The Great Alaskan Sapporo

[AlaskaMitsu]

It's my turn to start a thread on the semi-restoration of a US-model $200 1983 Plymouth Sapporo.

Sorry in advance for whomever comes to this page in search of help fixing up one of these weird (to us in the US) cars but just like all the other threads before me this one eventually fade away into the vast internet leaving you wondering whatever happened to that car and did any of that stuff he did actually work?

[AlaskaMitsu]

Long story short, I picked up an '87 Widebody Starion that was a POS, worked on it way too much then as it was dead I picked up this car knowing I had a few g54b engine parts lying around and knew I could fix it up easy.

For anyone interested here is my Starion thread that tapered off and never finished. Maybe some day...

http://www.starquestclub.com/forum/inde ... 155556&hl=

[AlaskaMitsu]

Here it is. Day one of seeing it in a garage on the local military base that a GI was selling for $200. Car was FREE about 6 months or more prior to this and my Starion sensei here in town had shown it to me on the Facebook marketplace. guy wouldn't reply to use then all of a sudden it was gone.

Dude had no idea what was going on with it. It just quit running and it wouldn't start.

[AlaskaMitsu]

[AlaskaMitsu]

Cam gear bolt broke. That's all the guy knew. Probably happened when the right rear tire was spun bald . Whatever. Not my first time in a g54b so i had it apart quickly and figured out the 4th-back cam journal was scored and I'm going with that seized the cam causing the cam bolt to break.

Oil looked older than me and judging by that shiny spot on my head that's a few years old. Dinosaur era sludge. Crude Texas tea. Guess what though? Of course I have extra heads and cams from dealing with the Starion. However there was no swapping happening today. Sanded that baby done, polished er up and tossed in a Starion cam which let me remind you guys is the EXACT same profile as the one that came out of this car. Swapped that top cam cap and back together it went. Only to see if it would run of course.

[AlaskaMitsu]

oh look what else I found. Jet valve. Good thing I have a set of plugs from a Starion head to get rid of them thangs. Well only the one for now.

[AlaskaMitsu]

fancy press tool for shoving a new hardware store roll pin for the gear.

[AlaskaMitsu]

Very very dirty

[AlaskaMitsu]

Yes the car did run. Started right up and ran pretty good. Super hard to push the clutch but it made it to the car wash. A little scrubbing and Purple power cleaner is exactly what it needed.

[AlaskaMitsu]

Just some glamour shots.





As you see in the last pic the taillights are different. The original left light is broken in the trunk. I'm still kind of confused on what models had what lights because they look like the earlier gen tail lights but then the left one I have seen in pictures for '82 cars. Whatever. I found a tail light for $70 shipped in great condition. Car-part.com is a HUGE database of US junk yards and I have found a bunch of parts on there.