95naSTA

Ok. So.. ABS tuck and FWI it is. With a little trimming and the OEM bracket welded in there, it will fit like it belongs. If I can't fit my charcoal canister in there too (went above and forward of proposed abs block location) then I'll just move it to the other side.

Ohh. Thats what you meant. I had to enlarge the holes behind my headlights to run the E39 projectors. I thought that's what you were talking about. That Audi pic, yeah It would point at the filter in the bay. I know I've seen better more tasteful examples but I can't find one at the moment.

Thanks guys. The bay will be black onyx, same as the exterior. I saw those magents for $5 at harbor freight and it was a no brainer. lol. I'm confused by what you mean by this statement.

That is another option. But whenever I see those panels I know right away that that person took the easy way out.

Thanks. Now I have a question for you guys.. Should I try and tuck the ABS distribution block? If I do, I'll loose the ability to run a FWI and have to run an open cone in the bay. I could do something like this to make up for it a little bit: http://www.rs-quattro.de/treffenoster07/N%...0Bild%20012.jpg (and it would undoubtedly look less crappy since I have quad headlights)

List of stuff that's been happening: Most of the ordered parts came in (ACDelco rack/bushings/power steering lines/blower motor/booster/proportioning valves/00+ tie rods. Delphi heater core. All oem subframe bushings/caps/spacers/bolts. 20' of red and black 4 gauge wire, remote terminals.) Picked up the ALT/FPR brackets and the long tube brackets form the powder coater Dropped off the header box (ceramic satin), power steering subframe hard line (purple), and STB (purple) Dropped off the fuel rail and fittings to be anodized On the passenger side: Cut and moved the battery relocation tray up a bit since it was hitting the bumper a little Cut out the pinched seam above tire that keeps me from getting lower and welded it up Cut out some rust and repaired Cut the whole battery tray sheet metal out since it was a mess, welded in new Welded in 4 major holes near battery tray plus a few smaller ones Welded in half of the rad support holes Kitty haired the whole battery area and sanded (ready for muddin) Mudded the rad support Undercoated the new battery tray metal, welded seam, rust repair I still have a shiton of sanding left on the passenger side but I threw some rattle can primer on there to keep the bare metal covered. Water can get through but it's better than nothing. This + the wiring will be the most labor/time intensive parts of the build. How I have the patience for this.. dunno. Pics:

I got the fogs in and wired up earlier this week and I had my buddy run the car through a car dealer car wash today while I was out running errands on the Bonnie.. So I figured I would snap some pics. Before and afters: Other than the pin stripe, the only major offenders are the drivers side doors: I'm praying I come across those doors for cheap, and I can get the pin stripe for free so that will come eventually.

I'll have to see just how much is feasible. But yep, that's the plan. The passenger side is cake, but all the ABS crap on the driver's side is going to be a PITA. As much as I would like to delete it, it's proved it's worth too many times. I'm also planning on an engine harness tuck but with so many variables with the engine/trans already I convinced myself to do that after everything is in and running correctly.

Thanks guys. I'm trying to keep this ball rolling. I'm here about half the time from now till June. Ordered: ACDelco rack/bushings/power steering lines/blower motor/booster/proportioning valves/00+ tie rods. Delphi heater core. All oem subframe bushings/caps/spacers/bolts. 20' of red and black 4 gauge wire, remote terminals. I have the entire body harness from my old car and I'll be using it to extend and relocate some of the engine bay harnesses. The fenders are coming off and the routing will be moved out there held high with coushin clamps. The next stage is the cut and weld part of the project. I'll be filling holes, fixing rust, making clearance for things, etc. Other major hit items are the bodywork associated with the cutting and welding, the wiring, and cunifer brake lines.

I'm finally making some headway. I stripped the bay, picked up most of the stuff from the powder coater, got the car off the street, fixed the blower motor housing where it had rusted through, and got some obligatory in the engine bay pics. I've been thinking about a solution to the cracked firewall plastic.. I broke off all of the old plastic and insulation when I was stripping the bay and realized that the bare blower motor housing, if cleaned up, would look just fine. I'm going to give it to the powder coater and have it ceramic coated. That will be simple enough to keep a lot of the heat out and make it look good. I'm also going to give them my STB to have done in purple and probably other things as I go. My electric water pump is boxed up and ready to be sent out for a rebuild, I've got 8 S1 L67 injectors boxed up and ready to be cleaned/tested, and the parts I need anodized ready to go as well.

I put everything up on a blog. Part 2 and 3 have some new pics and video. http://95nasta.infiniteboost.com/

Sex.. I need to delay and re-route my flight home.

