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Sarge's 1990 4WD Protege Worklog

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    #61
    How much warp are u getting on the roof? depending on how low that area gets i would recommend using some kitty or tiger hair before applying a light coat of filler. Just my .02..
    97 protege dx few mods

    94 escort lx heavily modded

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      #62
      not a lot of warp, really. there's a place on the inside brace that a tool can be put to that spot of the roof. I might try some PDR (paintless dent repair) techniqes on it before any filler. Right now, it's probably less than 1/8", but I haven't got out a depth gauge to measure.

      I didn't get a chance to work on it last night, but I'm going to try for some tonight after work. only thing is, it's now in the 30's 40's at night, and low to mid 50s during the day, and the garage in un-insulated. I've got a wood burner in there for heat, but I might just end up taking it to my buddy's shop for him to do the finish work on it, since I'd really rather have the paint stay on, lol!

      --sarge

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        #63
        Great work on the roof. Maybe next year I will get ambitious and do that to my rust spots. I would just be worried about it sprouting up again..

        I did a headgasket twice on my tercel last week in my unheated garage and it was probably near 32*F!! And I had the door open! You just have to work vigourously :D
        '90 Miata
        '90 Miata
        Taco
        '90 BG 4WD base- sold..

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          #64
          pdr is a bit difficult when there is no luster on the paint, but at least u can get it rough by feel. I am very familiar with pdr, i have alot of the equipment for it. VA paid 17k for my trng after i got out of the army.

          I definitely would not paint in the garage with a wood fire, i don't think you would like the results of that one. Friends shop ftw.
          97 protege dx few mods

          94 escort lx heavily modded

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            #65
            if I get it going right, there is basically zero smoke, but nice heat, to the point where I can be working in jeans and a t-shirt in january when it's -30F outside. However, the garage isn't insulated, so the fire needs to be stoked more often than it would otherwise. There's a huge squirrel-cage blower motor that circulates the heat pretty good, but without insulation, I don't trust the garage to maintain the temperature needed for the body chemicals to work.

            Anyways, on to tonights fun and games.

            First, I threw down a piece of tape over the hole to be patched, and used an exacto knife to cut out a template.


            Then, I took the grinder and scuffed down to bare metal on the donor hood.


            Then, stick on the template..


            Then, I chucked up a new Dremel 426 reinforced cutting wheel into the air-powered die grinder.

            This time around, I'd done some more reading about butt-welding sheet metal. Seems like lots of people recommend as little gap as possible, it helps to prevent burn-through sometimes. I left a tiny tiny bit of gap with the first patch, and it was a PITA to keep from burning through. It could've just been lack of practice on sheetmetal. Kinda ridiculously dumb to jump in to welding this stuff without practicing first, but it turned out ok. Anyways, I tried to not make the part smaller than it needed to be, and used a flat file and triangle file to make the piece fit snugly. Again, the hard drive magnets kicked ass!


            You can see that there is a wee bit of a gap at one end, but it turned out to be pretty good. I gave a half-turn on the feed roller tension on the welder, and loosened up the spool holder a hair, after noticing that the wire wasn't feeding quite as freely as it should've been.

            And another angle:


            Here we have the patch, after three go-rounds of tacking at (somewhat) even intervals. Penetration was NOT a problem this time, but the cool thing is, I didn't blow through even once!!




            Then, I ground it down (36-grit flapper wheel on a 10A 11k rpm grinder) and went over it again. I could actually lay a bead on the metal this time. Thinking back, it might have been the roller tension/spool tensioin that was causing the issues before.
            Anyways, then I ground down the welds once more, for the finished product.



            And, here's a shot of the whole thing:


            Next job is to put a wire wheel in the grinder, and remove as much rust as possible. If my friend has access to sandblasting stuff, I'll probably go that route, otherwise it's going to be Naval Jelly (phosphoric acid) and some zinc-rich cold-galvanizing primer, which I happen to have at the ready.

