here's an update for anyone and myself, if i ever look back to where i started..
since i bought this car about a month ago from some guy up in pacifica, san francisco, with 165k miles
i have stripped some of the paint off to make it look more of a car.
i don't know why someone would spend $800 on a paint job and have it be this color.
it's alright, though, it is my project for now.
and a buddy of mine said he'll paint it for free if i supply the paint!
dropped it on some tanabe lowering springs for now until i can get my hands on some bc or d2 coilovers and threw the handy tsurikawa on the passenger side handle.
did the usual tune up on this baby about 2 weeks ago.
smogged and passed, (was so anxious about this part for the title transfer).
but anyways, yeah.
can't really go wrong for a $500 car.

 

Nice work so far, and you're right - For $500, this is a pretty good car!

I saw that you were only shipped the headlight with the housing, without the fog light. I'm disappointed myself that they didn't include the entire part for you..

By the way, while you have that grille, can you tell if it is made out of plastic? I always thought it was either a black plastic chromed piece, or a metal chromed piece. I would be interested in finding out.

 

Runs and drives for $500, so can't beat that. And it's a Lexus on top of that.

 

Looks good so how are you removing the old paint? Is that original paint or to primer? Doesn't look like bare metal??? Are you using the hand method or a power tool? And yeah if they needed that crap color they should have just used plasti dip then you wouldn't have the mess you have now.

 

i sure can, it is plastic for sure. it was cracked when someone backed up into it with the previous owner! hope to get a celsior grille or so!

 

my thoughts exactly!

 

i don't know too much about paint and the process of it, but i'm guessing that the previous owner wanted it painted because there were sun spots on the car and the original paint faded horrendously and the owner before that used paint stripper and i sanded to bare metal not knowing that there was no original paint under the naaco paint job.
i guess i'll just sand it down, give it a good primer, and have my buddy paint it.

 

Ouch! At least the damage was only on the grille and headlight assembly. A new hood would cost a pretty penny.

A Celsior grille is a great choice. Always wanted one, but I can't justify getting rid of mine, which looks just fine.

Thanks for the info! - Keep us posted on how paint goes. I'm sure it will be a great relief when it comes back looking not so matte red.

I noticed you're also missing the bumper chrome molding. It's not worth spending $185 for the Lexus OEM part. Another owner bought a generic 12mm chrome trim from Ebay, which looks very good! The only difference is that the chrome will not have the little black plastic ends that the OEM molding has, but it's extremely minor.

Here's the link to that thread, which has some comparison photos. Keep in mind, even though the thread is about a 1998 LS, the owner who posted the info on the chrome is a 1994 owner, which is essentially the same car.

 

^^^^
Great info on the chrome molding. Thanks for posting!

Mike

 

You're very welcome! I can't believe they would charge nearly $200 for such a simple piece.

 

man shes rough looking. great project car though! love seeing these come back to life. cant wait to see it when its done