1Gb Talon Rust Revival

[Widgmaster]

You are so anal...but I love it...I bet Yatarō Iwasaki is looking down and saying... " sore wa watashi no shonen " which translates " That's my boy.

 

[Silverspyder]

You are so anal...but I love it...I bet Yatarō Iwasaki is looking down and saying... " sore wa watashi no shonen " which translates " That's my boy.

Oh, I know! A gift and a curse.

 

[Dericsh]

Mine is R65 Bluish Red Metallic. I always order my touchup paints from www.automotivetouchup.com Put in your year, make, model and all the colors and codes will pop up and you can choose what you need. I just did a search for your eclipse and it popped up no problem. You can get it in a rattle can for sure. That's what I always use for my touchups.

Thanks for sharing this. I was planning to check with oreillys but now I don’t have to worry about it.

Edit- just realized they are local to me, even better!

 

[Silverspyder]

Today I plugged (and removed) the thermo-valve. I've had it capped off for years, so I finally got around to installing a plug in it's place. It's a 3/8" NPT plug.

Then, I went to work on replacing my crusty front LCA's. What should have been a simple, 20min job turned into an hour as I was having to bang on this end with a fork and sledge to get it separated from the knuckle. finally got them yanked out though.

I have some ES bushings on the way to replace these stock ones, so I won't be installing the new ones just yet...which is fine because I want to take care of some of the rust under the front end now. Starting at the front of the car, I noticed some rust bubbling underneath the paint on the lower radiator supports. I prepped and painted these a few years back when I replaced my radiator. Looks like it's time to do a better job now that I have the front end ripped apart.

the rust was even worse underneath.

I'll spare the details, but I wire brushed, prepped and POR15's again...ended up doing the entirety of the bottom of the frame in the front. Tomorrow, I'll topcoat it.

 

[Silverspyder]

Didn't have much time today, so continued with where I left off yesterday. Got the various areas of the frame and body topcoated after the POR15 treatment. I did the chassis black topcoat on the underside of the frame and everywhere else I did body color with clearcoat over top.

Here's the after of one of the radiator supports. This should hopefully last forever.

Since I have the wheel wells all cleared out, I decided to finally get around to drilling out some bolts that broke off about 15yrs ago when I tool off the fender liner. I didn't have the means to remove them at that time as I was a poor college kid, so today I went at it (to be honest, I had completely forgotten about these until I saw them again today with the liner off)
Here they are in all their corroded glory. You can kind of see the one in the back, but these are both the same. Oh, and I know what you're thinking...just grab a vice grips and twist them out from the back. Tried that. They aren't budging. It was actually also twisting the little tab these bolts screw into, so no-go.

After the drilling and refreshing the threads.

Since I was in the wheel well, I decided now would be a good time to clean tf out of them. I want to eventually POR15 the underside of the strut towers as well. I'm shocked I don't have the common rust in those areas, but want to make sure i try to prevent it.
Before/During/After

Not sure what I want to do with them now. Either leave them be like this or do a rubberized undercoating like I did to the back? What do you think? Leave it or coat it? Let me know as I'll be doing it next weekend most likely.

 

[Dericsh]

I believe I would coat the front to match the back

 

[Silverspyder]

alright, so I did coat the wheel wells to match the front. Thanks @Dericsh for your input. Makes sense to keep it all matching front and back.
First thing I wanted to do though was protect the underside of the strut tower caps. So I roughed them up and POR15'd them. After that was dry I coated the entire wheel well with undercoating like the back.

If you guys don't have this little spray gun thing you snap onto rattle cans, do yourself a favor and get one. Makes it MUCH easier to do larger spray jobs.

I ordered some new wheel studs this week for the front. Figured I'd better get them swapped out since I was up there. Can't have brand new everything in the back and not the front.

also, picked this bad boy up this week. I've wanted one for quite awhile. this will make prepping all the little brackets and whatnot SO much easier and take less time.

Decided that before I can reinstall the new LCA's, I'd better get to whatever I can under there while they are out of the way. That led me to the front swaybar. the bolts, brackets and the bar itself looked rather crusty. It's easy enough to pull, so may as well.
Before/After Swaybar. Same prep to the swaybar as just about everything else.

The swaybar brackets were next. Here's a before prep...after blasting and after paint.

I ordered up some new bushings for the LCA's as well as the swaybar. Here's the old with the new. The old ones are the 30yr old stockers and are pretty brittle, yet intact at this point.

the long bolts that hold part of the LCA in were in good shape, so I cleaned them up a bit and freshened up the threads and added new lock washers and nuts. As you can see above, I'm using new bolts/washers for the swaybar brackets as well.

