Today was a big day filled with news and excitement! First off, Performance World has officially confirmed entry of not 2 but 3 vehicles. I have been considering alternative options to the 1989 Mustang build as it was going to be filled with lots of body work which has already been shown on the BMW. As nice as the project would have been an even better idea came to mind; my old 1987 GT Convertible. This convertible has been sitting for 3 years now since my friend bought the car. I built the car from stock to modified in 2004. You can read the history of the car HERE.

The car will be following practically the EXACT schedule that the 89 did but with less body work and definite time to focus on performance modifications including the Vortech Supercharger install, brake upgrade, suspension drop and a fresh coat of paint! The car features the same kit (minus rear bumper as I had custom made one before for it, and the spoiler) and even the same 18″ Black Chrome Saleens as planned from before! Final paint color will most likely be Satin Black to boot! All pictures of the car can be seen HERE.

Taking this car on instead of the ‘89 will allow for an extra week or so to give my 2000 SVT Ford Lightning a few upgrades in time for the show as now it will be entered as well! So now T.I.P will be featuring not 2 but 3 vehicles March 12-15 at Toronto’s International Center for Performance World Custom Car and Truck Show 2010.  I am very excited about this confirmation and the fact I will be able to show 3 pieces of my work.

Here’s a few shots of my 2000 SVT Lightning

It features:

• JDM Stage 1 kit: 3lb lower pulley, 4×4 transmission pan, valve body, 2 stage chip, upgraded MAF
• Mac Catback Exhaust
• DJM 5/6″ drop with use of springs, control arms, flip kit and shackles
• 23″ Oz Vela 3 Piece wheels (came Sonic Blue than painted to silver to match)
• Upgraded headlights and taillights
• HID 6k lows and fogs
• Billet grills
• Custom black interior
• Autometer Lunar gauges
• JBL Audio for sound
• Expedition Center Console and Passenger bucket seat mod

Just wanted to write a quick note to one of the business’ that have sponsored The Infamous Project. Bimmersport in Mississauga Ont. Have been kind enough to donate fluids for every part of the ACS car! The fluids include genuine synthetic oils and additives; Motor Oil, Filter, Transmission Fluid, Diff Fluid, Brake Fluid, Coolant, Transmission Fluid, Power Steering Fluid and Windshield Washer Fluid. To top things off, they even donated an X-brace to help stiffen up the chassis! These fluids will all be changed closer to show time in March as the car will be ready to tear up the streets for the spring!

A big thanks to Jon and Charlie from Bimmersport as your contributions to this project and your help to my past project have been wonderful! Don’t worry I will be putting the stickers on that you guys gave me! I just need to clean all the glass first.

Well here I thought this was going to be some seriously difficult task.. The S52 Cam swap into my M50 engine.. So a few tools and a few parts combined with a few hours of work = instant HP upgrade. My friend was kind enough to pick up the cams for me from 8 Legs Racing in Carleton Place (just outside of Ottawa). Scoth was even nice enough to loan us a few specialty tools such as the cam holder for the install!

So removal of the old cams were easy… Was not much more work than changing the valve cover gasket itself! (which was salvageable!) We located the so called “sweet spot” where we could loosen off all the bearing caps and except for the #1 lobes where we did the 1/4 turn method to slowly release the pressure off the lifter/valves. Install was a breeze and everything buttoned up perfectly.. Following the directions from Pelican, we managed to fire the car up with great success!

I can’t wait to see the increase in power these will add along with the supporting mods I have! It is a pretty simple procedure to do and make sure you follow the steps by Pelican or the BMW Bentley manual and you shouldn’t have any issues.. Making sure you work with TDC (top dead center) and time your gears properly with a tool and set your vanos as required..  Here’s a few pics from the removal/install.

Well the day finally came… after many many hours of prepping by myself and talking time and breaks to make sure I didn’t cut any corners, the end result speaks for itself! I am very pleased with the results and other than the odd tiny run from really laying the clear down.. Car looks awesome. I used just shy of 1 full Gallon of clear with my HVLP paint gun. Sprayed the clear at about 10psi (at the tip) and reduced the clear slightly just to get it to lay down extra “wet”. For those interested the gun i use is a Devilbliss with a 1.3mm tip.

Tomorrow I will be starting to put all the trim back on and getting ready to paint the moldings etc! ///M3 cam install will also be on its way so make sure to tune into that! Let the performance mods begin! Next week providing delivery we will also be looking at the header/midpipe install to get some better sound out of the ACS catback!

Be sure to check out the video of the Unmasking to see a walkaround of the car! I am also going to update the Previous Recordings page so that there is a small description beside the links to provide those with easier navigation! I apologize for the glitches that have been occurring with my USTREAM connection, but it looks like they have sorted out their issues. See you all tomorrow

Well I finally managed to shoot primer tonight! After prolonged hours spent on the side skirt you can see that it came out pretty good. I will be touching up a few little spots but other than that I think it turned out really well! So the body work is done and the primer is on. Tomorrow I will be spending the night sanding the car down getting it ready for paint so be sure to tune in for the cars transformation as it gets sprayed the brightest and purest white there is!

