well this arvo i bought a bench grinder, angle grinder + flap and grind disks, some spray putty and primer, rust converter, an 8mm drill bit, foam sanding blocks, wet and dry paper and some more grease. went home, stole my mates MIG and did a bit of testing on my old hatch. welded far better than I anticipated on the lowest available setting with cored wire. bought some argon gas but the regulator has a weird attachment so I tried gasless. ground down my brand new 8mm bit on my new bench grinder and did a few test runs to see how well I reduced the cutting angle. still needs a little more, but it happily still cut nicely after a 2mm pilot was drilled. certainly need some practice welding though. cant wait to try my new-found skills and tools on the real thing. perhaps on the weekend... then I can bash out the damage, fill what doesnt want to bash out, or get a replacement panel from the wreckers and weld that in. still no interior progress
the final verdict on the turbo conversion is that I can do it legally but I can ONLY use my stock engine and "add a turbo", keeping all emissions equipement the same... not sure if that allows me to add my own programmable ECU or whether they expect a GTX or my stock one (which wouldnt work at all!) to be used...
and my seats can be tested and plated too, so that will mean that others MAY be able to just use my certificate to get their MS seats done too. dont see why they might fail...
decided i might just get new front seatbelts in red. hoping to get this all sorted within the month, ready for the Mod day!