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Thought I would introduce myself before I introduce my build. Most people dealing with imports know me as Pag. Been around since the mid 90s. Most of my cars have been heavily modified, but not particularly well known. This one may change that, but we shall see how it goes. A good chunk of my friends, team mates and customers on the other hand are particularly well known. Been out of the game for the last few years, but now I'm back.
I did vinyl graphics under the name Competition Grafix for more cars than I can remember, and my work has been on multiple covers and who knows how many features. Here's a few of them. I'll start with a Lexus SC300 some of you may remember.
Enough with my past on with my future. So i bought a 1994 SC400 back in August. $600 bucks, decent body, blown out tan interior, great engine, dead transmission.
So I needed a parts car. Found a 1993 SC400 in Michigan on an auction site. Got it for $500. But they screwed me on shipping and other fees, and it gives me heartburn even thinking about it, so Im not talking about that anymore. Anyways, 1993 in black. Some dings in the body, especially the big giant one to the roof that crushed the passenger side rear pillar and blew out the back glass. Great grey interior with only a couple torn seams. A working transmission. Brand new looking headlights and fogs. Mille Miglia wheels which will do for now.
Honestly the parts car was in such good shape that consideration went into grafting the roof of the 94 onto it instead. But I decided that was too much hassle in the long run. So the transmission made it into the 1994, but the radiator ended up being bad, so I ordered the replacement Yonaka aluminum Supra rad with electric fans. Just FYI, local shop called VIP Performance in Portland, OR is doing most of this for me as I don't have the facilities to do it, I certainly cant do it in my current HOA neighborhood, especially with two cars, and Im not that great a mechanic anyways. I know my limitations.
The hydraulic fan setup obviously wouldn't work with the electric fans, so that was deleted with the a brand new $53 LS400 fan bracket from ebay, a $9 dollar pulley from an LS400 at the local Pick-n-Pull. I can take things apart just fine, thanks for asking. You can see the new fan switch there with the pink and orange wiring. The radiator stays are just the stock ones bent down a bit and swapped to opposite sides.
Since changing the stock radiator did away with the piping for the built in transmission cooler, my mechanic offered to close off or loop the piping, But i didn't want any transmission issues before I'm ready for the 6 Speed CD009 swap, so I bought this lovely universal unit and it is now secured to the front of the AC condenser.
I did buy Goodridge Stainless Braided brake lines. They have been installed, but I keep forgetting to take pics. I'll remedy that in the future, as I see this as a journal for myself as well as sharing with you fine folks.
Also getting ready to be installed is the coolant overflow. Didnt want the plastic stock one being put back in so I bought a Weapon-R aluminum one. I liked the design of it, and it amused me to put a Weapon-R anything on the car, as I barely remembered that Weapon-R was ever a thing, even though at one point it was a pretty big thing. It'll do for now, but might get changed later to match some other aesthetic choices. Expect quite a few completely custom parts in the future. Anything I have made I will make sure is available from my vendors for anyone else to order for themselves. I have some ideas I think some of you will enjoy.
Also ordered a crap load of stuff to enable the battery relocation. Ill take some pics of that as that goes down.
Regarding aesthetics, if you notice from my introduction that the 3 other cars I showed have Emotion stickers in common on them. Emotion is a crew Ive been with for a long time, which some of you may or may not know have a certain level of looks as well as performance being involved. Anyways, I have to keep up with my friends in the long run, lol.
Also in line to be installed. LS400 calipers. I havent gotten around to ordering the rotors yet. These still have to be cleaned up and re-coated, and I will probably end up putting them on myself. Im capable of that much. These are not my long term choice, but I'll care for them deeply while they are mine, just like all my exes. Some of the mods that are coming will only be on there as placeholders for the final products. Like the cheap Tein's I'll be ordering soon, which will give me the stance while I take care of other more important stuff I would never put on while the cars sitting high up in the air. For instance the exhaust, no stance, no pipes.
PS. The 1UZ is staying, now and forever, because it is a badass, unappreciated motor here in the US, and I am never ever going to put an LS motor in any of my beloved imports. But Im perfectly fine with putting a 1UZ in a chevrolet, such as my friend is doing in his 1948 truck..lol.
Thought I would introduce myself before I introduce my build. Most people dealing with imports know me as Pag. Been around since the mid 90s. Most of my cars have been heavily modified, but not particularly well known. This one may change that, but we shall see how it goes. A good chunk of my friends, team mates and customers on the other hand are particularly well known. Been out of the game for the last few years, but now I'm back.
I did vinyl graphics under the name Competition Grafix for more cars than I can remember, and my work has been on multiple covers and who knows how many features. Here's a few of them. I'll start with a Lexus SC300 some of you may remember.
Welcome sir! Sounds like you have big plans for this build. I look forward to seeing what you do. All info you share will always be appreciated and added as value as others comb through this wonderful site.
VIP definitely know their stuff but man they are expensive!
Looks promising so far
And I fully agree about the 1uz. When you look an engine up and find "has no known or inherent mechanical issues" and is capable of 500hp on an unopened engine you just gotta respect it. When I got my 400 I was asked when I was going to 2j swap it and couldn't help but laugh
So just a "got some stuff on my porch this week" post. Some of the stuff for the battery relocation. New battery bracket. 10' of 1/0 cable. New AC Delco battery terminals. Some cable clamps for neatness. Not shown, the wire loom that is taking it's sweet time arriving, and some rubber grommets, also for neatness. You can see a couple of 50w resistors sitting there, there are 4 more in the bag beneath it, and the box of 1156 LEDs, all for converting the taillights and keeping them from hyper flashing. (although i remember back in the mid 90s ****ing with all our Honda lights to get them to hyper flash on purpose. how times change.)
I dont have any new pictures at the moment. The battery relocation is done, I need to snap some shots of it. Trying to track down some sensor codes. Pulled the crank sensor off my spare engine, and that didnt clear the code. Apparently the cam sensor puts out the same code, so I pulled the cam position sensors off the spare, and working on getting those installed.
The cam sensors were tough to get off, I couldnt access the simple nut and screw holding it on without removing what looked like the entire water pump, alternator, pulleys, belts, etc. So you have to take intake, the top and bottom distributor/cam gear covers off, take the distro caps off and the rotors. Then there are three bolts of that soft silver/brass color i dont know the actual alloy name of, holding the aluminum housing that holds the sensors. Well those three bolts are torqued on tight, but theyre nice and soft so the 13mm just likes to slip and start rounding the bolt. So i had to go buy a nice Irwin Bolt-Grip set and that did the trick nicely.
I did buy a battery cut off switch this week, but due to future power upgrades, i have to reconsider how i want it and the remote battery terminals mounted. I should have another photo update soon.
11-04-17, 09:01 PM
Stickermaker's SC400
