The Bogan

Research research research, and tackle the important things first, like the rust, because as a wise old hippie and some crazy horses once said "rust never sleeps" Nothing good comes easy and fast, and nothing that comes easy and fast is typically good

I made an extension of the item circled above in red that is hard wired to the battery and tucks away nicely in the engine bay, could easily do the same if it in the boot, just run the extended cable out under the bonnet or boot lid, I then just stick the charger on a milk crate to get it off the ground

I see your start stop.....and raise you a

Ahhh, that, yeah, but it all worked out well in the end As for the ITB noises, I don't really wind it out with her in the car, and the dort only really starts dorting hard when your WOT or up it hard

I'll tell her I put in a new air filter on it, which, it would have anyway with the ITB's In the end she isn't to fussed, she spends lots of money on hair, nails, make-up and all the other "required" beauty products that women use, plus I grease the wheels with shiny gifts and holidays wherever and whenever I can She once questioned my car spending "budget", but after itemising everything she spends on herself, and what I spend on her, and the fact that I don't care if she does or doesn't wear make-up and fancy pants perfume, or requires new outfits for every wedding, funeral or anything else she deems worthy, and I'm quite happy to go "real" camping, instead of staying in hotels or jaunts on cruise ships, she decided not to press the subject on how I spend funds, and has never asked "how much did that cost" again, so a win to me And how often can you say you really get a win with the fairer sex? She is a good woman, and in the big picture, I'm really lucky.....that she hasn't killed me yet

I see no real downsides to ITB's, apart from the initial cost of my drive in drive out lifestyle, the "upsides" is they sound cool and would add lots of smiles I am willing to pay to play for the extra smiles I've spent the morning googling and youtubing the BBR ITB's, a "little" extra power and throttle response, but alot more dort, and really, I'm only really in it for the dort Who knows, after all this money is spent I might even make 150kwatw....LOL

Or just buy a Hyundai Equinox (???spelling???) N EV .....LOL https://youtu.be/xrUrUdmZrfQ?si=BzZLIKFmeTVeartM

So, we now have a straight and clean boot lid inbound and the car goes in for paint, again, on Wednesday, and will be ready on Friday, all ready to get cams and stuff on Monday And by straight and clean.....I mean a brand new OEM one that cost..... $1300....😪 Sadly there's no clean undamaged used soft top version available, plenty for the power retractable hard top versions though, which is arse and makes Mark have the sads I could have waited longer, until a NC sort top boot lid eventually turned up, but I'm sick of waiting and said fark it and made it rain cash, meh In other naturally aspirated news, one of the guys at work brought in his old Corola which had a 4AGE in it, really nice clean car with lots of mods, including ITB's, man that things induction noise sounds sick with all of the dorts that makes you smile......maybe the NC needs ITB's, yeah, basically for the noise they make, but they're pretty expensive, but, they sound so damn good I may bring this up when I drop the car up on Monday, and by may, I mean I will🤣🤑🤪🤣

Could you not use "thermal" spacers to give the clearance, like the ones I used between the blower and head? That raised the manifold height by around 10-15mm Albeit the ones I used were for cathedral ports, but I assume they have similar for rectangular ports????

The Varex is good if you want the ability to quieten down a really loud exhaust, and a fairly simple install if you have the clearance In saying this, a well designed exhaust, that doesn't drone, and "close" to not being a "big heat signature" for the constabulary, is a better way to go Noise does not = power, but a well designed exhaust that isn't "overly" loud will not negatively effect power, it will though keep the constabulary off your back I had a Varex, and it worked well, super quiet when closed, but sounded like war when open and up it, I did have available "realestate" clearance issues under the old SS though running a 4" exhaust, and the Varex was the best option for me, as the space where the rear box went was available for the valve, so compromises were made to quieten it down I have seen, and heard, alot of nice RB's with just some resonators and/or muffler/s, which, while sounding "beefy" were not obnoxious cruising around, and not something that draws unwanted attention, but, they did get real rowdy when up it The trick is to get an exhaust fabricated that doesn't break your brain, or your passengers willingness to be in the car, on a Hwy cruise, i.e. no drone, and also not have your neighbours breaking your balls because their house vibrates and wakes their family when you roll in late at night, or when you head out early in morning, but it also sounds real good to the ear Post up when your done, whilst I no longer own a RB, I do love their sound with a nice exhaust, especially when there's a lumpy cam lopping away

So, not only do you have a plastic bag to recycle, like the old plastic bottles that were full of old oil that we took to get recycled, we now also have a cardboard box....for bonus recycling points, well, apart from the additional trees and the manufacturing requirements used to make the boxes Oh, and now nowhere to put your old oil in and take to get recycled Seems environmentally legit, and super helpful for people who change their own oil Who comes up with these brilliant ideas