^^ Sick. When I was in Yoko in the fall of 09 I had planned on going to Mt Fuji but it rained sideways on my day off. lol. I hope to get there eventually. I wonder if Iwakuni is similar to Sasebo.. Sasebo is quite a bit different from the hustle and bustle of Tokyo and Yoko. My buddy is about to be stationed in Okinawa for a year and I may head over there at some point. I've gotten pretty comfortable over here. The people here have so much honor and are extremely helpful. It's pretty refreshing.. I jump on every chance I can to get over here. Here's some pics from Sasebo last year: https://picasaweb.google.com/cooneym63/Sase...feat=directlink And from Yoko and Tokyo Fall of '09: https://picasaweb.google.com/cooneym63/Japa...feat=directlink

Last week I flew solo from Cali to Japan. This is the fourth time over here and third time in the Tokyo/Yokosuka area. The way my work does drastic time zone changes is it gives you a day off after you travel to and from. I decided to take advantage of this and go on a little adventure.. I found the largest Ski resort within a reasonable distance from Tokyo and booked a room in the Roppongi part of Tokyo to stay on the way back. I originally flew into Narita/Tokyo and then took a bus about 2 hours south to Yokosuka, where I'll be working. So, that's where I started. Monday morning (+14 hours from EST) I left for Kagura to go snowboarding.. Small road block.. Hit up an ATM, didn't work. lol. With only 13000 Yen ($160) this was going to be a problem. I called up the bank and they were closed. I realized I can take out cash from my work CC but I never set up a pin. I called them up via skype and couldn't work the automated pin reset because the number tones stop working after the call connects. Googled that, got it to work, got a pin, and left again. That card didn't work.. Now I was thinking it may be an issue with Japanese ATMs, I tried one on base and I was good to go. I hop on the JR Sobu line up to Tokyo and then the Bullet train up to Yuzawa. There are a few ways to get there and different fares for different cars or reserved seats. One thing I learned last year is that if you have the word written down in English handy, it goes much futher than trying to pronounce/butcher the word. If I didn't have this I would have probably been screwed. Getting to Tokyo is easy, taking a Shinkasen (bullet) train past there is a new one for me. Figuring out where to go in Tokyo Station is pretty simple. Figuring out which Shinkasen is a little weird since it can branch off.. but deduction helps. After an hour and a half up to Tokyo and an hour and a half on the bullet train I arrived at Echigo Yuzawa Station in the Chuetsu Region of the Niigata Perfecture. It's north-west of Tokyo and of the opposite coast. There are a lot of resorts in the area and there are lifts literally right up the street. A local bus runs from the station to a few of the resorts but the signs for these are all in Japanese. Being so close and not really wanting to press my luck I just took a cab. I tried saying Kagura.. then showed the driver it written and I was golden. The driver said, pretty broken, 'So, you don't know any Japanese?!' lol. I guess knowing shapes, colors, numbers, and lots of random things isn't very helpful. I really wish I would have gotten further with the Rosetta Stone.. I get to the base of the mountain and I can't see anything but a rental place and a cableway. Getting a lift ticket and renting was relatively painless. I kinda loled when the shoe chart only went up to size 10 (I'm 12). I got everything I needed and headed up to the base of a few lifts via Mitsumata Ropeway from the rental. It's a pretty big cart that holds about 40 people. I get off and Sweet! A map! ... and almost none of it is in English. I couldn't figure out where I was, how far up, etc. I didn't even know the name of the ropeway I came up at this point.. A little more homework would have helped. Slowly but surely I got my bearings, going on different lifts, etc. I swear I had to be on this one closed car lift for at least 20 mins. This place was freaking huge. I probably only hit up a third of the trails and I was spent. Only having snowboarded in the Poconos before I was pretty overwhelmed. When I got back to the rental place I asked about the bus and they were able to understand and point me in the right direction. Interesting thing about the buses is.. You get on without paying and you have to look up at the front to see your fare. The stops are numbered but written in Japanese and you pay when you leave. Luckily, there was a European couple (first non Japanese people I saw at the resort) who got on at the same time so I was able to figure out my fare buy following them. Bullet train back to Tokyo, wander around for a bit and try to figure out my way to the Roppongi on foot. I banked on using the vague memory I had of a map of Tokyo and the small street maps they have at every few corners. I didn't have much luck with that so I just took a taxi. The hotel room was about the same size as the one I have in Yokosuka but a bit newer/nicer. I wandered around Roppongi for a bit to get my bearings then hung out in the room for a little while to waste time. Things don't really start getting interesting till later there. I went back out to do a bit more wandering around and get some food. The hustlers where in full effect. There were groups of African dudes trying to get me to go to Brazilian/Russian strip shows on almost every corner of Gaien Higashi street. I've done enough homework to know that a lot of those girls probably aren't of age or here legally. And a lot of those places were on the upper levels of these buildings. From what I've read, it gets shadier as you go up. Try as I might, I can't really get my party on by myself. I wandered around for a bit, got some I don't know what food, a couple drinks and headed up to bed. I used up about all of the ambition I had for 1 day and just had to call it quits. It's probably better off, especially since I was by myself with no one really knowing where I am. The next morning I hit up the free breakfast and I decided to try and find my way back to the JR Sobu Yokosuka line on foot. I figured this way I can do some random sightseeing. I saw a bus stop for Shinbashi Station. That particular station is a couple stops away from Tokyo Station toward Yokosuka.. I've ended up here a couple times after wandering through the Ginza. With no map or GPS I followed the bus stops and then street signs and wound up right where I wanted. It was sweet to end up in a familiar place. Then back to Yokosuka I went.. Here are the pictures I took so far: I'll probably be adding more but mainly or Yokosuka since it's time to work. https://picasaweb.google.com/cooneym63/Japa...feat=directlink Hope you guys enjoy.

