Project Chronicle

When I bought the 1989 Isuzu Trooper RS out of a western Mass. salvage yard, I figured it had rust....somewhere. I didn't look too hard. Basically, I wanted this dumb short wheelbase Trooper badly enough that I just looked at the odometer and decided its unicorn-like low mileage made it worth saving.

I still believe this, but now that it's in my secret bodyshop, I'm mildly concerned at how much floor work is needed. The driver's floor is basically gone. Or, in my glass half-full voice, it's halfway gone. The rockers are destroyed - I knew that - and thank God I had the salvage yard near my in-laws in Georgia cut up a pretty decent truck to get the rockers off of them, as those pieces are saving my butt in a big way right now. 

Nelson, my secret weapon body guy, is blowing apart the other pieces I've pillaged from parts cars over the years, but I honestly wish I grabbed a bit more. One truck in particular had a big chunk of the floor still intact that we could really use at the moment. 

The other side has issues as well, but not quite to this extent. Plus, on the passenger side, I was able to get a huge chunk of the floor from a local truck that was solid on the right side but looked just like this on the driver's side. 

I knew long ago this project would never make any financial sense as it's purely my illogical desire to save this 1-of-800 shorty that's keeping it moving forward. But this latest phase of work will be the biggest investment yet. 

This is my new pick-up, and first drivers car in four years. Feels so good to be back in a manual car with real driving characteristics. I will do another write up post to explain my story on how I picked this car up, and found it, but for now, let me just give you some basic information on her.

Its a 1988 BMW 325iS. If you are an E30 expert, you may be wondering why this 1988 has plastic bumpers. Technically, this is an early model, as the metal diving boards were swapped out in favor of 89-93 MY plastic bumpers by the previous owner. Okay, theres definitely a trade off we should talk about. I think plastics look better objectively, but the metal diving boards definitely add some character, and make the car look much, much older, and a little more vintage. Diving board bumpers SCREAM I am A Classic 80s Sports Car. 

This car is a 3-owner, I am the fourth, and spent its entire life in the dry, moisture free climate of Idaho. Luckily it has no accidents reported, and PO claims it was never resprayed. I dont see any run off, or paint inconsistency, so I do think its original paint. HOWEVER, (again, this is trivia for our expert BMW guys) it does have the front air dam painted in the wrong color. Early Model E30s (84-88) had a different shade of Alpine-Weiss compared to the 89-93 cars. The front air dam was resprayed Alpein-Weiss2, which doesnt look bad, but definitely a brighter shade of white. Not too big of a concern though.

Everything works - AC, Gauges, ODO, OBC, Power windows/sunroof, even the antenna motor still works, though she sounds very, very tired, and I cringe everytime I hear it struggle to come out of its shell. Oh well. 

 Alpine White Paint shows nicely, has its flaws, but still cleans up very well.

Cardinal Red Sport Interior, with matching door cards, carpets, seats, rear seats, etc. Drivers side does have a tear in the left bolster. I want to get it re-upholstered, but the entire interior color has faded so well over the last 34 years, its almost cranberry colored now. I dont want it to look out of place. I am 6'4" 210lbs, and when I get out of the car that left hand side bolster definitely takes a beating. Should I feel guilty about that? No, its my car. Do I feel guilty about that? Yes. Terribly guilty. 

The highlight of this E30 is its driving characteristics. Fresh set of OEM Bilsteins, and SLIGHTLY lowered on H&R Sport Springs. Sits perfectly. It also has a Z3 steering rack - So the entire range of steering angle is cut down by 30%. 4.0 Turns Lock To Lock Standard, Z3 Rack brings it down to 2.7 LTL. I recently drove a Shelby GT350 with Pilot Sport Cup Tires, and Magnetic Ride Suspension. This E30 has better turn in. Yes, better. Granted its 900lbs lighter. The car is so dialed, and it really is on absolute rails. Body roll shows its face, but not negatively, you just need to work with it. Once the steering is loaded up, this car is one very, very sticky piggy. Limiting factor is the tire. 

