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Salty Seagull's RS to GS Upgrade

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Piston slap with less than 100k miles? The only reasons I could figure that are if the car was ran low on oil or if the blown headgasket allowed enough coolant to severly dilute the oil. I once re-used OEM pistons and wrist pins with 180k miles on them and they had no issues. Definitely not recommending that, but yours should have lasted longer. Anyway, nice work so far and I'm looking out for next year!
 
Thanks @vanilla gorilla. I appreciate the comment :)

Thanks @BLACK'98DSM. Yeah I am not really sure what caused it. If I was a betting man though, I would put money on it having been run while it was low on oil. The bad head gasket caused oil to leak out of the head, and I feel like the previous owner was not passionate about maintenance. 😆

On one hand its disappointing, but on the other hand, I'd be lying if I said I didn't love it. 😊 This has been an awesome learning experience. And besides that, the car is so clean, it really would have been a shame not to save it.

I haven't decided what I'm going to do with the block yet. I don't know if it makes more sense to bore it out and sleeve it, or just use larger pistons. Or maybe it's better to just try to find another block?

That is awesome about those pistons man. I am not opposed to using a solid set of used OEM myself, but I don't think I'll be reusing these particular pistons though. I don't trust them.

I'm definitely open to suggestions on all of this. Right now it looks like I have plenty of time to think about it, but, as they say, time flies when you are having fun... and I'm having a blast 😁
 
My favorite auto recycler just got this 1998 Eclipse GS in!
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The car is beautiful in person, with a bunch of amazing parts, but being from the north, it does have rust.

The doors and hatch are actually in great shape though, and the interior is amazing!
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I've been looking for a car like this for a long time. Needless to say I'll be spending some money on this one. 😄
 
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My favorite auto recycler just got this 1998 Eclipse GS in!View attachment 684498
View attachment 684499

The car is beautiful in person, with a bunch of amazing parts, but being from the north, it does have rust.

The doors and hatch are actually in great shape though, and the interior is amazing!
View attachment 684501

I've been looking for a car like this for a long time. Needless to say I'll be spending some money on this one. 😄
Oof it hurts to see such a clean body taken off the road. I’d have a hard time not just buying the whole thing to save it
 
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Oof it hurts to see such a clean body taken off the road. I’d have a hard time not just buying the whole thing to save it
Yeah, it is sad. But while I may not be able to save the whole car, I am going to be saving a LOT of the parts from it. 😁 And I mean a LOT. 😅
 
I started pulling parts off that GS this weekend.

My first pick was the spare tire cover because a previous owner spilled something on my original one.
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I realize this isn't typically visible, but I love little details like this. 😉

Speaking of little details, the GS had a cargo net with a little blue tag on it. I believe it's an original manufacturing tag?
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I've never seen one before. That went into my trunk today too. 😄

There will be much more to come. 😁
 
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Slowly but surely I'm disassembling the GS. 😁

I worked out a deal with the auto recycler and paid for the whole car... or rather, I purchased all of the parts on it, and I have some time to get them before it gets recycled.

I'm working against the weather and short winter days, but it's coming along.
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I'm gutting it from the inside out, and in the end, if all goes well, it should just be a hollow shell of red paint, and rust getting crushed. 👍
 
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The weather has been unseasonably warm, and I'm not letting it go to waste. 😊

I was able to get the seats out today!
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I've been looking for these seats (2GB GS gray cloth) for a very long time. I can hardly wait to get them installed. :)
 
The temperature was over 50 degrees today, and the forecast for tomorrow is snow, so I pulled all of the trunk trim after work tonight. No broken tabs or mounts! :)

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I still have a lot to do before I pull the hatch and the doors. I want to completely gut it before that happens since whatever is left behind will be exposed to the elements.

I am being really careful with this. I actually cover the interior with a plastic sheet when I'm done for the day in case the moonroof or any of the seals have a leak. I'm working to save as much as I possibly can. 😁

My next big opportunity is to document how the main harness and hatch plumbing are routed and installed. I just need to pull a few more things before I can get a really good look. I can hardly wait!

No doubt, I'm having a lot of fun, but it turns out that converting an RS to a GS is a pretty big undertaking. Can't say I realized that before I started. 🤷‍♂️😄 But oh well, it's happening. 😉
 
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The parts car is coming apart. 😁 I'm learning a lot through this process. I feel like everything that is easy to pull is out of the interior now. :thumb:
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Slowly working my way to liberating the dashboard.
 
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Not much going on with my car lately but I've been making slow but steady progress on the parts car. 😁
Most of the interior is out, and now I'm working on the front end.

20230518_172617.jpg


It probably sounds strange but I'm really excited about the plastic duct behind the front bumper. I've been trying to find one off a GS for a very long time now, but they always seem to be damaged in some way. This one is in near-perfect condition, and I'm friggin geeked about it!

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This is one of those more subtle differences between the RS and GS. The GS duct has holes pierced for the fog lights. The RS one does not.

Yeah, it's probably pedantic, but I really love those little details. 😁
 
I was furloughed from my job earlier in the year, and money has been tight, so there still isn't a whole lot going on with the car, which is obviously a huge disappointment to me. There is a lot I want to do.

I've been working on my blog and YouTube channel in the meantime, and tearing apart the parts car, getting everything ready for when I can start making progress again.

