First actual event with the car. The course was too short to get the tires up to temp but it was still a good shakedown. The rear end is still pretty loose, which is a good sign that the added weight of the cage will balance the car out nicely.

The latest toys to arrive. One of the key components left, Ground Control "Track/School" Coilover Kit. Discounting the 2 weeks they spent being shipped to and from California the turn around time was a little less than 2.5 weeks. Not great but at least they are here and look good. Spent the extra $180 to have GC modify the strut housings (weld around the base of the tube, gusset the knuckle to the tube, shorten them, weld on the new collar and powder coat them); it was well worth the cash as they look brand new. Running on 525 lb front springs and 700 lb rears (around 450 lb effective due to the trailing arm setup).
The fact that everything came already assembled and the shocks adjusted the install went pretty smoothly. Like normal the hardest part was ripping the old shit out.

Seneca Test & Tune

Really need the coilovers, wheels (so the Avons can be mounted) and the cage. The remaining parts will really help the dynamics of the car, as it is now it is a drift machine unless there is a full tank of gas in it.

Finishing Pieces

Now that the chassis is solid again I have to take care of all the minor details before it is ready to compete. Stuff like seats, mounting the sunroof, fixing the gauge cluster (again).

First up: seat mounts. 3/16" plate steel to adapt the "new" buckets to the original mounts. Will weld some pieces of steel between the two plates to add some more strength.

Did a quick paintjob on the interior, basic white. Easy to clean, easy to touch up.
Picked up a second set of front strut assemblies so that the car would be drivable while I send the strut housing to Ground Control to get rebuilt with some Koni goodness.
After about 3 hours of work they are completely disassmbled and luckily I had a 36mm socket to ge the hub nut off. Hubs will be replaced when I get the assembled struts back.

She lives!

Subframe and Trailing Arms

Drilled and chiseled out the remnants of the bushing that was stuck to the body.

Couple of battle scars from drilling out the aluminum bushing parts, only superficial marks the structural integrity is still good.
Had the same result with the passenger side, currently in the process of drilling and chiseling this side out as was done with the driver's side. Not going quite as smoothly as the first one so I will let this sit overnight with a good soaking of penetrating lube.

While I am waiting for the pentrating lube to act I installed the new trailing arm bushings. Probably one of the smoothest installs on this build so far. I'll let the freshly painted subframe dry for another day before I bolt the arms back on.

Rear End "Enhancement"

Been working on cleaning up the rear end components and removing the old bushings during the week in hopes of reinstalling everything this weekend. That's not going to happen. Pressed the IE poly differential bushings in, some minor tweaking was required but overall they went in smoothly.

My first attempt to remove the subframe bushings was to cut the steel bushing structure and then bend it out as I had done with the control arm and differential bushings.

This obviously didn't work out real well so I turned to burning the bastards out, about 10 minutes for each bushing and they hammered right out.

Like normal I am too impatient to wait until the subframe is cleaned up to put in the new parts. So I pressed in the new poly bushings, this may come back to bite me in the ass...

The other half of the subframe bushing was still stuck to the budy of the car. My thoughts were that it was stuck on the stud itself so I drilled a series of holes in the side, sprayed some penetrating lube and went to work with a pipe wrench. I successfully cracked the aluminum along the holes I had drilled which made me think that it would come off quite nicely now...

Boy was I wrong, the only part that was stuck was the very top where it was pressed into the steel unibody. So I successfully snapped the aluminum at the body and will have to find some way of chipping the rest of it out. Of course if I hadn't pressed the new bushing in I could have thrown it on the lathe and turned it to eliminate the interference with the left over aluminum.

The 1/4-1/2" of aluminum that is still stuck in the body, hopefully I don't end up with the same result on the passenger side bushing.

One actual success that I had was the subframe and differential got a couple coats of primer and paint to stop the rust buildup. This will never be anything close to a show car so only the loose rust was knocked off, no need to get the surface smooth.

Bushing replacement in the rear end

Dropped the rear end to replace the bushings for the subframe, trailing arms and diff mount. What is not visible are the internals to the original subframe bushings that are still stuck on the body mount studs.

Separated the diff from the subframe to make it a little more managable to move around a clean up. Probably scraped off 2 pounds worth of dirt and other crap that was stuck to the outside.

Disassembled the rest of the rear suspension so that pieces can be brought into the basement to be worked on where the temperature is above freezing.
Everything ready to be worked on in the comfort of the basement. Poly bushings just waiting to be pressed in.
Original differential mount came out fairly easily, not sure the subframe bushings will be quite as nice.

Upgrades/Replacements Begin

While waited for the cage builder to have some time to build me a cage I decided there were some things that I could purchase and install in the mean time.

From Bimmerworld.com I picked up the following:
-OEM Control Arms
-Powerflex Offset CA Bushings
-Ireland Engineering Poly Motor Mounts
-Upgraded (Stiffer) Rubber Tranny Mounts
-Powerflex Poly Rear Diff Mount
-Hawk HP+ Pads
-Brembo Blank Rotors
-To be delivered in March...D-Force LTW5 15x7's ~13lbs each

From TurnerMotorsports.com
-Bosch W8LCR Spark Plugs (no local stores carry copper plugs anymore)
-A couple spare lug bolts

From TireRack.com
-Avon Tech R-A's 205/50R15's

The stack of 205 Avons is approx. 2.5" taller than the stack of 225 Azenis...sweet.


First to get replaced were the control arms. I assumed this would be as simple as it was on my old Nissan, well it wasn't and quickly led to the replacement of the motor mounts sooner rather than later. The inner balljoint on the passenger side subframe did not want to cooperate. It was a combination of having zero room due to the aftermarket headers running in the only place where a wrench would be useful.

Even after removing the subframe with the passenger side CA still attached the balljoint still refused to come loose so we resorted to grinding the bitch off.

The quality motor mount completly sheared the top mounting plate off when the subframe was dropped.

The engine sat supported by the jack and a backup jackstand for about a week while the subframe was cleaned up and the control arms were installed. Note the new shiny yellow IE motor mount.

New contol arms installed on the subframe. Much easier to properly torque the balljoints when you aren't cramped around the engine. However putting the subframe back on the car alone with the control arms mounted was an interesting experience. Slightly awkward/heavy trying to align holes while working around the engine being supported by the jack.

Subframe finally re-installed and the engine supported with the new mounts. Took a few attempts (1.5 hrs) to get the subframe mounts and the motor mounts to all line up. Will take a lot less time the next time the subframe comes off now that I have the process down.

Interior Cleanup

After a few weeks of early season skiing the weather is warming up a little bit so I now have some time to get back to working on the car.


Finished up scraping off all the interior sound deadening material, ended up being about 13 lbs worth.

Picked up a set of used Corbeau Forza seats from a friend. They are crappy and uncomfortable but will do the job at least for 1 season until I have more cash in the budget for seats.

The headliner was the last thing that needed to be removed before the cage can start being installed. It ended up being much more of a pain in the ass than anticipated. But at the same time I removed all the sunroof components and will eventually hard mount the sunroof panel, no more tilt/slide sunroof now it will either be in or out. Headliner, sunroof track and motor was about 10 lbs worth of stuff.

After ripping off the headliner foam there is a bunch of glue still on the sheetmetal which will need to be cleaned off. Easier to do it now while there is space rather than trying to work around a cage.