Another RC Body Project

So back in April I posted my Nissan R31 Skyline Wagon body (it's here if you missed it).  One of my hopes with that body was that nobody else in my club would have one.  The main reason for this is that there were very few shops that were carrying it and it was a pre-order item only.  In other words they were only going to make the number that were pre-ordered.

Well unfortunately for my hope of having a unique body, some shops pre-ordered some for themselves to sell later on and one of my fellow club members managed to get one.  This irritated me enough that I had to go out and find something that would be truly unique for at least a little while.

This led to much internet searching to see what bodies were available and hard to find.  What I found was that there were very few bodies that I liked that were "limited" and of those that were limited that I did like, they were in the most popular shops which basically defeated the purpose.  So I decided to create something.

Before showing the pics let me state that the company that makes the bodies that I hacked up to create something unique has probably the most expensive bodies.  So one way that I hope this will stay unique is that nobody will be willing to risk hacking up two of the most expensive bodies on the market.  The other is that most modelers in my club aren't willing to go to this sort of extent to create something.

I started with one of these, a Yokomo Koguchi Power S13 180:

And one of these, a Yokomo PS13 Silvia:

And combined them into the Sil80 (silvia front + 180 back) you see here by taking the front of the Silvia and grafting it on to the front of the 180.  There's still more details to add and some things to clean up but I figured I was long overdue for a new post so enjoy (hopefully).

Main Body:
1. Base: Ultimate Racing Pearl Base
2. Main Color: Ultimate Racing Daytona Yellow
3. Backed with: Ultimate Racing Basic White then Ultimate Racing Basic Black

Hood:
1. Base: Tamiya Lame Flake
2. Main Color: Ultimate Racing Basic Black

Doldrums

Not much going on right now.  After finding some unexpected costs with importing a car from Japan I'm having to save up quite a bit more money.  Thankfully the RC Drifting "season" is starting to pick up since the weather is getting colder outside today.  Speaking of which, we had our first real frost this morning.

For the start of the season I've painted up a new shell.  It is an HPI Chaser Mark II with their Overdose kit.  The kit includes the add-on grill and in addition to regular light buckets for LED lights, it has clear lenses to go over the buckets.  Typically you would just not paint that area of the lexan body, but in this case you have to cut out that part so that the clear lens can poke through.  It also has the WELD Racing decals applied over a white body, instead of the usual blue.

Importing Update and License Stuff

I've had a minor setback with the import process.  I discovered some fees that I wasn't expecting which means that I probably won't be importing a car for a little while until I can save up some more money.

I have also started the process of getting my Swedish drivers license.  It's quite different from getting a license in the USA.  To start off with it has four different parts instead of just two.  The first is a practical test where you drive a car on a extremely slippery surface intentionally making it slide and then recovering from the slide.  I did this part today and passed.  The next part is a theory class on the various risks that can take place while driving.  I will be taking this course in two weeks.  After that you have to take a theory test which is like the written test in the USA covering the laws and such.  Finally you can take a practical road test where they actually test your driving.  Once these four tests and activities have been completed you will receive your drivers license.

So many choices...

I'm so torn on what to buy.  There's just so many different cars in different genres that I'm interested in.

For example there's the PS13 Silvia like this one:

Or the R32 Skyline like this one:

The problem with these cars is that they are worthless in the winter and here in Sweden we usually have at least 5 months of winter weather and it's going to be winter soon.

I only have garage space for one car and it is going to have to be used for the daily as I don't want to be scraping snow off the car all the time and I don't want to have to go out 10 minutes before leaving to warm up the car so my son doesn't get too cold.

I also have a few performance parts for an Impreza left over from my last Impreza.  They aren't much but it would be something I could start working with right away.

For these reasons I keep coming back to a Subaru Impreza but they are harder to find with the features that I want than the previous two cars.

But still, every time I look at the two pictures above I can help immediately thinking...WANT!!!

***Confused***

Step Two

Powervehicles has received my deposit and I am now receiving emails that contain cars that they think their customers might find interesting.  I have also received the login info to the website that lists all cars available at auction.  I've found a few interesting ones here and there but nothing I'm ready to bid on just yet. 

It is quite like being a kid in a candy store window in many ways as there are lots of cars that I would love to bid on but I can only pick one.  In addition I don't have an unlimited budget so that's kinda cruel too.