I know it has been a long process getting the car ready but.. its worth it! Not too bad as we are only 1.5 weeks into the project and already the car is almost ready for paint, Stainless brake lines from UUC are installed (I did find the clutch line today! So that needs to be installed), the PSS9’s have been adjusted and spaces fit, fenders are rolled and stretched, etc.. Not to worry the performance mods will soon be getting bolted on! Stay Tuned…

Well I keep finding more and more little things that I am trying to make perfect. Some great progress but I do need to be putting in some more hours here and there! I hope to be painting this thing on Wednesday but we’ll see how the progress goes over the next few days as I need to get better lighting set up first. On a good note Sean from Oakville Motorwerks has sent the pics of the custom Mid-Pipe he has built for the ACS car. Check out the pics! Definitely a beautiful piece and I can’t wait to bolt it on!

I have managed to stretch and roll the front fenders, fitted the spacers and we should be good for some serious slammage! All the main body work is now complete.. Just finishing up the passenger side skirt! Man what a job that has been… but it’s coming out pretty good so far! I will have more progress pics up tomorrow and be sure to tune in!

So it’s been a week! The time is going by quickly and we’ve just got started! The interview with CBC radio went well and I have access to a recorded version of the interview which I plan to post in the next few days. Big thanks to Boogie at Mirage Auto Body in Scarborough for providing the Project with all the Paint and Clear Coat! I still plan on having the body work done and the car ready for paint by the end of this weekend! Some clean up in the shop and additional lighting will be then installed to make painting a more pleasurable experience!

Pictures of all the progress can be seen on the photo gallery page for the 1992 ACS BMW The next round of pictures will most likely include the primer on top of the body work and getting ready for paint! The passenger side skirt is now mounted back on the car and repairs of it will be completed this weekend as well. I have located spacers that will hopefully work in the front, and hope to test them soon. By next weekend we should be installing some performance parts, have installed white face gauges in the gauge cluster, dyed the door panel inserts white and more!

On a Mustang note! Racecraft have been in contact with me in regards to their mustang drop spindles! These are a critical piece for my 5″ of drop wanted in the front of the convertible. I will most likely be going with the SN95 version (1994-1995) for 5 bolt reasons and potential Cobra caliper bolt on. Sounds like they may be sponsoring the project so my fingers are crossed! I am looking forward to showing the install of them!

Lastly, I just want to thank all the viewers and supporters who have been tuning in and following along! I really hope to help provide a great library of information to those that want to learn how to work on cars. 1 week down… 8+ to go!

So on January 7th at approximately 8:15am I will be interviewed live on the CBC Radio Morning Show. They contacted me via phone/email after seeing my feature in the Peterborough Examiner! Pretty neat I must I say. So please listen out for that tomorrow morning if you’re within the frequency range. Alternatively, I will make sure I can post a recorded version of the interview for those that miss the show. Now we just need the News to interview me.. then the Discovery Channel to give me my own show maybe? Thanks again to everyone for your support.

Well I made it through the first weekend! Let me tell ya.. the stress of trying to get everything ready over the holidays was a challenge! Now it’s just a matter of scheduling myself in a routine fashion to get some serious work done and knock these 2 projects out! In case you guys have missed the shows you can click on the “previous shows” link so you can view the missed episodes. I am trying to find a suitable host to upload the files to as I have already maxed out my limit on USTREAM. I plan to rectify this issue as soon as possible!

So far we have found out how low the BMW will sit on it’s PSS9’s, still some fender work to do for proper clearance but that will be taken care of very soon. I have installed the UUC Brake Line kit, consisting of 6 brake lines all in braided steel with nice blue silicone sleeves. I have not bled the system out yet as I still plan to bypass the ABS unit and bleed the system out with DOT 5 racing fluid.

The car has been completely stripped down as body work has commenced getting the car ready for paint. There was some rust on the passenger side rocker panel which required removal of the passenger side AC Schnitzer side skirt. It was urethaned on, and required some serious force, patience and prying to get it off! After removing it some shaping and bending to try and get it straight again was needed.

Finally some body work and sanding has been started on the passenger side. Everything seems to be moving along quite well. Once the body work and paint are out of the way I will be moving on to installing the performance add ons such as the M3 S52 cams/trays/lifters, Super Sprint headers, Custom 3″ midpipe with race cat from Oakville Motorwerks, and a few other goodies here and there. Some door panel dyeing and white face gauge installation for the cluster are some of the other things to come!

For now here are a few pics of the progress over the weekend. Enjoy.

So the stress of Day 1 is over. This morning I was quite certain I was going to have to stream via the webcam on my laptop…. The “easycap” adapter I ordered for the S-Video to USB was suppose to be delivered on the 3oth and just never showed. Canada Post still shows deliver for then, so I am not sure what happened. Thankfully Chris from Darkside Fibre Communications had an old video capturing card that he kindly donated to the project today!

So a few connection issues, a horrible microphone until my cable shows up, and me accidentally yanking out the camera cord a few times resulted in some down time… But it was successful. I am still getting used to finding camera placement and sometimes I forget its even on and my language slips. I managed to get the ///M3 all buttoned up for now and moved in the first project car (1992 ACS BMW). Did a bit of suspension work on it to see how low I could get the car, some spacers will be needed for the front and some fender stretching.

I will be at it again tomorrow and hopefully updating the show schedule to a bit more detail early next week. So please keep checking back for that. I will try to formalize the show as much as possible however, i do work a full time job and have a life aside from work and cars. I will be sorting out what scheduled time I will be working on the cars during the week nights and approximate the hours on weekends. I am looking forward to getting these projects going! The next few months will be going by very quickly!