Teh Official "Dude Where's My Forum?" Thread, Brought to you by the minds of Box, and her fiancée, Lorelei Options

[Box]

Ahh ok, it looked like rivets in the picture which is why I said that. In that case finding some oil blackened screws or bolts should be easy.

but rust?

The blackening process is done for rustproofing, but rather or not it'd hold up north constantly pelted with salt who knows. Maybe some black anodized screw/bolts to go with the red anodized pieces? I got it, just move south and then rust is a distant memory!

[Bitter]

Listen,I'm not that one kid who smoked his clutch....

[Box]

Heh? Well even black anodized would be better than stainless I'd think, if that's what you meant.

[Bitter]

I forgot to quote the ziptie person lol.

Anodization and black treated steel are only surface treatments, I'm concerned they'll be abraded by the sand and gravel thrown by the tire in the wheel well but maybe they'd be OK. I know I do NOT want aluminum bolts in aluminum rivet nuts, aluminum is a bitch when it gets stuck together. At least stainless will always come out or pull the threads out with it. I'm looking for something that'll come apart with zero drama in 10 years.

[Box]

Ahhh ok. Well only way to find out for sure, but there's already the red anodized surface there so it seems silly to be just concerned with black anodized or oil blackened screws/bolts. You could always go with blued and then you wouldn't have to worry about it as much, just heat them to 500-540º or so:

[Bitter]

Eh no thanks, I'll leave it like it is. I've got plenty of other problems with the car to worry about first, like the paint. Ugh the paint is so bad up front. I really need to get the hood, bumper, and fenders re-sprayed and some PDR on the fenders prior to paint as well. I don't even want to think about that cost, I might treat myself and take some money from savings in a couple years and and get some of that done since I'm obviously keeping the car. I found a spot where I had tried poorly to fix a bad scratch and it's almost through the paint in that spot. I mean I might be able to get someone good to spot spray and blend but what's the point when the paint is thoroughly thrashed otherwise. I just don't know where I could trust to do it right, nor do I know what to tell them to do to have it done right. I've heard of building layers starting with straight single stage color then 50/50 single stage color/clear on top of that for more depth to the solid color single stage paint and it can add some durability to it as well since you've got a little more paint to work with. I just hate to pester someone for a quote then not buy but I also kind of need to know what I'm looking at cost wise so I can figure out the money side of things. This is incredibly frustrating, in the mean time I'll just be gentle around that area and do the best I can with what I have been given in life. It's all one can do anyway.

https://garage.eastwood.com/eastwood-chatte...urethane-paint/
Ah ha, I knew I wasn't crazy. I would much rather have 3 layers to work with, I'd be happy with solid color, 50/50, then straight clear. I need to try to find a good body shop in the area that does paint and PDR in house, the only one I know personally farms out their PDR work and I wasn't impressed when I saw a car they painted black. More holograms than the NCC-1701 Holodeck!

This post has been edited by Bitter: Jul 26, 2019 - 10:30 PM

[Box]

Not to be crass, but why spend considerably more on paint than the car is worth only for the paint to get screwed up again with use? Why not do vinyl wrap for a fraction of the cost and overall level of work? Then again I don't understand the premise of keeping the same car for any extent of time, so who knows.

[Bitter]

Not to be crass, but why spend considerably more on paint than the car is worth only for the paint to get screwed up again with use? Why not do vinyl wrap for a fraction of the cost and overall level of work? Then again I don't understand the premise of keeping the same car for any extent of time, so who knows.

Vinyl wrap isn't paint. This paint is trashed because the PO parked under sprinkler spray at their work without any wax on a black car and it got etched terribly. I can take much better care of it if I have a good base to start with, and I do not have a good base right now.
Vinyl wrap will never have the depth and glow of real paint, it will always be a depthless film and just doesn't look very good in my opinion.

[Box]

It's so much cheaper though and I've seen vinyl with just as much depth and gloss as paint, at least with black. I'd prefer paint too, but for an old mass produced daily driver it's good enough and when the inevitable happens and some asshat rubs against your car or bumps into it and scratches it you can just redo the damaged section of vinyl. That's just me anyway since I'd cease driving any car I spent the money on having it resprayed for fear of flipping my **** the moment it was ruined by some inconsiderate waste of oxygen.

I get it though was wondering as to why, I just wouldn't do it for the aforementioned reasons but I'm a cold, cruel, and calculating bitch. Hey, you could 6-speed swap it and vinyl wrap it for less than a quality respray!

This post has been edited by Box: Jul 27, 2019 - 1:23 AM

[Bitter]

Daniel!