Step One

So I've finally started step one of importing a car from Japan.  The first thing that you need to do with getting PowerVehicles to ship a car to you is put down a 100,000 JPY deposit.  Today I transferred the money to them.  Once it is received I will be put on their notification list and I will receive several notifications per week of "interesting" cars coming up at auction.  I will also be given access to a website that allows me to search for cars coming up at auction myself.  When I see a car that I am interested in, I just need to let them know which car it is and what my maximum bid is.  Then when the car comes up they will bid on it, if my bid is the highest and last in the timeframe then I will win the car. 

Here's an example of the kind of info I'll receive on an interesting car:

Brian asked me what I was planning on importing and when I said that I was trying to get a Subaru Impreza STi Type RA he said "Oh ok cool, I thought u were trying to get into drifting lol?"  Well, I was going to answer with another comment but it just became too long so I'll answer in a post instead.

I do want to get more into drifting but there are several reasons why I'm going to go with the Subaru.  I've been a Subaru guy since 1998 when I ordered my first Impreza.  Until last year I've not driven anything daily other than an Impreza of one year or another.  I've owned 4 of them in fact.  I've also attended a rally school in Ireland where I was invited to participate in a sponsorship program, but since I didn't have an EU residence visa I couldn't actually join. -_-  The school taught me several things but one of the things I took away was that a professional rally driver of 30+ years thought that my driving was good.  That means that I can do something with it if I can just get the opportunity.  Just drifting probably isn't going to get me there in this country, but if I can get into Gymkhana and Rallying there are more opportunities.

Here in Sweden there isn't a lot going on in the drifting community.  It mostly consists of a few semi-professional groups that do exhibitions and such and then your average teenager who has had their license for a year just messing around.  There's really no middle ground so there isn't much of a community.  Also the police and the laws are much more severe than in other places, probably quite similar to Japan in a lot of ways I would imagine.  For example 21kph over the speed limit is an automatic license suspension, under that and they usually don't bother you.  So the grey areas are wide but narrow which makes it difficult to do anything in that zone.  A friend has an S13 and had to take off his carbon GT style wing.  It went through the vehicle inspection just fine but the police didn't like it so he had to remove it.  It wasn't huge or anything, he just ran into a bad cop I guess.  So those sorts of things make it difficult to do things like street drifting.  Combine that with the fact that the roads are typically either designed in a boring way drifting wise, or where they are fun, they are very narrow with granite curbs and it makes street drifting an even riskier thing than normal.  To my knowledge the concept of a drift day doesn't exist at the few race tracks here either.  They are also huge fans of speed bumps here in Sweden.  There's two types, one that goes all the way across the road that is about a meter wide and usually about 25cm tall.  The other type looks more like some sort of leftover from the world wars.  They are like a pyramid with the top cut off and are just a little bit narrower than the width of most cars.  Additionally they have these same sort of obstacles on lots of the roundabout's to slow people down before entering.  The lowered Audi barely makes it over without scraping or getting hung up.  There is no way a properly setup drift car would make it over them.  It'd wind up looking like a teeter-totter.

So I figure with the Impreza I could get into doing Gymkhana at the very least and maybe that could lead back into rallying.  I'm not sure if there are events here already but if not, it would be rather simple to start one.  Just need an empty parking lot and lots of cones.  There are lots of rally events in Sweden and even an FIA World Rally event in February. 

Mostly, right now I just want a car that I can have fun with year round and is something different from all the cookie cutter Saab's and Volvo's here.  I know Subaru's inside and out and I have lots of option parts that I can install right away so it just makes sense.

I've got a bunch of things that I'm doing as far as my finances are concerned, consolidating things, cutting corners and my base income should be doubling by the end of the first quarter 2012.  So the overall plan is to get the RA and at least have a car that I can enjoy, work on saving for a house & garage and then probably import a JZX100 that I can dedicate for drifting.

Check out this video of a guy I know doing Gymkhana in his Type RA.

Flaky People

One of the things I have the most trouble with in life are flaky people. If you want to do something and say you want to do it, then do it if you can and if you can't for whatever reason, explain that. In my last post I stated that I found a car that I wanted to buy. I contacted the seller asking if the car was still available and if so, did he have any more pictures and when could I come see it because I was very interested in it. After two days he hadn't responded so I sent another email. Several days after that he responded that he had pictures of all the damage on the car and would send them. A week later I still hadn't received any communication from the seller so I sent another email asking if he had found the pictures. He responded the next day stating that the car had been sold. What?!?

