Rat's Ride - 1974 RA21 Celica

The white car has the very same wheels that I have to go on my Celi! 14" appliance mesh. They look damn good. Definitely a period correct look. See more cool J-tin at this show in SLC on the JDM Legends Blog

Been kind of slow going for the past couple of weeks but I am indeed going. To prove it I have pictures of the rear end FINALLY painted. It was a laborious choice for me of how to finish this thing off but I'm really happy with the final decision.

All paints are duplicolor high heat with ceramic. I LOVE the way this stuff sprays and coats, especially the low gloss black that is on the rear itself. The differential is painted with cast iron and all of the links have been coated in aluminum. I think it's going to look really nice under the car... I also think this is the last time I will see it this way. I had to learn the hard way that all of the decisions and work wouldn't really be worth it in the end but at least I know I did it I guess.

I've got all new rubber bushings pushed back in to the suspension links now and everything is ready to go back together. Just waiting on a felpro gasket for the carrier that should come in tomorrow. While I'm waiting I'm wire brushing all of the hardware that I forgot to clean. Going to lay it all out and give it a coat of flat clear coat and let it bake in the sun a while before I put it all back on.

For the remainder of the day I decided to take a little of the 1974 out of my 70s machine. I've already decided that I'm not putting the padded dash back over the clean lines of the metal dash. That may actually mean a step backwards in time rather than forwards... but I digress.

We're talkin woodgrain on the gauge cluster. Here it is halfway removed because I always forget the before picture. I was using a heat gun and a small flatblade screwdriver to heat up the grain then peel it back. You can sometimes get bigger pieces but for the most part it's slow going in small chunks. Underneath is a layer of adhesive. Depending on the climate your car lived in, I gather from reading, this adhesive could either be attached to the woodgrain or it could stay on the plastic when you peel the grain up... guess which way mine went.

So when I was done going through the process of heating and peeling for a second time I hit the whole front face with brake cleaner and a gray scotch brite pad. This was the chosen combo mainly just because it was readily available. I washed the brake cleaner off quick with some heavily diluted Mr. Clean to hopefully project the plastic from getting soft. To do it the right way I'd say some goo gone would be in order. But that's ONLY after you have peeled up as much adhesive as possible. Just rubbing anything on top of that stuff doesn't touch it.

I only got a little pushy with the screwdriver once. Hot plastic and a blade of anything don't really mix and I put a pretty good dent in it but I was able to sand it down just a touch. It's noticeable but probably only if you are looking for it.

Next step for this thing is to mask off the gauges and put some semi gloss on it. I'd really like to find some in dark gray so I'm going to spend some time looking around.

Click the pics to view on flickr with captions.

Got these for $70. I'm thinking of modifying the teeth on the center caps so they can fit these beauties.

So in reading this guy's blog I found out that all you need to clean off a dirt-nasty rear end from a Celica is some brake cleaner and a wire brush. Well I'm not sure what type of brake cleaner and brush this guy has but they obviously don't match mine. I gave up on that after about 30 mins of hard scrubbing got me NOWHERE.

The brake cleaner stuck around but I switched over to a knotted wire cup on my electric angle grinder. Jackpot. This made cleaning off the entire rear end almost fun. I must have spent 6-8 hours on it this weekend. See, it was so much fun that I don't even remember doing all of it.

So as a refresher, here's what it looked like last weekend:

And here it is now:

This week I will be finding a local source for POR15 and getting this thing coated in it. I'm also ordering all new drum brake hardware. I'll have to wash out the whole works in a parts washer before I put it back together becuase I didn't cover anything up when I was cleaning.. smart as ever.

Spent a lot of time at the wheel this weekend cleaning up the links for the rear end. Scrubbed the rear itself too and knocked off the 37 years of grease. Taking it to the car wash tomorrow night and getting the rest blasted off. Then I've got a can of paint stripper for it.

Next stop for all the cleaned up stuff is por15 metal ready and chassis black. I may go silver on the links just for some contrast.

A story in pictures. Took the rear end out of the car this weekend. Should be getting it blasted this week then it will receive a fresh coat of por15 chassis black to ensure that it never has to be removed and cleaned again. After that I'll get the new bushings ordered and put it all back together. Sticking with the 3.7 ratio rear from the 4 speed ST for better MPG so I won't have to take that out other than to inspect it then clean and paint the cover.

This job also brought the purchase of my first air impact wrench. I will never be without it again. I may sleep with it.