Been playin with DSMs since 95 when I got my 1st, an NA Talon. Had lotsa fun with that one, modded it and drove the bejeebus out of it day in and day out for about 5 yrs. Definitely one of the best cars I've ever owned. But ... I always had a longing for a Laser. Their simple body lines, minimal body cladding and understated styling always had me wanting one.

Picked up this base model 92 Laser needing a timing belt about 10yrs ago for $400. Slapped on a new timing belt, water pump and all new belts and drove it for about 6 months. It had some sniggling issues and finally just parked it and went back to drivin my 98 Dodge Ram.

Fast forward to about 8 months back when I finally decided to get the Laser back on the street. Drug it outta the back yard and over to my buddys shop and started seriously reworking its old suspension and brake systems as a start and have now replaced every piece of those systems: new lower control arms w/urethane bushings, urethane trailing arm bushings for the rear, KYBs front and back w/all new bumpers/boots/strut bearings/camber adjusting strut bolts/shock mounts, new brake calipers and rotors front and rear, SS brake lines, and front wheel bearings.

Having sat for a number of years waddn the best thing for the engine though and this meant a new timing belt, timing belt tensioner pulley, water pump, drive belts and all the hoses had to be replaced, again.

After doing all this and finally having it ready to hit the streets again my imagination started wandering to what else I wanted to do and that's when things began to get crazy.

I'll stop here as a tease to what that might mean but there'll be lots more to come as The Rolling Toy Box will be getting a lot of new life and some intense modifications.

Meh, it's a dreary, chilly Sundee here in the wilds of East Texas so I might as well add a bit more background to my ongoing build thread, so ...

About 5yrs ago I decided to show some much needed love to the Laser and drug it into the shop I was workin at at the time and made a few repairs.

Bein a long time DSMer I began lookin at the BSE idea and said, why not do it to the 1.8? So I jacked up the engine, yanked the oil pan and front cover, pulled the rear balance shaft and drove in the new bearing and just left the front shaft in the block and then installed a stub shaft in the oil pump housing. Buttoned it all up w/new gaskets and seals and called it good (more on that later!)

Spare Dollero$ were pretty scarce at the time but I had a buncha 4g63 stuff layin around along with a few old bushing sets on hand so I went ahead and put 'em to use.

I slipped in a set of sweet black urethane motor mounts and the trailing arm bushings mentioned in the previous post, cut open the stock air can so it could breathe a lil better and cobbled together a 2-1/2" intake pipe outta pieces of tubing I had layin around along w/some 2-1/2" diesel radiator hose I chopped up to use for couplers for the tubing sections and wound up with an intake pipe with just 1-90 degree bend and a second 45 degree bend. Sweet and simple and with just enough flexibility in it so it could give as was needed, which waddn really much w/the urethane engine mounts.

Had a spare turbo car aluminum radiator layin around so I pulled the dinky stocker and slapped that in along w/new radiator, heater and TB hoses.

Along about that time our shop ran into some tough times, meaning the spare dollero$ got even slimmer and all the work on the Laser screeched to halt for another 4 yrs or so, without ever even firin it up after all I'd done to it.

Our shop wound up shuttin down and I moved out into the sticks in East Texas outside the lil burb of 1959 souls, where I still live today. This is the land of cattle, cotton, corn and pickups, an odd place for a DSM for sure!

But, I dragged the 92 Laser, my 91 4g63 NA Eclipse, 92 Talon Tsi AWD roller and another 92 RS AWD Laser bare chassis I had all out here and here they sat, needing $$$$$$ to get anything going again.

All the while I was drivin a 98 Dodge Ram 1500 w/a 3.9 V-6 that just kept going so at least I had wheels and ones that fit right in out here, so ...

So now we're up to about Covid time and work out here became really scarce, though I managed a short stint at a local parts house for at least a while, but 3 months later I was outta work again. (Bein a native Texan I hafta say this is the most clannish damned town I've ever encountered! If you're not born here you're never gonna be accepted by most of the locals, something VERY strange to a native Dallasite!)

