Photos Unboxed: Stripping the Trueno - Juiceboxforyou

It almost seems like I never owned the Trueno, we got it in July 2017 and the car was actually in one piece until October of that year. We brought it to AE86 festival, Japfest and then stripped it down for blasting. Its been a shell longer than a car at this point and as of writing this, it’s a year and five months of metalwork with Barry.

I have to admit, I was quite delusional with the time frame for this thing. I was under the impression id have it done in a year and many laughed at me, it wasnt until we were deep into this build that I realised the true scope of undertaking such a project. The night we rolled it in, I did one more lap of the business park with Reuben, he was showing me how to get it sideways and we were having the best time ever, I remember him saying ” if you drift this before you take it apart, it will give you the urge to get it back together a lot faster” He was right, I’ve been longing for that buzz ever since regardless of how in-depth we have gone on this restoration. .

I stood back, mostly in shock, to be honest, snapping photos of the lads tearing into the disassembly, I had already struck up a pretty serious bond with the car and although it needed to be torn down, part of me was crying inside. The boys took great pleasure in ripping it apart, I was trying to ensure everything was staying somewhat organised as there was at least six of us pulling it apart.

Just like that, the car was dead, or at least this version of it. Never again would that little Nice intake pipe do its dance, we would never hear the whine of the supercharger again or use a screwdriver to start the car. I have to admit I was a little sad but this had to be done, what would come out of the ashes would be ten times the car and I had plans to make it right. To build the “dream machine” as some would put it regardless of how corny that sounds.

Once the engine was out, we could see the years of grime and shite, a mixture of neglect, cobwebs and two looms were thrown all over the place. There was heavy rust on the bulkhead and a few other little surprises. On a side note, we really have come a long way with the shell when I look back at these photos.

Parallel to us ripping the 86 apart, Reuben figured out what had killed his gearbox a few weeks earlier, you might remember this from our Japfest Vlog from 2017, Fith gear decided to say goodbye to us.

In less than three hours we had ripped pretty much the entire car apart.

The good thing was the fact we actually had a really decent floor, after chipping away all that sound deadening, to our surprise, there was rust in every other place except the base.

Reuben looking a little dissatisfied as he had to take another gearbox out of the Laurel.

I’ve mentioned it further up, but it’s great to have these photos. The vlogs are a little chaotic and I’m quite fond of having a static image to really digest what’s going on. It’s only very recently that I’ve had the time to go back over a year’s worth of photos and take it all in.

I love the fact Barry thought estimated four days worth of metalwork with the build, and to be fair from here it looks like we got off lightly. I don’t think ill look the same at a classic car ever again. For example, check those panels where the door hinges mount, they look pretty damn decent in these pics. Little did I know they would be chopped off a few weeks later…

At least the floor was ok, ish! You can see the holes up by the bulkhead where the floor meets the firewall, a super commonplace for these things to rot.

That little piece we tried to buff into the rear quarter was lost forever. I was staring at a stripped Trueno, ready to take on what has nearly been a two-year build so far. Id love to find another set of those Southern ways meshes that are on the rear.

The next night we decided to keep going at the strip down. Front subframe and suspension were ripped out.

Everything was caked in years of crust, the satisfaction of taking all this stuff apart and cleaning it down is something I could do over and over again.

As for grinding sealer off of the car, well that’s something I never want to do again. Easily the most depressing part of the build so far! Guess this stuff has to be done. The results after blasting made it all worthwhile.

Hope you are enjoying these behind the scenes look back features, its nice to look back at a somewhat slower pace documentaion of the build. More to come soon.