3 days to go! Rear brake upgrade time with a set of AW11 front rotors and SW20 turbo rear calipers. Also threw in a set of 75mm wheel studs since the 5mm spacer needed for this conversion leaves you with just a couple of threads to hold on with the stock studs.

Studs knocked into place. I didn't have to machine the knurl on them like the front hubs, so that was a bonus!


254X22 AW11 front rotor fitted with a 5mm waterjet cut spacer behind it. Leaves basically no hub left to center the rim, which is a real worry. I'm going to look at a couple of hub mods to fix though in the future (pending the wheels don't fall off between here and Wakefield >.>)



Brackets and calipers bolted on with some TRW pads.


And with a wheel back on, plenty of caliper to rim clearance (30-40mm) with my favourite little set of 15X7" ALT rims (If anyone knows where I can get more of these, LET ME KNOW!).

This car is basically gonna be all handling! Quite eager to see it in action :)

Tree
This car is basically gonna be all handling! Quite eager to see it in action :)

  With only ~83RWKW, I need to be able to brake later, get on the throttle sooner and take the corners as fast as possible or I'm just going to be out gunned by those with more horse power. At the end of the day, I want to push this car 10/10ths, if I don't have my foot flat to the floor, it better be hard on the brakes :)

And this is the main reason for stepping up to the big brakes.

Bitches love R888's :)
As much as the stock brakes work fairly well on the AW11, I believe they are not going to match the performance of the semi slicks, so I went to the cheap, easy bolt on options (ST185 twin pot fronts, SW20T rears).

There's something to be said for mild powered RWD with feet all the way to the floor
I think you'd give those guys a run for their money for sure with this dark horse, coupled with good driving everyone's gonna think it's got some monster engine hehe
 

I'm going to deploy some scare tactics...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20tsugTUStM

Nice 35'c heat today, which I enjoy, however humidity is insane and makes me sad panda... But progress was made! Today I got into fitting the flush mount bonnet pins that I picked up off ebay.
 
Started by working out where they were to get fitted, traced the mount onto the bonnet then drilled some holes. Because I lack some tools in the garage right now, I drill heaps of small holes to cut circles out....

 
I run a couple of slots in it with the grinder

 
Then bend the cut outs up

 
Flex them a few times with the pliers and they snap out


 
File them a bit with a random rat tail file


 
Then started press fitting the fixture into the bonnet

 
Then drilled the holes into the bonnet using my 11 year old corded, cordless drill.

 
Put some rivets in the holes.


 
Tada, it's done...

Now to wait for the sun to go done so I can get around to flushing the brakes with Motul RBF 660 and bleed the system.

Best wishs for the trip.  Both ways!!   We will be looking forward to some picys.     Got money on ya both days.   Enjoy.

Thanks Doug, will try to post as many images and videos as I can.
 
Well, another day of prep down!
Wheel alignment and windscreen done.




Side skirts touched up with some new paint.


And finished off the bonnet vent while it was pissing down rain.




Tomorrow it's off to get a full brake fluid flush and replaced with Motul RBF660.
Then to just mount the MegaSquirt to the chassis instead of floating around the boot.

Originally posted at - https://www.halfdonething...y-1-the-voyage-part-1/

The MR2 Challenge – Day 1 – The Voyage, Part 1
Been an interesting day.
First up, some twat forgot to secure the oil cap correctly…

Amazing how far a 4AGE will go with half a sump full of oil… <facepalm>
Drove 150km with the oil cap sitting on the rocker cover, was only when I gave it a blast at Highfields (Near Toowoomba) that oil ended up on the rear window and gave me a brown moment. Spent 15mins at the car wash “degreasing” the car and engine bay, at least it wont rust in there any time soon…

Pit stop at Glen Innes for fuel and drinks

Another pitstop at Tamworth, no photo due to iPhone, inverter and GPS all over heating. We suffered 44’c temps from Tenterfield to Muswellbrook before running into torrential rain that slowed us down to 40km/h on the highway TrackDub ran a little hot a few times along the ranges, but that might have been because I was flogging it along to overtake caravans, trucks and grannies in Mazda 6’s.

Now chilling out at Singleton in air conditioning!

It's interesting how everyone is having their own saga of desperate preparation and last-minute failures. This is going to be epic if we all make it haha

I just love this little car, even when I do stupid things to it, it just keeps going.