• General: The car is officially my “daily” for the time being. I did the 75 mile drive back to Atlanta with it and it is my only car here on campus at Georgia Tech. Certainly not the most practical of vehicles, but it has been good to spend some time with it in the driver’s seat both to enjoy it and also identify things I need to fix. Planning to put more miles on it driving around this weekend so we will see how everything goes- might even have to encounter a little rain.
• Issues:
• The only things broken so far is I had to remove all my black mesh trim I put on because it was coming loose. I think rivets plus the silicone is a requirement. 
• Need to fix drivers side rear wheel liner rubbing.
• Slight rubbing at full lock for the driver’s side front wheel.
• Have an annoying squeaking sound coming from the firewall or belts.
• People think it’s a Ferrari because it’s red
• Air Conditioning
• I have charged the A/C system and everything is working! Very glad because I was not ever able to test my compressor or the fan circuit until the A/C was charged so I kinda just had to hope that it would work. Blows nice and cold now :).
• Radio
• Since I’ve been driving the car more I have started messing with the Android radio features more. Overall I really like it but I am working on a better solution for digital gauges. My major hurdle is my Japanese ECU does not support OBDII so I can’t use most diagnostic readers on the car. Right now I use an app called BTSSM that works with OBDlink bluetooth devices and my Tactrix usb cable. I don’t like having the cable dangling in the open and I also don’t like that it stays powered on if I leave it plugged into the OBD port. I am looking into trying an SSM to CAN converter that a forum member used an Arduino to do. He’s basically done all the work and I could use realdash (which is very pretty!) to show my digital guages. I’d still have to use tactrix and BTSSM to check engine codes and such but that’s not a big deal.

The post September 2020 Update: Daily Driver! appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

• Test Drive: Took the car for its first adventure of my own street. I had to squeeze the drive in between some scattered showers- it’s definitely not waterproof – but the trip went great! Definitely things to fix on the car, but nothing new found on the drive :). I drove about 50 miles round trip on two lane back roads.
• Observations:
• The car is loud! I think this will get significantly better than when I finish sealing off the cabin from the engine bay, but right now it definitely makes longer drives uncomfortable at speed. Makes very good turbocharger noises though.
• Alignment definitely makes the car super darty at the moment. Better than it used to be but it’s very much a two hands on the wheel at all times experience at the moment.
• A/C needs to be charged soon, it gets toasty in the cabin.
• Even after raising the rear ride height a bit, the driver side rear wheel well rubs the tire on big bumps. The passenger side wheel liner sits a bit higher so it does not. Trying to think of ways to get the wheel liner to move up a bit to fix this.

• Dash installation
• Finished riveting in the front cabin corner aluminum pieces. I used rivnuts to install them because they will have to be removed any time the doors need to come off or any changes need to be made to door/speaker wiring.
• I used some leftover plastic trim that FFR provides to cover the metal edge of the cutout I ran the wires through. Help from a heat gun made this trim really easy to mold to the right shape.
• Plumbed the air conditioning vents.
• Installed an AM/FM antenna that I forgot I needed previously…
• Installed the dash in the car 
• This was pretty difficult! Reaching underneath and connecting all the wiring for the AC controls as well as the vent plumbing was really a challenge. Hopefully I don’t have to do this again for a while – I intend this to be the final install of the dash.

• Front wheel well aluminum
• Finished installing the last couple pieces of the wheel well aluminum. There are two pieces directly in front and behind the tires that protect the headlights and the doors. These pieces will likely have to be removed for things in the future such as taking off the fenders so I installed them with rivnuts.

The post August 2020 Update #2: 50 Mile Test Drive and Final Dash Install appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

The post August 2020 Update: Stereo, Center Console, Dash Install appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

• I spent HOURS sanding the body seams on the side of the car. And…it still looks meh. You can tell where I had to add gel coat paste to repair the thin areas or big voids. It’s better than it was though for sure and once polished it looks fine. It’ll certainly look just fine from a few feet/in photos. I haven’t finished the passenger side yet because I got tired of sanding but will return to it and also fix the seams on the front fenders. Bodywork is indeed as bad as other builders say it is.
• I had to re-fit the front fenders at the a-pillar since I’ve moved my top. Required a good bit of extra trimming
• Shimmed the rear fender area to make it fit better.
• Doors still need some fitment help in a couple areas. I think I’m going to switch to countersunk screws for the whole door area because of clearance issues. My passenger door also has a habit of locking people in when you use the inside handle. The inside handle doesn’t release all the way sometimes which causes the door to get stuck closed.