This car, though it has 260k on a working ODO, the transmission was swapped out with a low mileage refreshed unit, and the head was subsequently rebuilt under the previous owners care. I will say however, the trans can pop out of first gear when its cold. Could be a shift linkage that will cost a couple hundred bucks and an afternoon. Could be the engagement teeth that will cost a trip to the shop for a new tranny. Hoping its the former. 

This car was driven a couple times a month before my purchase. I hopped in it, and drove it home 2700 miles sitting at 80-85MPH at 3-3.5K RPMS. The car runs like a top. Fresh valve adjustment too, engine does not tick at all...I thought all M20s ticked. Guess my last one needed a tune up. 

Overall, excited for the future with this thing - It is sublime to be behind the wheel on a twisty backroad

Big news! The 1989 Isuzu Trooper RS is moving out of Jay's 4WD shop and heading over to *another* shop; this time, it's for bodywork. I am very excited by a few things, namely: this brush guard. This bull bar, brush guard, whatever the hell it is was on the first Trooper II to sell on Bring A Trailer in 2016. The truck ended up in Utah being parted out, and I found the listing on a Salt Lake City classifieds sight from a very sketchy seller. Needless to say, he followed through on sending it to me and it's been in my garage for the last two years, taking up a ton of space. Great to see it finally reach its intended destination. 

Jay got it mounted up and wired in two Hella 4000 spotlights with a custom switch. In addition, he's replaced the valve cover gasket; replaced all vacuum lines; replaced the PCV valve; drained and replaced the transmission and differential fluid and transmission filter; and adjusted the valves. He also mounted the bumpers and replaced the lights / bulbs with OEM pieces; the original lights, grill, and front bumper were all stripped off the truck while it was in the junkyard. 

I am getting it picked up and moved to the bodyshop this week. Unlike the Cosworth, they have not seen this truck in person so it will be interesting to see how much they hate it or love it, but truth be told, the Trooper has less rot to address than the Mercedes. Not much, but every little bit less makes a difference. 

As I mentioned, a friend of mine (Joe) works for the local Lexus dealer and he's worked on my vintage projects in the past. He agreed to take on the LX450 and has been dissecting the truck in a fairly comprehensive fashion. Here are the updates on what we knew and what we didn't:

-The A/C system is completely seized up. Basically doing a complete tear down here, in addition to replacing the condenser and compressor. 

-The power steering leak actually wasn't the cooler but just every damn hose. Effectively, every hose is being replaced. 

-The suspension is pretty tired. Shock bushings = gone, same for sway bar bushings. I'm going to save a major suspension refresh for when we lift it but replacing all bushings and rear shocks in the meantime.

-Rear hatch didn't work because the inner latch was gone. Pretty simple fix. 

-Going to replace water pump, thermostat, and flush transmission fluid proactively. 

-Crank seal leaking oil. Joe is going to try and sneak this into the A/C job. 

-Spare tire mount is completely rotten. Replacing chain mechanism with assembly from a Texas truck. 

More I'm forgetting! It's a long list but nothing too scary, and will make me way more confident putting the family inside and heading out to beach at some point this summer. 

The '89 Isuzu Trooper RS can't have too much more thrown on it, aside from whatever shortcomings are revealed as it gets driven. Jay, the mechanic who's been bringing it back to life on nights and weekends, has pretty much done all he can do short of driving it around every day for a week (he's not going to do that, by the way.) 

Over the past two weeks, he cleaned up the vacuum lines with new wires to replace some brittle hoses. I dropped off a new OEM hood replacement cable from the man himself, Jerry Lemond, who has a huge supply of NOS Isuzu parts in his barn in Georgia. The only remaining mechanical need Jay identified was an occasional stumble when it's cold, so we ordered a throttle position sensor. It can't hurt to put it in, even if it doesn't resolve the stumble - at least it's one more thing that's done. 

It kills me to take it out of Jay's shop but he wants to get paid and I need to get bodywork underway. As long it stays running well enough to get it around my property and the body shop's property, we can call that a win for the time being. If it goes back to Jay after some of the bodywork is completed, not the end of the world - but I really hope we can just keep driving it once it's home for a spell. 

