Nauta

iTrader: (1)

Hey every one well this has been a long time coming. I bought a 1993 sc300 2jzge about a year ago and have been repairing/upgrading it this hole time but not posting any pictures, so here they are. something to note i am aware that she is in rough shape but i like the idea of bringing something back .I am not a mechanic but i try between friends, club Lexus and Google i have no issues. so to start things off here are some pictures of the car before anything was done.

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

Ok so i have the car and am loving every second of it. how ever the interior is not in the best shape seats are a little tore up and the glove box has a crack in it.. but other than that it is good so was able to pick up a glove box for $20 and a pair of seats $100 off of a buddy and got them installed. don't seam to have any pictures of the glove box but o well. i use the leatherique restorer and pristine clean on the hole interior and it did a great job how ever you will use twice as much pristine clean in comparison to the restorer i would recommend getting the bigger bottle of it.

1JZPWRD

iTrader: (59)

I cant believe you waited so long to post up. Glad you did finally. Off to a great start, and the seats look alot better.

Whats the biggest plan for the car?

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

Now we get to the fun part.. car is running like a champ and i am completely blind to any rust. When tragedystrikes. I notice when i hit my breaks the car surges.. so i jack it up and look at the break and noticed that the front are a little warped so excited to do something on the car i go back to my buddy and pick up some ls400 front break 4 piston caliber and the roters to match. Did some cutting on the dust shield and mounted up the wheels, or well attempted. something to note you will need 1/2in spacers on the front wheels if you are rocking stock wheels. as well with the 1/2in spacers you will need new longer studs i went with arp is300 studs that gave me plenty of room.

So no the wheels and breaks are on the car and we go for a test drive and its still doing it.
o well took a look around the rest of the car and noticed some bad rust on the rear sub frame.
moved on and live with it for awhile till one day i was going over a speed bump and heard a crack and noticed that it was much worse. and this is were my true adventure starts. it is now end of fall so i park the car in the 1 car garage that i had at the time. No way i could swap a rear sub frame in that garage and I was moving in April. So over the winter i decided to do a "cheap & easy project" little did i know it would be anything but.

(sorry missing alot of the brake pictures i could take some more if any one needs them for anything)

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

well in general i want it to be a fun every day car that i can take to any track and have a good time. there is a local drift and drag track so that will be the goal. I would love for it not to have more rust on it for toughs events

gerrb

iTrader: (34)

Good luck on the build ... now the fun begins !

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

So with the winter months coming and not room or heat in the garage i found my self thinking.. what can i do this winter that will benefit the car and give me something to do? wile looking at the car i noticed that my head lights were really foggy. that's it im doing the head lights, a quick cleaning and polishing of the outside and the inside of the head light wouldn't cost much but it will take a bit of time. little did i know how wrong i was.

I started with just a simple rainx headlight restore kit which did a great job on the out side. i believe it was around $25 bucks and only took about an hr for the first one. Made it supper easy have the headlight out of the car. Did the hole process wile sitting on my couch.

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

thanks ill take all the luck i can get

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

so the outside of the lens looks good and lets face it i could have and probably should have stopped her but heck this only took 2 hr i still have all winter. So we press on. I start by throwing the head light in the oven at around 220 for about 20 min and using a body filler spade i am able to separate the outer lens for the rest of the encloser.

after letting it cool down i got to cleaning the inside of the lens.. I got to looking inside and noticed that that some one has been in here before i was. The glass projector lens had been cracked and chipped and their was some chrome tape on the chrome cover. But i got started lightly sanding. how ever i might have gotten a bit carried away. I accidentally scratched the ribs that are on the inside so it looks like we are going to have to removed them. ( this is the long part i spent the next 3 months off and on working on this.)

had to go to the store and get some sand paper i started with 80grit dry(d) and moved to 120(d) and then 220(d), 400(d), 600(d), 800(d),1000(d) then to change pace went back to 800 wet sanding (w) to 1000W, 1200(w),2000(w),2200(w). to finally 3000(w) at this point it looked OK but still had some fog on it. the hardest bits of sanding where in the corners you just have to take your time or it wouldn't turn out, and i mean a lot of time. so i attempted to rub it out with some rubbing compound and that didn't do much. So went to the local auto spa and picked up a 3'' random orbital buffer($150) with some wool and foam pads($50) and some Meguiars cutting compounds a heavy medium and a light + their ultimate compound and a plastic polish and wax. and went over them in order multiple times till i received what i thought was as good as i am going to get.

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

so here are some pictures of the buffer and the clean lens marked up next to the one that hasn't been dont yet.. they are not fully assembled at this point. by this time the new lens have arrived from the retro fit source and they are perfect dont have any pictures but they are great for the hids that i want to get and 100% optical quality. ($50) for here i contuied to the next one and nocted that that chrome tap was covering a pretty hefty scrach and now the the outer lens was clear you could see it and it looked like crap.

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

so now with the new lenses and the outer lens clean its tie to deal with that bit of chipped chrome. I figured the easiest and best way would be to flat black it out. so i roughed up the chrome went to harbor freight and picked up a $15 paint gun and then to napa and asked them to mix me up a quart of flat black paint. went home and sprayed them however napa failed it turned out to be high gloss black. went back and found out that the enamel that they put in it is what made it shiny so had them do it again with out the enamel re sanded the shiny black and repainted it flat.

1JZPWRD

iTrader: (59)

What are you taking the pictures with, a bag phone?????

JK. The progress on the headlights are nice, but I still prefer the look of the factory lines and the chrome underside. Did ytou plan on paiting the car a different color in the future?

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

pretty close htc evo lol. As for the head lights i agree i prefer the chrome but had to changed it because i couldn't stand the scratch. I do plan on respraying the car in a dark blue but here lately i have been kicking the idea around about getting new chrome inserts for the headlights and keeping the car white

so any one out there that wants some black inserts i am willing to trade for chrome ones

1JZPWRD

iTrader: (59)

Dont post up offers in the thread, post in the classifieds. GL on your SC

Nauta

iTrader: (1)

So now that my headlights are done it is time to start worrying about the job at hand... SUBFRAME

Picked on up for around $250 it was off of a 97 from Florida. As i was looking at it i seen that it had no rust. But determined that it just wasn't enough to slap another stock part in there so i set to work.

Step 1 sand blast. I sand blasted the hole thing and got it down to bare mettle

some things about sand blasting. If you pull the air hose off with out closing any of the valves you will regret it. after that i decided to go a little overboard with the safety gear but hey go big or go home. you will also want to set up a little room to do you blasting in.

Step 2 i got a map torch and torched out the rubber spacers we will not need them any more

Step 3 ordered some aluminum spacer from battle version

step 4 i hung up the clean frame and sprayed POR15 on it. I never want to have rust on this thing again

Step 5 rubberized undercoating in key areas

Now it looks shinny clean