4k GT86 Gets a Rocket Bunny Kit & LS3 V8 Swap!
Discussion
aka_kerrly said:
This thread is bloody glorious, I can't believe Ive only just found it!!!!!!!!
Even the current two tone look is super cool and top marks for the wheel fitment!!
Haha really glad you enjoy it! Good to hear people are finding it and giving it a good read through. Truthfully i've given it a re-read from time to time to re-live these last couple of crazy years Even the current two tone look is super cool and top marks for the wheel fitment!!
So this week with the rocket bunny install for the most part "finished" I've been wanting to go back over the car from front to back to refine, re-work and perfect the fit and finish of the kit along with having to go about some other tasks such as re-water proofing the front arches, making clearance for the front wheels and rust proofing the work for that clearance.
I was able to get a tiny bit more negative camber from the front by swapping the camber bolts to the bottom strut mounting hole, this will just ensure that the front suspension can compress properly without pushing against or damaging the rocket bunny arches.
Unfortunately i didn't get to achieve the proper fitment I was after on the front arches which is to have the kit fit fairly flush against the body without having to resort to using the supplied rubber trim as I prefer the look without as I need tot put a bit more time in to it however for now its good to have the arches back on the car with the correct hardware protected from any rust and with the wheels fitting properly.
For the wheel clearance I had to make some relief cuts in a spot welded lip holding the cap at the end of the sill in place, not wanting to go wild and cut it all away I decided to just hammer it back, seal it up where needed and give it a thick healthy dosage of underseal, hopefully it won't be rusting any time soon!
Likewise one problem with cutting the OEM arches is not being able to re-fit the original arch liners however the most important area is the large window leading in to the engine bay, i was able to cut and reuse this section of the arch liners to stop any water, leaves, mud, etc from flinging in to the engine bay and will continue to make additional arch liner sections to add to this however i'll have to keep the wheel travel in mind when thinking about this.
Check out the video below!
I was able to get a tiny bit more negative camber from the front by swapping the camber bolts to the bottom strut mounting hole, this will just ensure that the front suspension can compress properly without pushing against or damaging the rocket bunny arches.
Unfortunately i didn't get to achieve the proper fitment I was after on the front arches which is to have the kit fit fairly flush against the body without having to resort to using the supplied rubber trim as I prefer the look without as I need tot put a bit more time in to it however for now its good to have the arches back on the car with the correct hardware protected from any rust and with the wheels fitting properly.
For the wheel clearance I had to make some relief cuts in a spot welded lip holding the cap at the end of the sill in place, not wanting to go wild and cut it all away I decided to just hammer it back, seal it up where needed and give it a thick healthy dosage of underseal, hopefully it won't be rusting any time soon!
Likewise one problem with cutting the OEM arches is not being able to re-fit the original arch liners however the most important area is the large window leading in to the engine bay, i was able to cut and reuse this section of the arch liners to stop any water, leaves, mud, etc from flinging in to the engine bay and will continue to make additional arch liner sections to add to this however i'll have to keep the wheel travel in mind when thinking about this.
Check out the video below!
TheJimi said:
Looking forward to seeing the end result!
I have a question though, what are you doing about all the exposed metal on the arches where you've cut sections out?
That's gonna be catnip for corrosion.
The rear is being welded back up to close up the inner and outer arch layers and i'll be applying primer/paint and underseal much like I have on the front. Can't imagine what more I can do once the surfaces are all primed and sealed?I have a question though, what are you doing about all the exposed metal on the arches where you've cut sections out?
That's gonna be catnip for corrosion.
So the end of last week I started tidying up the rear end but more importantly preparing the car to drive over a friend's workshop to get welded up. With that in mind I had to briefly tidy up the rear arches, temporarily re-fit the rear diffuser (for the light) as well as fit new number plates and work on making some card templates to make our job of cutting sheet metal to weld in that much easier!
The whole thing can be seen in the latest youtube video here:
So starting off with something totally different - the rear wing!
I initially had the thought of cutting some steel plates, having a nut welded on to the back of them and then bonding them to the inside of the wing but that would just mean more work for us on the weekend while I had a chunk of what must be 8mm thick Aluminium lieing around. I decided to make some small plates, drill and tap them and use that as the brackets to hold the wing down on the car, eventhough its Ali the glass fibre of the wing will likely crack and break before the threads pull out of the soft Ali and i don't really see either happening any time soon so I ofcourse started off by making some cardboard templates.
