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Sounds like a great plan, and thanks for the link, certainly keeps my options open.
Ha, small world. I recall the VL repainting the roads outside the Chequered Flag in the Hutt many years ago while I was at a dyno day. I’m sure one (both?) of you had a magazine feature at some point too. Happy days…haven’t bought a mag for years now so I’m living on what memories I still have*.
*It should be noted I’m not losing my memories due to old age or infirmity, but due to the constant concussions I experience every time I hurtle off the line at the lights in the EoD. Which is, after all, the Ultimate Weapon.
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This reply was modified 6 years, 3 months ago by
Matty.
Heh, exactly what I was thinking… It’s put a bit of a delay on the likely next project but the end result would be much more what we’re after (LWB, AWD, V8, not dead 30 days after the warranty expires).
Eeeeexcellent…
(I’m furiously trying to give you a “like” but I’m just seeing a spinning wheel of death…)
Oh, forgot to ask…does that include Statesman/Caprice? Please say yes, please say yes, please say yes…
Mate Had to laugh at the last emoji could of used this one aswell
Oh hi there Frazer, Wellington lad perchance? I recall a gold VL with smokey back tyres there many years ago now with a JUDGE or JUDGE1 plate. Was that you?
Ohai. Shady’s back, tell a friend.
I ended up changing the coil pack, then I bought another Stagea (so I now have two, I’m trying to collect the whole set) and the EoD continued to oil the driveway for another couple of years. The paint on the driver’s rear quarter started peeling, the passenger-side window switches stopped working and then started working again, and it looked like it was game over for our hero. We sold the house and the EoD’s ultimate demise was in our hands.
Did we crush it? Did we bollocks.
It’s now oiling/cooling the street outside the in-laws’ house while we finish renovating it for them. It’s bleeding fluids from every orifice, and the right-side rear seat belt is home to a colony of mould due to a leak. I can understand the mould’s desire to live there given it’s so handy to the swimming pool that develops in the boot whenever it rains.
We finally threw out the sheepskin seat covers after 16 years of faithful service as a butt warmers and cat-pee catchers. The front seats now feel totally foreign.
The odo now reads some 305,000km, and the rear end is so worn out it rolls over like the Poseidon whenever I corner at more than about 30km/h. Somehow it’s still holding together well enough to pass a WOF (6-monthly roadworthy) but it’s been demoted to round-town duties.
It hasn’t carted any fridges or trees in the back seat for a while now but it routinely doubles as a ute when picking up some framing timber from the local yard. Did you know you can fit a 3.4m length of framing timber in a VS sedan with the boot closed? Now you do.
My wife actually cleaned it the other day (sadly not in a bikini), and it came up alright for a 22-year-old-in-April (the car, not her…sadly).
She looked at it.
She looked at me.
She looked at it.
She looked at me.
She said “You know how you’re talking about doing another project…”
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This reply was modified 6 years, 4 months ago by Matty.
A coil pack started playing up a couple of days ago, so it idles fine but anything over about 10% throttle sees it drop a couple of cylinders and sound like a lumpy V4. The whole car shakes when this happens but I can’t stop laughing as I hurtle around town speeding up then backing off for a satisfying pop from the exhaust. People probably think I’m insane but then they’d be able to tell that just by looking at the car anyway.
In about 15 minutes I’m going to fart my way down to the local yard and try and tow an 8×5 trailer loaded with timber back home behind it. It’s going to be hi-frickin’-larious.
Also, I may fix it. Maybe.
I feel so ashamed. Yesterday I suffered the ultimate humiliation. I employed someone else to work on the Equipe of Doom.
About a week ago, shortly after we discovered the Warrant of Fitness (roadworthy) on the Stagea had expired, the EoD gave a gentle “ping” when my wife tried to start it, and the dash remained lit up while the key became a free agent in the ignition barrel. I pushed it back into the carport, cursed it yet again and went back inside, not overly impressed we’d gone from a 2 car family to a 0 car family in one day.
So yesterday I had the day off and decided to pull the ignition apart, thinking maybe the ignition switch I’d built had come apart. It turned out my MacGuyver skills were too awesome for the ignition barrel to handle, and the little nub (technical term ahoy!) had snapped off in the switch.