            --sarge

            Comment


              #66
              Well, this is about the gray 4WD, but it's still a '90 4WD, and this work started on the blue one, so I'm putting it here.

              RE: the blue one and the bodywork, I'm working on insulating the garage, so temperature can be maintaned when I finish the bodywork. I'm not able to get into a heated area anytime soon, and since the garage needs some work anyways, it's good motivation.

              Anyways.

              Todays (actually last friday's after work) work log, was that I took the BumperLightBar and mounted it on the gray 4WD. I re-used the two relays, and the two switches, and the siamesed ground-wire from the switches, but everything else was new wires. Why new wires? Well, because of the need to connect four HID ballasts, of course.

              Two Hella 500FF (cheap from Wal-Mart, nothing super-fancy) lights, modified to fit some HID's, and two no-name lights, also modded. The Hellas I'll refer to as the "center HIDs". They take the place of the el-cheapo "pencil-beam" 100W lights that I had before, but since they leaked (I think the reason why they're known as el-cheapo), and the reflective surface started to discolor and chip, I wanted something better.

              The other ones, I'll call the "corner HIDs" as they point to the sides, got fitted with the same type of HIDs, 35W 5000K units. The "in-bumper" lights that I previously had got removed, but were too shallow to take the HID bulb, so I got some other ones, but never got around to installing them yet. I found I had a bad ballast anyways, but that's fine since I've since got a replacement. Those two lights will be getting a similar treatment. I'm using the passenger-side high-beam signal wire (red with white stripe) as the signal to the relays, then each relay goes through a switch to ground. This means the high-beams must be on to activate the HID setup.

              Anyways, on to the pictures. next time, I'll try to put the camera on a three-legged stand, aka triple-monopod (a tri-something that is silly to be in the word filter), so the image angle doesn't change so much.

              Here are the low beams, running standard 9004 bulbs, in OEM-oxidized housings:


              here are the high beams:


              Then we flip on one switch on the console, and get the corner-HIDs:


              And flipping the second switch gives us the center-HIDs:


              I might need to mount the Hellas slightly differently, as the mounting hardware doesn't allow them to be aimed quite right. I need just a hair more down, but the travel is already used. When I get around to fixing the in-bumper lights, they'll be aimed to fill that hole between the corner-HIDs and the center-HIDs.

              These are NOT for use on public highways.

              --sarge
              Last edited by SgtRauksauff; 12-13-2010, 02:06 PM.

              Comment


                #67
                wow looking awesome sarge! that 4wd is going to love you after she's done with the body and paint.

                also lights look good man, i've always loved your in bumper fogs too, i enjoy coming up with neat things for my car as well, good to see other ppl aren't scared to venture off the norm path lol.
                -Jack

                ONTARIO MAZDA CLUB! Join! https://www.facebook.com/groups/500055016671733/

                91 626 LX - basically stock and pretty slow still
                http://www.clubprotege.com/forum/sho...my-GD-626-LX-)

                01 E53 3.0i - FOR SALE! pm if interested

                91 USDM Protege LX - SOLD! turbo/manifold up for sale!
                http://www.clubprotege.com/forum/showthread.php?t=46606

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                  #68
                  Ok, another little update, on the gray protege.

                  This past summer, I slapped together a little splash shield for the engine bay, to protect from rocks and debris at a rallycross:



                  Well, with the massive amount of snow, and the fitment of the GhettoFabâ„¢ lightBarBumper, the front edge got yanked around and was essentially a snowplow, or a badly placed airdam.







                  I just hammered it back up, after getting all of the snow/ice out of there.

                  Then today I got a 12" x 24" piece of 16ga steel, a box of self-tapping screws, and fixed it after work.

                  This way, there's no more deep snow shoving right into the radiator, which can cause some pretty serious problems if you're going fast enough.

                  They're cell phone pics, it's all I had at work at the time.


                  I bent the top edge to be flat against the escort bumper channel, and the bottom edge was bent to meet the existing splashguard. a couple pilot holes were drilled, and done.



                  it's not the best thing ever, but it'll do through winter, and be just fine until I get it caged and get a [b]real]/b] skidplate under there.

