Cefiro -> Laufiro

[SirRacer]

2009 updates

Will just add in a few update to what ive been up to in the last few years:

I changed the turbo manifold to a brand new one (pics as below) which didnt solve the problem but improved boost response. A friend of a friend offered me a bigger exhaust housing for a good price so i took that and put that on, and took the opportunity to sell my Tial 44mm gate and buy a Turbosmart 48mm gate. I still had boost creep problems so I now have the wastegate mounted off the turbo housing which works perfectly.

Biofuel (E10 from Gull) is still causing me issues with my fuel tank sealing so i have another of those, and my fuel is still overheating so i have a new 044 to test out so see whether thats the problem.

I also got around to fitting the custom Laufiro guards i have had for ages for the car. I dropped one of them at one stage which cracked it so another 10 hours later it was finished again. Now the plan is just to repaint the car so its at least one colour. Im thinking white at this stage to help with resale.

Edited December 19, 2010 by SirRacer

[SirRacer]

I took the car to get dynoed December 09, and the oil pump unfortunately managed to crack on the dyno. Teaches me for using a second hand oil pump, but i guess im just lucky that it didnt happen on the road as i wouldnt have noticed it.

Bottom end since been rebuilt with new very expensive 33gtr oil pump, along with new bearings all round. Shame as the other ones hadnt done more than 1000kms, but we did it for precaution. Have mounted up an oil press gauge now.

Most recent updates: (last few weeks)

Since its been rebuilt after an oil pump breakage I’ve done about 100kms in it, but taken it to my trusty warrant guy, so its now warranted and ready to go.

As im at Uni at the moment cash is tight, and I’ve always wanted to learn how to paint in case I ever get the hankering to do up something like the rx2 series 2 sedan I’ve always wanted.

The car has dents everywhere, holes in the occasional place (bonnet pins that I remounted) and mismatching panels, so time for a new colour. As i’m a bit older now, and I want to sell it Matt Black wasn’t to be again, so I’ve decided to go white.

I’ve got no painting experience at all, other than painting a speaker box for my boat. Panel wise im no better off, but ive got a cheap trademe paint gun and a 15cmf compressor I got from trademe as well

First step – Strip the car to get it ready for masking to do interior. While I was stripping the rear tail lights, I noticed a heap of rust that id paid to have removed years ago. Turns out the panelbeater just used a urethane glue and glued over it. As i cant weld, and had the car stripped so couldn’t drive it anywhere, I cut out all the rust with a grinder, and fixed it with a number layers of fibreglass on each side of the holes. Fibreglass is a perfectly fine way of removing rust/patching holes and is easy to work with + I’m pretty handy with it. Its now physically stronger than the metal in the repair spots.

All holes sorted out and fixed.

I wanted to flare the rear guards to match the custom Laufiro guards on the front. After a panelbeater telling me they would do them with a dolly I used a big hammer to bash out the rears and then covered them with a scim of bog to just help with the shape. The paint cracked, so I wouldn’t recommend it but for me it worked fine. They are now probably 15-20mms wider than a stock cefiro, and look heaps better.

DSCF3067

While I was at it, I changed the bumper to a series 2 cefiro one id be given and fixed up as it was in crap condition. These are a bit lower, and look smoother than the original one. I don’t like the aftermarket bumpers as low = cracking, so will stick with these.

DSCF3066

Interior door jams all painted now. This is a hell of a lot harder than it looks as all the nooks and in the doors are hard to get to with the spray gun. Masking the door gaps is a hell of a job, and i managed to leave a big enough gap to allow overspray onto the inside windscreen. Painting the exterior will hopefully be much easier. The paint is light in 2 places (will fix when im doing exterior) but otherwise im happy with how its come out.

DSCF3055

DSCF3060

I also sanded both bumpers back to plastic, fibreglassed over the cutout in the rear bumper where a towbar once was, and repaired inperfections in both. I then primed with an etch primer.

