Oil pan, intake assembly, valve cover and undercoater.

It was finally time to re-install the oil pan, which was done with little fanfare, but high drama.  The gasket is necessarily thick and it took some patience to get the bolts all through the holes in the gasket. I used a touch of Permatex on the block to keep the gasket from shifting too much and I had the advantage of rolling the block over with the pan face-up.  It was a nice milestone to make.... but WHAT?!?!?  A shiver ran up my spine!

Did I remember to re-tighten that hold-down bolt on the oil pump?  I recalled having to keep it semi-loose when I tightened up the pick-up tube at both ends (for proper alignment).  But did I go back and tighten that silly bolt???  Shiza.  After a bit of contemplation I had no choice but to remove that pan and check.  It went much better than I anticipated because the sealer held the gasket in place, and yes, the bolt was tight.

Now, to reassemble the intake.  First I wanted to make some improvements:  One, the hold down bolts were changed to cad plated styles to match the OEM look.  Of course, one of the holes was stripped and I needed to install a Heli-Coil!  (I had an 8mm kit).  I cleaned up the carburetor and made a new cover for the  port on the side of the manifold which had previously been covered by a scraper blade with holes drilled in it!  Seriously, a scraper blade!  See the before and after.

Before

After 

Next up, the body tub.  First I had to build a rack on my utility trailer, which was a quick 45 minutes and a few 2x4's.  Then assemble the crew (timed for Sunday when everyone's around!)  Out the tub came, then over and up she went on my new rack.  Now I can move it around and paint between the rail drops.  Actually, this tub is as nice as it gets for a 33 year old Japanese vehicle, but I still wanted to seal all the seams and hit it with an undercoater.  Here are a few pics of the process which I've just begun by seam sealing with POR-15.

Finally wrapping up the day, I buffed up the valve cover.  Sounds trivial?  3 hours of the messiest work you'll ever do!  But the results are worth it.