Now, I knew the theory of getting the barrel out – turn the key to “ON”, stick something small in the hole at the top of the housing, pull on the key and the barrel will just slide out easily. I have disturbingly large fingers for someone my size (but a very happy wife, chortle) but eventually I got a 2.5mm allen key in there. Then I pulled on the key and the barrel just…
I PULLED on the key and the barrel just…
I PULLED ON THE DAMN KEY AND THE MARTHA FOCKING BARREL JUST…
…stayed put. But the key came out nice and easily. D’oh.
Commission one locksmith, wait 15 minutes (hooray for small towns) and feel like a dickhead as he whips it out in under a minute. Apparently I was too gentle.
Forty minutes later a new barrel was fitted, I put it all back together and was back to shaming my kids by picking them up in it.
The locksmith informed me he’d been told the ignition barrel was practically considered a consumable item and dealers were told to swap them out at major servicing intervals die to the faulty design. So I guess 19 years out of this one wasn’t so bad after all.
Sorry, been AWOL for a while but stoked to hear it’s legal, an inspirational build if ever there was one.
I’m rapidly leaning towards that after the Stagea came home with yet another scrape on it from the supermarket car park. Also considering RBs, but sadly nothing will come to pass until after a potentially expensive family matter has been tended to.
I must say though, I gave up caring about the exterior of the Commodore some years ago. It’s refreshing to not give a fark if my mother in law braille parks in it.
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This reply was modified 9 years ago by Matty.
Right, so the beast nearly failed its last WOF (roadworthy) for modifying any 6-rib belts by turning them into 5-rib belts. I bought another tensioner assembly from Holden to replace the one I bought from them about 18 months ago that was faulty from the get-go, leading to the 5-rib preference. I figured the weekend was a good enough time to fit it.
First I tried doing a half-engine coolant drain by using the pipe that slots through the back of the tensioner, but failed because the damn thing wouldn’t budge. So I pulled off the thermostat housing to allow me to whack the other end with a hammer, only to find I couldn’t get to it. This did however allow me to sort out the leak from the housing that is caused by the damage I did to it last time I used more hammer than skill.
I eventually got all the coolant pipes out of the way, replaced the assembly and put it all back together. My wife took it for a drive the next day to drop the kids at school only to bring it back making a squealing noise. The car that is, not her. The belt is slipping when the steering wheel is turned.
I did what any good home mechanic does and left it sitting until a couple of hours ago. I checked all pulleys and pumps for freedom of movement, then fired it up in the driveway. No noise. Gave it a few bootfuls, still nothing.
Turned the wheel a bit and it chirped. So I decided to take it for a drive. Fanged it up and down the street a bit (past Greg Murphy who lives locally and was visiting a few houses up, he’s rocking a VF GTS btw, he’ll be happy to know I approve) seesawing on the wheel, then pulled up just outside our house.
Now, this section of the street is wide enough to do a U-turn, so I drove round and round out the front, gradually getting faster to hear the change. I was hoping the belt was just a bit glazed because it was unused but had been hanging in a cold damp shed for years.
Then I stopped, cocked the wheels to one side and held the revs up around 4,000rpm to see if the belt would burr up a bit. Nothing but more squealing. Bugger.
So I pulled up the drive and turned it off.
Then I thought about the image I’d just set: Shaven-headed bloke with beaten-up VS V6 revs it in the drive, hoons up and down the street past Greg Murphy, does some Os, then a standstill with plenty of squealing but no smoke.
Kill me.
Kroozer: Very high on the list if I can find one. They’re hovering around the $15K mark at the moment here, so that plus $5K to tidy it up is a high possibility. I know $15-20K would get me into a VY SS (bear in mind Commodores are overpriced in NZ) but my wife loves the VR-VS shape, as do I, and the simpler the better since I’m the mechanic.
EJ Dude: That sounds awesome, and old school is the other leading contender. My only issues with it is parts availability and relentless tin worm. I can fudge my way through the mechanical stuff but body work is definitely not my thing.
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This reply was modified 9 years ago by Matty.
