Davros El Davros

Hey Ken, Top work on the car mate, it's looking really good. Love that white paint. Looks thick and smooth! Make your own choices and stick by them if it's the look you want. Haters gonna hate, and everyone is quick to throw out an opinion, but it's your car, your project and your vision. That's the only thing you have to follow. Keep up the killer work. You are inspiring me to get mine finished quicker!

Sure thing Mark, I'll snap some flicks and get them up. I had started welding up the brackets to hold the Tilton Box in place, but then work ramped up so my time was limited. Next thing I need to do is weld the braces in place to bolt it up under the dash and have it sit in the correct spot. From my research, there wasn't a great deal of difference between the Willwood and Tilton pedal boxes in terms of price. I have heard that willwood stuff has trouble get past engineering laws due to it being labelled as 'for off road or racing use only' however, this is unconfirmed. Just a rumour that I have heard. In terms of progress, I am currently working on the strengthening of the trans tunnel where the new hole has been cut for the T50. Have been welding in 1.6mm mild steel plate with the TIG. I was initially a bit worried about blowing out on the thin gauge metal in the car, but the welds have been flowing really well, and its looking really neat with no heat warpage at all. I will post up some flicks in the next few days. I have also discovered a nice little surprise - an 8cm hole in the firewall around the accelerator pedal that was previously blanked off with a metal plate and held in place by screws and glue. Love the dodgy workmanship from previous owners of this beast..Its going to be a tricky bit of welding to fix this up, but I'll get it nailed. I figured I would get the trans tunnel and firewall done in one hit, then attack the brakes.

Cool, so there is actually a spring in there. Thanks for the info guys. Otherwise I would have just been trying to yank it off, like the old school Valiant ones that just push on. Cheers Davros

Just wondering if anyone has any tips on removing the (inside) door handle and window winder from a KE10? I am trying to get mine off to pull the door cards off, but they are being pretty stubborn. Don't want to break anything just because I may not know the right trick... Thanks Davros

Well, ASAP turned into a couple of months but I have finally fixed the broken image links, except for a few that I can't locate on my computer. In terms of progress on the car, I'll have some updates soon. I have been neglecting this thread a bit, but work has been continuing. Stay tuned!

Well, I ended up running with the tilt tray. $84.70. Was only a real short trip - Brisbane inner north side to east side. I didn't have the time on friday arvo to ring around and get the absolute cheapest price. I rang a few tow truck places and was quoted between $85 and $100, but I needed it done on Sunday so I went ahead with Ready Tow. Using the tilt tray was a super easy process. We were able to back the truck right up the driveway and roll it off the back straight into the garage. I definitely won't be messing with a car trailer again for such a short trip.. I have had a few bad experiences before with trailers, so the tilt tray option is a lot more appealing. Thanks for the feedback guys. Work is resuming on the car with a vengeance now, so watch out for progress updates. Cheers Davros

Thanks for the ideas guys. Being such a light car it seems a good solid truckers hitch and a few ratchet straps would do the trick. The custom tailshaft isn't in yet so leaving it in gear wouldn't make much difference! However, after a few phone calls I think my solution is at hand... Have been quoted $84 for a tilt tray, compared to $107 for a half day trailer hire. Admittedly, trailer hire was from Kennards. I am sure the local servo probably would be cheaper. However I don't think I can go past the tilt tray. Thanks again for the help. JIP - Ill give those places a call and get some quotes. Ill let yall know what was the cheapest. Cheers Davros

Hey Guys, I need a few opinions on what's the best way to move my KE10 project to a new place that I have just moved into. I was thinking of renting a car trailer, but the KE10 currently has all of the brakes disconnected, including the handbrake. Was looking at getting some of those hardcore ratchet ties that they use on car transport trucks etc, but I am not sure if they would support the car and stop it from moving under braking by themselves. I know some car trailers have winches which would stop the car from rolling backwards, but I need to also stop it from rolling forwards under braking. So, here are my options 1: Rent a car trailer and somehow secure the car so it doesn't move at all. 2: Get a tilt tray truck and transport it that way. And, here are my questions: 1: If I get a trailer, can anyone suggest a good way to secure it. I'm thinking ratchet straps, chains etc 2: Can anyone recommend a good place to rent a trailer from in S/E Brisbane? 3: Can anyone recommend a good towing/tilt tray service in S/E Brisbane? Any help greatly appreciated. I'm looking to move the car this sunday 21st Feb. Thanks Davros

Damn nice!

