LUMBERZACK

Ahhh, THAT H-town. Yeah, there's Houston, and then there's HOUSTON.

So rad having an x3 still chugging along strong. Why did it take 10 hours? Traffic?

Hoping life quality improves for you buddy. Shit sounds rough, but I commend you for pushing through it and getting out there to keep your mind off of shit. 2020 has been such a year and I'm not even surprised at the increase in suicide and domestic violence cases. It's saddening. Looks like you had good time driving though, that's rad!

@battleaxe Maybe I haven't announced it officially, but the Cressida is no longer my daily. I now have a company truck that I drive. The Cressida just gets driven on the weekends to friend's houses and shit, just ready for a drift event. Yeah, I'd never run front toe on a daily, especially 1/8" lol. Thanks homie! We're definitely taking our time on the bumper so I'm hoping for great results! I like a lot of wheels and I kept my eyes open for Chrome Work XC8's, Model 5's, Advan T6, AVS Model 6, GramLight 57Pros...well pretty much any early 00's wheel in chrome and the market right now for '90's-'00's japanese car parts is fucking ridiculous. Parts aren't littered over yaj like they once were and the parts that are listed are 3x the usual price. Same with the local marketplace even. It was actually pure fate that I got a second set of WMB XT7's for a great price. @bigtoepfer Totally man. I'm glad I have a company truck now, because I've gone through 2 windshields in 7 months. The company has full-coverage and since it's a common-ass F-150, I just call the mobile guy and he replaces the window same day at my house. Super convenient. What's crazy to me is, I've imported multiple sets of glass headlights from Japan and the glass is pristine on them, even being 30 years old. After 3 months in Arizona, they'll be pitted and cracked. Such a disappointment, which is why I use Lamin-X film on my headlights and they look perfect. Thank you for the compliments!

Not much to update this time around, but I'm bored and have some free time to post here. Windshield glass doesn't last long in Arizona before it becomes littered with rock chips and has more crack than a Circle K parking lot. So I had my buddy install a freshy for me. Windshield coverage and next day install is a huge benefit over owning and driving a JDM import. I began noticing that my rear wheels had a bit of play in them when I grabbed onto them. I immediately thought it was the wheel bearings or ball joints, but given that I replaced those 1.5 year ago. I checked other culprits and found that my Xcessive poly joints had a fair amount of play in them. Mind you I have over 4 years and 40k miles, with a couple dozen drift events on these. I think they served me well. So I ordered new joints. One thing I noticed in the picture below, was the old ones (top) have zerk fittings, whereas the new ones (bottom) do not. They're clearly from a different manufacturer, but hopefully these last as long. It's finally time to show my rear bumper some love since it is on its last leg. My buddy who is doing the repair is taking the opportunity to address many of the fitment issues the bumper has had its whole life. Hopefully it will fit much cleaner than previous. We're hoping to raise it up some as well to minimize how much it drags and gets caught on shit. I had a local guy come work his magic on my alignment. He is mobile and comes to your house to do your alignment, granted you have a garage he can work it. He brings a digital camber gauge and toe plates and spends as much time as he needs to to set it up perfectly. I think he was at my house for the better part of 6 hours painstakingly making sure everything was perfect. My final specs are: Front: -5.7 Camber, 1/8 Toe out Rear: -0.5 Camber, 1/8 Toe in The car drives fantastic. The steering wheel is level and it drives as straight as an arrow. Well worth the money. I don't have a picture of him doing the alignment, but here's a picture of my post-alignment fitment. Also, I wanted to make sure that I didn't miss out on the limited run gold work emotion center caps, so I bought a second set for my drift spares. Now my wheels will always match. I also got new valve stems because the seal on all of mine are starting to dry rot. That's it for now. My bumper is not finished yet. I have a few other things I'm working on as well, but I don't have any pictures, so we'll wait until the next post.

God I'm so hype on this. I have absolutely no need for it, but will probably end up buying for the sole reason of supporting a company that finally cared enough to release something for these stupid cars. My biggest question is, given that I drive my car A LOT, longevity is a huge determining factor for me. The main lower ball joint on the LCA looks welded in place. Are the heims serviceable? Does Acostal use universal joints or will I have to contact Acostal any time the joints start to wear out?

@ROBAPHENT Well now you can post an update about those Acostal front arms for X8. I'm super pumped, but I have some questions about em. @AcidTrip I'm stoked for you bud! Good to finally see you throw on some quality parts! :* Now send me a new Christmas card.

Thanks dudes! There's so many ideas in my head of things like this I want to do, but I just got to get over the money hurdle. Haha. I've got time though, so this stuff will continue. Honestly, they're always quite a bitch, but my best advice is removing the bolt and screws that hold the lock actuator and get it out of the way and use a 1/4" ratchet with a 6" extension and a swivel head for the socket is the best bet at getting to the bolt for the handle. The little plastic retainer clips for the rods are always a pain too. lol. small but strong fingers is the recipe. Thanks dude! If you're in Cali, let me know what they are charging for this work, because in AZ, it's $$$$

Thanks guys! @Urrik most people associate with El Chapo or some Mexican drug cartel, but I’ll accept your creativity lol.

