Ethand's Eunos Presso 1.8 V6

[ethand]

ah, ok, so mines just a 130-135hp one, then? bummer...
Well on Saturday, i did a little tidying up of the beast. The car came with weather shields, but the driver's side one flew off the day after i bought it when i was just cruising in a 60km/h zone (roughly 35 mph)... i was so annoyed! i went back and picked it up, but it'd snapped off a little at one end.
So after 8 months of being annoyed by it, I finally decided to tidy up. I took off the passenger side weather shield (a new drivers side one was gonna cost me about $180 + postage), sanded back the black window frames (and decided to do the front and rear wiper arms as well - they were faded back to the metal), and resprayed them all with the 3-step (primer, colour & clear coat) respray... I went for gloss black, so it would match the rims better plus, gloss black is the new black
here's a few pics:










It's far from a perfect job, but it looks a hellava lot better than the faded & chipped black that was there before, covered in glue and crap. And for the fist time in ages my car isnt lop-sided!!! take a photo from front or rear and it wont look munted!!! hehe
Unfortunately, I also got a little over spray - while i was sanding everything back, i must have sanded some holes in the taping up. I patched the ones i saw, but there was still some over spray. Its mostly really light so should come off pretty easy with some cut & polish, if not then I'll carefully turps the thicker areas... but thats for next weekend!!
I also need to get some new door seals - the little clips that helped support the weather shields have kinda wrecked the seals a little, and the outer seals look like someone got really really hungry!!

[MrMazda92]

Sexy! =D

Beats my paint job by a country mile(and a half!)

I'll post some more pics of mine later, but it's in a thread or 2 bouncing around here.

[ethand]

haha thanks, man... yeah, its far from perfect, but its a billion times better than it was before, and I rate makes the car looks heaps newer and fresher... plus, it matches the rims better
aite, i'm searchin it now...
[edit] screw it... i cant find it anywhere... no results for 'tracy paint' and 'tracy' gives a hellava lot of other posts
maybe you can post a link if you find it?

[MrMazda92]

Found it haha, it took me about 5 minutes. I wasn't sure where I posted it...

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=74512

[ethand]

Just thought I'd post to say that I am alive, and so is Zeke!
I've not done a lot to him since my last post, other than electrical & mechanical fixes, and I had to re-do the paint work I did on him around the windows, etc... Turns out I used the wrong type of Automotive spray paint, so after about 2 months, it started cracking, etc. I redid that with the good stuff about 3 months ago now, and it looks as good as new still!
Other fixes I've done include a new indicator/headlight/wiper switch to fix a fault, a new master window switch, some work at the Auto-electrician to fix a short-circuiting right indicator, and a new air intake hosing, plus the usual upkeep... Brakes will also be replaced (pads) & skimmed on Thursday. Due to this (and the fact that I'm a student once again), I haven't really had the time, money or inclination to do other mods to him... But I'm starting to consider some small things just now...
Some things I've been considering:
Getting some interior parts chrome plated (apparently there are places that specialise in doing this to plastic parts)
Installing some clear, sleeker looking side indicators from a VX Holden Commodore (Aussie car)
Still thinking of getting a S/S door sill/scuff thingo
Painting brake Calipers (if I can be bothered eventually )
Altezza Tail lights (In black, if they come up at the right price sometime, with the right financial situation hahaha... Very nearly got some a few weeks back)

I'll try remember to keep any little things I do updated on here... that's a try... haha
Oh, and just to prove he's still all good, here's a pic I took the other day... Pretty rubbish photo and it makes Zeke look covered in dents, but hey!