They were able to slide easily inside the wing with a decent enough area over the inside lip of the wing to hold the weight of it with nothing but the cardboard, and in the position you see the dots on the full length section of the wing line up perfectly with the OEM wing holes in the boot, result!
So with that done I cut them out of the Aluminium, drilled and Tapped but... my only tube of tiger seal was a tube of grey jelly instead, so it'll have to wait until I can get the new lot in the post.
So moving on from there to a brief update on the diffuser, so following the recent hackery of the rocket bunny unit i was able to roughly glue in and then lay some glass fibre over the "V" light section in to the rocket bunny diffuser, i'm quite pleased with how it's turned out so far as it is in the exact position and angle i envisioned and now just needs to be assaulted with a vulgar amount of filler and sanding.
I also fit the light back in to it and fit it on to the car, just so when i drive it I would have all the required reverse/fog lights, etc.
And finally moving on from there once more I started making the templates for the sheet metal to be cut and welded in on the rear arches. Quite a simple process really which I had a few small tricks for which I show in the video but I was able to make 5 small templates for each side which gives us some fairly simply and easy to handle cuts of metal. I'll be going more in to the welding/sealing process in my next video and update but here you can see the pretty simply little templates I made. After doing this process on both sides I... made some clingfilm seal to close up the arches.. just so i could drive the car without any junk and rubbish flying in to the inner arches... hey if it works it's not a dumb idea right?
The whole thing can be seen in the latest youtube video here:
So starting off with something totally different - the rear wing!
I initially had the thought of cutting some steel plates, having a nut welded on to the back of them and then bonding them to the inside of the wing but that would just mean more work for us on the weekend while I had a chunk of what must be 8mm thick Aluminium lieing around. I decided to make some small plates, drill and tap them and use that as the brackets to hold the wing down on the car, eventhough its Ali the glass fibre of the wing will likely crack and break before the threads pull out of the soft Ali and i don't really see either happening any time soon so I ofcourse started off by making some cardboard templates.
They were able to slide easily inside the wing with a decent enough area over the inside lip of the wing to hold the weight of it with nothing but the cardboard, and in the position you see the dots on the full length section of the wing line up perfectly with the OEM wing holes in the boot, result!
So with that done I cut them out of the Aluminium, drilled and Tapped but... my only tube of tiger seal was a tube of grey jelly instead, so it'll have to wait until I can get the new lot in the post.
So moving on from there to a brief update on the diffuser, so following the recent hackery of the rocket bunny unit i was able to roughly glue in and then lay some glass fibre over the "V" light section in to the rocket bunny diffuser, i'm quite pleased with how it's turned out so far as it is in the exact position and angle i envisioned and now just needs to be assaulted with a vulgar amount of filler and sanding.
I also fit the light back in to it and fit it on to the car, just so when i drive it I would have all the required reverse/fog lights, etc.
And finally moving on from there once more I started making the templates for the sheet metal to be cut and welded in on the rear arches. Quite a simple process really which I had a few small tricks for which I show in the video but I was able to make 5 small templates for each side which gives us some fairly simply and easy to handle cuts of metal. I'll be going more in to the welding/sealing process in my next video and update but here you can see the pretty simply little templates I made. After doing this process on both sides I... made some clingfilm seal to close up the arches.. just so i could drive the car without any junk and rubbish flying in to the inner arches... hey if it works it's not a dumb idea right?
Cliff J said:
Having just read the whole thread, I can honestly say that for me personally, this is the best thing on PistonHeads right now.
I love how you almost lead me to believe this was a routine fix up and drive It daily post on the cheap, and then I started seeing monster wide wheels., reading about Rocket Bunny parts, etc, this is insane, I’m a Jap car man at heart so this is my dream you’re building lol
haha i'm glad to hear you've enjoyed it! I did consider perhaps making a 2nd thread when it moved on to the widebody parts as the thread title doesn't particuarly reflect what's going on these days but in a way I use this pistonheads thread as my go-to log/blog for what's gone on with the car since I got it.I love how you almost lead me to believe this was a routine fix up and drive It daily post on the cheap, and then I started seeing monster wide wheels., reading about Rocket Bunny parts, etc, this is insane, I’m a Jap car man at heart so this is my dream you’re building lol
shalmaneser said:
I'm a bit skeptical about the rocket bunny look - doesn't the huge offset of the wheels ruin the suspension geometry - but it looks like you're doing a good job of the conversion and I hope it goes well for you!
