LA Lancer Rebuild (Deux)

[sambamboo]

Hi all,

Well as you may have noticed I've just sold off my Blue LA Lancer 4 door, Omg what a difficult decision, anyhow the new owner (who is an old poster on these forums) loves it, and has driven it back from Sunny / Floody QLD to Victoria.
Should you read this Rob, all the best mate and take care of your new Toy.

Which brings me to my new/old project, My Yellow 2 Door LA Coupe. Its been sitting in my parent shed in Adelaide for the past 10 years or so and is in need of some TLC. i need to get it to QLD somehow in the next couple of months to restart some work on it. just as an update, to bring you up to speed, I'll post some thumbnails of the build so far.



These are the original shots of my LA Stripped to the bones around 12 years ago before being sent to Toowomba, for some much needed love and attention in the paint department. unfortunately owing to finances, and some shoddy workmanship the car now (although looking quite nice) has an excess of body filler in it which needs to be addressed.

While the Coupe was in Toowomba, I relocated to Wollongong in NSW and when the job was finally complete they sent it to me in a Shipping container tied down with 2 pieces of thin nylon rope, (luckily no damage).
they also butchered the bonnet... but more on that later. Here's some thumbs of its arrival at my Wollongong home... Oh, i had hair then ..and a dog (both are gone now :/)



More to come...

[sambamboo]

I've had this Lancer since around 1986, so its got a fair bit of sentimental value to me. From what I can remember it was won in a competition by the first owner, and was then sold to a couple before me who used it to take their scuba diving gear in it...unfortunately that meant a few rust issues in and around the boot. Just after I bought it was resprayed in the original Savannah style yellow, I managed to source some new door skins for it too, I followed this up with Pedder's Shocks and some 13 inch 'Performance' rims as seen in the picks above, quite similar to the good old Pepper pots.

Around this time I tracked down a worked engine out of a ex-rally car in Adelaide, basically the usual 1600 Block bored out with the 4G35 (1700) pistons.. apparently it could spin up to 9k :O (not that i ever got it that high).
This Engine came with a 'Gower' head and D Ports (still fitted to the car), a Number '8' Factory cam, some hand fabricated long throw extractors, and a set of 42mm Weber's...One regret is the fellow had some Twin-cam heads there too, I should have grabbed one while i had the chance.

This setup lasted well for a while I have however, undertaken at least 3 rebuilds of the bottom end owing to the thinness of the material between the bores. It wasn't until i moved to Wollongong that I managed to source a 4G35 Block and undertook (hopefully) the last rebuild for this motor ..touch wood.

While the engine was in getting sorted out, i started to put the lancer back together again. Id managed to Source a set of Grafted GH Struts with larger discs and, Koni inserts all round.

I decided not to use the original wiring and bought a "Painless Wiring' loom. don't believe them, lol. I mean how hard could it be ..really



Along with no Wiring came No Dash ...hmm now where did i put that? So a custom Job was the go.



While far from perfect it was enough to get it registered back on the road.

now about that Bonnet....

[sambamboo]

So continues the saga of a man and his Lancer...

I kept on working on the wiring and moved the battery to the boot, while the engine was being completed. and made a start on the new door cards and the area behind the rear seats ..(still tracking down photos) but i basically made a frame from aluminum and covered it with thin ply
this gave me an extra storage facility where the rear seats were, and once covered would give the impression of seats still being fitted. well that was the concept.



I decided to have my old Recaro seats reupholstered too, and get my matching door cards. the photos don't look to bad but the wings on the seats leave a lot to be desired ..ill have to have them checked out once i collect my car from SA
I also splurged on a new Steering wheel a duel spoke Sparco did the trick. the dash i just gave a quick coat of mat black paint, and attached the original instrument binnacle behind. (Shitty i know.. but it did the job.)



Now the bonnet was originally brilliant, and i thought when i sent the car away for painting that i would get it modified similar to the Wherett Sigma with mesh inserts in the bonnet skin..unfortunately the painters in their wisdom not only cut through the skin of the bonnet but through the frame as well .. and then called me and said 'Ohh its a bit to flexible' lol. So i had to source another one, fortunately i managed to secure a resonable one from Melbourne and had that redone.



Once the engine was returned from getting a freshen up basically new bearings pistons rings etc etc (my mind is a little fuzzy now as to what i had done exactly ...ill have to trawl through my receipts >_<\ ) i reinstalled it in the car.

[75wagon]

How long till you get the car back from SA?
I'd be curious to see more pics of what you've done with the dash? It looks like you've made a whole new panel from wood paneling and fitted the original gauges up behind it?

