Sunny Ute

[benzo]

right on!

[starni_boy]

The engine was pulled out of the bay again to start setting up the steering/suspension. I stripped the shell out from wiring etc so I wasn't working on top of other shit/getting the shits with wires everywhere.

Got the rack in place/centred and got it welded up:



Then it was time to clean it up and give it a paint/bolt it all up:



Then the task of tie rod ends/rack end lengths. It needed to be much shorter than AE86 items so that was sorted with an angle grinder to shorten the AE86 items. Probably still need to get them trimmed a little more though to allow for more adjustability.
The LCA's needed the bolt hole drilled out to accommodate the AE86's larger LCA bolt. Spacers were also welded on the inside of the engine Xmember for the LCA's due to the AE86 items being ~15mm narrower than the Datsun items. This also allows me to put XT130 LCA's in at a later date if I want, but at the moment the 13x8's are going to be a push to fit under the small guards. I guess Camber will help a bit here.



While the struts were out it was time to fix the caster arm mounts. The stock mounts were on a totally different angle to the AE86 arms so they were cut off, notched the rails and new mounts fabled up out of 5mm plate. The caster arms also had ~75mm more thread cut onto them and then 50mm trimmed off them due to the arms being too long to fit in nicely.

Old mounts:



New mounts:





Front struts all bolted up and sorted!

[starni_boy]

Next up was mounting the new brake booster/master. The firewall was cut and shut with a KE70 firewall section and adapted into the datsun. Cleanest mounting option I reckon.



Next up, weld in the clutch master section and the KE70 steering column to suit the rack. All ground back and smoothed off with a touch of bog. Fucken cleaaannnnnnnn



Cut out the stock battery tray and moved it to make more room for Velocity stacks and just generally clean up the look of the bay. Didn't want the battery in the tray because I'll be chucking shit in the back of this quite a bit.



Cut out the radiator section to make room for the new radiator. Using an RX2 alloy rad, perfect size to fit in the bay and also has the inlet/outlet in the right position for the 4age.



Got the spray gun out, mixed some primer up and got to it:





There's a 25mm x 25mm tube spot welded underneath the top of the rad support that is welded to each side of the engine bay. More rigidity right up front because honestly the rad support once I cut out the new radiator hole was super flimsy. Solid as now

Dropped the engine back in to get everything mounted again and sort out what is going to go where. Carbs turned up, Extractors turned up and then a few days later my carb manifold came so that got all set up to see what I was working with. I think the carb manifold needs a little more trimming to get the carbs closer to the engine.

The carbs are Mikuni RS-40 smoothbores, they're flat side carbs that are VERY similar to FCR's, just the mikuni version. They have velocity stacks available off mikuni themselves so I'll be getting a set of those eventually.



Thats pretty much up to date with where I'm at. Still lots to do but I'm just stoked the engine mounting is finished and most of the fab work is done. Just a few little odds and ends to do until I can have the welder packed away for a while which I'm kind of keen for haha

But anyway, next thing is getting the bay sprayed and the underside painted with some tar sorta spray. It'll happen over the next few weeks but I'm flat out at work at the moment so maybe longer..

[Sup2a]

This is so good!

[Mirko]

so good dude nice work

[drift kid]

Oh lawdy this is too cool, going to be one of the coolest sunny trucks around

[starni_boy]

Cheers guys! Ticking boxes all this week after work so I'll hopefully have some painting happening soon.

Started the new handbrake this afternoon so that should hopefully be welded in tomorrow afternoon. Upgraded to a KE70 item due to the handbrake lines becoming a HEAP cleaner under the car

I'll have more photos over the weekend.

[Mirko]

Wish l have the fab skills like that dude. Hats off to ya

[Jdm-Mcc]

f'yeah

[joeschmo_57]

You don't do things by halves! Looking rad