Yeah, im pretty destroyed at this point. I'm going to leave the car be for the next week or so, then access the situation when I dont feel like rolling it off a cliff face. There is going to be alot of work ahead. I might grab some 1500 grit next weekend and try rub out some of the gunk. Issue is, its all over the shop. If it was only 5, 10, 15 specks, sure. However, there are literall hundreds of specs about the car. I hired a freakin booth so this wouldn't be an issue - alas - it was poo poohouse, and the owner didn't seem to care in the slightest.

That's pretty pathetic the booth owner doesn't wanna take any responsibility...jerk (firebomb his house!). The car will still hammer with those engine mods however....as you said, leave it a week or so then decide what to do.

Well its 2am, I woke up, now can't go back to sleep. This tends to happen when horror things go wrong with my car, seeing as its my pride n' joy. freak sake, I want some sleep.

think of it this way James.. you've spent near $30,000 on the car and your getting all worked up over a grand.. yes, $1000 is a lot of money, but after what the car owes you a paintjob isn't the worst of it!

Even if it were just in primer, it'd still be better than most of the modified MR2's around!

Hang in there mate!

Still alot more time and effort required now. Its not so much the money, money comes and go. Its getting time around a full time job to do this stuff.

Ah well, I'll give it a cut back (and a rub in areas with some 1500grit) and then polish it up sometime this week or next weekend. If that doesn't go well, I have basically an entire week off in a fortnight, and can concentrate my efforts in that week on reprepping it for another layer of paint. Safe enough to say, we wont be using that booth again. My mate still has good ties with the old spray shop he worked at so he should be able to organise use of a booth on saturday there, I just have to get the car to the northside. I don't really want to harrass my painter mate too much more, as he is doing all this work for me FOC. I'll see what he says, he wasn't happy with the job and said he couldn't leave it like that, but quite frankly, its not his fault that the booth wasn't properly maintained.

If anyone knows anyone with a car trailer I could make use of one weekend that'd be great. Otherwise I may just have to hire one.

PS Kraze. I spotted you on Granard road on monday. I was in my corolla coming outta bunnings.

Well im starting to cheer up a little now. Just had a chat to my painter mate and appears he was stressin out about it just as much as me! He is more then happy to help me sort it out, and get it looking swish. Now I just gotta scrounge up the funds to do so.

Well, engine arrived at port on Tuesday and looks like I'll have it late this week or early next week.

This monday gone was an RDO, so I spent it gathering up little bits and pieces for my car such as gaskets and what not. Got my hands on the idle air control valve I'll be using. The throttlebody i'll be using (75mm edelbrock racing throttlebody) doesn't have allocation for an idle air valve, so I'll be using a standalone item fitted on some Fords. I also spent a little time doing up an injector loom so that if required I can switch between different injectors with relative ease.

I've got to wire the whole car, including cutting and splicing parts of the old loom into the system in order to run the dash cluster and other bits and pieces that have sensory in the engine bay. About 10 months ago I stripped the factory loom right down (pulled all the conduit & tape of it) and labelled everything that I needed to keep. Took me a while to sort it out, and its going to take me a while again after all this time to recall what needs to stay and go... Great.

I also picked up my whiteline sway bars on Monday and my phenolic resin intake manifold gasket arrived in the mail.

Going to be a busy few weeks ahead getting the car back together and running once more :)

Some pictures:

Injector loom trial fit on rail:


Injector loom complete - made a bit of a bungle of the connector bit, didn't get all the wires going there perfect length so the heat shrink isn't nice and smooth, oh well



Ford idle air control valve:



Intake manifold gaskets (one is a mates):



Whiteline sway bars (front & rear adjustable):






Have ordered all my required silicone joiners and all my gearbox bits (synchros & bearings), misc gaskets & bolts are currently on there way from USA. They should be here in a few days (early next week) so just in time to get that sorted for the lot to go back into the car.

Will keep everyone posted.

Oh yeah, it wont be running until I can find a lower t-belt cover & crank pulley, so anyone who can help out there, I'd appreciate it...

nice mate. have you tried toyota or road and track for covers ur after?

Haven't tried road and track, they are constantly trying to get ahold of timing belt covers themselves (I assume for engines they are building) Im not sure how much they are from toyota, should probably check. Think I could probably get them both for around $100. I think the crank pulley is fairly expensive from Toyota though.

Hope you got both the gaskets that go behind them and a blowjob from a smoking hot chick for that.

Could source them from the guy I'm getting the rest of my Toyota gear from for ~$150AUD inc. gaskets. In hindsight, I should have done this. Bit late now, as I wouldn't wanna pay for an individual shipment just for the two covers (postage would run me at least another $50.

If I have to, I will though. I can't even confirm my timing without a lower cover....