So...I've decided to bypass the middleman so to speak and am going to be purchasing the car I want at auction in Japan. I have located a buying agent who will handle the actual buying, all the paperwork and get the car shipped to me. Once the car arrives here in Sweden I will be responsible for handling all the paperwork and getting it registered. The buyer I have chosen to use is PowerVehicles.com. There are several reasons for this but among them are that Powervehicles can perform any desired modifications on the vehicle before shipping.  I have had several communications from them as well as seen many testimonials that have led me to trust them.

The end result should be that I will get a car that is in great condition as cars sold in Japan are typically very very clean and in like new condition for less money than I could find a similarly equipped car that has already been imported to Sweden.  Also the cars that have already been imported are not typically in the same condition as when they left Japan.

So watch this space as I detail out the process and how it goes.

Impatience

So I finally figured out a way to possibly purchase a "fun" car. I even found a car that I want to buy, it's a 1997 Subaru Impreza WRX STi Type RA. Enough names in there for ya? Anyway it needs some work, which is fine with me as I want a car to work on, I already have a daily driver.

I contacted the seller on Monday and still haven't heard anything back yet. Starting to get pretty annoyed, the advertisement is still posted. If the car was sold or the seller decided not to sell the least they could do is reply back and say that the car isn't available or take down the advertisement.

Getting Inspired

Still trying to get the Opel GT over here so I can start working on it.  That's a whole other set of problems that involves trying to find a place to store and work on it, but one step at a time.

Been reading this thread on the resurrection of another of my all time favorite cars, a Porsche 356 hardtop.  In just under two years it went from this:

to this:

Granted it had a roof replacement and it is intentionally kept in the "worn" look so it's not showroom perfect but that is still one hell of an accomplishment. I wish I had guys like that available here to work on the Opel GT once I get it here.

Dead Zone

It's been a little while since I posted, mostly because not much post worthy has been going on.  I've been really busy with work trying to get a few projects out the door.  I also took a 5 day weekend and went on a short trip down to southern Sweden. 

Mostly been trying to figure out how to make more money so that I can get a project car to work on or get my Opel GT shipped over here.  To ship it is going to cost about $1000 plus customs charges but it has to be in running condition and that will likey cost me another $1000 or so. :(  Then once I get it here I'll need a secure place to park it, preferably indoors.  However if I can find a project car to work on that doesn't have the same sort of sentimental value that the Opel GT has I won't need a secure parking area other than the parking lot where I live.

In the mean time while I try to drum up more cash I've been drooling over my friend Brian's new project car, an S13 Sylvia.  Check it out over on his blog here: http://pandapirates.blogspot.com/

My Opel GT

I've been reading a very lengthy blog/forum post with about four years of content about the build of an Alfa Romeo Spider, it's inspired me to start working on my Opel GT again.  Sadly it is still in the US and I need to figure out a way to get it shipped here.  So for now I've started photoshopping some images of it to start working on the design direction.

Here's the first draft, all I've done so far is give it a healthy drop, and add oversize wheels.  They will likely be 16" or 17".  In today's world that doesn't sound so big but you have to remember how small this car really is, it came with a 13" wheel from the factory!  There will also be extensive body modifications, but in this draft the body is completely stock.

First draft:

New Shoes

Today I went to the Elmia car show in Jönköping Sweden, which I think is the largest car show in northern Europe.  There are four halls filled with cars of every vintage. This year was the 40th anniversary so there weren't any special guests like usual, unless you count the poor, riced out, beaten up cars from the various Fast & Furious movies.  They had the Charger, Supra, both Eclipses, RX-7 and the R34 Skyline.  The cars are even more disappointing in person than they are in the films.  The front of the R34 has had a light coat of gray sprayed on it to simulate road dust and the like from driving and it was done so badly that it even has some major runs in the paint since they sprayed it on so thick.

Anyway, I picked up a new pair of shoes there, Sparco Esse in blue/white.  I got a pretty good deal on them, roughly $20 off of regular price.  They're not the competition shoes that are fireproof and all that, just regular sportswear type shoes but should be pretty good for driving.

Here's a pic I found on google that will have to do until I can take some pics of my own.
  