Are you still planning on running those rims on it when it's done? Or going for something a bit more old school and deeper dish maybe?

Dave...

[sambamboo]

Ola Dave, I've got to go to Japan in late March for a couple of weeks so I'm thinking of getting it sent up in April, although i don't think i can wait that long. More than likely ill do it in the next few weeks ...shh don't tell my wife.
as for Wheels the ones in the pics aren't on the Coupe anymore i have a set of old 14s off god knows what ..they are a spoke design sorta BMW-ish. I'll post a pic here when i find it.


I was thinking of going for a set of Performance Wheels 'Superlites' in charcoal http://www.performancewheels.com.au/superlite.asp i can get them in a 15 x 6 with a +24 offset ...still thinking about going 16 x 7 with a 12mm offset not sure how far out they would stick tho.

[75wagon]

Have you looked at other options?
I do have a set of 14x6 Charcoal Superlites in my garage if you are interested? They are the ones with the steel sleeves in the stud holes (apparently the all alloy ones crack?). They were sold but the deal fell through. They are the perfect offset for a GA/GB, I would imagine they would also suit the small front guards of the Lancer.
Wheel: Superlites
Size: 14 x 6 inches
FS: 65mm
BS: 115mm
Offset : +25mm
For what these measurements mean How to measure Wheel offset.

Dave...

[sambamboo]

Ohh ...very tempting ..i'm sorta mixed about the 14s atm, I'd like minimum 15 as that's what i had on there previously (pepper-pots that i sold with the blue one) send me a pm tho with the price and ill see what we can do might be a good stopgap measure in the interim.

what sort of application was causing the all alloy ones to crack ..rallying?

[sambamboo]

Just another job i had done While putting it all back together was getting a set of polished Pepper-pots. mmm Shiny. unfortunately i sold these with the blue one recently.



Where the Truck lites were installed in the rear of the car, the painters just used the rubber grommets.... it looked a bit ass. So i had some laser cut stainless mounting rings made up with a U shaped bracket welded on behind to facilitate the mounting of them. i originally had them painted yellow but ended up having them painted black to make them stand out a little better.

[sambamboo]

Sorry Dave i missed a little bit of your post earlier about the dash ...i modified the left and right mounting points to suit, and used one piece of 10mm mdf for the dash, and then cut the binnacle down and placed a flat piece of perspex over it (simple but effective) the only addition is some aftermarket led indicator lights. I'm still at work atm, but I'll post up a design i have in mind just to make it look a little less home made, basicly I've done a fair bit of fiberglass custom work in my time, and I'm thinking of doing the same for the dash.

While i was trawling through my receipts i also found some of the various design ideas I had for the coupe, ill post these up too. I cant seem to track down a photo of the rear seat area, but you will get the idea from the pictures below ...btw disregard the pig-angel doodles that's my wife corrupting my work, lol



I had only just had the Coupe back on the road for around 3 Months when the Blue Lancer fell into my lap, and as i had always desired a 2.6 Lancer I made the decision to grab it while i had the chance. One thing that it came with was a factory LSD. As the blue LA was a little fuel hungry so i figured i would grab a Scorpion rear end for taller gearing (with discs) and have the diff. shortened to fit the narrower track, this meant i would have the LSD to refit to the coupe.

Fuel wise I'm running 42mm Webers, which i haven't seen anywhere else, im not even sure what they came standard on. Ive made a custom air box for it, running a K&N panel Air filter. I'm considering removing this filter and enclosing this box so I can run short ram tubes inside, then having another panel filter box up the front where the battery was, just to get some cool air in there and give it more of a factory look.

As you can see in a few of the Thumbnails earlier the strut tops have been painted as well (not surprised really) I'm still tossing up what to do here as I've had the original K-mac strut tops fitted on the Blue lancer and although not real pretty they performed fine. I'll have to do some more research me thinks. but I'm fully open to suggestion.

On the exhaust side a set of 4 into 1 Mandrel bend Pacemaker extractors reside, these are a copy of the original hand made headers i had fitted when i bought the rally motor way back when ..the long throw design made it really sing around 3.5k rpm
I had these treated with some protective coating a fair while back and by all accounts seems to be working.

[sambamboo]

That's about it currently for my LA Coupe, once i can get it up here ill start a list of issues I need to address to get it back on the road initially, luckily i have an engineers report for it, and also a mod plate from last time we were in QLD. and then the longer list of modifications to make it a more enjoyable piece of machinery..here's a couple of shots of how i left it.



judging by that last photo I've come to the conclusion my Folks are hoarders.

