For the sake of documenting this particular build, I wanted to stick with Zilvia considering how much information this forum has provided me with over the years. It still feels nice to browse through peoples builds/restorations, pick up some ideas and definitely gain some inspiration along the way.
There's a long story involving the red Kouki build I had previously made a thread on and is ultimately the reason why we decided to move onto building this one. (My biggest excuse is that the red Kouki is a sunroof chassis and I am very much anti-sunroof on these cars.)
This was an interesting pick up. My brother and I were driving back from a quick (14 hour) unrelated round trip drive to San Francisco when we came across the post for this Kouki. What stood out to me the most was that it was a completely straight frame '97 Kouki slick top.
The car was in pieces. The all too common "let's start this build and go all out! oooh...what's that over there" that I am definitely guilty of myself.
Bad habits are hard to break unfortunately. I read the parts list, saw the price, and after a lengthy conversation with the owner, we got ready for the trip to Vegas the very next day.
After meeting with the owner and going over every last bit of the car and his now abandoned plans, we pulled the trigger, loaded the car up, loaded up several parts storage containers, and spent the rest of the evening in Vegas before heading back home.
Once we got the car back home, there were several rare bits that came with it that really stood out to me. Queue me going down a rabbit hole for several hours and eventually finding out who originally owned and built this car several years back. My mind was blown!
Come to find out an old Zilvia member from Arizona originally purchased this car all stock and slowly built it up from there.
What really threw me off was that the new owner in Vegas decided to sell off the entire OEM front end, OEM aero, and was damn near ready to cut up the rear quarter panels in place of Origin 75MM overfenders on a car that didn't warrant them. Everyone has their own tastes and personal preferences, but damn. He had planned on an all-out track style build with the crazy widebody, GT wing, "stanced out", etc. I don't mind the all-out look on an actual track car, but it would have been a shame to have gone through with it on a '97 Kouki slicktop of all S-chassis.
Now, onto the work. As I mentioned earlier, the car came with a ton of parts. A lot of which wouldn't be used on this particular build. Commence the sales to bring the overall cost of this car down.
You can get a better idea of what base I would be starting off with. The Vegas owner aside from selling off almost everything exterior related had also decided to cut out the engine bay tubs and removed every last bit of seam sealer for stitch welding. I would have preferred the factory tubs, but going custom isn't a big deal especially with the end result I'm aiming for.
As anyone who has ever built a car from the ground up would know, storage space is vital when it comes to any tear down / rebuild. My biggest problem (err...bad habit) is hanging onto a lot of cars and parts. I wanted to free up some space in storage, but at the same time ensure that I had every last bit that I needed for this particular car before selling off a lot of the extras.
I went ahead and did a temporary mock up interior install.
The dash that originally came with the car was cracked and several interior pieces were either missing or damaged. I replaced everything with the cleanest panels I could find and made sure to use the correct bolts/hardware along the way.
Again, keeping in mind that this is a temporary install. I do have quite a bit planned interior wise and will be going away from the typical Bride gradiation seats and panel inserts. If you have seen any of the Singer Porsche builds, a lot of my interior inspiration will be coming from them.
Moving onto the exterior. I had come across a completely stock/original '97 Kouki at auction that had been rear ended pretty bad. Due to some unforeseen circumstances, I missed out on bidding and was only able to see the car sell live (at a more than fair price, too).
Several days later, a friend of mine reaches out and sends me an offer up link. Lo and behold, it was the same wrecked '97 Kouki. The mark up price was nuts considering the condition, but after some back and forth, I decided to reach out to the seller. We worked out a deal and now comes home the perfect donor chassis.
The extent of the damage was severe. The entire trunk area was trashed, the obvious quarter panel, and the frame would have needed extensive work for it to have been saved. I ran it by a few close friends and discussed an attempt to save it, but the cost of labor alone would have far exceeded the cost of the car or what they actually fetch these days.
A sad day for a rare starfire blue Kouki. What made it sting some more was that somewhere along the line they had installed a crappy aftermarket sunroof. I kept the donor front end, sideskirts, and a few miscellaneous pieces. The rest was sold to locals and plenty of out of state folks.
Now the Kouki was coming together. I picked up new JDM bumpers through Corner 3 Motorsports in Laguna Hills (thanks John!), my OEM Kouki wing came in from Japan, and temp rollers were thrown on. Everything is temporarily installed to verify fitment before the body work begins.
The OEM lip was thrown on along with the valances and a mock up install of the Reinhard exhaust. A problem I've encountered with Reinhard is that due to how big the dual tips are, it rubs up against the JDM bumper causing it to melt/burn. We will be addressing this later on to ensure that the exhaust doesn't end up damaging the bumper down the line.
Being fairly content with the overall panel fitment on the exterior, I moved onto the engine bay.
The plan with the engine bay is tubs, shaving any unnecessary holes, and just tidying up whatever I can. The goal is to have a nice weekend car, not just an over the top garage queen / show car. I want it to look nice, presentable and have it be practical as well.
The engine was kept from a car I owned a few years back. A very well built 400+HP S14 SR20DET running a Full Race twin scroll manifold, Garret GTX3076R, and lots of other goodies.
Same as the interior and exterior goes, this is a mock up install. Considering we are very much in the planning stage, we wanted to decide what stays and what goes. We are definitely keeping the AC system on this build. It's something I overlooked early on with other builds and I regret having done so.
This brings us up to date. We have decided where we will be mounting up an oil catch can, power steering reservoir, and coolant overflow tank. Other than a few minor mock ups, the next step is shaving and tubs. A close friend of mine is an excellent welder/fabricator and will be working with me on these next few steps. Custom intercooler piping will be made once the tubs are in.
I'm committed to making progress on these cars now more than ever. We are now on the tail-end of a pretty hectic year and this hobby definitely helps keep me grounded.
Here's to hoping my kids appreciate my car and parts hoarding insanity once they're older. Haha