Newest Project

It's been a while since I last posted, not a lot has been going on but I did manage to paint up a new body for the RC drifting I do.  It's a limited edition Nissan R31 Skyline Wagon.  It was actually produced for R31 House which is a Japanese tuning shop that specializes in, what else, R31 Skylines.

Usually RC bodies come with a ton of stickers for every little detail like the black weather strip that goes around the windows and things like that but this body only came with a few decals for the headlights/taillights, door handles and the intercooler in the lower grill opening.  So there is a lot of little detail work that I have had to do to it and I am still not done but I figured it was time to post something and this is what is new.

I still have to paint a thin black pinstripe trim line between the blue and silver, install the led light kit, install a muffler, install mirrors and a bunch of other little details before it is finished.

For those interested it was painted with the following colors:

Tamiya PS-49 Aluminum Sky Blue
Faskolor FasPearl Silver mixed with FasBlack to create the lower gray
Tamiya PS-53 Lame Flake backed with Faskolor FasBlack on the hood

If you want to see another version of this body in action check out this youtube clip of an R31 Wagon versus a Volvo 850 Wagon.

New bling

After much delay thanks to the US Postal Service not recognizing that "Sweden" is not a state in the USA I have received my new bling.  A friend of a friend makes these so I had my friend pick up a pair and mail them to me.

I really like them and they're better than I had hoped they would be.  It was definitely worth the wait.

If you're interested they come in several other variations, in both men's and women's versions as well as different sizes.  Head over to X7X-Yubo.com if you want some of your own.

In our thoughts

Just a short note to say that all the people affected by the tsunami in Japan are in our thoughts today.  Glad to hear that my friends in Japan are a bit shaken but none the worse for the wear otherwise.

When will it end?!?

So yesterday was a beautiful day, about 3 degrees celsius, sun shining wonderful weather.  I got the car washed finally, figured it was about time as the car is black and it was starting to look grey from all the dirt.  This morning I get up and it looks like it's going to be about the same kind of day, the road is wet from snow melting, sun shining again.  Ten minutes later I look out the window again and there's a damn snow squall.  The roads are now covered with snow, yet again....

 

Crappy iPhone 3GS pic

Pics of the Mark II Chaser shell will be up later today, got a few tiny areas that still have some paint in them that I need to clear up first.  Won't be much different than the last pic as it is still just a clear body, but now I have the holes drilled so it can be mounted to the chassis and you can see what it will look like when there is some paint on it.  I'm thinking of going with a pearl white and just leaving it at that.  We'll see...

 

JZX100 Mark II RC Shell

Success!  I was able to get all of the paint off of the JZX100 RC shell so now I can make it look like the 1:1 JZX100 that I want to get.  Pics later.

RC Drift shells in the works

 So I have two RC Drifting shells in the works on my desk at the moment and thought I'd share.

The first is a limited edition R31 Skyline Wagon that was made exclusively for R31 House which is a 1:1 (full size) tuning shop in Japan.  You basically had to pre-order the body and they only made the number that was pre-ordered.  Some shops cheated a bit and ordered a few extras but not many of this body were made overall in comparison to most bodies.

I haven't really decided on how I'm going to do this one.  The neon yellow TE37s are just there to see if I like them on this shell, still haven't decided yet.  The black panel lines are also just temporary, I find it helps to see them when I'm planning out a color scheme.  Most RC bodies have a plastic film on the outside to protect them during painting.  So you can draw on the plastic film and when you are done painting you just take it off.  The paint goes on the inside of the body so that the clear plastic of the body creates a gloss finish and protects the paint from scratches if you hit something.  I'm thinking I might go with a factory color scheme from a PS13 Sylvia coupe which was a light metallic blue on top and metallic gray on the bottom and then add white TE37s.  Here's an example of the color scheme I'm thinking of:

The other body I'm working on is a Toyota JZX100 MarkII.  I had painted this one a custom blend of pearl white and tan trying to get a creamy white.  However once it cured it turned more tan than white and I hated it so I'm in the process of removing the paint.  The paint I use is water based so you can just soak the body in a bathtub of hot water and the paint will soften and come off in bits.

If I can get all the paint off of it cleanly it will be getting a new coat of just pearl white.  It's not very visible in the pic but the wheels have chrome lips and white spokes.  It will also be getting a lot of other custom bits to it as I want to make it up the same as I want a 1:1 JZX100.

