RT81Guy

this is wicked great progress pictures!

decent drawing btw glen!

boys. and forum stalkers... rt80-90 series corona carina dscussion for sale whatever. new facebook group here. come have a look and be sure to whore it to everyne you know who owns an rt80 / 81! also i've foudn this forum to be great and love sharing my car here but theres like 4-6 of us here woth rt80/81's and theres a whole world of them out there in the abyss of the internets. https://www.facebook.com/groups/534084973366554/

lets talk project progress. SLOW! weather's ordinary in melbourne in apr / may! a few days back i bit the bullet and removed the battery tray from the corona (with intent on relocating the battery.) there were signs of lots of battery acid leak. the plastic coated battery tray (4 bolts to remove) was completely deteriorated inside and underneath the tray was stained and even had some battery goo still there. Pics! under the battery the battery tray i was doin that while prepping for wiring and playing with speaker positioning on the parcel shelf. parcel shelf speaker positioning- lots of work still to do there! the rt81 is pretty ahead of its time in fit and finish and complexity of the build. to remove the carpet first the seats and scuff plates came off. then along each side 3 plastic blac trims and a kick panel plus the piping around the doorframe. thats the same as my 03 commodore! my 88 commodore would have been out with the scuff plates and seats... this allows me to run the wiring properly, and its always a better finish than lifting one side and just tucking it under. also i get to check the floorpans and replce the smelly dusty underlay. goodbye old car smell. underlay sub $10 blanket from bunnings lay it out, spray it, wallah templates! now the floorpan... passenger driver and thats where i left off as the girlfriend was coming around for dinner and i needed to scrub away all the dust and grime and get mysekf presentable!

seal the mdf with paint or resin. it'll stop warping and dampness. also maybe bolt it down in more spots like i'm doing. better clamp on it.

test fit was good so i drilled out the seatbelt holes and bolted it into place. I did this so i get an accurate trace of the holes in the shelf and theres no chance of wobble or movement tighter than a nun's.... oh wait i can't say that ;) once bolted in pull everything from the boot and do this. i also got the drill in there with me and half drilled through every single hole. my thinking s i'll get an accurate idea of where and what i can bolt through. rattle is caused by airpockets and anything loose. I'm thinking i can usee extra plastic threaded plugs to hold this down and theres a bajillion holes. its held by 2 standard and 2 seatbelt bolts but theres room for another 3 plugs at front and another 2 at the rear all of the little mounds you see are sawdust from drilling the holes all the way through. couldn't believe how many there were! i'll use the 2 5x3' holes. the oes at the back are more round but theres honest to god no room between the window and the shelf for my speakers I'll essentially create a couple of rings, float them on a few stands built from offcuts then fibreglass it all up. I can slot these black speaker baskets into the finished fibreglss product testing 2 x large rings 1 x small for each basket. so yeah. its all happening! i won't let the rabbit out of the hat. I'll show everyone the material and battery in boot ideas as they happen. more fun that way. thanks for reading Y'all -Mitch

@ Mark, throw me a phone number. I'm happy to throw my business your way aswell. even a work PH number is fine :) Updates Yee-Ha! Today i've been out shopping. I visited: (try to guess what i'm doing from the shopping list..) Jaycar - (car aerial T piece parts / audio install battery fittings / audio fuse holder) Autobarn - (Battery isolater switch, 8m 4ga wiring (blackish colour,) RCA wires 5m / 4ga crimp terminals) Bunnings - (Resin / hardener / builders twine) Spotlight - (1.5m x 1.2m mexican rug print material / 1.5 x .5m strechy polar fleece material.) Clark Rubber (1.5 x .5m thin foam / .5m flat rubber 30mm wide / $10 bag of offcuts) then I called dad and got all of my miscelaneous MDF cut-offs sent from the farm to my house in mebourne. so whats hapening? Battery relocation stereo install (inc lots of fabrication) adding some padding to the seats. so the first activity is a bit strange. i didn't realise how ghetto it'd look until i started but i think you get the idea. Take 100m builders twine ($4) bag f foam offcuts ($10) and your cars seats.... stuff em! with that done I removed the parcel shelf and started the build. now there'll be more photos as i go. no point giving it all away now. but I have some base details for you. RT251D MTX sledgehammer 2ch monoblock aplifier (2 x 125wrms) 2 x DDcX6.5 (i think thats the right name.) Digital designs 6.5" woofers and tweters (splits) 2 x MB Quart Discus crossovers (not the made in china rubbish) + whatever the media player i got is called. so the speakers will have to be installed angled on the parcel shelf to avoid any cutting. amp and crossovers will be in the boot. heres some starts of the parcel shelf and woofer rings. still have a lot of work to do on the tweeter rings then the angling. Laying it out These are 6.5" but look like 10"s in such a small car! trace twice, cut large then trim. test fit -

