Simplicity.

…and if you’re curious to see what they look like when backlit – click here.

A Celica like none other...

Over the weekend of 3rd-4th November a large and varied group of oldschool.co.nz club members made a pilgrimage to Hahei, on the idyllic Coromandel Peninsula, for a meet-and-greet with none other than Rod Millen, famous championship winning driver in various motorsport disciplines and proprietor of the Leadfoot Ranch.

Convoy enroute to the Coromandel, via State Highway 2.

Leaving bright and early from the convening point at Bombay just outside of Auckland, roughly 20 cars made their leisurely way to the Coromandel, stopping in the towns of Kopu and Tairua along the way for rest, refreshment, and to meet up with members from other parts of the country – some travelling from as far as Taupo – eventually arriving at Rod Millen’s sprawling ranch just outside of Hahei around 11am.

Assembling at the Ranch.

Our group was immediately shown into the large barn adjacent to the parkup spot to be greeted by Rod and Shelly, who gave a short but detailed and colourful history of the vehicles contained within. Included in the collection were Rod’s meticulously rebuilt RX-3, a pair of mighty Tundra stadium trucks, his 2007 Transsyberia Rally-winning Porsche Cayenne, a couple of quirky prototype vehicles, and of course the famous Pro Rally RX-7 and Pikes Peak Celica… both championship winners over multiple years in the ’80s and ’90s respectively.

The Barn.

After the meet-and-greet we had the opportunity to mill around browsing the collection of vehicles and take photos to our hearts’ content, while Rod chatted with various groups and individuals in turn. It was somewhat humbling to see him taking the time to answer various questions and shoot the breeze with so many of us!

Of particular interest to me was Rod’s SCCA Pro Rally Championship winning Series 3 RX-7, a vehicle which inspired my own love of RX-7s growing up. This particular example runs a fascinatingly unique 4WD drivetrain prepared by Weismann in California for the Pro Rally series in the early 1980s. As Rod put it, “we did it in order to beat Audi’s quattro!”

Pro Rally 4WD RX-7. Click photo for walkaround video!

And of course, parked square in the middle of the barn towards the rear of the room, sat Rod’s “Unlimited” Pikes Peak winning 1000hp Celica in all of its outrageously sculpted aerodynamic glory. Of certain note is the fact that the 10:04 minute start-to-finish record set by this car in 1994 cannot technically be broken!

There’s already discussion of entering an oldschool.co.nz club stand at the 2013 Festival, so hopefully this is only just the beginning.

Peeking under the bonnet of the RX-3.

Additional photos courtesy of Automotive Culture – check out their album of shots from the Leadfoot Cruise here. Thanks to Ryan Fels for the driveway video footage!

Details for Leadfoot Festival 2013 can be found here.

Must. Complete. Squid.

Maximum Low.

I’ve been following zeki‘s Minkara blog for some time and his DR30 sedan is picture-perfect in terms of aesthetics.

This is 'stance' I could definitely live with.

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and I’m fervently hoping I can pull off a look with squid that’s even half as clean. I don’t have the wide Wats but I do have some Ewings that might do the trick!

Cherry blossoms! So iconic.

Perhaps 2012 will finally be Year of the Squid?

photos courtesy of zeki @ minkara

I can’t find much information about the deck, except that it was apparently a factory upgrade option for the BF Familias and Lasers in Japan for a short time in 1985 before the CDX-P1 compact disc player was introduced, but the tuner is a standard Pioneer off-the-shelf item. This particular one, typically, is locked to Japanese AM/FM frequencies only.

There is a plan in motion for this setup; all shall be revealed in due course.

And it’s all over you, electric blue!

Next step: figure out how to switch input seamlessly between cassette and line-in without blowing anything up. (Don’t look at me like that; everyone knows cassettes are The Bomb!)

The component cradle mentioned in last month’s update is now installed in squid, with cassette deck and EQ fitted.

It is awesome.

Now where did I put those Black Sabbath tapes?

Fit some lush wheels.

Track down a functioning AAC valve and other miscellaneous replacement engine bay sensors, then give car to John (aka CXGPWR) for an afternoon to werk his magic. Voila, car feels like a completely new beast to drive and actually picks up from down low instead of bogging like a bastard.

Wash it for the first time in aaaaaaaaages.

Yes, I know it looks like it could do with a bit more slam but this is actually an optical illusion more than anything else. Perhaps 55 profile tyres weren’t such a good choice after all.

OK, so I cheated and simply swapped the rims off squid.

From 1:18 right down to 1:89 scale.

the level of detail on the 1:18 Autoart is nothing short of breathtaking, especially when you have the Real Thing parked in the garage to compare it with. Check out some detail shots of it here.

A shame that my other 1:89 model, a Seibu Keisatsu Machine-RS, has gone missing. It used to be parked on my desk at the office but mysteriously disappeared one weekend. I blame the cleaners!

Those tail lights... drool.

Yours for a cool $22,000 and comes with all the fruit, such as the Watanabe rims, front chin spoiler, sweet L16 engine with twin Mikuni crabs, and aftermarket suspension.

Authentic RS-8s of dish.