So, I managed to get a job at Wallyworld about mid swing of the Covid pandemic, which was good, they WANTED Wallyworld to stay open ... and I needed a job! Things were lookin up, started savin my shekels and so what did I do? Well of course I bought another Mitsu! I mean why bother fixin the ones I had when I could just buy another to add to the collection, right?

Whew, that was a buncha typin and a bit more to get us to where we are today, but I'll stop there for now.

If you find any of these long winded ramblings interesting or humorous feel free to chime in with some of your own DSM meanderings or just wait for more of mine. There's still a lot more to this story :>)

Nice and sunny today so I took some pics of my sun faded baby. As you can see in some of the pics I'm a big fan of allen bolts and have replaced most of the engine bay fasteners with stainless steel button heads, washers and nuts where possible. You'll also see I replaced the always in the way hood prop rod with struts which has come to be one of my favorite mods.

The body shows no signs of ever having been in an accident and is in great shape with only a few small door dings and a small dent in the lower drivers fender.

Had the windshield replaced which is why the A pillar and roof trim is missing since it was removed before the windshield was installed and it along with all the other external black trim will eventually removed and powdercoated.

Those with a discerning eye will note it looks like 1/2 the timing belt is gone but it just looks that way since I stuck a spare 4g63 pulley on it when I re-did the timing belt.

After having spent a cuppla years parked too close to a cedar tree the windshield cowl and wiper arms were rusted up so they got sand blasted and shot w/VHT primer and satin black polyurethane wheel paint. Some very durable paint for anything external.

The wheels are stockers off my 07 Eclipse, which I replaced w/some old American Racing wheels I've had, well, forever. Went with some 225-50-17s and they fill the wheel wells just right. There's less than a fingers clearance between the back of the tire and the struts and if I wanted to go with anything wider it'd require fender flares, so they're just about right ;>)

My plans for the car include a complete g4cs Hyundai 2.4 block w/10:1 Wisecos, 2G ported head w/some +2mm valves, a short ram intake manifold, lightened crank, 1G FWDt tranny and a long list of other goodies. Got waay too many trick parts just sittin in boxes that need a home.

Once the new drivetrain's in I think this puppy will be well deserving of a fresh paint job.

As a major part of this build a kick ass stereo system is definitely goin in. It's gettin a 10" Samsung tablet for the head unit, a USB hub/charger so I can add a cuppla TB HD for audio and video storage and have ample phone charging, etc. The head unit will output via a single cable along the drivers side back to a DSP which then will output to a pair of amps to run the 6.1 sound system w/all new speakers for the dash, doors and rear area, topped off w/a 10" sub tube in what was once the rear seat area. Not really wanting some bass box on wheels but a clean sound system that sounds good when cranked up a bit. The 6X9 JBLs, 6-1/2" Focals and 3" DS18 speakers along with the Skar 10" sub tube goin in should do fine for what I'm after.

To that end I stripped out all the (badly sun faded) interior panels and added sound deadening panels front to back and side to side, even in the roof panel. All this sound deadening material also will all be sprayed with 3Ms rubberized undercoating to fill any gaps at the panel edges. Some of it's already done and you'll note the difference where the blue from the sound deadening panels can still be seen. I've also been shooting low expansion foam into all the body cavities to gain a little structural rigidity while simultaneously eliminating what were once resonant chambers in the body and eliminating a ton of road noise too. Even without carpeting in it the car is a lot quieter inside now.

Almost finished with the interior panels which have all been sanded and smoothed up a bit, then cleaned and repainted w/a satin black made by Rustoleum with a final coat of clear matte to knock down the sheen the satin black gave the parts. The last step for the panels was to apply foam sheeting to the back side of them to again help with any undesired interior resonance.

The spare tire hole is gettin a full size spare and as we all know that means it'll be sittin up a lot higher than the usual rear hatch floor. So, I'm raising the floor panel up high enough to accommodate the spare which then gives me enough room to also add in a 1-1/2 ton aluminum floor jack and it's 2 piece handles along with a very compact tool kit I've assembled for the car that just fits inside the bag I got w/a Milwaukee cordless ratchet, which can be seen in a cuppla the pics sittin in the spare tire well now. The jack, handles and tool kit will all be mounted in place on either side of the spare under the new rear hatch floor.