Jalopnik: At $7,500, Would You Give This 1996 Toyota RAV4 a RAVE Review?.
https://jalopnik.com/at-7-500-would-you-giv...rave-1836692455

[Bitter]

It's so much cheaper though and I've seen vinyl with just as much depth and gloss as paint, at least with black. I'd prefer paint too, but for an old mass produced daily driver it's good enough and when the inevitable happens and some asshat rubs against your car or bumps into it and scratches it you can just redo the damaged section of vinyl. That's just me anyway since I'd cease driving any car I spent the money on having it resprayed for fear of flipping my **** the moment it was ruined by some inconsiderate waste of oxygen.

I get it though was wondering as to why, I just wouldn't do it for the aforementioned reasons but I'm a cold, cruel, and calculating bitch. Hey, you could 6-speed swap it and vinyl wrap it for less than a quality respray!

I'm sure I could, find me a good used C60 that's not going to **** the bed in 30K miles. They don't exist anymore, any C60 you buy you HAVE to have rebuilt which drives up the cost quite a bit. Could I rebuild it myself, probably. I lack the special tools and experience. Also I'd need to swap the PCM too, adding to the cost. I'm OK with it being a lame automatic, it's kind of rarer that way.

[Box]

6-speed and A'pexi ECU, I'm feeling it. So what you're telling me is, all this time you said for me to get a 7th gen GT-S 6-speed it doesn't exist anymore?

[Bitter]

6-speed and A'pexi ECU, I'm feeling it. So what you're telling me is, all this time you said for me to get a 7th gen GT-S 6-speed it doesn't exist anymore?

Probably.

Hey so why are you getting the Firebird painted? Why not just lay base/primer and wrap it?

I'd love to run some kind of ECU besides stock but I have emissions every 2 years, not that swapping the ECU every couple years would bother me but if say I ended up with things that needed a tune to run and then the car wouldn't run well enough on the stock ECU to complete the emissions monitors I'd be sunk. I've tried to do some research on OBD2 emissions simulators but it seems the answer is always 'no one does that because they don't want to go to jail'. Look, I've had my intake manifold sitting on the floor next to my PC for like 2 years now, it took me almost as long to get the HID headlights installed too. I move slowly and regret immediately. Heck, I've owned this buffer for over a year and this is my first time using it!

[Box]

I'm not paying for it as it wasn't my fault, and it's just the front end section, so that's why. Once I get a Miata if I just don't leave it be in terms of paint it'll definitely be vinyl wrapped, and if it's Brilliant Black it'll more than likely be vinyl wrapped regardless of how good the paint is.

Move somewhere without emissions, or rust!

This post has been edited by Box: Jul 27, 2019 - 5:29 PM

[Bitter]

Easy to say 'move' but harder when you have a house to sell to do that, a job, a partner with a job, 2 dogs, 3 cars, and a whole house/life full of stuff.

[Box]

Yeah I know, easier said than done. Funny how that works for most things.

Though for whatever it's worth I think just the ECU alone with bolt-ons and swapping the ECU for emissions you'd be ok, from my understanding on the 2ZZ-GE the biggest gains are from the ECU and then cams. Or if you're Lotus, a supercharger.

[Bitter]

I agree, but I'd need to also swap the 6spd since there's nothing to control the trans. Basically I'd be investing north of $5000 to do ECM/trans with good parts plus all the time involved in it. I'm not that unhappy with the slowness, it's fun for what it is and it goes around the curves wicked good. It's just depressing that the paint is in such bad shape cause the person before me parked by the sprinklers at work.

[Box]

Well if that's the biggest hurdle to happiness then get it resprayed, hopefully you can find someone that'll do a good job for a fair price. Though I've come to realize it's futile to try and have perfect paint on a daily driver and especially one you leave unattended for any amount of time, even mom's Challenger that was bought brand new less than four years ago has marks all over it now because of asshats in parking lots hitting it with their car or shopping cart.

[Box]

I got it! Find a 6-speed GT-S with nice paint for less than either repainting or swapping yours!

[Box]

It's funny in a way; how I can feel so strongly and 100% commit to something that drastically changes my life yet on something like cars I'm more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff(I'll love you forever if you get the reference), though I guess it's because of the amount of options and variables with all their pros and cons. Why does my brain do this to me, this incessant thinking? I suppose maybe because there are a lot of cars I like, but I've made myself so particular on certain things in order to limit my selection pool and force a single selection. Or it could be because until the Firebird is fixed I'm just stuck and can't do anything. Maybe it's a combination of the two. Could be I'm just mental, wouldn't put that one past me either.