Did the same process with the big LCA brackets as well. Here they are after prepping and paint.

That's all I had time for today. Next weekend I'll start reassembly.

 

[Silverspyder]

More blasting, coating and assembling this week...
Before I re-installed my swaybar, I noticed some corroded steering rack brackets that were super easy to get to while I had everything out of the way. So, off they came. Figured I'd get the large subframe washers while I was at it.

and here they are after blasting...forgot to get a blasted pic of the washers.

Had this crossmember brace off too and it was looking quite gross, so figured better get that cleaned up too...It had some decades old undercoating on it so had to get that all scraped off first. A bunch of Goof Off makes short work of it. then I blasted the parts that were rusted, then primed and top coated. Looks like new!

Everything prepped and ready to go.

The swaybar bushing install was not fun at all. Took me at least an hour of swearing and throwing stuff. The way the bracket slides into a slot and becomes "hinged" in a sense is a total pain in the ass. One way I made it a TINY bit easier was to modify the ES bushings a bit by just rounding out the bottom corners. Made it a little easier to get the damn brackets to pivot down over the bushing. Some big prybars and channel locks helped a bit too.

Assembly is pretty straight forward. New ES bushings on the LCA ends too.

These new Moog endlinks are beefy.

 

[92AWDHX40]

Lools good im por 15 everything, and installed. Moog parts too.

 

[Silverspyder]

Got lots done this week. I wanted to start by getting the brakes and suspension off my workbench so I reinstalled it all. Before I did that, I wanted to check the boots on my front axles and steering rack. They are still in great shape, so I took this opportunity to clean them really well and protect them with rubber restorer. I use 303 rubber restore.

Next up was installing the new OEM studs so I could mount the brakes.

Here is the adapter plate needed to run the CTS-V brakes. And I can't forget to grease up the endlinks while I still have easy access, so I did that too.

Before mounting the suspension up, I wanted to take care of the strut to knuckle bolts. these are in great shape still so I blasted them clean and blued them for a little more protection. I had some super blue sitting around so I figured why not? It's a cool process.

Next up was something I've been sitting on for quite awhile. I bought one of the first batches and it's just been sitting in the box ever since. Was great to finally get this bad-boy out and ready to install. You may remember, I installed the shifter cable plate way back when?

Boostin Performance H-Pattern shifter. I've always hated the "slop" with 1g shifting and I had previously done just about every mod to help stiffen it up. This oughta take care of it. If you haven't watched the video when this thing was released go check it out.
The first step (and one I've been dreading is removing the stock shifter cables. Anything where you're twisted up under the dash is no fun.

I've seen a lot of questions on here in the past about how to remove them, so here are some pics for future reference on the site. First, remove the cotter pins and slide them off the shifter arm. Next, remove those gold colored clips holding them onto the shifter base. Use a pliers or vice grips if they are stuck. Mine came off super easy with a pliers. Next, there's a u-shaped clip holding them onto the floor...I don't have a pic of it, but it's really easy to find and access. Just one 12mm nut holding them on here. Then, the shitty part is removing the two 12mm bolts on that metal bracket in the pic...this is the passenger side. You can see the threads of these bolts sticking through on the firewall side. Then, you just yank them out after you separate that metal bracket from the rubber grommet. Go through the firewall side as it's easier.

If you're removing your shifter, this is all you're left with...4 bolts hold it onto the floor.

Here's the old next to the new.

I want to re-use the shifter cables grommets so I cleaned them up really well and applied some rubber protector. To use them with new shifter cables, you need to cut a slit. I used a razor blade, then dremeled out the holes for the cables just a little bigger to accommodate the slightly thicker cables.

The new shifter requires an adapter plate. For this vehicle, it bolts directly to the floor with countersunk hardware.

New shifter sits on top bolted down by those supplied nuts. I fed the new cables back in through the firewall side and attached them to the shifter. The adjustment was super easy following the video Boostin has on their site.

I didn't take many pics of the battle I had reinstalling the damn cable grommet into the firewall. Needless to say, it sucked and now my back hurts.
Next I needed to mod the transmission a little. Due to the super long throw of the shifter arm on the tranny, they supply a new mounting pin and recommend installing it 2.5" from the pivot point.

Then install the heims, adjust per Boostin's instructions and done!

I just ordered RTM's new billet fuel sending unit and E85 fuel supply line kit so I'll prob be starting on that for next time...