The new rear hatch floor will be hinged at the cross brace behind where the rear seat back once was and then hinged again on each side in the rear deck side areas to allow the outside corners of the rear hatch floor to fold towards the center so it can all be easily lifted for access to the spare tire, jack and tools.

Where the rear seat base once was will be replaced with another hinged panel which will be level with the rear hatch area floor and the battery, DSP, and amps will be mounted out of sight underneath that panel. This panel will have a master electrical disconnect switch like drag cars get installed in the vertical panel facing the back of the front seats so at the flip of a switch all power can be disconnected from the battery instead of havin to yank a battery cable when doin work on the car.

All the cars lighting has been replaced w/LEDs and that's another fave mod so far. The head lights are amazingly bright, the markers and tail lights look much more crisp and you can actually see behind you when you put it in reverse!

Looking awesome dude!! I always loved the blue lasers, I wish mine was that color tbh, not enough to paint it again though

Im still learning here, so I wanted to ask:
Does the g4cs block have the same mounting points as a 1g? Or are they the same as a 2g? Just curious. I’ve never looked into the swap but if the mounts are the same that is really tempting..

Redrocketlaser said:

Looking awesome dude!! I always loved the blue lasers, I wish mine was that color tbh, not enough to paint it again though

Im still learning here, so I wanted to ask:
Does the g4cs block have the same mounting points as a 1g? Or are they the same as a 2g? Just curious. I’ve never looked into the swap but if the mounts are the same that is really tempting..

Click to expand...

Thanks so much dude.

I just really got lucky when I landed this one, since blue's my favorite color.

Yeah, the g4cs is basically a 2.4 version of a 1g/6 bolt block. Always heard it was a Mitsu design that they never built and allowed Hyundai to produce. I believe Hyundai only used this block in 90 and 91 Sonatas. Picked up this block and crank back around 2002 and have been hoardin it ever since. Got even luckier with this block since it came w/a forged steel crank which I had a machinist lighten by about 8lbs, which really changes the way it revs. I'll hafta get some pics of it later and put 'em up here but it very nearly resembles a flat plane crank.

It's such a close copy of the 1G block that it even has the bosses on the back side of the block for mounting the AWD carrier bearing, which means it allows running the equal length drive shaft set up. Been haulin around a cuppla drivers side 1G AWD jack shafts for many years and will be using one plus the drivers side AWD CV joint I just received from Rock Auto on a close out. This set up helps eliminate the wheel hop that often is common w/FWD cars.

Sadly these blocks are just about all gone now. Last one I saw for sale was goin for $700. However, if you manage to find one the only pieces you'd want from it are the block, crank and the beefy individual main caps, everything else is just scrap metal.

Back in the early 2000s my best buddy Justin Harris and a cuppla other guys had a shop and built 2 of these engines for customers. One went into a 92 AWD Talon and another into a 97 Eclipse GST. Both were beasts!

There's been so much misinformation and disinformation spread about these engines, usually by people who've never even seen one or have any experience with how a well built package with one performs.

As a turbo engine the additional .4 liters will spool a much bigger turbo like a 4g63 does a 14b, making them awesome hot street car set ups. My recommendation for a really mean street set up is by using no turbo smaller than a big 16G.

I bet there's those who will doubt what I'm about to say but having seen it with my own eyes, it's the absolute truth.

We converted a 96 or 97 (?) Spyder with a SOHC NA 4g64 to a DOHC turbo 4g64 and the customer, against our advice, chose to go with a 14b turbo for the build. Amazingly we did the conversion in 1 wk. Justin worked days on it and I worked nights to make it happen.

Anyway, once finished, when we fired it up it was in boost just as the rpms hit 1k! No kiddin, it boosted just off of idle! The other sad side of the story was that by about 2500rpm it was all in at the 10psi it was limited to since it was using the stock Spyder 9:1cr cast pistons.

The customer, again against our advice, had chosen to use his stock (and worn) Spyder clutch which got smoked as soon as it made one session up the street, fresh outta the shops driveway.

