How it all started…

It all started when a friend of mine texted me saying that he’d found an unusual car for sale. It was an 80s Japanese hatchback, 2.0L turbo with RWD, LSD rear axle and ”Handling by Lotus”.

Me, I had never even heard of the model and at first sight I thought: ”That car is rather ugly.” But my friend kept pushing: ”Imagine going to any car meet and most of the people there would never know what car you’re driving!”

I really liked the idea of having a really unusual car and after some time thinking about it, I went for it with a trailer and picked it up.

This car had been standing oustide on a grass lawn for seven years under a plastic cover. Not the ultimate pre conditions you might say. At first glanse this was a car to start renovate and build on.

I was capable of getting the engine going, and even test drive it with pretty small amount of work. New battery, oil, filter, fuelfilter and clean gas in the tank did it.

Next step was to drive to the inspection to get a rather long ”To-Do” list. Apart from some small notes like the horn not working and some light bulbs broken, it obviously didn’t pass because of the rust.

I even started to hunt down parts and found a whole car picked apart that I went and bought. Got an extra engine, gearbox and drivetrain with it. It was a red Piazza that had been acting as a spare part donor for his other project, that already had been sold.

It was after this I started to pick the car apart and found out the rust was excessive all over the car. You could punch a screw driver through the driver side floor, and the strut towers were fighting for their lives to hang on to the rest of the engine bay.

Side skirts were equal terrible and after a couple of days in the garage it was all to clear: This car was beyond saving, at least for someone like me.