"Afters"

Ok, so it took a bit longer to get an after shot. Here's a pic of me with my 11mo old son taken after the haircut.  We were trying to get a picture of him looking up at the ceiling because the reflections from the light were moving around and he was laughing at them but every time we took a picture he looked down at the camera.  Kind of an awkward looking pose but it's not easy hanging on to a wiggly 10kilo bundle with just one arm. ^_^

"Before"

So Brian demanded some before and after shots of the haircut.  Before pics are hard to come by as I was avoiding the camera as much as possible the last few months.  The only shot I can find is from Christmas and my hair grew quite a bit since then.

In this shot my hair comes down to about my eyes, the day I had it cut it was down to my mouth.

I'll try to get an "afters" shot tomorrow.

Finally

Typically I get my hair cut every 4-5 weeks but I've gone the last 6 months without getting it cut.  Today I finally got a haircut.  She cut off about 4 inches to start with before doing the small cuts for the style I wanted.  Having long hair is nice for a while, but I just couldn't stand having it always fall in my face every time I looked down and feeling like a walking mop.

Time

Time is a funny thing, too often we don't have enough of it, it goes by too fast and yet at other times it just doesn't go fast enough.  In my case lately I haven't had enough.  Today marks the first real day off that I've had in about 3 weeks.  I've been working 12+ hour days as well as moving into a new apartment and all that goes with that.

There is so much more we would all do with more time.  I for one would spend more time with family, work more on my side projects that will hopefully one day allow me to be self employed and update this blog more often.  Sorry about not updating more often, I also just noticed that Brian of Panda Pirate Brian_日本で (^_-) linked me in the friends/links area of his blog so I apologize to those of you that came here only to find a somewhat stagnant blog, I promise I'll try to do better.  Big thanks for the link Brian! ^_^  You have no idea how jealous I am of some of the posts you put up, like that visit to UpGarage for example.

The new place is great, has lots of space and best of all I have my own room.  That might seem a bit strange, but I work at home so having my own office is a huge necessity that was seriously lacking in the old apartment.  For the curious, the new place has 3 bedrooms (4 if you count my office), 2 bathrooms and a total of 115 square meters of space.  It is also on the top floor and has great views.  I'll get some pics posted soon when everything isn't dead and white outside.

Speaking of the side projects, one of them is finally about to start moving into the production phase.  I've recently ordered the materials I need to start making Carbon Fiber parts.  I'm going to start off small and work with some parts for radio control cars and see how it goes.  The parts are small enough so that they don't require huge amounts of raw materials which will keep my costs down while I'm learning the hands-on skills.  I've already studied lots of resources on the techniques and methods I just need to learn the physical skills of putting those theories into practice.  Hopefully it will take off and I'll be able to make something much larger out of it.  I have lots of ideas, it just depends on how much time I will have to dedicate to it.

Chasing a Chaser

Well, probably a Corona Mark II but they share many of the same features.  Toyota made the Chaser, Cresta and Corona all off of the same basic platform, with differences in the taillight shape and some other minor areas.  I'm saving to get one of these imported from Japan, pretty sure it'll be the only one in the country as far as I've seen.

Here's some shots of the Corona owned by Andy of Powervehicles.com which is one of the places I'm considering importing from.  They seem to be a pretty reliable source as well as being able to perform modifications in house.  That way I could get many of the modifications done that I want before the car even arrives.

Photo credit; Dino Dalle Carbonare.

Mark II specific taillights

Being used properly

Back in the flow of things

We're all fully recovered from those nasty viruses I mentioned the other day. Thankfully they were just the kind that last a couple of days.

I've setup ads on the blog. Sorry if they are too intrusive, however I could really use the extra cash to get towards my goal of a "fun car" sooner.

Not a lot else going on here, just getting back into the flow of things after the holidays and trying to get as much work done as possible, which is why this blog entry is going to end here.

But, for some visual goodness, here's an interesting S13 that I wouldn't mind buying. I'd have to ditch the hood though.

I'll be sick for Christmas....

And apparently New Years and beyond . Before Christmas I got a headcold that evolved to have a cough that I still have. Two days ago my fiancee and my son got a stomach flu and today I got it. I guess I was due tho, these are the 2 first real cold/viruses that I have had in 3 years or more.