I have a connection with the local Lexus dealer that has proven helpful over the years. Joe Manzi, a former technician with the now-defunct Oxford Motorcars, joined the Lexus dealer technician team in Warwick, Rhode Island, a few years back. Joe worked on my E21-chassis BMW 320 and my extremely obscure 1981 Toyota HiAce wagon. He was a life-saver time and again on that HiAce and I'm sure he was grateful to see it go onto a new owner. 

The Lexus LX450 I picked up recently had some needs. The power steering leak, non-working rear hatch, warm A/C, and no evidence of recent transfer case or transmission fluid changes. All told, I wanted to get Joe's capable eyes on it to address some standard, deferred maintenance along with flagging anything I should be mindful of over the long-term. 

He has yet to text me with an update, which is good and bad. It either means he's found nothing out of the ordinary or the list of needs has quadrupled he's afraid to call me. To that end, you have to take advantage of the few perks going to a dealer affords you, so I didn't hesitate to take the complimentary loaner car they offered me while they work on a 248K mile LX450 that is profusely leaking power steering fluid. 

And hey, for a brief minute, the neighbors may even think I've come to my senses and purchased a reliable, late-model vehicle. Joke's on them! 

The Lexus LX450 arrived with a pretty powerful stream of fluid terminating from below, and the best guess so far is the power steering oil cooler. Of course, the cooler consists of hard lines and therefore can't be replaced. 

There's the possibility that the leak is coming from the power steering reservoir itself, as there's a few accounts online of a misdiagnosed leak being traced back to the very cheap fix of replacing some O-rings inside the tank itself.

My friend Jeff, a professional mechanic who arranged the sale of the LX450, said it's the hard lines going into the cooler. I have no reason not to believe him, so I tracked down a used cooler assembly from a place in New Hampshire that deals exclusively in Land Cruiser parts. I've also got an appointment on the books for the truck to go to the local Lexus dealer for this repair along with proactively swapping the water pump, thermostat, and drive belts while it's there. My good mechanic friend Joe Manzi, from the now-defunct Oxford Motorcars, will be handling this job, which I'm pretty psyched about. Joe's a great guy and an excellent mechanic. 

The tags from Vermont should arrive shortly, and then we can get this thing some beach passes and take it on the sand! 

I've often referred to 944s as a German Pickup.  Open the hatch, lay down the rear seat, and you have the open space to rival any comparable car.  They will swallow bicycles whole or all the camping gear for two.  Here we see my 944S serving as a communications platform for the 2011 Mt. Washington Climb to the Clouds.  Tucked away under the upper hatch lip on both sides of the car are threaded hard points for mounting a rack.  I fabricated a good looking bracket to use the right hard point and provide a mounting surface for a 60" Amateur Radio antenna and we provided radio communications support for the marshal station 3 down from the top of the mountain.

This was just three months after acquiring the car and in the last picture you can see a pair of cosmetic details I later resolved.  The stone guard on 944s is a 6-piece set around the wheels.  The original material ages and eventually turn black.  Look at 944 ads and you will see most are discolored.  The fix is simple and relatively cheap; but so many owners miss this detail.

My mechanic Jay has been working on (what he very much wants to be) final punch-list items for the '89 Isuzu Trooper RS. I'm a little melancholy, as there was a comfort that came with knowing Jay has been fixing plenty of little items along the way, and now it will be incumbent upon me to figure out what still needs doing.

In this latest installment, Jay has installed four new Old Man Emu shock absorbers and replacement sway bar links; replaced the valve cover gasket and adjusted the valves; and even done some body work by installing a replacement bumper up front and replacement bumper ends in the rear. He did note the hood latch cable is shot and needs replacement.  

He also threw on the genuine RS grill I snatched up a few years ago along with a set of good headlights and turn signals, parts that all disappeared when the Isuzu was still being occasionally scavenged for parts in the boneyard. 

It really can come home at this point, but I'm not sure if it will be towed or if it's ready for an interstate trip just yet. Jay is going to perform some road tests near the shop to see if there are any last-minute fixes to perform.