DSCF3061

Im at the stage where the car has had all the dents in the roof filled (don’t ever jump on your hack cars roof, as you may try and fix it up one day) and most other inperfections sorted. The roof dents took me the better part of a day to get out. Otherwise the body is still looking good from where the dents were removed last time. I replaced one door and removed the plastic door liners (mid door) from the doors to match the replacement door i brought as one had dents and lots of rust.

The car has now been sanded down with 320 grit all over. Plan for tomorrow is to sand it again, wash it twice with dishwashing liquid, wipe down with a wax and grease remover and then prime, with 3 to 4 layers of primer to give me a nice base to work with.

Then will give it a week to cure (I didn’t want to fork out huge money for 2pack primer, so im using a 1k) and potentially shrink, then ill put on my top layer of 2k Arctic white.

[SirRacer]

I primed the car myself in the garage and has issues with the gun shooting the primer. The gun explicitly states not to go over 43psi, yet i had to thin the primer 200% more than it reccomended to get it to spray.Crappy chinese spray gun!

DSCF3092

Unfortunately my masking on the door jams wasnt good enough to i have overspray on the area ive just painted. Bugger!

My girlfriend has a mate whos a painter so i asked him to come around and check out my spray gun. Id never met him before but he came around and checked out what id done and has since offered to help. He helped smooth a dent i was having trouble with on the roof and then noticed a few more on the car id missed. Im pretty fussy so he was doing well.

Its quite interesting how easy a pro can check out a car and pick all the flaws in it. I thought i had it sorted but hes noted a few more we have now fixed.

Anyway, we sanded the primer back again with a DA sander (i should have brought one in the first place) and then have since primed again with a bigger gun,and a lot more pressure. 4 coats of prime now on. Ive got and spot puttied all of the little inperfections in the paint work as well as the bumpers, so they will be treated to another few layers of primer, over the etch prime. The primer also showed that my compressor wasnt keeping up. I will hire one for the top coat so we dont have issues with the fan shrinking, and water seeping into the paint as the compressor was getting so hot.

The door jams are also now masked up again and we will paint those before we top coat. Door jams we will do in the next few days, and the final coat on the 10/15th of Jan once i can get a bigger compressor that keeps up.

[SirRacer]

Bit of an update now is in order as its finally finished.

We primed again on 17 December to allow the 1k primer plenty of time to cure and shrink.

While my mate was away on holiday (we have become good mates with the amount of time we have spent together sanding) was on holiday until the 10th, so after Xmas i resprayed the door jams, boot and the front guards in the engine bay.

When my mate came back from holiday we then sanded back the car with a 400 grit sandpaper on the 13th and got into the spray booth on the 14th (January).

Having seen the mess than the overspray made to my garage, and combined with the fact that although my compressor was the biggest you can get on normal 2 phase power, it didnt keep up with the gun flow, we decided to borrow my mates booth at work ($150) and spray the car there. Using a $1200 spray gun was also looking a bit more promising than my 26 dollar job, as was masking using proper paper instead of my favoured newspaper.

DSCF3166_small

DSCF3172_small

DSCF3171_small

DSCF3185_small

DSCF3184_small

Car all painted. A couple of runs in the paint work, but according to my mate thats perfectly normal. I drove it home and now am piecing it back together. Once its done, hes going to come around the scrape out the runs (they use a razor suprisingly) buff the car and then its good to go. The hard part now will be remembering how the internal door latches go together.

While all the trims were out, i also gave them a quick polish up with Autosol as they were cover in corrision. Some bits where i couldnt reach are still a bit average, but it is a Cefiro after all.

DSCF3190_small

The back bumper isnt on yet as i needed to get the brackets i made modified as i cant get a bolt underneath them. Mike from Sinco Customs will do this for me as hes going to remake my brackets out of steel instead of alloy now. As the bumper is a series 2 cefiro, the mounting brackets are different with a series 1 car. The bumper didnt have brackets to modify so i made my own out of a sheet of alloy.

DSCF3193_small

Edited January 18, 2011 by SirRacer

[Char]

looks great!

u can paint mine next