You cant learn without mistakes. and well done on all the progress for 2025. Be proud you have done heaps.
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A couple of steep learning curves coming along at the moment.
I’ve started playing around with fusion 360 on a personal account, and that has been difficult to learn.
The Speeduino has arrived. I’m yet to pay for Tuner Studio which I will do because why struggle when you can get the perks by buying through the pay wall. The idea of adjusting the cells individually is mind boggling, plenty of help thought YouTube though.
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You are doing so well with fusion. I struggled and gave up. I have tunerstudio but I have never activated it as Life happened and things went sideways. I still have the email etc to do so when I get to that bit.
Well done on tackling hard stuff mate.
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I bought a pair of LS2 coils because they have built in igniters.
Coil = $40 each
GM 4 pin connector $45 each
I’ll be mocking the sensors on the spare engine for now.
Hopefully doing this after All Japan Day 2026, might drive Colan again.
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In the effort of making new old stock speakers sound less horrible.
I don’t want to modernise the audio in the Handivan. The 28 year old radio cassette player, and relative period correct speakers.
This is the first time I have used dyna mat in a car for over 20 years. Actually this is the same supply of dyna mat.
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In my usual fashion, what we have here is a permanent temporary job. It’ll probably stay like this for some time before the real job is complete.
What I can tell you is cheap speakers have never sounded so good. There is low notes that I would never expect from dual cone speakers. Distortion doesn’t happen until the head unit is on max volume. The volume is much higher than the cheap Jaycar 6x9s I had in there before, which means the 6 inch speakers are a lower wattage that the packaging suggests.
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Resonance boxes and sound engineering, in general, are cool. I once got a ride in Arizona from a dude who did this to his Alfa, even placing tweeters where both air vents on his dash were put to redundancy.
What also sounds good are BOSE systems where snail-type coiling designed into their speakers is used.
Mounting one of these bulky and ugly units into our Keis would be challenging, though.
Getting them to work, without a factory code would take some hacking, even. Every breaker yard I visitted still had them in. That’s not to say it couldn’t be done. Most of the time, I was looking for Daihatsus, not thinking to go look into every Audi.
Once connected, though, their sound can’t be beat
I accidentally turned the cassette player into a disposable single use smoke machine.
This Kenwood unit is a hefty upgrade from the cassette player. I still want a cassette player down the line or run a “walkman” in to the AUX plug.
The rocket switch is to turn off the radio as the factory loom isn’t 12v ignition switched.
The biggest plus is still having the connection to my phone, having hands free connectivity is a must especially with how much the government will lift from my pocket if I touch my phone.
Another cars and coffee event this time closer to home.
The reason the tape player became a smoke machine was after fixing the eject button today, I decided to wire it into the car power. Didn’t go to plan - I looked at a wiring diagram and instantly reversed it in my head.
Also I fixed the constant drain from the alternator upgrade. The auto elec found a 12v supply for the exciter on the alt, it just happened to not be a switch 12v, I’ve instead wired it from the 12v relay for the facet fuel pump.
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My Tom Scott impersonation.
I am driving on a beach.
A lovely spot for a Cheeseburger Pie for breakfast.
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Next piece to the EFI conversion. Analogue to digital converter for DBW throttle body.
A collection of gubbins for the conversion, and there is more to unbox.
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I have been buying a plethora of parts for the EFI conversion.
Looking forward to getting on to that around winter.
Today I’ve also fixed an electrical gremlin that I’ve had for a while. The radiator fan was feeding off the same circuit at the ignition coil. Whenever the fan turned on the engine would stop at idle. I repurposed an old relay and did the forbidden thing and did my own wiring.
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well done 
happy to hear you walked through the forbidden door!
My first and last All Japan Day in the Handivan. Now retired from daily duties for a while. Time to go back to Colan while I work on the next bunch of things with the Handivan.
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So I kinda broke the Handivan. It got hot about a month before All Japan Day, progressively over the 4 weeks of driving it I began to notice bits a pieces not quite right. A little down on power. On hot days the coolant would make bubble sounds through the expansion tank when the engine was just switched off.
I’m working on getting the EFI running on the high flow head and on the 620 cc bottom end. At this stage I am on the fence on turbo vs a cam regrind and increasing the static compression ratio from 9.2 to 10.5 With the head work I’ve had done, a regrind would only need to be 270 duration and 108° love separation angle.
It will give it the choppy idle at 1200-1400 rpm, move peak torque from 3500 to 5000 and peak power from 5250 to 7000 rpm.
I’ll probably weld the tooth wheel in place. But until the cam sensor is in place, it will be screwed in.
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thats a really nice snug fit.
It’s the same trigger that Marty has used on his Mira.
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So I will be changing the radiator out for a M101 GTVi radiator, larger dimensions and twin core. The Mini radiator is too low and Sirion radiator will be able to take a factory L700 or M100/101 fan which will draw less current than the Davies Craig.
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Compression test 100 psi on 1 and 105 on 2.
Coolant test, no contamination in the coolant.
Pressure test - 15 psi no issues.
Radiator cap = failure
Replacement came from my older radiator, after the new Tridon cap doesn’t reach far enough.
Still going to replace the radiator with the Sirion GTVi radiator.
Also fabricating the trigger wheel for the ECU.
The first phase of the Speeduino is ignition system only.
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Oh really pleased that it was only the radiator cap. Ignition only I will be very interested On the results.
Having said that though, the carburettor is massive pain in the ass and yesterday the needle for the valve float stuck open. Fuel poured everywhere through the vent tubes. I really should just pull the pin and get onto all the fuel injection.
It’s not like there is so much more to do.
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