in at the wiper motor, which dripped down onto the EZK. I pulled the grommet and siliconed it to the firewall and then more silicone where the motor goes inside the grommet. There's another leak on the passenger side of the center console and somewhere on the driver side too.

I think I fixed all 3 water leaks on the firewall. They were the grommet around the wiper motor, grommet for the vacuum line that runs the vents, and the grommet I had the old amp power wire through. Now I've have power mirrors installed, sound deadner on both front doors, and on the passenger floor.

20211223_120716 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

20211223_125036 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

20220107_134348 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

I didn't go to town covering the doors, so I might go back when the weather is better and add more.

I finished laying down the killmat, at least for now. I also finally got around to adding the 3D printed shift boot adapter I got months ago. Now I wish I could remember what I did with the file or which TB member I got it from, so I could tweak it to fit better.

2022-01-14_10-52-42 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

2022-01-14_10-51-51 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

I replaced the foam mats that go under the carpet. I was able to get more coverage and the new material is a feather weight compared to the old beat up mats. I ordered the 48"x70" package and had enough to do one car with some scrap material left over.

Design Engineering Carpet Lite

20220115_153527 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

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20220130_154413 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

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The car is "done" now and put back together. The power mirrors still don't work. I swapped relays and switches with no luck, so I need to find a way to test them. I also need to figure out why my wipers don't work now. I'm guessing that was me getting distracted and forgetting to connect the ground or something.

With the 1/0 wire I can now turn my sub all the way up and the needle on the volt gauge doesn't even wiggle. That's after changing all the power wire in the engine bay to 1/0 and upgrading to a 100A Denso a few years ago and still getting a decent voltage drop when the sub hit. The sound deadner works great. Road noise has gone down significantly, to the point that I now hear every creak and rattle in the dash. It also seems to not muffle the exhaust at all, so now it's more prominent and therefore louder.

In 2003, when I bought the car, I had a really cool Sony flip-down head unit installed. After a handful of years, it stopped playing CDs. I swapped it for a used Alpine I got for free, which eventually stopped playing CDs. My 242 stereo also doesn't play CDs, so I've been running with just FM for years. I finally jumped into the modern era with a brand new Alpine CDE-1758T. I finally have AUX, USB, Bluetooth, and hands-free calling!

20220614_131654 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

20220614_132638 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

I finally got a strut brace from BNE Racing!

20231003_152758 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr

I also got seats from a 2013 Dodge Dart. They offer some decent bolster, but have much more padding than the Subaru seats I'm currently running. Now I just have to get them mounted to Volvo rails.

20231007_170546 by M. Blue 240, on Flickr