I just realised that all of my images on this thread have broken links, due to changing web hosting... I'll go through and fix this asap..

Hey Darren, Yeah you do need 15" inch wheels to clear the Hoppers Brakes - the rotors are 290mm in diameter and they use PBR 2 spot calipers - I think they are the same as what you find on new Falcons. I had been experimenting with a few different upgrades, one using Volvo 264 4-spot calipers and Honda Discs, but nothing was working properly and it was costing me a lot of valuable time, so I just bit the bullet and got the Hoppers Kit. Being able to simply bolt everything on is awesome. Now the fun and games starts with plumbing both remote boosters - one under each front guard, and installing the Tilton pedal box and masters up under the dash. Pedal box should be arriving in the next few days from Earls Performance in Sydney. How is your build going? That little KE10 has been a big inspiration for me when I first got mine - I have a full print out of the an old thread somewhere detailing the build....

Hey Guys, Thanks for the info and clarification about the axles. Obviously I haven't clued myself in fully about this, and have been taking the advice of people working on the diff for me. I'll make sure I know my facts a bit better before posting opinions in future. My axles have just been cut down and not re-hardened at this stage. I know a few guys who are running non hardened shortened axles in turbo cars which seem to be ok. I'll take my chances at first, then move to hardened axles down the track if necessary. Going N/A to start with, then perhaps turbo in a few years time, after my skinned knuckles and battered wallet have recovered from the initial build. The diff is now back and test fitted in the car with a set of Koni adjustable shocks. It all fits beautifully, and the wheels fill out the guards nicely with enough clearance on both sides without using spacers. I just have to weld up the brake line mounts on the diff and give it a paint, then it's good to go. Was going to get it powder coated, but I thought it best to wait until I have the car on the road and all of the back suspension fully sorted before powder coating anything. I still may have to play around with some mounts on the diff. Beerhead is currently rewiring the whole car and doing a killer job. Its great to think that I can possibly start the engine soon - after the wiring is finished, I just have to hook up the heater hoses and rear water outlet. I'll post some progress pics of the wring up soon. Sleepy - I'll get you some images of the Hoppers Stoppers kit soon. If you want to PM me your email address I can send you the high res pics. I have found the kit to be really good quality so far and the guys at Hoppers Stoppers to be really helpful. You probably would have read on my thread somewhere how I had a few issues with the rotors hitting the LCAs. If you get the kit from Hoppers, ensure that they include some spacers like I got them to make up for me. Also be aware that you will need to upgrade to a 1" master cylinder and get a booster in your system as well for best pedal feel.

I think this is a pretty cool idea - it's something that is in a different direction to the calendar that JIP does a great job of organising. Could be potentially a cool idea to lay all of the submitted cars out in chronological order in terms of manufacture date. It would be great to see the changes in the models from early on to modern day cars. In order to get the printing done as cheaply as possible, you would need to do a run of over 250 (for offset printing), but that would depend on how popular the idea is..