[ddt]

Wow, your LA is unique and looks stunning. I'm also impressed you've held on to it for so long.
I love LA lancers but the rear is my least favourite side because the regular tail light treatment makes the car appear even narrower than it really is.

Have you considered some pinstriping or blacking out between your rear lamps to make the car look even fatter? I like it how it is now but think it would look pretty cool like this too..

[sambamboo]

The 2nd Picture is kinda growing on me ....can you do one with a little bit of separation between the light mounts and the striping so it doesn't look like all one piece of black
...love the idea however, cheers.

[7thsin]

Thats the NICEST LA lancer i have ever seen , 4 just one reason , the tail lights ,
thats wats allways turned me off em .

[sambamboo]

Finally....

It took some time but my LA is in Brisbane in my Shed. After being trapped in my Folks place, behind a large amount of Furniture for the past 18 months or so, we were able to extract it, and with the help of my brother in laws car and a hired trailer, It was bought up from Adelaide over 3 days.



New Home


My wife and I have recently bought the house we have been living in for the past 2 years, and we have a baby due in January so I can see this being a relatively slow build process, but at least I'm able make a start.

I've scored some Nissan R30 15 x 6 25mm offset rims of an old forum member and have had them cleaned up and repainted silver by a mob in Adelaide
I will fit them up with some 195/50 15r Michelin pilot sport 3's prior to roadworthy.
The twin 42mm Webers were quite gummed up due to lack of use so I've given them a good clean and they are back to working beautifully.
I'll change the current plenum arrangement to fully enclosed and run it into a commodore air box (this should hopefully keep the induction noise down a little and give the engine a cooler air feed.. this theory looks good in my head, but i'll have to see how it works in practice.

More updates and pics to come.. hopefully a bit more regularly than my last ones. Happy New Year.

[75glnt]

When you mean plenum... Are you building a box that bolts to the carbs, then runs down to a filter box like the injection setups?

If so, could I have some pics I've been toying the idea but don't know how to go

[sambamboo]

When you mean plenum... Are you building a box that bolts to the carbs, then runs down to a filter box like the injection setups?

That's correct.. my current setup is a long panel filter which sits on the side of a plenum attached to the twin weber's, I'll mock something up this week to see if its going to work out of cardboard


This is the plenum you can see how / where the panel filter sat inside with a sliding cover to keep it in place. I will more than likely have to change this design to allow me to tighten the ram tubes.
I will fab up new inlet pipe to be attached to the sliding cover.

I have plenty of room to place a new filter box in where the battery used to be located. I'll need a decent catch can too that old drink bottle just ain't cutting it.
Those original strut tops have to go as well >.<\

[75glnt]

Nice!

I've got twin dellortos and am planning the same thing.. Only have an inch and a half between the tubes and strut tower :/

[dirtjockey]

I'd be keen to see your final setup - I've got a set of 42mm webbers on a 4g32 - I've got some filter socks on them but want to change that - I'm northside brisbane.

[sambamboo]

I'm attempting to track down a VS Commodore air box and associated plumbing.. found one on gumtree for $30 its a fair hike north however, will see if I can get one closer to home. Just curious Dirtjockey what type of ram tubes are you running... i have a set of 45s and I'm thinking of slipping some 45mm x 1.5mm Aluminum tubing inside to drop them down to the 42mm I need.

[BlueThunder]

Nice!

I've got twin dellortos and am planning the same thing.. Only have an inch and a half between the tubes and strut tower :/

On my old 4g32 engine with twin dellorto DHLA-40's i had the same problem. I mailed ITG and they had one laying on the shelf: I think it was a JC40 filter which i took with a blank base plate as i didn't know exactly how far the carbs were positioned from each other... fitted perfectly ;)

[75glnt]

I'm running the same... DHLA 40s

Might look into that! Cheers blue

[BlueThunder]

Your welcome, if you need more info about them, just ask, i think i still have the emails...

[BlueThunder]

Here's a pic of my old 4g32 with the twin DHLA 40's and the ITG filter:

[75glnt]

That strut brace! looks like it was made out of a sway bar and some steel plate

[BlueThunder]

That strut brace! looks like it was made out of a sway bar and some steel plate

ow shut up you :p i got rid of it with the installation of the twin carb 4g63 sohc. Otherwise i coudn't open the air-filterbox...
And with the 4g63 DOHC i also won't put it back :p

[Scorpma82]

[/quote]


Is it me or does the car look like a Chrysler Centura with the round lights?