But, we had fun buildin it for him anyway :>)

Took the Laser over to my buddy Justin Harris's auto cross event this last weekend. Was there to provide some food service w/some spicy pulled pork and stuffed jalapenos and habaneros for the participants but just had to take the Laser out on the track for a few runs once everyone was done for the day just for kicks.

Had fun takin the Laser through it's paces but found out the loadin up of the plugs was really hurtin my laps.

The Laser having sat for about 15yrs of its life really has wreaked some havoc w/its performance. Seems the plugs are loadin up and hampering acceleration once down shifting, causing a really sluggish performance once down shifting. Tends to blubber once you try to accelerate in the lower gears or after sitting after idle during a traffic light in town. Maybe some anti-fouler spark plug tips would help but I'll just deal w/it till I get the new engine in.

Meh, just stuff that happens w/a 33yr old engine which will easily fall to the way side one I slap the new 2.4 engine in later this year.

While I've always liked the simple styling of the Laser, one element of it's styling just never enthused me ... the front bumper cover. Having 2 rows of different sized openings in the front just always struck me as odd and kinda cheesy.

While I could have performed major surgery to the bumper and opened up those dual openings to a single opening it seemed like that would probablee not turn out well so I began to look at other alternatives.

Found some aftermarket kits that looked more aggressive but they all were made with the lower edge of the bumper cover dropped down further than the Lasers front end. I expect that styling was intended to match Eclipse and Talons which have lower body cladding that extends lower than what the Lasers does.

So, I started lookin at replacing the cover w/a stock one from other models. The 90 and 91s bumper covers are different due to the pop ups they came with, so they were out. So this left me with only 92, 93 and 94 bumper covers to choose from.

Diggin around on different sites, lookin at what was available and what styles I liked I came upon a reproduction bumper cover from Rock Auto for the 92 Eclipse that was exactly what I was after, well almost anyway.

As always the price was fantastic, just $52.79 and with shipping came out to just over $200, less than I could find any used 92 Eclipse covers for so I pulled the trigger on it late last Sundee night. To my surprise today, just 2 days later, it was sitting in front of the house when I got home today!

Unlike most aftermarket bumper covers that come folded up in a box and they tell ya to let 'em sit out in the sun to regain their shape this one shipped in a huge box, wrapped in bubble wrap, then bagged in plastic with the remaining space in the box filled w/air pillows so it arrived completely unscathed and pristine.

I was lookin at a stock one my buddy had on a 92 Eclipse over the weekend and since he had it off the car we got to do a really good comparison against the stock one on the Laser. The body lines matched perfectly but one thing I noted was that the Eclipse cover had a recessed area in the center for a Mitsu Tri-Star emblem. I knew that would need to be covered somehow. Again, this new bumper cover has that area completely flat, so no modifications necessary.

The cover is made of really nice, thick black plastic, has all the necessary mounting tabs and even ones along the bottom edge for the sheetmetal reinforcement strip.

It comes with the same support bars across the center as the stock Eclipse cover has and these will be removed leaving one large grill opening that I'll be making an expanded metal piece to then fill the opening with which will give me pretty much exactly the look I wanted for the front end.

I've attached Rock Autos catalog pic so you can kinda visualize what I'm talkin about.

In case anyone needs a replacement bumper cover for their 92 Eclipse I'd highly recommend taking a look at this one as not only is it a steal of a deal but a really well made piece to boot.

The Rolling Toy Box rolls across Texas ... well at least some of it.

Took the Laser on an extended run yesterdee which gave me about 7hrs worth of seat time, w/most of that on the highway. It performed well except for having picked up one bad DSM trait when it threw a CEC within the 1st 15mins of the ride. Oil pressure was good, temps were fine so I pulled over, saw no obvious problems and got back in and drove the snot outta the lil 1.8.

Tmarra I'm headed to my buddys shop and have a short shifter, all the freshly painted interior panels, new fasteners for the panels, SS screws for any interior needs and all 3 of the engine motor mounts, everything except the tranny mount.

Plan to install the shifter and interior panels and the mounts. An ambitious day to be sure so we'll see just how far the day takes us.

Should have some new pics to post later this week. Got my fingers crossed.