[MrMazda92]

Good update ;D

[kulluminati777]

That engine bay was like ridiculously clean and i love your dash yum pure JDM

[ethand]

Haha the engine bay isn't THAT clean, thinking of cleaning it up again soon...
And the dash is pretty much identical to most of the ones sold here in Aus, but because mine's a jap import, it has a different style of logo on the steering wheel, but that's about it, I think. Oh, and the writing inside the sun visors and fuse box is all in Japanese... just as well I learned some in high school hahaha

[ethand]

I had a $550 service the other day
But at least that means my brakes are good again; my fan belt isn't doing it's occasional, soft squeaking; my battery terminal isn't loosely hanging over my battery and the usual other stuff has been done... Hopefully my next trip (next week) will reveal the reason for Zeke running very rich (mechanic thinks it might be an ECU ), then he'll be running as good as gold!! (and almost as expensive! haha)

Anyway, the other day I read somewhere on here that Autosol (a metal polish) worked miracles with restoring headlights, and (after having had limited success using normal car polish with this) decided to give it a shot (I had some in the Garage). It did an amazing job & took all of 3 minutes, so I did my front indicators, too. My side & rear lights are all fine & shiny, so i didn't need to bother with them...
Here's an after pic (the befores didn't turn out too well haha!)


And here's a pic of the lighting mod I've been doing so far:


The indicators & clock look a bit better in real life, though haha! I hacked up an old pair of 3D cinema glasses to make a dark grey filter for the indicators & clock, so that it looks like shiny black/very dark red plastic when the they're off. I'm real happy with these, not so with the fact that I seem to have made the fuel & temp gauge not work somewhere in the process... (took me half the day, but I've managed to fix that haha! )
I've put the interior back together now, too, as it'll be another 2-3 weeks til I get my other red dash bulbs off ebay, and will then be able to complete this thing... I might try get some night pics tonight to show the other dash lights I changed...

[ethand]

Today a storm was just coming through as I was driving along West Coast Highway home from Uni, andI couldn't help but think 'Gee, that cloud could make for some seriously nice photos!' so I found a nice spot overlooking the beach on a side road & whipped out my phone! haha... turned out surprisingly well!!

I kept driving a little further, then thought it might be cool to capture how cars bead water in the pic as well. Because it started pouring with rain litterally about 30 seconds after taking the picture above here, there was no shortage of water with which to show this! So I stopped off again, and took some more, but wasn't able to capture the texture of the clouds...

[kulluminati777]

Badass pictures bro

[Calg_93GS]

really like the colour of that car, the way the shadows make it look deeper in the sunlight really makes it look sharp

[ethand]

Cheers guys - it's amazing what the right lighting, angles & background can do! Haha
Yeah, to be honest, I didn't use to like the colour - I'm not really a fan of red, especially bright reds on cars - I'm more of a blue, grey, black kind of person. But the colour has grown on me, and I think it really suits the car now. I think adding the rims & other stuff that's black/red makes a big difference. (I whish I had saved the pictures of it before I bought it, with the original rims - they looked rubbish on this car!! Just as well I got rid of them before i even got the car home haha!)
Seeing this picture does make me want to attempt what Mooneggs did to his glass headlights - paint the surround gloss black... But I must admit I'm more than a little scared that my lenses would go the same way as one of his did, so don't wanna attempt it just yet! haha!
I also think I'd like to lower it a little - I think just 10-15mm would make a massive difference... But I do tend to scrape on kerbs, etc. without that, so am reluctant once again hahaha

[ethand]

To procrastinate working on my uni assignment this afternoon, I decided to play around in photoshop with what my car would look like with the JDM full-length side skirts, Eunos Presso front lip, clear front indicators & clear side indicators from the Australian VX Holden Commodore (I believe you guys have had some VX Commodore coupes (Called the Monaro here) imported to US as the Pontiac GTO...? I think you also have our current model (VE) Commodore there too, I think badged as a Pontiac G8 or something..?)
Anyway, I couldn't quite get the angles right & couldn't be bothered fiddling with it too much, but here it is:

Because I figure that getting the lip & skirts to match the colour of my car would be next to impossible, I'm thinking of painting them gloss black, and I'd obviously paint my mudflaps to match...
What you guys think?

[Ukrman]

looking good. Love the color