Not particularly the suspension geometry, your Camber, toe, caster, etc is never going to change due to wheel offset but it does cause your steering angle to take more of a swinging motion than a pivot. It's quite litterally the same as running spacers in that sense.Which for the most part just means your wheels taking up more of the wheel well as they move more when you turn. Lowing your car generally does alot more to change the geometry than lower offset wheels will ever do
(but then im no expert at all!)So last weekend was a big one. The car was back on the ground, aligned, driven on the road and it had the rear arches welded closed. After that I fit the Liberty walk rear wing and with this the Body kit is essentially "finished" on the car. The Next steps will be bodywork and a wrap!
The full video can be checked out below and i'd also just like to thank anyone that's taken the time to watch my videos so far as well as subscribe as I hit the 100 subscriber mark this weekend which i'm quite chuffed about!
but let me go in to more details..
So i started off by fitting a new set of rear-trailing arms after getting a refund from Driftworks as I was a bit of an unlucky sod in their their units didn't fit so I went with some from SPL which are a fantastic bit of kit and very easy to fit however they allowed me to centre up the wheel in the rear arch and using the good old string method I was able to align the car as I was quite worried about my toe being out on the rear which I found out it was and was able to zero it out a bit more. This was just because i didn't want to totally shred my tyres to pieces when driving around.
Once this was done I was able to drive the car home for the first time, what a great feeling! I missed the sound, the low seating position and surprisingly it didn't feel incredibly wide on the road, it was easy to drive it with confidence and felt nimble and agile. The tyres were grippy and the front steering was a tiny bit heavier but that may just be down to being quite used to my daily driver. The new brakes feel great and the car stops on a dime, theres no darting either side and it feels just like OEM only.. better!
I pulled it in to the drive way and couldn't help getting a load of pictures from all angles to mark the occasion, it looked fantastic in thes un as well even if it was covered in dust all over.
The next morning it was up bright and early, something i've not done in a while to get over to my friend's workshop to get the rear arches welded up. My Friend has been running their own fabrication and custom furniture business for the last couple of years now originally picking up welding as a hobby to work on their own car and eventually growing it as a skill and passion in to their own side business.
I started off by cutting the 1.5mm sheet metal to shape using the templates I had made previously and this saved alot of time in any guess work with the shaping of the metal. Once that was done it was able to be fairly easily zapped in using with Mig welding. Choosing to go for Mig over Tig as I believe (in my very limited knowledge) that it's far easier to control the heat with mig and therefore there's less risk to the thin sheet metal of warping or burning through it.
So with my fabricator (haha) hat on again I got to work as their assistant for the day with cutting and prepping the panels with primer!
The results were fantastic! it came out really well and we were able to get both sides finished in a single day. After Zapping in the sheet metal we tidied up and ground back the welds before applying weld through primer, seam sealer and a healthy coat of brush-on Underseal, hopefully the work we've done won't be rusting any time soon!
I left it at their workshop overnight to let the underseal dry somewhat rather than get loads of roadgrime stuck in it and once again it drove beautifully, got plenty of looks and attention even in its Red/black ladybug form
And at the beginning of this week I finished up the saga by installing the rear liberty walk wing.
Much like the rest of the kit there's plenty of bodywork to be done but with the aliminium plates tiger sealed in to the ducktail and extensions I was able to bolt down the wing which should be plenty to keep it on the car! but i'll still give it some back up in the form of a sealer once it's all said and done.
The full video can be checked out below and i'd also just like to thank anyone that's taken the time to watch my videos so far as well as subscribe as I hit the 100 subscriber mark this weekend which i'm quite chuffed about!
but let me go in to more details..
So i started off by fitting a new set of rear-trailing arms after getting a refund from Driftworks as I was a bit of an unlucky sod in their their units didn't fit so I went with some from SPL which are a fantastic bit of kit and very easy to fit however they allowed me to centre up the wheel in the rear arch and using the good old string method I was able to align the car as I was quite worried about my toe being out on the rear which I found out it was and was able to zero it out a bit more. This was just because i didn't want to totally shred my tyres to pieces when driving around.
Once this was done I was able to drive the car home for the first time, what a great feeling! I missed the sound, the low seating position and surprisingly it didn't feel incredibly wide on the road, it was easy to drive it with confidence and felt nimble and agile. The tyres were grippy and the front steering was a tiny bit heavier but that may just be down to being quite used to my daily driver. The new brakes feel great and the car stops on a dime, theres no darting either side and it feels just like OEM only.. better!