Had a really productive day at Justin Tyme Autocraft today.

Changed out the polyurethane engine mounts for stock mounts which totally eliminated the insane transient buzzing and vibration it had. Checked the plugs and found it was burning a little lean and that they were gapped too small so we opened them up to around .040. Installed new Taylor plug wires. Installed a Ralco short throw shifter (which does not shift as smoothly as the rebushed stock shifter did). Installed the rear end surround interior panels and all the small panels that went inside the larger panels. Tore apart the rear deck latch assy and found the reason the rear hatch lighting wasn't working was due to a bushing in the latch assy that had just disintegrated and then made and installed a new bushing outta some vacuum tubing so the rear hatch light works again. Removed all the excess foam deposits from all over the cars interior. Massaged the rear seat side interior panels so the new 6X9s, 3/4" speaker spacers and the speaker pods all fit together well.

All in all a very productive day and I can say the car sounded another step closer to being the quietest DSM ever on the road as there was a huge reduction in interior noise as I drove home versus how it sounded this morning.

After hours of installing sound deadening material, shooting foam into every place possible in the A,B & C pillars, across the B pillar cross brace, into the body openings in the sides of the rear seat area, the sides of the rear body panels, the side of the foot well areas, inside the running boards, all the way around the roof support bracing and filling the rear hatch cross brace areas, then applying foam sheeting to the backs of all the interior panels along with fresh foam strips along all the panel interface points it's all making noticeable cumulative results in how the car sounds inside while also quieting tons of squeaks and rattles the car had.

Once the rest of the interior panels go in I feel sure it will get even quieter still.

A years long DSMer customer and friend Rob Allen who runs an exhaust parts distribution center here in DFW hooked me up last weekend with all the parts needed to put together a killer exhaust system. When we get the 4GCS motor in the whole system gets rebuilt from the header back w/no cat, 2 mufflers and a sexy dual exhaust tip for the rear.

Have a custom monogrammed leather shifter boot made by Jose Gonzales ready when the center console goes back in and a sweet set of reworked/recovered sun visors he did for it on the way. I highly recommend his work as the quality and craftsmanship of his stuff is amazing.

Though the progress has been slow, it's been steady and seemingly worthwhile in not only bringin this long dead Laser back to life but making it a better car overall than the way it rolled off the assembly line when new.

Though it's certainly no hot rod, that part is definitely gonna happen once the interior and sound system gets finished up. Still a long way to go with all that but every step forward is one step closer to the end goal and I'm very happy with how it's turning out.

Been too long since I've added anything here so here goes.

Since the Rolling Toy Box sat for about 15 yrs of its life rebuilding the suspension and braking systems was just a good start on all it needed. Necessary for sure but several other parts have failed along the way.

When I 1st put it back on the street the rear main seal blew out within the 1st 100 miles. Headed to work and saw the oil pressure gauge drop to almost zero. Pulled over and found oil pouring outta the rear of the engine which had already completely coated the car from front to back underneath. Wound up taking almost 9qts of oil to get it the rest of the 45 miles to get to work and home that day, then 3 more qts to get it to my buddys shop.

Disassembled the front suspension and yanked the drive shafts and tranny to install the new seal. Wasn't too impressed when I could easily slip the new seal in by hand and really wish I'd have had some shim stock to make spacers to go behind the seal to move the seal to a fresh spot on the crank but as loose as it was I was afraid that would only have made it less secure in the housing anyway.

Watched the oil pressure like a hawk after this repair and luckily that alerted me to more seal failures as now the balance shaft/oil pump seal, front main seal, valve cover seal, oil pan and the cam seal all started leaking like a sieve, now completely coating the underside of the car on the other end of the engine, sheesh!

So, removed the drivers side drive shaft (1 pesky bolt on the oil pan required that the shaft had to be removed to get at it), yanked the oil pan, front engine cover/oil pump assy, valve cover and dropped the exhaust pipe between the down pipe and the cat so the oil pan could come off.

Replaced the seals, resealed the oil pan and valve cover, installed all new belts since they were all oil soaked and for good measure I put in an new timing belt tensioner pulley.