I was once told, who it was I'm to old to remember, that the length of the OEM wheels brace supplied with a vehicle is designed long enough for a average person to apply enough torque to do up, and undo the wheel nuts to the specified torque What a average person is is anyone's guess though, i.e. average fat bastard, average knuckle head, average perfect sized human......like me Unless of course, a tyre shop has ugga dugga'd them up to "torque to yeild/strip" specs, used cross threading as natures lock tight, or a big breaker bar was used to tighten them up to get some nice stretch in the poor old wheel studs Me, I torque wheel nuts to 1 elbow joint click, lower torque settings are based of wrist clicks, higher torque settings are based of shoulder clunks, or total dislocation for anything that requires all of the torques

Store bought, like dis https://racecraftaus.com/products/muffler-oval-new?variant=39611886305393

I remember those, people use to steal them to make bongs.....

IIRC, it only cost me a couple of hundred dollars to get an Liverpool Exhaust to fabricate a custom stainless resonator for me to fit in the available realestate that I had under the car I actually watched as they did it, took about 1 hour to cut up the material, tig weld the body of it, and then add it to the exhaust 4"in and out, with a packed 5" body, that was about 12" long In the end, it is some blindly simple sheet metal work for an exhaust shop, and some welding

Yeah Nah, Sydney

If you like how loud the car is now a resonator behind that mid muffler should help with drone and not effect the volume much I've added resonators to a few aftermarket exhausts before specifically to reduce drone, volume really never changed, but cabin noise hwy cruising was much improved......with great success

As stated above, if you don't have anything in the mid pipe look at putting a resonator in the mid pipe to reduce drone, the biggest and longest that will fit clearance wise

I had a generic 4" Varex rear box on my old V8, worked a treat for sneaking home late at night, it was as quite as stock when closed The car was "fairly" loud when open as it consisted of 1" 7/8 headers to 3" catted Y pipe, to 4" single, it did have a resonator in the mid pipe and only the Varex out the back I also hard wired in a Varex dash mount switch, as the key fob thing is a pain to use when driving I wouldn't recommend giving the beans when it is closed though as it creates a large restriction in the exhaust It also can in very handy when pulled over for "random" breath tests or just cruising past the constabulary

I love fastener joints, the price difference between them and joints like Bunnings or Super Cheap is amazing, and they either have exactly what you want, or they can get it to quick They have even given me some for free when I only needed a couple of specific size In saying this, I have paid premium for fasteners from Bunnings if they have the sizes I need, but only for convenience really, as my local is only 10 minutes away, the Sushi joint near them is also a consideration How's the weather Matt? Stay safe mate

Yeah, it was a bit of confusion with me, I rang and asked if they had a boot for a soft top, and then the paint shop when they rang and were asked if it had a hard top on it, which it does, just not a PRHT....LOL Meh, whilst frustrating for all concerned it isn't a war stopper and should be a thing of the past in a week or two In other N/A related news, car is booked in at the end of the month for the cams, springs, retainers, harmonic balancer and retune I might even pull the lazy arse card and get them to do a full service on it whilst it is there

Nah, I much prefer colour matched Talking about colour matching stuff, the new/used boot lid turned up, all painted up perfectly......aaaannnndddd, it's for a power retractable hard top, not a soft top.....LOL They are now sending a boot to fit a soft top....., whilst frustrating, life is like that sometimes, sometimes you just need to dodge, duck, dip, dive and, ummm, dodge.

The incoming weather event seems to be affecting people in weird ways....🤣 And no, whilst there is some fancy engineering going on, I have no real interest in anything rotary really I had a Capella in the 90's, the rotary engine is way to temperamental, and extremely thirsty for my liking If I won lotto and wanted to waste a ton of cash, a boosted K-swap would be what I would look at, until then, the N/A MZR2.5 will be at home in the engine bay of the NC A build like this, just without the idiotic street pulls and skids would be interesting to waste a huge amount of money on https://youtu.be/EgqAoVtUD1E?si=n3_umivrUPP8C9Cs

$5-10k isn't much for reliability if your looking at more power for a RB Me, with that much money currently on hand, I would only look at things to suit future mods, as stated, a fuel pump and ecu would be my first point of call, as well as getting the injectors cleaned and tested, maybe even replace all the coolant hoses After a little time with the tuner, they should be able to tell you how your car is running in relation to things like your ignition, cooling, and other stuff that will be picked up when it has had a few runs up on the dyno and some logs to look at Basically, get everything sorted for reliability before you start leaning on a 30 year old engine Good luck with the one and only true Godzilla, enjoy Note: for your birthday presents, ask your family and friends for lottery tickets, a 32 GTR can cost "all of the money" to make reliable power