I pulled it in to the drive way and couldn't help getting a load of pictures from all angles to mark the occasion, it looked fantastic in thes un as well even if it was covered in dust all over.
The next morning it was up bright and early, something i've not done in a while to get over to my friend's workshop to get the rear arches welded up. My Friend has been running their own fabrication and custom furniture business for the last couple of years now originally picking up welding as a hobby to work on their own car and eventually growing it as a skill and passion in to their own side business.
I started off by cutting the 1.5mm sheet metal to shape using the templates I had made previously and this saved alot of time in any guess work with the shaping of the metal. Once that was done it was able to be fairly easily zapped in using with Mig welding. Choosing to go for Mig over Tig as I believe (in my very limited knowledge) that it's far easier to control the heat with mig and therefore there's less risk to the thin sheet metal of warping or burning through it.
So with my fabricator (haha) hat on again I got to work as their assistant for the day with cutting and prepping the panels with primer!
The results were fantastic! it came out really well and we were able to get both sides finished in a single day. After Zapping in the sheet metal we tidied up and ground back the welds before applying weld through primer, seam sealer and a healthy coat of brush-on Underseal, hopefully the work we've done won't be rusting any time soon!
I left it at their workshop overnight to let the underseal dry somewhat rather than get loads of roadgrime stuck in it and once again it drove beautifully, got plenty of looks and attention even in its Red/black ladybug form
And at the beginning of this week I finished up the saga by installing the rear liberty walk wing.
Much like the rest of the kit there's plenty of bodywork to be done but with the aliminium plates tiger sealed in to the ducktail and extensions I was able to bolt down the wing which should be plenty to keep it on the car! but i'll still give it some back up in the form of a sealer once it's all said and done.
So with the Rocket Bunny kit now officially installed I'ved moved on to prepping the car for its wrap.
I've chosen to go with a wrap over paint for a few reasons, the first being cost of course, the next being that i'd like to change the colour of the car (still staying somewhat red) as the original red on the car is very flat and if the rocke tbunny panels were matched to it I feel the new curves of the body would be lost in the flatness of the OEM colour and finally if I were to do paint i'd like to go the whole 9 yards and spray the whole car inside & out including engine bay doors, etc.
So with all that in mind I've decided to go for a wrap which i've been in talks with a company down in Southampton called Monsterwraps which appear to do some very good work as well as get great reviews. Not wanting to skimp out on the fitting of the wrap ofcourse or do it myself i'd rather pay a sensible price to get a good job done. However as I mentioned i've been in talks with them to confirm how they would tackle the kit, the Wellnut holes and what prep work I can do to speed up the process as of course the car is far from factory fresh.
With that said the car is now booked in to have the wrap installed the week commencing the 15h of June giving me just over a couple of weeks to get it prepped and ready to go!
Check out the first video related to it below where I talk about the proceses as well as my choice in Colour.
As far as colour choice goes i've shared it with a few people but i've not been keeping it much of a secret or such. I wanted to stay close to red and have a nice deep gloss to it which lead me to find KPMF Black Red Iridescent
I think this will look amazing on the car and I can't wait to see it completed!
I've chosen to go with a wrap over paint for a few reasons, the first being cost of course, the next being that i'd like to change the colour of the car (still staying somewhat red) as the original red on the car is very flat and if the rocke tbunny panels were matched to it I feel the new curves of the body would be lost in the flatness of the OEM colour and finally if I were to do paint i'd like to go the whole 9 yards and spray the whole car inside & out including engine bay doors, etc.
So with all that in mind I've decided to go for a wrap which i've been in talks with a company down in Southampton called Monsterwraps which appear to do some very good work as well as get great reviews. Not wanting to skimp out on the fitting of the wrap ofcourse or do it myself i'd rather pay a sensible price to get a good job done. However as I mentioned i've been in talks with them to confirm how they would tackle the kit, the Wellnut holes and what prep work I can do to speed up the process as of course the car is far from factory fresh.
With that said the car is now booked in to have the wrap installed the week commencing the 15h of June giving me just over a couple of weeks to get it prepped and ready to go!
Check out the first video related to it below where I talk about the proceses as well as my choice in Colour.