Rocked along for about a month or so until one day on my way home the engine just quit running. It would crank fine but no fire at all. This turned out to be a corroded and broken piece inside the distributor so back on Rock Auto for a replacement distributor.

Slapped in the new distributor and went ahead and installed a set of Taylor 8mm spark plugs wires I had layin around. Checked the plugs which only had a few thousand miles on 'em and they looked fine so reused 'em. Fired right up, Yay!

About a month later on my way home when turning off the highway I found there was no power steering and a quick glance at the gauges showed what I instantly feared. It had lost the water pump/alternator belt which meant the water pump waddn turnin either and yep, the temp gauge was reading all the way at the top end.

I was about a mile from the only parts house around so I called them and they had a belt so another call and a buddy came and took me to the parts house then back to the car to slip on the new belt. $36 for a belt I could get on Rock Auto for $7 but I had to have it. Luckily the head gasket held up through this over heating event.

Since I was already gettin some parts for my 98 Dodge Ram I added a spare alternator/water pump belt and a power steering belt for the Laser for my next round of parts from Rock Auto.

Then about 3 weeks later on the way to work runnin about 70 I hear a shoooonk sound in the engine bay and instantly have no power steering again so again I'm on the side of the highway w/a broke car. This time the alternator/water pump belt is nowhere in sight and when I touched the alternator pulley it's too hot to even grab. Got a rag and spun the alternator pulley and yep, now the alternator bearings are toast and the pulley evidently got so hot it just melted the belt off.

Luckily my job has a spare Toyota Tacoma I can use when my car's down and so it's back in the Toyota again while I wait for a new alternator.

When I went to install the new alternator and belts I find the alternator belt is just a scoch too long and won't get tight enough. Went lookin at O Reillys and found a belt that was about 1/2" shorter, which worked fine.

After all that work the car's doin Ok for now. Gets me back n forth to work but due to leaky valve stem seals and worn valve guides and rings it uses about a qt of oil every 3-400 miles. Since this engine is meant to be replaced anyway w/a 2.4 I don't see the point in rebuildin the head and block so I'll just keep addin Amzoil as needed along w/a quart of Lucas oil treatment every 5 qts or so. The Lucas seems to have at least slowed down the valve stem seal leaks since it dudn smoke as much when I start it.

With our stock oil pressure gauges being decidedly vague as to what actual pressure the engine has it still gets about 3/4s of the way up when cruising and above the 1st line on the gauge at idle so I know it's at least gettin decent oil pressure all around. Dunno what part removin the balance shafts plays in all that but since I didn mod out the oil pressure relief valve opening I think I probably gained some extra pressure from that, which is helpful.

When the new engine goes in lotsa other goodies will be added in as well like an actual oil pressure gauge which will be reading oil pressure off the turbo oil feed outlet at the head which will show the oil pressure present at the last place in the oiling circuit. I'll still leave the stock oil pressure sensor and gauge hooked up too.

Also adding an actual temp gauge. Since I'll be using a Davies-Craig electric water pump and back flowing the coolant (coolant enters the head and then exits the block before returning to the radiator) I'll install a coolant temp sensor at the water pump block off plate so it will read the highest temp within the system, like the stock system does reading off the thermostat housing.

Still filling out the build list of parts for the 2.4 engine and 1G FWD turbo tranny I'll be using w/that new engine and have just about everything needed to be able to cart off the block/lightened crank and bearings, Eagle rods and bearings, Wisecos and rings, flywheel/clutch/PP assy, and Fluidamper to the engine machine shop to have the boring/honing and balancing work done to get the short block built.

Got to sort out my Rams issues too so I can have a ride during my down time and that beast has strange issues all its own I've never seen on ANY vehicle I've owned!

And ... I forgot about the most recent issue the lil 1.8 gave me.

Noticed an exhaust leak that was gettin worse and expected the gasket at the cat eliminator flange was leaking again, which had already blown once so far, but that waddn the problem.

Got to my buddys shop with what now sounded like open headers, jacked it up and this time the 2 into 1 Y pipe coming off the head pipe had completely broken. Someone in the cars past had probablee drug the flex section on a speed bump or something and had just replaced it with a straight piece of pipe so every time the engine rocks it's stressing the exhaust pipe, which eventually just broke.

