Nice!

 

my favorite build thread of all time read it front to back & always check for updates! sorry to hear about the sick 2 month old hope its nothing too serious.

 

I got rid of my stock steering wheel so I could be a cool guy. And I didn't want my air bag deploying on the track with my helmet on, should I go off. There have been papers published about the dangers of airbags and helmets I guess.

Removing the stock steering wheel is no simple task. The 8mm allen bolt is deep inside the wheel hub and is torqued to kill. I bent a standard allen wrench while prying with a crescent wrench. I wanted to use an impact socket allen tool, but it was not deep enough. I ended up using my T-Handle allen wrenches with crescent wrenches on both ends. I was afraid I was going to bust the wrench - but the bolt finally cracked loose with a "snap" and came out.

Just got this action today. Sparco 375 and Splash solid mount hub. Rallysportdirect had it in-stock, and I'm buddies with them from back in the old days. They are FTW.

 

I turned a cheapo lowes brand allen wrench into a candy cane when I did mine.

oh and I think I chipped a tooth when the thing finally did break loose and my hand came at my face at around mach 10

 

smart idea on the safety wire..

get urself some safety wire pliers... our tech mark, prides himself on being able to safety wire about 6-12 bolts together in one continuous string lol.

those bolts (manifold to turbo flange, and turbo to o2 flange) are the reason we use Vband housings lol!

cb

 

that would be because all evos come with A/C, even the RS. so there is no official part number for a non a/c belt.

 

Here are some pictures of the wheel installed.





I finally got around to installing the Whiteline roll-center kit I've had forever. It was a learning experience involving a few curse words. I've got a new addition to bolts I hate, the front control arm bolt, which is torqued to around 140 ft-lbs. My impact gun broke it loose on one side, but the other side required me jacking the car up higher than it was and using a 3 foot breaker bar. Ball joints are sometimes hard to remove, but I learned those tricks a long time ago.

Once the arms are off these clips on the ball joint can be a little tricky, but if you use snap ring pliers to pry them open and then a pick to pop one end over the edge they are no big deal.



I tried using a vise to press out the ball joints and that was a joke, I tried for about 30 seconds. Then I went to Harbor Freight and bought a shop press for $120 which I've been wanting to do for years now. I also went to the hardware store and bought some pipe couplers to use as dies for pressing. This is way cheaper than buying large impact sockets.

Our buddies at Mitsubishi swage the annular ring that surrounds the ball joint after it is pressed in at the factory. This means you have to break through that material to press the factory ball joint out. It makes a loud noise and you believe you just shattered your control arm, but it's really no big deal.



Pressing the whiteline parts in.



My sweet $1 per part dies.



There's a little notch in the ball joint that lines up with the pinch bolt on the upright. It's best to get that in position when you press the ball joint in. I didn't, and then thought I was hosed because the ball joint was very rigid after being pressed in - like I couldn't move it at all by hand. But I stuck a pipe on it for leverage and broke it free, and spun it around with some pliers. That was better than removing it and pressing it back in.

Torquing the control arm bolts back to 130-140 ft-lbs laying on the ground was awesome as well. All installed below - going to make some little heat shields for them as well and clamp them on.

 

Nice! I like the new wheel.

Thanks for the heads up on the whiteline kit. I have to do here in the near future.

 

Harbor Freight presses and DIY dies for the win.

I've mangled enough sockets as "dies" at this point that I probably ought to invest in a few of your high-tech choices.

 

The pressure is on for me to stop wrenching and get the car ready for action again. Just confirmed with a friend that he is game to help me tow the car down to Portland for the first track day of the year - next weekend. So I need to have the car ready to load on the trailer by Thursday evening. I still haven't started it since I swapped the headgasket out.

There's a bunch of little stuff that needs to get wrapped up. I ordered some new rear springs and I'm not sure when they'll arrive, thanks KW for not providing tracking . I might just pass on that for now and do that later. But the car needs to be re-aligned after the whiteline install regardless. I just dropped off my race tires to be installed on the rims and grabbed two cans of E85 to get back on the good stuff.

The plan is to have the car back together and running this weekend and then finish the alignment and maybe springs at the last second before it goes on the trailer.

I'm planning on doing a little pre-track session with JohnBradley the evening before hitting the track since I'll be in the neighborhood. So I'm excited to finally put the car on the dyno. I plan to record the engine with the mic I have on the head files to listen to the what going on. My knock light will still randomly flash, and I'm pretty sure it is false.

 

Got the car back together and running, just a few things to sort out before it's ready for track-age.

My stiffer springs arrived Friday, so I swapped those in along with putting my 25mm adjustable rear swaybar back on. The shock bodies were dirty and the threads on the bodies develop a hard build-up that makes it impossible to adjust ride height. So I cleaned them up with WD40 and a wire brush.

When I went to reinstall my wideband sensor the plug was stuck in the bung. My impact gun just spun the hex opening into a circle. At that point I knew I wasn't getting the plug out. This was crap because I have a hole cut in the flat bottom in the specific location of the bung. So I just cut that entire section of tubing out and replaced it with a new piece with a new bung. That was lame.

I took the car out for a lap around the block and the brakes feel like hud. I must have screwed up my bleeding job, so I'll have to give that another go tomorrow. I also need to make a front ride height adjustment - then it should be ready to go get corner balanced and aligned. After that I just need to run it out of pump gas and get the e85 in it.



Making a mess with WD40.

 

Awsome build

 

Nice!! The whiteline kits(and trailing arm bushing IMO) are the finishing touch to a well setup suspension. If you intend to do any driving on the street though invest in a 5 gal bucket of silicone lube. Mine were SQUEEKY!

 

If you're looking for a way to keep those threads clean on the coilovers. Wrap some teflon plumbers tape around the threads before you re-install them and hold it in place with a small piece of duct tape at the ends. It's worked great for me.

 

Re-bleed the brakes and got them feeling good again, I also made a ride height adjustment to get it a little lower. I was planning on taking it to be corner balanced and aligned, but I don't have time right now. So I gave it the usual garage alignment. I'm planning on buying some scales so I can corner balance myself.

The car still had 1/4 tank of gas in it. So I drove it to work today and filled up with E85 at my normal station just as the gas light came on. I try and go deep into the gas light when I can, but sometimes you fill up a little early.

During my removal of the charcoal canister I plugged all the breather lines and such, trying to stop the car from always smelling of fuel. Well this has the negative effect of choking the gas filler tube and not allowing it to breath. So the gas builds up in the fill tube and stops the pump within a few seconds of squeezing it. I had to just "crack" the pump lever so gas flowed at a snails pace to keep it from stopping the pump. So I'll need to go back and open that breather up - because that was super annoying.

Overall the car is feeling nice and the new steering wheel is a joy. I'm going to keep driving the car to work for the next 3 days and get a tank of E85 through it. Going to check the tune on the way home with some pulls and make sure it's doing OK at full boost after the headgasket jobber.