As far as colour choice goes i've shared it with a few people but i've not been keeping it much of a secret or such. I wanted to stay close to red and have a nice deep gloss to it which lead me to find KPMF Black Red Iridescent
I think this will look amazing on the car and I can't wait to see it completed!
Over the recent weekend I was able to have a few friends over to the workshop and over the course of a single very sunny Sunday the whole Rocket bunny kit is now prepped for its wrap.
I'm quite lucky that a couple of my friends have wrapped parts of their cars before and one of them even works in the bodywork department at BMW (We gave him the whole front bumper to do!) so I knew they'd do a good job alongisde me!
We started off by keying up the panels with some 320 grit and getting rid of any motting/orange peel in the FRP as well as any extra blobs of material that were stuck to the surface, followed by a couple of healthy coats of grey high build primer. Once it was dry and ready to sand we applied any filler or knifing putty in areas that needed it, there were a couple of cracks and some scratches or air bubbles that had to be filled and finally all the panels were finished to a wet 800 grit finish which should be plenty for the wrap to adhere to nicely and no inperfections to speak of!
The video for it can be found here:
We all really liked how the front bumper turned out in its sanded back primer look ironically, it sort of looked like a comic book sketch or some kind of video game (If anyone's played Borderlands you'll know exactly what i mean!)
But in just under 2 weeks the car will be off to Monster Wraps in Southhampton to have the wrap applied and I can't wait! I've got some small jobs to get done before then and I need to continue work on the diffuser so that it's ready by the time the car is complete.
I'm quite lucky that a couple of my friends have wrapped parts of their cars before and one of them even works in the bodywork department at BMW (We gave him the whole front bumper to do!) so I knew they'd do a good job alongisde me!
We started off by keying up the panels with some 320 grit and getting rid of any motting/orange peel in the FRP as well as any extra blobs of material that were stuck to the surface, followed by a couple of healthy coats of grey high build primer. Once it was dry and ready to sand we applied any filler or knifing putty in areas that needed it, there were a couple of cracks and some scratches or air bubbles that had to be filled and finally all the panels were finished to a wet 800 grit finish which should be plenty for the wrap to adhere to nicely and no inperfections to speak of!
The video for it can be found here:
We all really liked how the front bumper turned out in its sanded back primer look ironically, it sort of looked like a comic book sketch or some kind of video game (If anyone's played Borderlands you'll know exactly what i mean!)
But in just under 2 weeks the car will be off to Monster Wraps in Southhampton to have the wrap applied and I can't wait! I've got some small jobs to get done before then and I need to continue work on the diffuser so that it's ready by the time the car is complete.
Paulr1980 said:
Ah cool, you’re near me (Hamble). If it’s ok I’d love to pop round and see this. It’s not something I’d do personally but I’m fascinated watching it come together from humble beginnings.
Well truthfully i'm based over just outside Brighton (Henfield) So not quite around the corner but not a milion miles either. probably won't invite too many people over to my little shed either as I know the landowner isn't too keen on the idea of it but i'd absolutely be up for having a good old chinwag and showing anyone around the car when we're finally able to have some decent meets or Pistonheads Sunday Service's again! 
defblade said:
Yep, 100% with you there... do the whole car like that, instead
Haha it would be good fun although perhaps not something i've put so much time in to 
If you use instagram you should check out Shin.ga1976 - A chap in japan who paints scale models to appear as though they're 2d and from a page of an Initial D manga.
Lewis's Friend said:
Quick question OP.
I like the look of this and find it fascinating seeing the work that goes into fitting a kit like this, having normally only seen them as finished cars on Speedhunters or similar!
My question is, what does it drive like on those wide wheels? I fitted 8'' wide wheels on my mk1 Mx5 and it totally destroyed the ride and handling. Going back to a 7'' wheel felt much better. I think Mx5s can be very sensitive to wheel size so it may be model specific but I would worry the dynamics of the car would be compromised.
Great build though!
Good question I like the look of this and find it fascinating seeing the work that goes into fitting a kit like this, having normally only seen them as finished cars on Speedhunters or similar!
My question is, what does it drive like on those wide wheels? I fitted 8'' wide wheels on my mk1 Mx5 and it totally destroyed the ride and handling. Going back to a 7'' wheel felt much better. I think Mx5s can be very sensitive to wheel size so it may be model specific but I would worry the dynamics of the car would be compromised.
Great build though!