Rolliac - Ha, this sounds familiar. I did a lot of calling around and talking to different people before I took my diff anywhere. I was quoted between 1900 and 2500 from a few different places. I ended up going to Geoff England Engineering down at Mt Cotton, upon a personal recommendation from Steve who runs Tyres and More at Geebung. Steve has an RB30 in a Datsun 120Y and has all of his diff work done by Geoff England. Geoff is an absolute legend. Very straight forward, knows his stuff inside out and easy to deal with. I had been given the line about the billet axles as well, but Geoff said this is a load of crap. There are hardening issues with Skyline axles if you go down too far apparently, but I don't know 100% how this works. Shortening an R31 Borg Warner diff for a KE10 is fine with the stock axles. I think my diff shortening will come in at around $1600 - this is with new wheel bearings and U Bolts plus all plates for mounting to the spring pack etc. I haven't picked it up yet, but I'll let you know the final price when it's done. If you are keen I can get you his number. Would be a good time to talk to him, because he has been going through all of the measurements for my diff - pinion angle, handbrake cable setup etc. Cuzzo - thats a bummer about the intake manifold. The guy that bought it should be able to make it fit. If it doesn't work out and you have to refund his money, let me know and I may be interested in getting it, depending on how it fits, or how easy it is to modify.. Let me know if you come up this way, would be good to catch up for a beer. I hope to have the car mobile by christmas, but we all know about deadlines for modifying cars....

Yeah mate, the foot pedal is the goods. It allows you to strike the arc at high amps, get your weld pool going nice and quickly, then ease off as you progress to keep the weld bead even. Then you can ease off the amps at the end so your edge doesn't blow out. (I speak this like I am a pro, but I am still burning holes in stuff sometimes..!) I was having big issues at first, welding with 2.4 mm tungstens and getting really sloppy welds. I moved down to 1.6mm tungstens and lower amps and found everything to be a lot cleaner on thinner alloy.. I think I was pumping too much current in there at first. For your foot pedal, depending on what welder you have, take a look at the pedal that goes with the UniMig ACDC 200, as that unit is exactly the same as the base model CIG unit. CIG just charge about 600 bucks more..

Hey Cuzzo, I am doing all of the welding... Been teaching myself how to TIG welds over the last couple of months. Just starting to get in the right groove and everything is looking much neater now. It's also helpful being able to polish everything up, it helps me hide mistakes :lolcry: After your recommendation I'll probably go the KAAZ LSD. The 28 spline R31 diff is getting cut down at the moment. I am hoping to pick it up this week and get it in as soon as the springs are re-leaved. You don't have an LSD you want to sell do you?? I was going to bid on the custom intake you had for sale on Ebay (if that was you..) but I figured I should get the car running as it is, then start pushing it...

Thanks for the props guys, I'll try to keep more pics coming :lolcry: People keep booking me in for work, so I am not having as much time on the car as I would like... Mick - I can't wait until this thing is finished as well! I'm mad keen to get it down for a big Rad Rollaz cruise when it's all done. I am having some dangerous thoughts about re-spraying it at the moment, so that might delay the finish date a little. I'll just wait and see what happens there. Depends on how I like the look when everything is together. Philbey - Man, the welds are still a bit lumpy in places. From what I have been learning with the TIG, make sure everything is prepped properly and nice and clean - use metho or thinners on all of your metals before you weld them. Also use a foot pedal on your TIG which allows you a lot more control. I found there is a whole stack of awesome reading material on the Miller website - shoot me a PM if you want me to dig up some links and send them to you. My welding sure ain't perfect (as I want it!) but it's getting better and plus I can say I have built mostly everything that you see on this thread, even if it's not super pro.

Hey Philbey, Thanks for the comment. I think the offset change was about 55 per rim or somewhere around that price. I definitely didn't want to run spacers on the wheels, so for me it was worth paying the money to have it done. In other progress, I have received the wheels back from the powder coaters - they are now super smooth satin black. I have fitted Bridgestone 175/55/15s to the front and Federal 195/50/15s to the back to give it a bit more rubber on the road. The wheels look awesome on the car, but I am definitely going to paint the outer lip of the rims white, to break up the black. Also going to lower the front when I get the coilovers on there. Pics: I am also making a custom set of alloy centre caps for the rims. The R31 Skyline diff is off getting shortened at the moment and should be back by the end of next week. Most of the cooling system is also hooked up. I finally got the top tank mods on the radiator finished, plus the 90 degree angles for the outlet and inlet plus the filler neck. I am pretty happy with the welds on the radiator and cooling system, considering I have only been using the TIG for a few months. Still got a bit of polishing to do for the radiator, and also have to hook up all of the heater hoses etc. Pics:

Nice clean welds there mate. It's looking good. Do you use a TIG for your body work? I have been speaking to a few different people and some have said if you use a pulse TIG, AC current, it's good for welding thin gauge steel without warping, as the alternating current help pull the heat out of the weld area. You seem to be pretty handy with the TIG, just wondering if you had any suggestions. Cheers Davros

Long Overdue Updates... Ok, even though updates have been sparse, work on the car has been fairly constant. Brakes: One major decision has been to quit dicking around with the Volvo caliper/honda rotor/custom caliper brackets that I was looking at previously for the brake setup. I found that it was all too fiddly, and the rotors that I was planning on using were hitting the LCA. So, I made the call and bought a Hoppers Stoppers kit, which will give me 290mm slotted and vented rotors, with PBR twin pot calipers. I thought this would be straight forward, but I have had a few hassles with the rotors from this kit hitting the LCAs as well. Seems they developed the kit for a KE20 that one of the guys that works there has owned for years. The LCA from the KE10 must be closer to the inside of the strut bottom than on a KE20. Anyway, to get around this, the guys at Hoppers Stoppers machined me up a few 3mm spacers, that slide on over the stub axles before the bearings are mounted, which brings the hubs out by a few mm, thus clearing the rotor from the LCA. It still allows the bearings to mount properly and the castle nut does up properly. I don't have the full brake setup fitted as yet because I need to sort a few other things out. I'll post some pics of the whole setup when it's all done. I'm also scrapping previous plans for the brake master cylinder and clutch master. I'm going with a Tilton under-dash setup, with a remote booster. I was thinking of mounting the booster in the boot, but have lately been looking at the idea of mounting it up under the front guard. Anyone got any ideas on this? Wheels: The wheels are finally sorted. I'm going to run 15x5.5 chasers off a pre 1987 Saab 900. I have sourced 5 (4 are good, the other one is only fit for the spare), and have had the offset properly changed, so that they clear the front strut by about 10mm, and also will sit almost level with the guard. I didn't want to use spacers at all, so hence the extra expense with getting the offset changed. Also from rough measurements so far, with the offset change, the track stays within the legal limit for NSW specs. I took the wheels back to bare metal as shown in the pics below (no, they are not going to be chrome or polished....) and smoothed them out. They are off getting powdercoated satin black at the moment, and then as soon as they get back I am getting tyres fitted. Going to run 175/55/15s on the front and 195/50/15s on the back. I was going to whitewall the tyres, but I think I will paint the lip of the rims white. Not sure yet. Want to wait and see what they look like on the car. Pics: Cold Air Intake: I decided that with the amount of custom stuff I want in the engine bay, with the alloy radiator and mods, air intake, catch can, and other brackets etc, I should get off my ass and learn how to TIG weld. So I have got myself a little Unimig ACDC 200, which is a pretty good little rig and I have been learning how to use it. Having some experience with oxy Welding has helped, but TIG welding aluminium is darn hard! It flows like water when you have too much heat in it... Anyways, after a few solid days of practice, I have started building a cold air intake box. It's going to sit in the front driver's corner, and I'm going to vent it at the front to let the air in. I have welded some lugs in the front panel, so that I can cut 2 big holes in the front of the box, then bolt a plate over the top to make it look like it's fully sealed if I need to. The box is unfinished at the moment, but here are some progress pics. It's the first thing I have ever made out of alloy, so the welds are a bit rough in parts, but I would rather have everything in the car that I have made myself be a bit rough, rather than just getting it all done elsewhere. I have started polishing it a bit, so there is a bit of polish resin left on the welds.. Pics: Gearbox Mount: The custom gearbox mount that I bought along with the engine mounts a while back didn't fit for some reason, so I have modified it a little. I wanted to change the design a bit, so that the mount extended back from either side of the mounting plate, not just being welded at the back like the mount I bought. For a reference pic of what the mount looked like, go back a few pages in this thread. Using the existing mount I had, I cut it down and then cut some more pieces to fit. I also added some spacer plates on the mounting surface of the bracket, where it meets the Cusco mount, so that the gearbox will sit higher in the tunnel. I have massaged the tunnel a little to allow more clearance. This sits the engine more level in the engine bay, and gives the rear water outlet more clearance from the firewall. I may put some extra 10mm aluminium spacer plates in between the mount bracket and the mount to sit the gearbox up even higher if needed. I TIG welded all of the joints on the mount, and it has turned out pretty well. It will be nice and strong, and is pretty neat. I'm starting to get the hang of TIG welding. Other stuff: In terms of other progress, I have got myself an R31 skyline diff, with a 3.89 28 spline centre. I have cut all of the mounts off, and will be getting it shortened as soon as the wheels come back, so I can work out my distances. I'm going to go with a KAAZ LSD centre down the track. The JAR alloy radiator has been purchased and is being modified at the moment. I'll finish that after I do a bit more TIG welding, as well as the alloy cooling pipes. The whole car is being re-wired by Beerhead the guru at the moment. Alarm system, boot lights, hazard lights and a few other goodies are being added. Clear cam covers have been purchased as part of Little Red Spirit's group buy. And thats about it for now... More pics and progress as it happens.