One day I shall own a ’70s Datto coupe, but between the Bluebird, Skyline, Laurel and Fairlady there’s so many different ones to choose from.

Not quite a C10, but the '70s Nissan DNA is definitely there.

Now where did I put my secret stash of asian millionaire gambling moneys?

1970 Datsun 1600 coupe for sale on Trademe »

If anyone’s keeping count, this is number five.

Test drove a couple of examples up here in Auckland and was severely disappointed by a) price, b) various mechanical faults, and c) an endemic reluctance on the part of each seller to negotiate a) based on b). Gave Ewan @ hayatonka a call as well, but a search of the auctions and yards in Japan yielded no results within budget, apart from a couple examples with major rust that would never have passed compliance here in NZ without $$$$ worth of repairs :doubt:

Then just as I was about to give up, I received a phone call from a good friend in Wellington saying that one of his mates was selling a tidy hardtop manual AW11 SC, in more or less standard condition, and was I interested at all?

And it's all over you. Electric Blue.

After a bit of back and forth negotiating (and agonizing over the fact it was midnight blue with blue interior, my [i]least[/i] favourite colour combination of the lot) – during which the price sharpened considerably after Ben, the seller, sold the BBS rims separately – I finally caved in and said yes.

So during the third weekend of June I flew down to Wellington, picked up the car, and covered the 650km trip back home in some of the most horrendous torrential rain ever, on the sketchiest of sketchy tyres, but without incident. And more importantly, drip free, thanks to the hardtop roof :p As it happened, the very next weekend a snowstorm closed the Desert Road, so timing was impeccable.

Here it is sitting in my driveway, on the crappy balloon tyres and mega fugly wheels that replaced the BBSes:

Wheels are Yuck.

Super charger heaven?

The good: 5-speed. Super charger of course. Hardtop. Wind-up windows and lightweight glass (rare). Adjustable damper shocks. Rear swaybar!

The bad: Most infuriatingly it doesn’t seem to have a LSD, unless it’s a Torsen of some sort. Already miss the TRD one from old whitey

The ugly: Smurfy blue interior. No sideskirts. Those wheels, yuck.

Within a day of getting the car home I’d already found two tiny spots of rust, naturally at the bottom of the A-pillars, but the rest of the car remains thankfully free of tinworm… the direct result of being located in inland Otago for the last few years before the previous owner bought it. Upon advice from my panelbeater and a few friends I fishoiled the most troublesome spots for peace of mind, and then set about making a list of things that needed doing. you really didn’t think I would just drive the car as-is, did you?

The exterior does need a few touch-ups here and there, but unlike my TX3 which ended up being a budget blowout restoration of stupid proportions, I reckon I can get away with painting the worst affected areas and cut’n'polishing the rest. It won’t be the mintest AW11 out there by a long shot, but it’ll certainly be one that an “enthusiast” would still be proud to own.

Thanks to the strong NZ dollar it was a good time as any to pick up a Twos R Us engine cover gas prop kit; I’ve been wanting one for a long time, but I’d never kept an AW11 long enough to really justify the effort. The key blank was a last minute “add to cart” decision

Goodies!

and I finally found a use for the vintage deep-dish Momo wheel in my parts pile.

Excuse the smurfy interior...

The fugly wheels have got to go, and the balloon tyres are not conducive to epic twisty touge runs, so I ordered a set of 14″ RE001s (the only ones in the country, apparently) and found some suitably retro wheels to whack them onto.

Pepperpots

Eventually the AW11 will wear some 15″ Buddyclub P1s in bronze, but the Speedlines will do for now.

The other week I happened to stumble across a pleasant chap not far from my house who was wrecking an AW11 in midnight blue. Now half the exterior panels from his wreck reside in my garage

Including a pair of sideskirts, which my panelbeater will find a way to retrofit to the car and hopefully prevent any future rust issues. One distinct advantage of having an AW11 without skirts from factory is that you can check the condition of the sills and be satisfied they haven’t completely rotted away…

then someone tipped me off to the presence of a complete ’89 AW11 at Pick a Part Avondale, so I made haste down there to see what I could scavenge. Arrived about 20 minutes too late to score the LED rear spoiler according to the nice lady at the counter, but did manage to grab a whole swag of other small bits, including the swanky updated mirrors that only came on that year.

chunky vs. swanky

Coat of blue will see them right.

opinions are divided over whether chunky is better than swanky, but they take literally minutes to swap so it’s not the end of the world.

A hot date with the panel shop and paint booth is fast approaching, so I guess the next update will occur after this takes place, or once the tyres arrive and I can finally fit the Speedline telephone dials, or if I do something incredibly impulsive and click buy now on that Cusco LSD that keeps taunting me on Yahoo Japan…

but as this is my daily driver I can’t really justify having it off the road for too long, nor do I really want to do anything outrageous like fit monstrous swaybars, or gigantic blower pulley kits, or anything that would impinge on reliability. Yes it is a LOT slower than the white AW11 was, but I suppose I should exercise a shred of self-control now and again, am I right?

lololololol.

Toyota MR2, for Fun to Drive.