Under the knife: My car's progress

[nando]

it's basically a huge bolt with a peice made to fit the outer diameter of the bushing. I have it in my basement somewhere if you want pics. it's pretty crude, but it works great.

[rwh11385]

post pictures, please.

[nando]

It's a little more complicated than I remembered, but here you go:

http://www.325ix.com/pics/subframetool/

one of my old bushings is still in there. the nut and U shaped peice go on top of the bushing, the collar and bolt go on the bottom of the subframe.

[Digitalwave]

You should rent that thing out Nando.

[nando]

yeah, isn't the dealer tool like $350? I think it weighs around 5lbs, so shipping wouldn't be too bad.

there's a shop in town that has one, but they didn't want to look for it (even though I was going to pay for the work). bastards. :P

[rwh11385]

that's kickass, so you just put it on and it allows for easy removal? I'd rather rent that then borrow a torch.

I'll talk to you when I need to replace mine this spring.

[Digitalwave]

Day 6:

I masked and painted the hats of the rotors. VHT paint rocks! The nozzles have a nice, wide, full spray. I highly recommend it.

I completely disassembled the front calipers, and painted the bottom portions of them. I will let the paint dry overnight and then flip them over to do the topcoat tomorrow morning. I think they look AWESOME, they came out a lot better than I thought and its a HUGE visual improvement. I am really stoked about these.

I stuffed a rag into the piston bore of the calipers, and left the stock outter seals on in order to prevent paint from getting in the piston bore. Seems to have worked great.

Rotors before and after satin black paint:



Bling bling!



The pics don't even do them justice.

[rwh11385]

wow. nice work. glad you decided on a silver for the brake calipers.

[Digitalwave]

I am the spray paint king! MUAAUAHAHSHH! $@%^@%(@) INSANE^#@^

wow, too many fumes today.

[Erick]

I am the spray paint king! MUAAUAHAHSHH! $@%^@%(@) INSANE^#@^

wow, too many fumes today.

Since I have nothing to do this week I might just hit up Sarasota....

[Digitalwave]

Day 7:

Finished painting the front brake rotors. They look very, very good. I will rebuild them and install them tomorrow.

I went to the hardware store and got new pieces for the front end, reassembled everything and torqued it all to spec.

Installed the new front rotors, they look good, I just have to clean the pad surfaces off with something before I drive the car.

I burned the hell out of the subframe bushings. I lit them on fire for like 15 minutes each. My whole house and garage ended up smelling terribly, and some of the burnt rubber traveled in the air and covered my car. It'll wash off though... the bushings came out with a lot of coaxing from a BFH.

I installed the new urethane subframe bushings, and cranked down on them HARD. I put a lot of LocTite on, and I am letting them sit overnight so the LocTite cures. I am going to reinstall the subframe and put the rear end back together tomorrow.

[rwh11385]

Hey Teej, what's that bushing?

[Rob]

front control arm outer ball joint or something, i dont know the technical name. but yeah, why is it red?

[e30Matt]

It's a new Ball Joint Type-R.

It makes the car faster. :)

[Spaz]

urthane boot cover, bmp sells them so u don;t have to replace the ball joint if u only have a torn boot.