Beginning the transformation:

WOW - What a mess... The first thing was to clean up the car's wiring before attempting to reassemble the engine.

I removed an aftermarket amplifier and wiring from the trunk, an aftermarket amplifier that was zip tied up under the dash right above the accelerator pedal, and removed the stereo. I had to fix where the wiring harness was butchered and pull out all the bajillion wires that were added.

After that it was time to track down the wires going to the back. I pulled the speakers from the rear deck and doors and discovered a hidden electronic crossover under the rear deck. All that was pulled out and wires were all removed. The amps, speakers, radio, and crossover were all sold.

Next came removing the alarm system from hell. There was a main unit that was sitting smashed under the seat, an auxillary unit under the dash - WAY UP UNDER the dash - an antenna transmitter, a control panel on the bottom side of the dash, a siren under the hood, various relays, and wires EVERYWHERE. All that was eventually and patiently unwired and the ignition wires were patched up.

The aftermarket airhorns were removed and a stock horn was put back in. A new battery finished out the electrical issues.

Once this was done I went ahead & stripped out the interior and repaired the driver's side window. The regulator was broken and the little wheels that help guide the window were busted too. A spare motor and driver's door were acquired for parts (Thanks again eBay!) and the door was switched out to now be a powered window. The wiring for this will come later, now it's time to get it running.

WOW... I'll make sure my next car is all together before buying it. I've had to purchase a LOT of items that were missing... Three baffles in the valve cover, intake studs/nuts, exhaust nuts, exhaust manifold & downpipe (gotta be stock!), intake/exhaust gaskets, exhaust mounting bracket (on the side of the transmission), a large variety of missing bolts, a new coil bracket (the old one was busted badly), timing belt covers, front turn signal housings, and more items I'm sure I'm forgetting...

Next came all the other items that needed replacing - not all of these have been installed yet as I'm wanting to get it running first before doing the full TB/WP job. Timing Belt, idler pulley, head bolts, tensioner pulley, crank seal, cam seals, CAS o-ring, gasket set (actually came with the car!), thermostat & gasket, clutch slave cylinder, and motor mounts.

I actually should've taken pics of all this work but didn't since I was all greasy and didn't want to get my camera dirty. Oh well...

DANG! It takes a lot of work to clean off ALL of the old head gasket material... once that was done the head was mounted with a new gasket, new bolts, the cam seals & CAS o-ring were replaced, and the water inlet & exit tubes installed with new gaskets/o-rings. Next the intake and manifold was installed along with fuel lines, sensor connections, and ground wires.

I started pulling out the aftermarket exhaust header and I found the cause of the overheating... The hose that goes from the engine bay to the engine had a THREE INCH split in it! At least I found the root cause of the car's problem. So that was replaced and a stock exhaust manifold was installed along with the o2 sensor. Once that was done the coils, plugs, and wires were installed followed by the intake assembly. The timing belt (old one still) was lined up & reconnected.

After all this was done, the car started right up! It was WAY out of time but it did start and it was LOUD! (open header exhaust)

The downpipe was connected and the clutch slave cylinder was installed & bled. Then the driveshaft was re-connected.

Work will continue on the next page... stay tuned...