San Diego treasure.

So P went to SD to visit his brother.  Luckily he was driving back so he rented a car and picked up a bunch of parts for the racecar!  We finally got our $20 header and I must admit it's quite the bargain.  Sure it's cracked, but it's easily fixed.  My buddy Norm is going to take a look at it and try to TIG weld it back to "new" for us.  If not, we can just run it with the crack, that's how small it is.

The better buy will probably be the Factory Service Manual (FSM).  These things are invaluable for wrenching on any car.  I remember my wife bought me an FSM for my MR2 and I thought it was a great birthday gift!

The BEST part of the haul, and why I use the word "treasure" is the box of FREEBIES.  Who doesn't love free stuff?

We got (from top left)

1) new clutch cable

2) spark plug wires

3) FSM (ok, this wasn't free)

4) camber adjustment bolts!

5) OEM fuel filter

6) Energy Suspension shifter bushing!!

7) Axxis metal master brake pads!!!

8) OEM brake pads

9) Fram oil filter

10) extra fuel cap

11) SARD injectors (ok, so this was just the box)

12) OEM radiator cap

13) OEM thermostat

14) OEM (?) injectors with new(?) gaskets

Simply awesome!  We'll have plenty of spares for the car.  Those extra brake pads make me consider sticking with the SE-R brake calipers.

-Hong

AR Entry #3 - $31

I had removed the fog lights a while back because a) we don't need them b) they weigh almost 5lbs and c) someone would buy them.  My wife thinks I'm crazy because a) they're almost two decades old and b) the glass lenses were both cracked.

It was a PITA to remove, but it gave me a good excuse to take apart most of the dash to get out the wires and fog light switch.  Someone on SR20Forum.com offered me $30 and I thought it was a fair price.  Since shipping and PayPal fees were only $9, I actually made out with $31.  Just enough to offset the new passenger side window we're getting.

Drove the car to Wal-mart for some Robitussin.  Got a 5qt jug of oil and some Turtle Wax polishing compound.  I got the cheapest oil ($10.17) but it still felt like extravagant expenditure for such a POS car.  Oh well, we've gotta pass smog right?  Driving to Reno is gonna be cheaper than trailering it up.

-Hong

AR Entry #2 - $20

Posted the car on CL to sell some of the larger items to local folks. Got a surprising amount of interest, but no serious buyers yet. This kid wanted to buy the stock 14" (by 5.5" wide!) wheels. I guess they're kinda cool? I dunno. We are probably going to 15" wheels with 205 tires anyways, which are safety items outside the budget. But in a strange little loophole, if we sell the stock wheels we can recoup more money under the $500 budget.

So the kid sees the wheels, and they're all curbed. I mean every single inch of the rim is curbed. Wow, that takes some special parking skills. All FOUR of the wheels are like this. He said he would pay $80 for good wheels, but offers only $50 for these. Seems fair, but they've still got two good tires.

But he also wanted the glovebox because his is all scratched up. I show it to him, and while it's not in excellent shape, it's still better than his. He pulls a $20 out of his wallet. SOLD!

-Hong

NYE update!

As we prepare to bid adieu to 2008 and say bonjour to 2009 (don't ask why I'm using French - Le Mans influence maybe?) I decided to take the SE-R to work today.  That's right, a bona-fide DAILY DRIVER.  Those two initials are a red badge of courage for a track car.  It means license and registration, smog testing and road worthiness.  It's easy to make an all out race car, but for endurance racing comfort is an important ingredient in the recipe for success.

I'm glad to report I made it to work in one piece!  Sure the plastic window was noisy at 80mph, but the car ran well, didn't overheat or anything catastrophic.  I think we'll have to do a basic tune-up, but overall this is a strong runner which won't require any miracles to run a 24hr race.

In other good news, our friend Chill from SR20-Forum.com dropped by FVD and picked up our Recaro race bucket for us.  He's dropped it off with Greyhound and it's on a bus (or two) across the country to it's rightful place as the throne of the Nissin GT-R!