Luckily it was weldable and my buddy had a spare flex section off a Ford Focus along w/a short piece of exhaust pipe that we used to make a proper repair.

It's amazingly annoying how loud the lil 1.8 is when you have no exhaust!

On another note I'm tryin really hard to add to my dysfunctional Mitsu collection. Found a 1990 Galant GSX that I'd love to have, just not sure if I'll be able to get things lined out financially soon enough to make the deal happen. I've wanted one of those cars for years, even had one slip through my grasp about 20yrs ago.

Keepin my fingers crossed and squeezin all my schekels tryin to make this deal work out.

Oh baby, oh baby! Still ain't set in stone but the seller of the GSX and I are workin through the details of finalizing the deal on the car.

I'll just keep my Laser as a back up car and build the new 2.4 I had planned for it and drop it in the GSX instead. This will give me an NA 2.4 AWD daily driver and should be totally dependable as a DD w/enough room to even haul my grand kids around.

Right now I'm as happy as a puppy w/2 pet__s :>)

Well the Galant GSX deal went the way of the DoDo but ... while finishing up the Laser I have a new project and build thread for The Rolling Toy Box #3, a 92 Eclipse GSX and it will be getting the 2.4 engine instead of the Laser.

Last week the 4g37 in the Laser finally died. Having been down for the last few months needing a new distributor after one of the connectors snapped off while changing out the timing belt tensioner pulley I finally got it back up and going again. And ... it made it about 58-1/2 miles of my 60 mile round trip commute.

On my way in about 1/2 way I noticed it was runnin poorly all of a sudden so I pulled over, popped the hood and found the engine covered in oil while also pouring blue smoke outta the exhaust. It was still holding good oil pressure and temps were ok so I decided to limp it on to the shop. The power was way down and it didn wanna rev so I kept it to about 60 mph for the rest of my all highway commute. It was also puttin out tons of blue smoke. I am guessin one of the worn rings finally just let go but a full tear down will be necessary to confirm that.

Had a long 12hr day at the shop where we were having fits w/scheduling and mechanical issues w/one of our machines and I really waddn lookin forward to the trip home but decided there really waddn anything to lose at this point so I cranked her up and headed for home.

Made it about 6 miles when the oil pressure began to drop like a rock. Slipped into a rest area and added about 2qts of oil but had to let it cool for about 30 mins before it'd crank back up.

Got it cranked and it was makin horrible mechanical squeels, tapping and groaning noises but w/no safe place to park it I decided to just see how far I could get.

I could get it up to about 60 mph and then I'd kill the engine and let it coast until getting back down to about 20 then turn the ignition back on and pop the clutch in 3rd and gently take it back to around 60, then do it all over again.

Made it close to another 20 miles when the oil pressure again began to drop so I pulled over and added the last qt and 1/2 I had w/me and let it cool off again.

A local cop pulled up and asked if I was Ok so I told him what was up and he let me use his flashlight to poke around in the engine bay but there was oil everywhere and no way to tell where it was comin from. Thanked him for stoppin and he went on his way.

Gave it about 10 more mins w/the hood up to let it cool then cranked it back up for what would be the last time.

Made it about 2 more miles before it dropped oil pressure again and with just 3-4 miles left I said screw it, let's see if it'll make it before it seizes. It didn!

Was headed up the last little rise in the road, hopin if I crested the rise I'd be able to coast most of the rest of the way home but it just started slowin down and finally the engine just stopped.

Called up my best buddy Justin Harris and told him I was lookin for the Dead DSM Hotline:>) Like the trooper he is he came out and we used his Cummins Dodge Ram to drag it the last mile and 1/2 to the house

Got up the next day and started lookin for a suitable used engine for it but couldn find any I really wanted to take a chance on, so, I came up w/another idea.