little update. not much has been happening. sorted the charge and overheating i think... the fan belt was loose and slipping. its running like an absolute pearler right now. the wheel hub is still a bitch. i've misplaced the nardi button and ive drilled out the hub to fit properly but its still not spot on. finding swaybar bushes is impossible. noone cares at spare parts joints. getting fed up with the lack of availability. theres a lot to be said for restoring a more common car! i've been to a few more events with it and generally been putting it out there. the spare air filter housing i sourced doesnt fit. different mountings! i gave up and left it for a bit. all of the stuff that doesn't fit or needs modding is a complete head F***

today i did a little work on her and started to fall for what we all know we shouldn't do. the "while I'm at it i may as well....." the entire front of the engine is off. all pf the alternator puleys, fan, radiator etc. theres a suprising amount of gunk there which I've been softening up and scrubbing ff with petrol and degreaser and the entire alternator apart from the top which has obviously been cleaned, is full of black grease and dirt. even all of the innards. I set to work with a toothbrush and some petrol and its come up good. even the regulator on it was ful of bloody grime. no wonder it decided to give up on me. hopefully all of this as well as the new terminals and some cleaned up earths will get me by for a while longer. before \ after more gunk :( new hardware did i memtion i flushed out my goop? i mean break fluid sorry. from speed, i can now slam on breaks ad they'll pull up dead straight. that means i can put the brake rebuild on the back burner for the time being :) At Melbourne Oldschol cruisers a few wekends ago and finally a few dress items, 1944 kooyong tennis club lawn tennis guide. what appears to be early 70's touring map. the fantastic view from my home office today

and thats running most of the time at 50-70mph

more running in issues. overheated a few days ago after the system had been slowly leaking for a few hundred miles. let it cool down and filled it back up and ran fine until i lost blinkers on the western ring road of melbourne. i was a bit suprised and wondered if the flasher can may have gone. anyway ill fix that when I'm home i thought. next thing i pull up at the freeway off ramp and lost all power. so i'm pretty sure whats happened is that the dirty water (still working on radiator flushing the clogged engine and pipes etc.) has leaked out of the thermo housing, its been sprayed all over the engine bay and has dried up as a film of dirt and grit. its also been sprayed all ovr the alterntor. I t first thought i may have shorted out and fizzled the alterntor. but i fully charged the battery then tested the charge. now it could be higher but that looks pretty good to me. i think the next step is a full pull off and clean of the alternator and all associated ground leads and battery clamps. also while I'm at it i'll empty that bloody radiator again. its a bit dark but you can see how un-clear the water is. the radiator flush has been left in for longer than it's supposed to be but its working! also i took the radiator off and have been hosing out the inside. i'm actually getting chunks of crap out of it which wouldn't pass through the radiator (they were in the top of the core.) so more work! ---------- Post added 24-03-14 at 14:08 ---------- Also did the math. 7.8l / 100km

totally with yiu guys on that! My VL owes me unknown $$ and i don't want t think about it. it all goes so quickly. but i'd totally suggest doing this with any new projects. its enlightening! plus i didn't build this car to own forever, just for a distraction that i can enjoy for a while then sell off when i get a good offer.

awesoe sauce so whats the verdict? is it running? did you fab the manifold setups yourself/?

Full costing of the project to date for those who think they can restpre a car cheaply... Excel spredsheet on Google Docs

cheers Glen. if you have a spare 12R intake amybe let me know on that aswell. my one has all of the original stickers etc and i don't want to repaint it and lose all of that! or even a red lid in good nick as mine is all buggered.