I was actually quite worried about how it would feel especially on the front with wider and lower offset wheels. Truthfully on the one time i've driven it I wasn't trying to get the back end out which I imagine will be nigh on impossible to get a set of 285 Federals to step out with ~200bhp in the dry unless i'm driving like a right knob so I can't say the rear feels any different really, it feels wider (or for lack of a better word "more planted" as in it would take much more force to unsettle the car at the rear however as far as the front goes it is a bit heavier steering wise which isn't a massive issue as these cars have quite light assisted steering by OEM Standards however there does seem to be one issue which I think is primarily down to the front camber but i'm not sure if i've lost some caster as it feels much slower to self-steer than before.
But having said all that as far as the front's concerned i still have a set of new front caster bushings and anti-bumpsteer kit that I need to fit to the front control arms that may bring everything back more in line with OEM.
Thanks everyone for all the recent kind comments. I'm really looking forward to getting the car back to a "finished" state and getting it out and about!
A bit of a small one in a way but last week before getting the car back in one piece I wanted to change my headlights and install and AC delete kit while I had the front bumper off.
With the AC delete i've been contemplating it as i've never actually got the system fillled up in the 2 years i've owned the car so why bother having all the gear, pipes, etc making a mess of the engine bay, blocking the radiator or taxing the engine if it's not doing anything, plus I might be able to sell the condenser and recoup some of the costs and eventually sell the AC delete (When i remove & sell the engine) and again recoup soem of the costs.
So with that in mind I went ahead and purchased the AC delete kit from ICP https://www.importcarparts.co.uk/par...y=&sear...
The process of Installing the delete along with removing the condenser and AC pipes was reallly easy, so easy infact that i forgot to take any pictures but covered it in my latest video.
Following the AC delete and went ahead and changed my headlights, Opting to swap my rather expensive Valenti headlights for a set of Vlands with a HID kit. My main reason for this was that despite the valentis being a great bit of kit and no doubt much better build quality I simply prefer the look of the Vlands. Plus this allows me to sell the Valenti lights!
I don't have a decent before/after comparison but you can see plenty of pictures of my Valenti headlights on previous posts
All of this is covered in my latest video. Give it a watch!
A bit of a small one in a way but last week before getting the car back in one piece I wanted to change my headlights and install and AC delete kit while I had the front bumper off.
With the AC delete i've been contemplating it as i've never actually got the system fillled up in the 2 years i've owned the car so why bother having all the gear, pipes, etc making a mess of the engine bay, blocking the radiator or taxing the engine if it's not doing anything, plus I might be able to sell the condenser and recoup some of the costs and eventually sell the AC delete (When i remove & sell the engine) and again recoup soem of the costs.
So with that in mind I went ahead and purchased the AC delete kit from ICP https://www.importcarparts.co.uk/par...y=&sear...
The process of Installing the delete along with removing the condenser and AC pipes was reallly easy, so easy infact that i forgot to take any pictures but covered it in my latest video.
Following the AC delete and went ahead and changed my headlights, Opting to swap my rather expensive Valenti headlights for a set of Vlands with a HID kit. My main reason for this was that despite the valentis being a great bit of kit and no doubt much better build quality I simply prefer the look of the Vlands. Plus this allows me to sell the Valenti lights!
I don't have a decent before/after comparison but you can see plenty of pictures of my Valenti headlights on previous posts
All of this is covered in my latest video. Give it a watch!
Edited by Samjeev on Tuesday 9th June 10:18
So with the new headlights installed it was time to wrap up the final assembly of the car ready to drive it to Monster Wraps
One thing I wanted to do while putting the car together I wanted to check out to see whether i could lower the car a little further as there's still a gap from the sideskirt to the ground when fully aired out and the answer that?.... NO.
As you can see the chassis is very firmly sitting on the tyre at the front, but it's not the end of the world the car still looks incredible when fully aired out and practically sunken in to the ground with the bodykit hanging a bit lower than the stock body.
With that confirmed I moved on to continue some of the glass fibre work on the diffuser (sorry no pictures, check out the video!) and the final assembly of the car ready to drive to Southampton on Friday.
With the car all back in one piece I couldn't resist driving it out in to the sun, rinsing it off to get rid of any loose dust and taking some pre-wrap beauty shots!
Check out the latest video and the pictures below!
One thing I wanted to do while putting the car together I wanted to check out to see whether i could lower the car a little further as there's still a gap from the sideskirt to the ground when fully aired out and the answer that?.... NO.