Have a 91 NA 4g63 Eclipse parts car w/a dead 4g63 in it so I'll strip the engine bay harness out of it, buy a rebuilt 4g63 short block, slap on a 2G head, Chinesium 2G short ram intake manifold I snagged offa eBay some years back, the 3" intake pipe set up I still have from a NA 92 Talon I had, spare 75mm TB that's been loungin around in a tub for years now, some larger 1G AT injectors I've been rat holin for years, use 1 of the 1G DSMLink V3s I have so I can run SD, a new SS header I have sittin in a box, new water pump, and a good used oil pump I have, rob all the access. brackets, etc I need off the 4g63 along w/the tranny and put together an NA 4g63 daily driver. Should be able to do this for a lil over a grand w/all the parts I already have just sittin here.

This should yield a fun to drive, dependable daily while I finish up collectin the rest of the parts for Rollin Toy Box #3, the 92 GSX I bought. In the interim I've been pokin around for somethin else to drive since the old 98 Dodge Ram I have that's still runnin is not doin too well either.

DSM life ... chicken one day, feathers the next :>)

Whaddya do when you kill a DSM? Why not just buy another one?

Found a suitable beater in great shape about 2hrs away and if it's meant to be I'll have another one next weekend. It's even a version of a 1G I've never had previously.

If the deal comes through I'll post pics of it.

Been a while since the last post here and lotsa changes in plans, life happens, blah, blah, blah.

Decided to go forward w/a long held build idea for the Rolling Toy Box and have been collecting parts to finish out the build.

For this build I decided to go all out and do everything possible to get the block machine work spot on and needed a very special piece to help in doing so. Contacted Fatboy Fab (on FB) and had them make me a deck plate to send along w/all the parts to the machine shop.

The 1st pic I received was of the initial fly cutting operation and the second pic is of the finished plate as received today.

I'm also including a cuppla pics of the sweet CNC'd Clutch Master Cylinder cap I received w/the deck plate.

These guys are awesome to work with, hold to their deadlines and do some masterful machining. I couldn't be happier w/their parts and highly recommend doing business w/'em when you can.

After having been down for a few months now I changed my mind on the direction of both the Laser and the 92 Eclipse GSX.
Workin on buildin a wicked DD 2.4 NA engine for the Laser.

Here's the basics for the build, some of which is duplication of stuff above, some not.

g4cs 2.4 block w/lightened crank, front of the block oil passage ways and mail oil gallery modified, .040 over 10:1 Wisecos, lightened Eagle rods, ARP head studs, new water pump and oil pump/front cover assy., Fluidamper crank pulley, turned down rear balance shaft, 1G FWDt tranny, Fidanza FW, 2100 PP and a stock turbo clutch disc, 2G ported head w/a new set of SuperTech stock size valves, valve guides and seals, GSC no tick lifters, set of old school Crower 280 cams/springs/titanium retainers, Skunk 2 adj. cam pullies, custom ground/polished valve cover, Magnus SMIM, 70mm TB, 3" intake pipe w/a 3-1/2" velocity stack inlet in the air filter, speed density MAFless set up and tuned w/a DSMLink v3, SS header, 2-1/2" custom exhaust w/2 mufflers and a sweet dual tip for the exhaust pipe.

Lots more custom touches like the time waster custom AC bracket, and will be doing some interesting things w/ Cerakote for this build. So much still to be done but I at least have the bulk of the parts and this one will be built w/all SS allen head (SHCS) fasteners, washers and nuts. And, I have a totally new idea for building a primary catch can into the block itself.

Here's a few pics of a few of the parts to be used.

Being old n slow the work on the new engine's comin along, just not as quickly as I'd like.

Took the Eagle rod set and deburred and radiused all the edges to eliminate any possible stress risers then buffed 'em w/cartridge rolls and scotch brite. Still need to buff 'em w/a brush wheel on a bench grinder and sand blast 'em before Cerakotin 'em.

Spent more than a few hours cleanin the 2G head, removing the valve guides so I can port it, removed all the casting flash inside and out, opened up and smoothed the oil drain back passageways and water passageways and made some improvements in the valley areas to help the oil return more easily to the pan.

Once I get the head ported and the chambers buffed and slightly reshaped I'll post some more pics. Also need to give the Wisecos a little love to eliminate any detonation hot spots before recoating them and the chambers and valve faces.

So much still to do!