Thanks! Fwiw I bought it for $1700 and I've only spend $500 on it so far.

I didn't get a chance to clean off the rest of the car and the interior but here are some more pics. I didn't get the fog brackets under the bumper.. That will happen outside in the dark/cold I guess. And the paint match is definitely not 100% but decent none the less.

Today was a good day for the i30. I woke up at 4:30 this morning with roughly 2 hrs of sleep, rolled up past Albany, picked up and installed the newer leather seats. I still have to wire up the heated portion of the seats and install that specific center console. After I got home I picked up the painted bumper and fender and put those on with the new headlights. There are some alignment tweaks to make still, I didn't install the fogs, and it's missing the pin stripe. Here's a quick pic. I'll try and grab some more tomorrow before I head out a few weeks.

I got the bumper and fender finished up and over to my painter buddy today. They should be ready next weekend. Also going to get some nicer condition 4th gen max tan leather heated seats next saturday morning. The current ones are pretty beat:

Yep on the black and purple. Got a subframe for $25 this morning and dropped it off and the powdercoater's along with: trans side pan, sway, sway brackets, header brackets, FPR/alt bracket, and my valve covers and alt to have un-cleared (they oxidized underneath). The subframe will be satin black along with the FPR/alt bracket. Sway and sway brackets will be dormant purple, same as current scheme. And header brackets will be a textured black to match the headers. It doesn't get luckier than this.. This is how I found the subframe. I just had to take off the sway, FR control arm, bushings, and seperate it.

If all goes well I'll have the bumper and fender ready to go by the weekend. Thursday and Friday are looking dry so that will help. Hopefully Ii will be looking closer to this sometime soon:

I did some more work on the bumper and fender today but after I wasn't in the sun anymore the filler was taking like 3+ hours to cure. I tried a space heater and a hair drier but it wan't doing sht so I called it quits for today.

I decided to invest a little time and money into the i30 to get it looking a bit more decent. Firt I found a NIB set of Cefiro headlights on the org for $75 shipped to replace my cracked set. Waiting for the right color bumper and fender to show up seems like it's going to take much longer than I expected since I can hardly find the same color i30 anywhere. So, I decided to grab some different color parts and hand them over to my painter buddy for him to try and match. I'm hoping to spend less than $350 and I know the value of the car will go up by that amount maybe even double. At the yard today and got a fender, inner fender, washer bottle/pump, and bumper with support and 3 out of 4 fogs for $135. The bumper/fender are on ok shape, especially compared to all the other i30s Pennsburg/Hazelton Harry's had to offer today. The bumper needed a skim coat in a few areas and the fender had a small dent. The bottom corners on these bumpers always seem to get mangled. The drivers side on this one had a dent and being plastic, it's a PITA. So, I c-clamped it back closer to the correct shape and lightly took a torch to it so it would stay that way. lol.. (I need a heat gun) Then threw some kitty hair on top. That's as far as I could get tonight without breaking out the air tools and pissing the neighbors off. I sill have to knock down the paint in some areas but I wanted to get the bondo and kitty hair on there so it'll be cured by tomorrow. (cold slows it down) Tomorrow morning I'll take care of that, block the skim coat, and finish the overall prep. If I'm lucky I can hard the parts over to my painter buddy tomorrow. p.s. 3 thermals, 2 hoodies, long johns, a neck warmer, winter hat, and gloves ftmfw. Barely got cold.

I've got a bunch of travel coming up and I would like to get some things organized and shipped out before I leave on the 23rd. Anodizing the fuel fittings is something I would like to happen while I'm away. So, I started with that. I wanted to get rid of the 'Thrasher' on the front fuel rail before I sent it out. So, I grinded it down, did 180 to 1500 grit, then polished the front face so there are no sanding marks when it gets anodized. That's all ready in a box. Now, I just have to figure out where it's going. The rails are for an L67. (injectors are in the heads) So I had to make the legs and FPR mounting. (sorry that's as far as that's getting polished) Anything blue fittings will be black to match the rest, and the rails will be purple. Next, I'm going to get together everything I want powdercoated. It's mainly brackets and a larger front SSEi sway. I kind of want my subframe done too but I'm not sure I can grab a spare one in time. And while I'm on travel I'll make sure to have everything I need to draft the strut top mount in CAD. The top bearings, carriers, and spacers came in.

Can't wait to see it get lower. Grats on the calendar.