Thanks for the props. Been a bit slow on the updates lately, but work on the car has been going well. I'm flat out with work for the next week but I'll have pics and progress updates up when I have some spare hours.

Ahh, my bad - I thought they did a lot more custom stuff. Sorry for the false info.. Thats good to know Scott's only do generic p/m - I dare say I will be looking for some rubber for my KE10 in the near future so Ill keep an eye on your progress.

I haven't had to purchase any rubber for my car so far, but a mate has just been restoring his KE10 and got all of his stuff through Scotts Old Auto Rubber. Click here I have no idea what his prices are like, but worth checking out for hard to find bits. Good luck. Keep us posted with your progress on the car. Davros

Yeah - I am running a stock standard harmonic balancer. I am no expert either with these things, but last time I was out at Road and Track in Ipswich talking to Terry I showed him some images of my detailed engine with the T3 crank pulley on it, and he said I should take it off, or risk doing some damage to the crank/bottom end. From what I understand those machined aluminium crank pulleys are more for racing purposes where weight reduction is crucial and everything will be balanced with the engine. Those aftermarket pulleys are a one piece unit, and don't have the rubber damper in the middle that is the whole purpose of the harmonic balancer - to prevent resonant vibration in the crankshaft that can be quite damaging to the bottom end. I didnt want to risk it for something that I didnt know too much about, and in my case would be for purely aesthetic purposes, but realistically is not that visible in a KE10 4AGE setup, as the radiator sits pretty darn close to the engine in my car. My original stock harmonic balancer was a double row setup, and after I got it lightened it looked the same as the one in your photo. The stock toyota one I have now has 2 rows.

Yeah, be very careful with the way that you remove the old key and install the new key. Clearance and fit are very important here. Also, what type of harmonic balancer are you going to run? A stock toyota balancer or aftermarket? I decided to machine the second row(power steering) off my stock balancer as I figured I didn't need it. I then later purchased a nice shiny aluminium crank pulley, and was planning to run with that until someone informed me (I should have thought of this myself :D) that the aftermarket pulley would change the rotating mass of the crank, and could potentially cause big problems. I then had to source another new stock pulley to keep everything factory..