As you can see the chassis is very firmly sitting on the tyre at the front, but it's not the end of the world the car still looks incredible when fully aired out and practically sunken in to the ground with the bodykit hanging a bit lower than the stock body.
With that confirmed I moved on to continue some of the glass fibre work on the diffuser (sorry no pictures, check out the video!) and the final assembly of the car ready to drive to Southampton on Friday.
With the car all back in one piece I couldn't resist driving it out in to the sun, rinsing it off to get rid of any loose dust and taking some pre-wrap beauty shots!
Check out the latest video and the pictures below!
J.C... said:
I must admit I’ve been following this from the very start but as soon as I saw the words “Rocket” and “Bunny” I did think oh ffs don’t bother, but I have to say it looks the absolute b
ks! Massive fan of the colour choice as well.
As for the welding and sealing - you should have just left it all open. You’d have had people queuing up to fly you all round the world paying you huge amounts of money to hack their cars up if you had...
Haha i'm glad to hear my work has paid off to get that level of recognition from someone that otherwise wouldn't be a fan.ks! Massive fan of the colour choice as well. As for the welding and sealing - you should have just left it all open. You’d have had people queuing up to fly you all round the world paying you huge amounts of money to hack their cars up if you had...
Likewise I was massively against wrapping cars in the past as I thought why bother compared to paint but having now been in that position myself when faced with costs vs finished product there are plenty of reasons to go for a wrap over a half-assed (windows in, not painting engine bay, etc) job in my opinion as you essentially end up with the same result, but one doesn't suffer from rock chips in the long run
Took me a moment to wonder who you were referring too there as well.
Although i know it's just a joke the problem with keeping it all open is you can litterally peer in to the cabin with the rear arches cut open, you see the back side of the rear interior panels, rear speakers, etc and it lets in quite alot of cabin noise!
Glad to hear people like it though, can't wait to get it back from wrap and another "stage" of it's life will be finished, the first being fixing the car up from the wreck, this one being to Rocket bunny it (It was always the plan from the start
) and the last one being some MORE POWAH.Butter Face said:
Looks amazing that colour should look superb.
I’m just contemplating a wrap, think I’m going to just go for a normal red but seeing that colour has got me thinking!
Can you let me know the rough cost for what you’re having?
I'm paying £3k all in, which includes doing the Door jams and Boot jam too.I’m just contemplating a wrap, think I’m going to just go for a normal red but seeing that colour has got me thinking!
Can you let me know the rough cost for what you’re having?
Having done my own research it seems on average £2700 is the go-to price for a mid-sized car, I think throw in the fact my car's widebody, might require some additional prep for their application and will be ceramic coated at the end of it I feel i'm getting a fairly reasonable deal.
Having said that i've already had someone else comment on another forum that their having their whole car resprayed for £2k but to be honest you're always going to get comments like that with any bit of car paint/wrap work and personally I would question the quality of a £2k paint job which quotes "Will spray as much as the engine bay as possible with the engine in-place"
Superhoop said:
When is it due back from being wrapped? It was going in this week wasn't it?
Hoping to get it back at the end of next week they advised a 2 week install.But i've got a couple of small videos via instagram of the wrap going on, i'd link it but not a clue how to link instagram stories
gobuddygo said:
Try this, but it wont work for private accounts - https://www.storysaver.net/
Oh fantastic thanks! Well here you go, a small video they sent me when they began, starting off with the doors and boot jamshttps://i.imgur.com/9iaOqPW.mp4
Bensontoast said:
+1 for sanding the whole car down to make it look Borderlands-esque
haha that would be amazing but pretty hard to pull off I think on a steel bodied car. It only works so well on the body kit as the raw FRP is black underneath Edited by Samjeev on Thursday 18th June 17:49
I can't wait to see it either. Will be popping up there early next week to drop off the freshly painted rear diffuser as well as a new set of boot hinges (the OEM ones on the car are red ofcourse, from the factory and I can't expect them to wrap something as intricate as a boot hinge so i picked up some new black OEM ones) so when i'm there i'll be getting a sneak peak of how the car is can't wait!
for now there's been some more little videos:
https://i.imgur.com/UPZ6d1J.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/3vHn6xb.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/upGWaTJ.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/NPzT9fI.mp4
It appears they're actually going further with it than originally discussed taking the wrap all the way under the widebody and even wrapping over the sections of the cut arches that have a layer of underseal around them. Ofcourse in reality this doesn't matter either way as the arches cover all of that up but assuming that it doesn't lift or peel at all near the underseal it's good to know no pesky eyes will be able to peek up my arches (that's quite the euphemism) and see the original red under them.