 

[Silverspyder]

Got my new billet RTM sending unit. Also got a fuel feed kit. Went with an -6AN tank to rail with teflon-lined braided stainless hose to replace the rubber hose I have. I run E85 so this is what Paul recommends for that setup. I gotta say, this thing is top-notch, but that's not even it, he includes absolutely EVERYTHING you need for a good install. all the washers, nuts, ring terminals and connections. I always appreciate a complete product. I went with a new fuel lab filter to replace my old one. I know I'm doing all matte black for most items, but I wanted a slight pop of gold so I went with the gold/black fuellab filter to replace my all black one.

I had installed a -6AN tank to rail end setup about a decade ago, so this was fairly straightforward in just replacing those pieces. Started at the fuel filter since I wanted to take care of the associated brackets as well. First, I used paint stripper to get the old stuff off, then i blasted and recoated. I did the same thing with the radiator brackets since I had those sitting out as well.

Here's the old sending unit I'm replacing. When I added my Walbro I broke probably half the tank studs (common problem), so I replaced them with stainless hardware at that time.

Since I'm reusing my walbro 255 and also my stock float setup, I needed to transfer them to the new sending unit. Pretty straightforward. I did notice the wiring on the walbro plug is pretty damn brittle, so I have a new plug coming tomorrow and I'll redo that wiring.

 

[2fastTSi]

This thing is looking amazing so far. How much taller is the KDN shifter than the stock one?

 

[Silverspyder]

This thing is looking amazing so far. How much taller is the KDN shifter than the stock one?

Not quite sure. I can def put the old 2g shifter knob back on the old one and take some measurements for you.

 

[Silverspyder]

Not a ton to update with this time. I am at a standstill with my fuel tank. I cannot for the life of me get two of the nuts loose holding the tank in place. In fact, one of them is super mangled and rounded off now.

I could use some ideas from the collective here. How and the hell to I get this removed? It's a flanged nut so that makes it even more difficult.

I've tried an extractor bit and a nut splitter. No go on both. I managed to shear off one side of the top of the nut now unfortunately. (no pic)

Been at it for about 2 weeks now. It's been blasted with penetrating oil a million times too.

So, since that was a no-go, I decided to replace an old foglight plug that wasn't working. The terminals inside the plug disintegrated from rust. I cut off the old one and replaced with a new one with pigtails.

Reinstalled my hella horns while I was at it too. Also replaced the fog bulbs with a higher temp LED bulb too.

Figured I'd get the newly painted rad brackets on as well. Had to hog out the bushings a bit in order to get them lined up.

Let me know any ideas for getting that nut unstuck. Keep in mind this is the fuel tank...even thought it's mostly empty, I'm not willing to use heat just in case. Thanks guys!

 

[habitatguy187]

Angle disc grinder

 

[TCB91GSX]

Mini hacksaw, will take a few minutes but no sparks and no heat.

 

[AWD-Tony]

It’s still sealed up? Use an angle grinder to make a cut on an angle. The heat and relief cut will loosen it. And if needed, use a hammer and chisel to knock it loose.

 

[Silverspyder]

Mini hacksaw, will take a few minutes but no sparks and no heat.

How would that remove the nut? I'm not wanting to cut the stud off. Maybe I'm just not following what you're saying?

 

[Silverspyder]

It’s still sealed up? Use an angle grinder to make a cut on an angle. The heat and relief cut will loosen it. And if needed, use a hammer and chisel to knock it loose.

Well, kinda. The sending unit is out and I have a plastic lid over the hole for the time being.

 

[TCB91GSX]

How would that remove the nut? I'm not wanting to cut the stud off. Maybe I'm just not following what you're saying?

Oops, figured the stud was toast as well and you were replacing it and the issue you were having was not wanting to use heat or have sparks near a fuel source.

 

[AWD-Tony]

I would install the hanger before I would attempt the method I mentioned or any grinding for that matter.

 

[Silverspyder]

I would install the hanger before I would attempt the method I mentioned or any grinding for that matter.

Unfortunately, that's the problem and why I haven't gone right to the grinder. I'm trying to remove the tank, so I can repair the sending unit studs. Aren't these cars oh so much fun?

 

[AWD-Tony]

How many are broken? If it’s only a few, you’ll be fine.

 

[Silverspyder]

How many are broken? If it’s only a few, you’ll be fine.

What I think I'll do is put the old sending unit in and seal it back up then use your idea with the grinder and see how it goes. Thanks for the help!

 

[Dericsh]

Is that stud salvageable? It looks beyond that point to me but I don’t have much rust to deal with in my area. If anyone can save it, I’d bet you can.