On that note, the parts car had an OEM front bumper on it AND that duct I'm still unreasonably excited about. So I thought, "hey, why not take an hour, and install those?" Afterall, Fort Gratiot cruise weekend is coming up this weekend, and I've been wanting to replace the headlights and a broken fender liner anyway. Might as well get it all done. Easy-peas-y, right?

12 hours later...
20230621_094532.jpg


It needs to be repainted (like the rest of the car), but I love it. It looks so much better with the Mitsubishi emblem, in my opinion.

We had a heck of a time with it though.

Long story short, the car was missing some bolts and we had to fix a bent slot because, as best I can tell, the previous owner went John Cena on it rather than to try to reseat the bumper bracket when they missed the slot. That was fun. 😆

It was a lot of work but it's all fixed, and all the fasteners are in their place. Thankfully I had spares. 😅

Speaking of spare parts... the parts car is really coming apart now. I pulled the carpet and seat belts today. I still have the dash and a few odds and ends to pull, then I can get the doors and rear hatch off the car.

I'm really excited about the doors because that will allow me to get the power side mirrors up and running sooner rather than later (plus it gets rid of about 50% of the dents on my car! 😆).

Getting the fog lights and rear hatch wiper working will take more time because it's a lot more extensive wiring job. I'm still thinking about the best way to handle that.


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It's a lot of work, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't love it. :)
 
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Thanks @Dericsh and @BLACK'98DSM I really appreciate that. :)

Well, due to the weather, we missed the official cruise last night, so we charted our own course tonight instead. It didn't have the density of a usual cruise, but classic cars were still in good supply, and we had an absolute blast.

What’s Your Happy Place?

I found mine last night behind the steering wheel of my Mitsubishi Eclipse.

There's something special, almost magical, about driving that car on a summer's evening; being on the road as the sun kisses the horizon, painting delicate strokes of vibrant amber, gold, and crimson across the sky in such a way that only summer can.

As the car glides down the road, the temperature and feeling of the air whooshing past the lowered windows changes. Like the flip of a switch, as soon as the sun slips behind the auburn horizon, the muggy haze of the day transforms into a soothing cool aromatic blend of deep fried foods as restaurant-after-restaurant blurs by. The breeze feels amazing rushing over your sunbaked, radiant skin.

All-the-while, in a slow descent of fading intensity, the fiery hues of the sunset catch the hood bump, making the red paint gleam with reflections that pour like liquid light across the surface, melting onto the black dashboard and filling the cabin with vivid, yellow-soaked light that paints my wife in a breathtaking vibrancy that exceeds even the most masterful strokes of a Renaissance painter's brush. My son, bathed in that same warm light, sits wide-eyed in the back seat, watching the world rush past the quarter windows, clutching his own toy model "Mitsubishi Eclipse," and melting my heart faster than cotton candy in the rain.

Every time I drive this car, it tethers me to the present moment. I think that's one of the biggest reasons I love it so much. But my affinity for the car pales to that for my family, and when the two are brought together, especially during a summer's dusk, well, that is my happy place.

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Tonight I drove the Eclipse to its first ever car show thanks to encouragement from @Widgmaster, and boy was that AWESOME. The show was at a Culvers restaurant, and they do it every Thursday. My son LOVED it! That little dude is starting to get into cars-- especially the Eclipse. I'm raising him right, I suppose. 😆

I bought him his own recently, a white 2nd gen "Bride" diecast they had at the hardware store that looks a lot like the Fast and Furious car, and he really enjoys it. He usually brings it with him when he rides in mine. 😍

We got there kind of late so we ended up parking with customer cars, but we weren't the only ones over there. 😆
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The only bummer was that I discovered the seals are bad on the headlights I just installed. I ran the lights for a while on the drive home (we took the looooong way home, LOL) and there was condensation inside the lenses by the time I got it into the garage. They'll work for now, but I'll want to look into restoring a set in better condition at some point.
 
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I just completed my annual trip-odometer reset on the Eclipse. The car is in storage now (and has been for a few months), but I put more than 500 miles on it this year! Most of those miles were making memories with my wife and son. It was a hard year as far as job instability, but those miles were magical. ☺️

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Won't be long until you're catching up with me on miles. I just started mine to get the fluids flowing, it was the first time in a while. Soon after that I pulled the ignition coils. It's going to sit for a while as I figure out how to mount these things. 97k original miles is awesome though. Keep it low.
 
It's still officially winter in Michigan, but somehow it reached 70 Degrees today (woot!), so I went back to the parts car and pulled the main body harness.

I learned a few things during this process, and one of the things I learned was that it is a LOT of work turning an RS into a GS. 😆 Is it worth it? No, probably not. 😅 Do I still want to do it? Yes. Yes I do. 😁

I have a few more things to tear out of the interior before I pull the hatch and doors and start cutting sheet metal. With the main harness out, I will have no trouble pulling the rear washer tubing out of the trunk. That's my next target. 👍

Oh yeah, and I finally cobbled together a good set of OEM headlights. That was a long quest, LOL. The lenses are pretty clear on both, but they could use a polish. Anybody have any tips for a treatment that lasts?
 
Congratulations on your progress. Use 2K Clear 2-part spray epoxy on the headlights once they are sanded/buffed clear.
 
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