Perhaps I disguised my desire for a new project too well…
I should point out I don’t give a damn what the other parents think, and while I like Fezzas etc I’d never want to own one because a) while I could afford to buy one I couldn’t afford to maintain it, b) my mother-in-law also drives my cars, badly, and c) my wife is an accountant, meaning any expenditure on depreciating assets requires justification, hence the smaller budget.
I’m just trying to think of projects that are “different” yet practical and “cool” enough not to embarrass my son when he’s dropped off at school in it.
Maybe I’m too tired to explain properly. Meh.
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This reply was modified 9 years ago by Matty.
Apart from the everything on my VS, I reserve a special level of hatred for some of the dumber engine design details. I had to change the tensioner assembly (again) on Saturday, and you have to drain the coolant from the top half of the engine to do this because GM in their infinite wisdom decided to run a coolant bypass pipe through the back of the assembly AND bolt another one to the front of it. I cannot wait for this engine to throw a leg out so I can put something decent in it/send it flying off a cliff in a fireball of retribution.
Build thread now dragged over from SC. Have your tissues and lube handy, it’s going to get erotic.
http://www.commodoresplus.com.au/forums/topic/the-equipe-of-doom/#post-4688
Yeah that was as of March 2013, it’s still sitting out there in the driveway, mocking me. I haven’t updated the SC thread in about a year.
Current state of play:
– No more race tape! Bumper was repaired and resprayed. Then my mother-in-law backed it into a wall. Now there’s a nice crack in it. I also dropped the trailer draw bar on the bumper as well, just to make sure it’s nice and banged up.
– Bonnet peeling nicely, front left quarter looking keen to get started too.
– Still running a custom 5-rib serpentine belt. New 6-rib and tensioner assembly is currently in the boot. Of my other car. Been there for months.
– Ignition switch shat itself so I got a new one from Holden, only to discover it was for a VT and wouldn’t fit. I nearly ragequit but decided I might as well have a play with it and ended up managing to build a hybrid VS/VT ignition switch that works perfectly. Shocked at my own competence.
– Smelling more like cat wee every day since it’s been raining more lately.
– Rear mudflaps removed, at speed, using a garden edging. Present from wife.
– Coming up 290,000km. Has now had 2 oil changes since 2006. Beginning to lose hope it will die.
Folks, yesterday was a momentous day. For the first time in 7 and a half years, and nigh on 100,000km, I changed the oil and filter on the beast. Took about half an hour for the oil to drain from the sump. One does not simply kill an Ecotec. Also discovered that when everyone I know is saying “don’t waste your money on an oil filter wrench, they’re bloody useless” it’s not a conspiracy; screwdriver through the side ftw.
I am now waiting for a phone call from my wife telling me it’s left a thick sludge all over the road and is making weird noises.
Hi there Steelrod, and thanks for your feedback. Like failures deep within the bowels of the Equipe of Doom, this thread is not dead, it’s merely waiting for the least convenient time to make itself known.
But I do have an update. The car now has 1.5 working electric windows. The cable on the right rear window frayed so it wouldn’t go all the way up. Solved with a pair of lineman’s pliers and disconnecting the switch so no one messes with it again. Then a few weeks later the driver’s window wouldn’t go up. Temporarily solved by pulling out the switch in the console and shorting it with a flat blade I happened to have in my back pocket at the time. If I’m feeling particularly lucky I put it down while driving and use hopes and dreams to get it back up. The other 0.5 signifies the left rear window, which will only go down from the centre console switch, so I have to reach over and use the door switch to get it back up again.
And it has also been cosmetically enhanced by my mother-in-law when she backed it into a wall in a car park. She was tearfully apologetic, I was just gutted she hadn’t barrel-rolled it off a cliff into an oil tanker. Ahem.
Clear coat on the bonnet is now peeling, rust bubbles on the pillar and base of the front passenger door.
Number of farks given: Zero. You know your car is truly fearsome when even the local gang members won’t park next to it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xos2MnVxe-cTime of life: 8:27pm. Monday 08/07/2013.
One does not simply kill a Commodore.
Never mind, just unclipped it. Somehow. Technique involved anger and a pair of pliers. No idea how it’ll go back on but meh. Short sentences. Wiicked. -
This reply was modified 6 years, 3 months ago by