                  I still need to fill the in-bumper light holes. There's a definite gap in the light pattern to fill, but once it's taken care of, it's going to be awesome!

                  --sarge

                  Comment


                    #69
                    thats some good work sarge .. say i noticed that your plate says hobbyist ... is that a ???? um a ubuild or something???? kinda got my mind wondering ...

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                      #70
                      I love it!
                      1990 Protege 4WD
                      GT-X BP26 swap [AT->MT]|Cup holder cut to fit|Synthetic gear oil|Synthetic brake fluid|Corksport SS brake/clutch lines|Mazdaspeed HV oil pump|GT-X front STB|Corksport type I rear STB|Matching full-size spare wheel|Homebrew Brass shifter bushing|Speed Source brass shifter cable bushings|EDM headlights/corners|FMIC|EDM cabin vents

                      1 3 5
                      ├┼┤
                      2 4 R


                      Seeking: Canadian 4WD seatbelts.

                      Comment


                        #71
                        wow man i just spent some quality time reading this from the very beginning and WOW you do put alot of time into your cars. crazy creative ideas you got going on. keep it up Jordan!
                        Anyone knows what 9K rpm feels like? I do



                        93 Mercury Tracer SW
                        99 Honda Accord 4DR 'VIP' status
                        01 Honda S2000 Future Boost

                        Comment


                          #72
                          Thanks guys!

                          Hobbyist plates are very similar to Collector plates: car must be 20 years old. They both share the "cannot be driven in January" rule, although you can purchase temporary permits.

                          With Collector plates, technically the car must "have NOT been altered or modified from the manufacturer's specifications." Hobbyist plates allow this. "Street Modified", "Replica", "Reconstructed", and "Homemade Motorized" vehicles are what's covered by the Hobbyist tag. So, engine swaps, or back-halfing the car is legal, and scratch-built or kit cars like Factory Fives, or a Locost, stuff like that.

                          The BEST part about both Hobbyist and Collector plates though, they do not expire. You pay 2.5 years worth of normal registration upon first getting the plate, but never again. So, if you've got a 20-year-old car, and plan to have it for a few years, it pays for itself. Only catch is, you MUST have a normally-registered car also. And the aforementioned can't-drive-it-in-january rule. Although, the cost is only 30 bucks for the entire month of January, or 5 bucks for a 5-consecutive-day period.

                          --sarge

                          Comment


                            #73
                            And another thing about hobbyist plates is that there are no inspections required after its registered. My uncle has them on his heavily modified (about 550 hp at the flywheel with a chevy 383 small block!) '79 chevy nova, and he has lots of stuff that he wouldn't be able to get away with if he had regular plates, like no catylitic converters, VERY loud exhaust (exhaust modifications are technically not legal in WI, especially if it makes it louder.), no smog stuff any more, and lots of other stuff. He can get away with all this stuff because they don't check.
                            My family has lots of bg's!
                            2003 Ford Escort ZX2: Project car/future daily driver. Built Ford Tough (With Mazda Stuff)
                            1999 Escort ZX2: Daily driver/beater. Going to be replaced by the '03 next summer.
                            2000 Escort ZX2 S/R: bought wrecked, going to use as parts car
                            1992 Protege LX: My old race car. Just a wrecked shell right now. Waiting for scrap to go up so that I can get rid of it.
                            1992 Mazda 323: Race car
                            1992 Escort Gt: My grandpa's old race car
                            1994 Escort GT: My grandpa's new race car.
                            Parts cars; 1993 Escort Gt, 1995 Escort lx

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                              #74
                              i did not know this about these diff plates except for the historical ones but man that is sure something
                              Anyone knows what 9K rpm feels like? I do



                              93 Mercury Tracer SW
                              99 Honda Accord 4DR 'VIP' status
                              01 Honda S2000 Future Boost

                              Comment


                                #75
                                thats pretty cool... thanks for the info ...

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