• Starting to work on the interior now as something to allow me to go back and forth on the bodywork sanding. Used some time the last couple days to work on electrical items as well as plan out some of the upcoming work for the center console.
• Installed my keyless entry controller (Amazon chinesium part for $20). Works great! The instructions were next to useless but thankfully I’m good enough with a multimeter to figure it out. For $20 this is worthwhile for any 818C/S build since they’ve already got the actuators.
• Installed 3/4 of my vintage air vents. Waiting on the placement of the last one because it will depend on if a radio screen goes in the dash or the A/C controls do. I don’t really understand how these are supposed to be held in place securely…may need to give Vintage Air a call.
• Installed my backup camera. Haven’t run the RCA wire for it yet because that’s going to be a pain.
• Trying to decide whether to mount the radio in the dash or in front of the shifter. Dash has better visibility but might interfere with A/C ducting. Shifter area is harder to see and reach but a little easier to fit. If you’re a builder and have already tackled this issue let me know what you did.

• My ABS system continues to have issues that confuse me. It sets a code as soon as I drive forwards at any speed. Code is for motor/relay failure. It’s also blown a fuse in the past, but it’s not blown right now. I honestly can’t remember if the ABS system worked with the current pump in the past. I know my last pump, that had some messed up threads, worked with the same wiring setup. I may try to re-read my older updates to see if I ever had ABS working with the new pump because if not my issue is likely that the pump is bad. 
• The only other diagnosis I have is that there is a capacitor wired into my iWire ABS harness and it seems to be open-circuit so possibly bad as well? Not sure if it is the cause of the issue, or like the blown fuse, is a result of a pump issue.

The post July 2020 Update: It’s Road Legal! appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

• Bodywork
• I installed the tail lights into the rear bumper and cut out the lower bumper vent.
• Drilled and cleco’d the side panels in place. I will probably rivet them after I fit and check the rear bumper alignment. I want to keep them easy to remove for the time being in case something needs to be changed.
• Cut the vent holes in the hood, but these took much longer than the other cuts! These vents have stamped mesh and are not designed to have a trim piece so the cutout is actually a cosmetic part of the car and it has to fit the mesh perfectly. So I did a rough undersized cut with the saber saw and then did a dremel-fit-repeat process to work my way from there. It still needs some sanding by hand to finish it off but I will do that later when I fix fiberglass defects and install the mesh. The build manual included no instructions for the updated version of the hood mesh so that was a bit confusing but fairly simple after asking FFR.
• I had planned to fit the bumper and roof this last weekend, but it takes at least two people to install the roof and my help had to cancel. Still plenty of items to work on such as the headlights, front bumper vent, rear bumper mounting, etc. I’ll get the roof on there sometime in the next couple weeks.
• Stereo
• Made a bench setup to mess with my Pumpkin Android head unit. Just wired up enough to turn on. It’s a pretty sweet device and has pretty much any capability you can think of if you have the time to mess with it and set it up. The way the cameras work with it is pretty weird but overall I’m happy with it.
• I’m using a Verizon 4G USB modem to give it internet connectivity in the car. Bought the dongle for about $20 off Ebay. Internet connectivity is pretty much a requirement for any of the features and I did not want to mess with always using my phone’s hotspot to provide that.
• A/C
• Did a vacuum check on the A/C system. Seems to hold vacuum fine! I’ll probably wait a while to charge it since I have no need for A/C in a non-driving car. I’m pretty confident it will all work if it’s not leaking and I finish running the wire to the ECU from iWire.

