Firehawk's N2 racecar project

[firehawk]

Phew, after about 1200 kilometers of driving and a total of 16 hours on a ferry, I'm finally a happy owner of a 1986 AE86 Levin 3-door. Thanks to Widar for letting me buy one of his hachirokus - I promise to take really, really good care of it!

Here's a few photos I took after we had finished loading the car onto the trailer, and one I took on the ferry's car deck;

http://paranoia.tuug.fi/gallery2/v/jh/ae86/nov19/

Anyway, the plan is to begin by reconditioning the bodywork, which should be started off by stripping all parts off the car, leaving a bare bodyshell. Getting all the soundproofing, underbody sealant and rusty bits off the car should provide me some entertainment for a while, after which it's time to replace the rear arches, patch any rust holes found and generally reinforce the body a bit by spot welding. Finally, I'll try to finish the exterior repairs by lead soldering to minimize the need for polyester body filler. Then - it's time for a few coats of primer and some 040 Super White II.

I haven't yet decided on what to do after the body is finished, but the engine is probably the next in line. I have to decide on whether I should rebuild the current bluetop 4A-GE or go for a low-mileage japanese-import redtop. I'm quite certain that both 20v engines are illegal to swap into an AE86 in Finland so those are unfortunately out of the question as I want the car to stay street-legal.

Yes, and as those sandblasted and powdercoated bits you guys have been flashing off here on the forum looked really impressive, I may have to jump on the bandwagon.

[Widar]

firehawk Wrote:Thanks to Widar for letting me buy one of his hachirokus - I promise to take really, really good care of it!

You are way to kind!
Off course i wanted to sell it to someone that's gonna take good care of it!

Jani (Firehawk) also brought the AE86-movies i was missing like Best Motoring 41 AE86 special... He's a great guy!

Wishing you all the best, and as i said, if you encounter any problems with the car, don't hesitate to call!

/Widar

[nmwisima]

Well Jani, VERY nice!

One more happy owner

I am sure you re gonna take care of her :wink:

Shame the 20V isn't legal... Here neither. But here you can go pay and register it! Cant you do that in Finland?
Of course here, why bother register? You 'll just have to pay something to the MOT guy

There is something LEGAL though: Only the first 4 numbers of the engine VIN are checked, so... 4ageuc... 4agzeuc... No difference here

Why dont you check this out? :wink:

[James]

Ahh Widar you did sell it in the end...well it's good to see it going to a good home.

[SuperHessu]

You lucky bastard, I made an offer of that car one day too late...

I bet you can register a hachi roku with 20valve blacktop in Finland, or at least I attend to... And a turbo engine is even easier, as you can take a dyno-paper of the car with less than the +20% allows, just lower the boost enough...

[firehawk]

Well, on paper the 20v engines make too much power (only 20% increase is allowed, stock is 124hp so up to 149hp is allowed) to be legal in an AE86, but one thought I had was telling them that only the head is from a 20v but the block+bottom end is stock - I'll be damned if any of the MOT guys can tell the difference between 3-rib and 7-rib blocks. This makes the engine a "home-made" one, and the power on paper is no longer valid and needs to be established with a dyno plot. Then just use an e-Manage or something to retard the ignition a bit at the top and set a rev-limiter to, say, 7200rpm and suddenly a blacktop makes a bit less power for the dyno run. Disabling the VVT-i for the dyno run might also do the trick.

If only the 20v cam covers looked the same as 16v - there wouldn't be any need to actually register the new engine..

[Darkstar]

It seems that this car is a great base for a project - that's why I sent an offer to Widar some time ago (thanks for you patience, and sorry for the whole trouble I made). As a result, the Hachi went to Finland instead of Poland and I'm searching for another car.

It's a shame you need to do all these tricks to make the car roadlegal in FIN - here in Poland you only have to get a paper from the place that measures everything, like smog compliance, sound level, light alignment etc. (can't even call it MOT) and you're read legal! Fortunately there's no power limit, simply because there are no dynos in the whole country, except for those in tuning shops.

[Widar]

Wonder how long you can use a car on Polish plates here in sweden....

[SuperHessu]

That was my point exactly, to lower the power enough to make it legal, but in a turbo engine it's a bit easier to do that, and in the 20 valve they might start to arque that the engine has had more power coming out of stock than it currently has.... But then again, there is a hachi in Finland having a 4A-GZE turbo converion, and made street-legal by taking a dyno paper at 0.3bar boost, as in real life, it's driven with 2.2bar...

And I have also thought of removing all text from the head covers, that way no one will know that it's a 20 valve, but then they might notest that the block number is different from the original, and request a dyno-run... It's a bit kinky, but with some imagination, everything is possible....

[Apolan]

firehawk Wrote:Well, on paper the 20v engines make too much power (only 20% increase is allowed, stock is 124hp so up to 149hp is allowed) to be legal in an AE86, but one thought I had was telling them that only the head is from a 20v but the block+bottom end is stock - I'll be damned if any of the MOT guys can tell the difference between 3-rib and 7-rib blocks. This makes the engine a "home-made" one, and the power on paper is no longer valid and needs to be established with a dyno plot. Then just use an e-Manage or something to retard the ignition a bit at the top and set a rev-limiter to, say, 7200rpm and suddenly a blacktop makes a bit less power for the dyno run. Disabling the VVT-i for the dyno run might also do the trick.

If only the 20v cam covers looked the same as 16v - there wouldn't be any need to actually register the new engine..

i cant believe you have to go through that much trouble to get something like 20v registred legally. if i drove my hachi to mot w/ a 20v inside.. heh, hez never even seen a 4ag before, letalone the blacktop. here they dont even check the engine number.. its all up to the judgement of the MOT-guy. somebody here even passed MOT w( a BMW e30 318i (and had m50 2.5 w/ near 200 hp. but in that case the "blue envelope" happened. =) here you can have anything under the hood, as long as it looks fairly stock. (but if you paint the cam covers red or something like that they wont let you through. and you might get a fine for having a flashy "tuning" object on your car) stupid law.