The MightyBoy - is it restoration or Hotrodding?

I see the retired baker in Wangaratta still getting around in his MightyBoy. Bought new and very original but boring compared to yours. Double thumbs up.

The engine fits with 15mm clearance to the body and crossmember. I’ve fitted all new rubber engine mounts (al standard Nissan on custom brackets) to keep engine movement to a minimum.

So far I have almost everything electrical working except the engine (that would be handy) and the ABS will have to wait until the car is mobile to see if it works.

The wiring is interesting. Nissan in their wisdom decided to change the wiring between the N14 model, which our engine and trans is and the N15 model, which our dashboard and instruments are. We had to use the N15 dash as Lachlan likes the white instrument faces and the better looking dash.
This has created some fun as things like the windscreen wiper motor is wired totally differently between the two models as are the headlights.

With deleting wiring not required, air conditioning, rear door switches, speakers, power mirrors, power windows, rear demister, rear wiper and central locking it has been a big task.

I have the shifter in and working plus the exhaust back as far as the rear axle.

The accelarator pedal is a work of origami to clear the steering column, the brake and clutch pedal. it snakes it's way up and seems to worka dn that was the intention, so a win.

I still have a list of around 30 items to sort

I still have the rear brakes to sort out but I think I have that under control.

At this stage the only thing I haven't figured is sway bars. I could try it without them and see how it handles but I'd like to get the Matiz front bar to fit and then work on the rear.

The car has no original wiring left in it and the only MightyBoy mechanical part is the windscreen wiper mechanism, if you don't count door hinges, locks and window winders.

The body is all MightyBoy except the front substructure, firewall and floor back to the step up in the rear of the cab,

Narrowing the dashboard 200mm has been fun but it looks like it go back together OK and it will look the part.
I haven’t touched the car in 3 weeks as I’m busy digging a wine cellar under out dining room. This entailed installing two 5.5m 250x250mm UVB’s to hold the floor up and excavating 30 tonnes of clay by hand.. The rush is I load the spoil in our trailer and take it 50km to a friendly dump site, we can't get a truck on site, but tow it with my old Range Rover that has no doors, roof or windows and it’s a bit chilly whilst driving. I’m a woos!

To make it all fit in we had to delete the air conditioning and move the power steering pump to the front of the engine. This entailed insert two additional idler pulleys to ensure adequate belt wrap where needed.

Before

After

The last real challenge is making the front driveshafts 135,mm narrower. I’ve decided to cut them at a 45degree angle, remove the appropriate amount from each axle (they will be different amounts) then machine up a sleeve to go over the joint. I’ll drill and plug weld the sleeve to the shafts. The sleeve won’t be transmitting much torque as it is designed to stop the two halves of each axle from moving apart. The 45degree cut will stop the axle halves rotating in relation to each other.

As it looks today.

Only 4 months between posts!

I've been a bit busy renovating some rental properties and the house.

Finally back into it.

Sorted the fuel system today and thought for sh*ts and giggles to turn the key and see what happens.

First try it burst into life and settled into a nice even idle. Couldn't have asked for more, it's even passably quiet.

Need to finalise some aluminium welding for a top water outlet and then fit some shorter axles, which will be fun making, and then I can run it longer.

Aim is to have the axles shortened within 2 weeks but to do that I need to get under a standard Nissan and do some measuring so I can work out how much needs to come out of each driveshaft. Because the engine isn't as central as the Nissan each shaft will have to be shortened by a different amount and it's quite critical or it will pull the shafts out of the diff or bind up at certain points of suspension travel.

Then it's onto the brakes to get them bled and see if it drives.

The wiring is still doing my head in but I won't let it beat me.

Certainly a gallon in a pint jar.

Hopefully photos of it running in the next few days.

Project is still moving forward, albeit slowly.

In the midst of this I have been chasing an oil leak on my yellow custom Ute and we also have people (from country to the west of Taiwan) trying to buy our home so life has been a bit busy but could be most profitable.

The alloy welding was completed on the coolant outlet and the engine now holds and retains coolant.

I've ditched the ABS as being an unnecessery complication, plus the ABS unit took up room the battery would rather live in.

The axles have been sent out for shortening and once they come back we can install them and add oil and run the engine for longer periods. The engine can run but the gearbox may like some lube to stop it eating itself unless we run it with the clutch depressed.

Today I sorted the rear end with hand brake cables installed and fuel lines retained and rough wheel alignment to give us some negative camber and toe in on the rear wheels.

The big effort has been on the dashboard. The MightBoy is 136mm narrower in the cab than the Pulsar. This meant we needed to remove that 136mm from the width of the plastic dash from the Pulsar. Some judicious cutting and joining gave us the following.

I was under strict instructions the car had to have the white faced instruments, an uncommon fitting in Pulsars. Simple, buy a set and install them. Not! These white faced instruments use a module to run them against all other instruments fitted to Pulsars that are simple old fashioned gauges. These instruments required a matching dash loom to make them work. Now as we're melding Pulsar N14 and N15 wiring and switch gear with Matiz rear half wiring things get interesting.

After doing my head in again I think I have it all working.

The dash in the photos is a composite of two dashboards to get it how it is. The left hand end of demister vent is fouling the windscreen wiper motor so it will have a session with Mr Angle Grinder to sort that out.

Once the dash can go back in for the last time the windscreen can go back in and we can reassemble the body and give it a test drive.

Sounds simple, like me!

I am impressed with this build, its different and it is extremely challenging

Well done for getting this far

Paul

Zuffen You are doing an amazing job. That dash looks like it grew there on the production line. The work you are doing is way beyond my imagining.

Well done.

So here we are 6 months after my last post on this and not much to tell.

Our house, which wasn't for sale, sold to a lovely Chinese lady (well she paid well over market) so we had to move, which meant I couldn't work on the little car.

Since moving onto acreage I've been flat out sorting the house, which is 18 months old by knocking down walls and building new ones.

The new place came with a 12x12m shed my wife immediately claimed as hers so she could train her dogs.

I get to build a new shed for me but it will be October before that is done, at the earliest.

To get the MightyBoy here we started it up, drove it onto the trailer and parked it in the garage. It's been started a few times and that's it. I've noticed a slight oil leak from the power steering return line, but this should be an easy fix.

Hopefully during winter things will slow down enough that I can get the car finished.

The list of jobs isn't too long and should be done in a week of work, but there are 9 cars in this family and I'm the only mechanically inclined person so I fix them all.

To add to my problems my wife Helen just broke her ankle so I may have a few more around home chores to do.

Updates will follow as soon as progress can be reported.

Sounds like a busy house at the moment

Good luck with ankle Helen

Paul

Rent a knee scooter for Helen and she will be whizing around with the best of them.

Morris,

I picked one up locally for $100.00 so she's away.

I'm thinking of modifying it so she can sweep the floor by towing a broom behind it. Then a small scoop so she can pick up after her dogs.

It has a small basket on the front so she can still fetch a beer for me. If only!