The post January 2020 Update #2: Bodywork and Stereo appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

• Body
  • I started the bodywork on the car! Just doing simple things at the moment such as cutting holes for the taillights, cutting vent holes, and starting to mount the panels for a rough mock-up. Right now, I have just the sidesail clamped to the car but I plan to throw on some of the other panels soon.
  • Bought an air saber saw to cut the vents. This thing is awesome! Cut the vents in almost no time. Highly recommend getting one of these.
• Electrical
  • Had my first couple issues with the iWire harness.
    •  Minor issue is that they did not wire in the A/C input switch that tells the ECU to turn on the A/C fan and idle up the engine.
    • Slightly more concerning is that the car had a weird electrical issue and died when I was trying to purge the coolant system. While poking around, I found three wires on the brown engine harness plug that were completely loose from their connector pins. They pulled right out with almost zero effort. Easy to fix, but cost me a lot of time in troubleshooting the issue.
  • Bought some stereo items! This is not high on the priority list to complete but I wanted to do things like mount the speakers and run wiring before interior/body is installed so I didn’t cause myself unnecessary trouble down the road. I purchased a Pumpkin Android head unit, 2 analog cameras (reverse camera and front cam), plus two 6.5″ full-range speakers. I like messing with the tech stuff so the plan is to have all the cool goodies working like a dash cam, track apps, virtual gauges, internet connection, etc. I’m planning to mess with the stereo using a bench setup while I’m at school so it doesn’t interfere with building the rest of the car.
• A/C and Heat
  • I ended up having to remove the 4-way LS heater valve because the vacuum controlled valve is not compatible with the new Vintage Air units. On the Mini Gen II they use a servo rather than a vacuum actuator and servo wiring doesn’t operate on a on-off voltage signal like a solenoid. But luckily they sell a H-fitting with a small bypass that serves the same purpose and can be used with the standard servo they provide. I also switched over to spring-style coolant clamps for everything. The servo connector did not appear waterproof so I mounted it inside the cabin where the existing vintage air wiring could also reach.
  • I will test the A/C seals with a vacuum tester this upcoming weekend. Hopefully I can work with iWire to finish the wiring needed for it.

The post January 2020 Update: Bodywork Begins! appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

• Vintage Air A/C
• Heater lines plumbed incorporating a GM LS-engine heater bypass valve that is 4-way to allow for coolant circulation even when heater route is off. It was a bit of a pain to get the whole system to bleed but it all seems to be working now that it’s bled.
• A/C lines from vintage air were plumbed using the EZ-clip system. AZPete’s length recommendations were spot on and the plumbing for this was super easy to do.
• Wiring is mostly complete. I tested the blower and actuators, but am waiting for some tech support before wiring in the AC fan relay wire and the heater valve.
• Chassis
• Rear firewall was trimmed and reinstalled for final fitment.
• Center console panel installed
• Shifter
• My shifter already broke! The ball stud on the bottom of the handle snapped off the last time I tried to put it in reverse. I’ve replaced the ball stud, but I think I’m going to engineer a solution that decreases the resistance in the whole system so I don’t get a repeat.
• Throttle Pedal
• I modified my throttle pedal mount the change the pedal spacing. I have not yet gotten the chance to drive the car with this setup but it seems to be in a pretty good spot now.
• Brakes
• So I finally got the master cylinder installed and connected…and it leaks :(. I thought the leak was coming from the ABS pump area, but it is actually dripping from the brake booster where it meets the master cylinder. The Ebay seller said they would send me a replacement so hopefully I can get this resolved and evaluate the new setup.

The post December 2019 Update #2: Final Go-Kart Items appeared first on Lawson's 818C.

• Vintage Air A/C
• What I’m Using: Vintage Air Mini II Heat, Cool, and Defrost
• I purchased all my components based on the forum info compiled by user AZPete. He did a good write-up and a comprehensive parts list. I have a newer gen Mini unit and I am taking his advice on the heater bypass valve. Otherwise my setup is basically the same.
• I installed the blower, condenser, and drier onto the chasing. Plumbing all the component will happen next week
• The blower unit definitely cuts into passenger footspace, but I think it’s well worth the minor tradeoff. I’m not sure how it’s going to work with the FFR upper console either, but judging by the build manual pictures I will probably have to cut the upper console to fit it.
• Brakes
• The fittings I got did not work :(. The threads were correct but the flare they had was too small for the master cylinder. So I found a way to make lines that use a braided AN line instead of hardline. I was trying to stick to hardline but I could not find a combo that worked. So less ideal of a setup I think, but I do know that all these fittings are more standard and will work which could be benefit should they ever need replacement.
• What’s Left Before Body?
• A/C plumbing
• Brake plumbing from MC
• Firewall install
• Timing belt change
• Center console install
• Testing: Assuming the brakes connect up and I’m happy with the car, I will bring the car to an autocross on 12/15 to give it a go-kart shakedown before I begin working on the body.

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