So been a long time since I worked on this car, winter depression. But the last few weeks have been nice and warm and I've spent everyday out there getting shit done. Went through my other build on the corolla forum and copied the updates I've made the last few weeks.
So I put the turbo back on, tightened it up and primed the fuel system. Couple of the injector orings were pinched so I replaced them and it was good to go. Plugged the gauges in and fired it up, started pretty good.
Moved the car forward and spotted this crap.
So I yanked the motor, the giant plug on the back of the block was finger tight. Must have been pulled by the machine shop when they cleaned the block out. Tightened that back up and pulled the oil pan, my buddy tapped it for my temp sensor and is an idiot. He apparently has never used an npt tap, and just ran it all the way in. It had a slow leak so while the motor was out I figured I would pull the pan and I'll weld an tap it again in tomorrow. FML!
I bolted in the gauge panel in a new surround that wasnt destroyed. Sealed the edges with some silicone and then sprayed it with some wrinkle paint. Hogged out the holes around the edge for the rest of the gauges and drilled the holes for the turn signal indicators. In the pics I caught them in the middle of the flashers being turned on. The other switches are for the heater fan, the wiper speed and I think the other is for the headlights? I'll figure it out again when I put the lights back on the front. The 4 buttons in line with each other are for setting the warnings on the 4 smaller gauges. Its not perfect but I'm pretty happy with how it all turned out as a whole.
Bleeding brakes is never cool, and they never feel good on the first shot. Few leaks here and there but they are all good now. Everything on the rear axle is good and tight, all the front is good except the one caliper bracket needs to be changed still but no big deal.
Got everything back from coating, I really like the way it all looks.
Plan is to hopefully start it this weekend and let it warm up and check for leaks again. Gotta wrap up a bunch of other stuff, do the charge pipes weld the seat in etc. After I start it next to make sure everything is cool I wont run it again till we put it on the dyno and break it in. Pump gas tune the first time around and drive it a few weeks, change the oil and go back to the dyno for race gas.