@battleaxe This 100%. Yes, seeing that first shot of base will totally reignite the motivation, I promise. If you’re getting bad results, just focus on spraying sealer on one part that is quick and easy to fix until your settings are solid. For instance, a door. Don’t practice on the most complex canvas with all those curves. Also when you said 30psi, I immediately thought your pressure is too high. Especially with something as diluted as sealer. Try 20psi. You’ll get it.

JEEZE that's cool.

All this gold got my creative juices flowing. My car has become pretty flashy with all the chrome and gold accents. It reminded me of the lowriders I would see with my father in-law. He was always into the lowrider scene and we would go to lowrider shows and I would see champagne Impalas with gold bumpers and accents and it really sparked an idea. So I got to work. I dug up my OEM painted door handles and started stripping the paint. So I got them to a pretty decent mirror polish using sandpaper, a dremel with scotchbrite wheels, and polishing wheels with jeweler's rouge. Next I hit up a homie that has been modifying lowriders since the 80's to work his magic. To further accentuate the roses, he then engraved diamond cut around the edges of the handles and roughed up the surface surrounding the roses. Seeing them in person in this condition made me want to stop right here as they looked so killer, but these door handles are made of pot metal which would rust, tarnish, etc. Also they would require regular polishing which would wear away at the finish over time, so plating was the necessary next step. I fought myself back and forth deciding whether to chrome plate my handles of gold plate them. Chrome would've been a safe decision since I already knew it would flow with the rest of my car and the chrome accents, but I was reluctant since having chrome would just mean I'd be right back where I was prior and they would easily be overlooked. However with gold, it is not something you commonly see and the vibrancy would automatically pull the attention of someone walking by ultimately capturing them into discovering the engraving. Also what cartel wouldn't gold plate their custom engraved desert eagle? I said fuck it. Copper plating first. I'm aware this type is not everyone's cup of tea, but the artwork and detail is hard not to appreciate. I was very nervous going with gold since it could really break the look of the car, but honestly, I'm very surprised with how well it works. Obviously a little more gold accent would help, but gold can get gaudy and tacky fast. I'll leave it as is for a while. I hope you guys like it. Criticism is always welcome and expected, but come correct. lol

Since I've never really had a wheel with cool center caps, I splurged and bought these. My assumption was that the gold caps would kinda compliment the gold logos on my car, but the color ended up being a bit more yellow than expected. So then to compliment the center caps, I decided to change the body molding trim to gold as well. Gold trim is a vanishing option, so getting my hands on some was a little bit of a hunt. Many of these companies are only producing chrome and black trim, so I bought a lot extra.

So to kick off this next update, lets talk about wheels. Running the R33's was cool as a beginner drifter, since I got them for a steal and they are good spec and look okay for an OEM wheel. With that said, my car did not look aggressive and I was never truly happy with the look. I bought the Rays Gramlights 57CR as a possible step up from the R33's. Even though I think they looked better, it still didn't hit right with me. I then came to realize, a lot of it had to do with my ride height, tire size, wheel diameter, and wheel color. I was then on the hunt for some 18's. That's when my friend and I were eating sushi when he said he had the WMB XT7's I ended up buying and installing. I fell in love with the way my car looks with these wheels. It is a great alternative to pricey 3pc wheels that never quite look aggressive enough on stock body imo. I always hated seeing pictures of my car at drift events with mismatched wheels, so I definitely wanted to find another set of XT7's in WMB. I assumed it wouldn't be too difficult since they were in production for ~10 years before being disco'd. I was oblivious to the gaining rarity, popularity and price of these wheels when I bought them. Now that I have them and searching for another set I realized what I'm in for. COVID has really dried up the market on all levels. People are just not selling as much stuff as they were. This paints the false picture of "these parts don't exist anymore, therefore the prices must rise." I think the stuff still exists, but Japanese people just aren't selling right now. Either way, prices are through the roof and finding these wheels in my spec was starting to seem like an impossible feat. I started considering buying the XT7's in any color and getting them chromed once I had them. I also considered buying Advan Model 5's, Advan T6's, Work XC8's, or any monoblock in chrome, but that really didn't help my search at all. This shit just wasn't on the market. Thankfully one of my IG followers hit me up about a set of WMB XT7's being sold by a wheel page based out of Russia in THE SAME SPEC. I instantly moved on them. I was nervous about shipping due to COVID since I know dudes that have had packages from Russia held up since COVID started back in March-April. Thankfully these wheels got to my house in 8 days! Packaged beautifully. Kind of a weird name, but I totally recommend "SlamBangWheels" on Instagram. Great packaging, fast shipping, great condition. My expectations were succeeded and now my car will always have matching wheels. I sold all of my 17's, so now it's just 18" XT7's for me.

Looking forward to the future progress. Three builds to update is a lot of work lol.