for now there's been some more little videos:
https://i.imgur.com/UPZ6d1J.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/3vHn6xb.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/upGWaTJ.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/NPzT9fI.mp4
It appears they're actually going further with it than originally discussed taking the wrap all the way under the widebody and even wrapping over the sections of the cut arches that have a layer of underseal around them. Ofcourse in reality this doesn't matter either way as the arches cover all of that up but assuming that it doesn't lift or peel at all near the underseal it's good to know no pesky eyes will be able to peek up my arches (that's quite the euphemism) and see the original red under them.
The time is nigh to get the car back from it's wrap, just a bit of a shame that the weather is so shocking this week!
I'll be saving posting any pics up until i've had a chance to get it outside and make a little "reveal" video but also because I really want to take it down to Fuel Coffee house just outside Henfield This Saturday, they open at 11am to give a chance to have a little meet with friends and anyone that's interested in seeing it in the flesh before i post up any videos/pictures online, so if you'd like to pop down for a coffee and to see the car, I hope to see you there!
But in the meantime i've made a few small videos for my youtube channel. The first couple of videos were a 2 part vlog just going over the history of the car, the repair, the costs, etc which of course anyone reading this has likely already seen so I won't bore you with a link to that but the other shows off the completion of the custom fibreglass work on the Rocket Bunny diffuser.
It was quite a long process which wasn't without it's headaches for both myself and the painter but i'm thrilled with how it turned out, the idea i had in mind coming to reality really pays off.
After getting the Surround of the "V" light fibreglassed in to rocket bunny diffuser it was largely a case of tweaking the position, fixing any cracks that occured from that and then building up the surrounding area with Fibreglass based filler and eventually fine body filler. Doing so allowed me to sand back and form the shapes that I was looking for around the edges of the light so it looked as intentional as possible.
When it was close to completion i then passed it off to a friend of mine who wanted to finish up the filler work and then paint it gloss black, unfortunately for the both of us my fibreglass and filler materials reacted quite badly with his paint which I know can be quite a common issue for painters when dealing with someone elses' work which was why he wanted to finish the filler work himself but unfortunately I think it was a bit late at that point as the bulk of the material had been added by me, however after tackling through the issues it ended up looking absolutely fantastic. With a great, smooth and glassy gloss black finish it really was a great finishing touch.
I delivered it down to Monster wraps and i'll see it next when I get the car back!
Video of the diffuser work here:
I'll be saving posting any pics up until i've had a chance to get it outside and make a little "reveal" video but also because I really want to take it down to Fuel Coffee house just outside Henfield This Saturday, they open at 11am to give a chance to have a little meet with friends and anyone that's interested in seeing it in the flesh before i post up any videos/pictures online, so if you'd like to pop down for a coffee and to see the car, I hope to see you there!
But in the meantime i've made a few small videos for my youtube channel. The first couple of videos were a 2 part vlog just going over the history of the car, the repair, the costs, etc which of course anyone reading this has likely already seen so I won't bore you with a link to that but the other shows off the completion of the custom fibreglass work on the Rocket Bunny diffuser.
It was quite a long process which wasn't without it's headaches for both myself and the painter but i'm thrilled with how it turned out, the idea i had in mind coming to reality really pays off.
After getting the Surround of the "V" light fibreglassed in to rocket bunny diffuser it was largely a case of tweaking the position, fixing any cracks that occured from that and then building up the surrounding area with Fibreglass based filler and eventually fine body filler. Doing so allowed me to sand back and form the shapes that I was looking for around the edges of the light so it looked as intentional as possible.
When it was close to completion i then passed it off to a friend of mine who wanted to finish up the filler work and then paint it gloss black, unfortunately for the both of us my fibreglass and filler materials reacted quite badly with his paint which I know can be quite a common issue for painters when dealing with someone elses' work which was why he wanted to finish the filler work himself but unfortunately I think it was a bit late at that point as the bulk of the material had been added by me, however after tackling through the issues it ended up looking absolutely fantastic. With a great, smooth and glassy gloss black finish it really was a great finishing touch.
I delivered it down to Monster wraps and i'll see it next when I get the car back!
Video of the diffuser work here:
Edited by Samjeev on Wednesday 1st July 12:40
Edited by Samjeev on Wednesday 1st July 12:42
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