Chill also added a little "bonus" package in the form of some AD22VF calipers he was selling.  We got a fair price on it and didn't have to pay any additional "shipping" since they'll also be going on the SE-R.  We just need some rotors, some track-capable pads and some stainless steel brake lines for good measure.  Going with all new hardware is nice, and since it's a safety item it doesn't count against our $500 budget.

Got some interest from a Craigslist post for our SE-R front seats.  Why would anyone want seats out of 15yr old car? The SE-R came with special sport seats that have additional bolsters on the sides which help keep the driver in place.  They actually are pretty nice, but we won't be needing them.  More funds for performance parts!  If I can sell the seats, wheels, trunk & hood, we might just make enough for some real suspension parts!

-Captain Ando 

1st Accounts Receivable (AR) entry - $50!

Packed up some parts today in odd-sized boxes.  Reminds me of the old Pelican Racing days.  Shipping and packaging was a particular talent of mine since I wanted to make sure my customers got their parts in excellent condition.  I know those monkeys in brown and purple are doing their best to destroy my packages, so I take extra special care in packing items up.

What may look like ordinary brown boxes to you actually took hours of time and effort to create and pad/cut/box/tape into their current form.  Doesn't seem worth the effort, but in the overall scheme of things, they're highly valuable.  $25 in profit per box (minus fees and shipping) means $50 cleared up under our $500 budget cap.  That will pay for the header and bank us $30 for future mods.  We're off to a great start!

-Hong 

Wrenching on Christmas evening.

What's car guy to do on this wonderful holiday evening?  Start stripping out the racecar of course!

I removed the door panels to get to some trim pieces that a SR20Forum.com member wanted to buy.  The speaker grilles ended up being part of the whole lower door trim (like 3' long) so I'll have to get creative shipping them out.  The guy's even buying the ashtray!

Another fellow wanted the foglights, even after I posted pictures showing that they were cracked.  He offered $30 which is NUTS because it took me over an hour to remove the dman things.  Still worth it because we cleared up some funds under the $500 spend cap and now can afford some performance parts.  Header and rear sway bar are on the top of my list.

Wrote a nice e-mail to Jay Lamm (guy who runs LeMons) and got a response on Christmas day!  I'm going to try and sell the stock 14" wheels/tires, but not sure who would actually want these!  They're all of 5.5" wide. Wow.  Thinking we should go to 15" x 6.5 or 7" width to run some 205 Azenis.  These appear to be the tire of choice for LeMons.  Time to draft a sponsorship proposal to Falken!

-Hong

The Racing Gods are looking down upon us.

Racing is about preparation, talent and a whole lotta luck.  Even the best drivers in the best cars can get beaten on a lucky SOB on race day.  That's just the way the cards fall.  I have a good feeling about our team's chances given some recent "car-ma" that came our way.

First I mentioned the $20 headers that one of the guys is going to pick up while on Christmas vacation in San Diego. It's a $3-400 item, with a small (repairable) crack.  There were others who wanted it, but the seller wasn't willing to ship.  I half-jokingly posted my status on Facebook as, "looking for someone to pick up a part in San Diego."  My friend Plato saw this and commented he was going down there!  What luck!  We get the header (later this week).

So we also won an auction for a $1500 Recaro racing seat for a mere $26.  Yes, two digits.  It was even used by Milka Duno at some point!  Again, the seller wasn't willing to ship, which helped keep the price low.  I figured we could find someone to pick it up, maybe on a car forum or I could hire a courier/mover off Craigslist.  Again I posted my dilemma on Facebook and AGAIN my teammate Plato came through.  Apparently his co-worker was in the right neighborhood in Florida and could pick up the seat for us!  What tremendous stroke of luck!

Now we've got a real FIA certified seat (albeit a bit expired), with some racing history (and luck?) in it's pads.  Doesn't hurt that our low-buck "race car" is really getting some nice low-buck parts for it.

-Hong