Death by a 1,000 papercuts

Well, it has been two weeks since my last post. Not a lot has happened since then. Mostly road blocks and detours that led nowhere.

My biggest hang up at present is the wheel locks. No one can get them off. No one knows who made them. All I know is that they make me want to cry. I am quickly running out of alternatives beyond just cutting the wheels off. Not only will that be expensive but also possibly destroy wheels, hubs, and possibly the rotors. Can I get a "GRRRRR!!!"? Here is a picture of one of the culprits:



I have also taken to tearing apart both doors. Mostly to work on a couple of glitches in the lock system and replace some power window switches. Well as I started taking thing apart I found more and more stuff that was wrong. Most importantly the backing of the interior door panels was pretty much completely rotted out from getting wet. Hence, I am replacing them. Cool thing is I took this chance to upgrade from vinyl to leather. I found some leather door panels on eBay for $100 less than new. I also have to replace almost every insert that holds the door panels on be because the screws that were screwed into them to hold on the door panels...seized. The inserts are plastic by the way. So I had to tear out all to the bad inserts, which was basicly all of them. I have never seen that before. Here is a pic...the inserts were along the bottom of the door.



This next pic gives you an idea of the condition of the door panels:



Unfortunately, I cannot get the passenger door panel off due to one hex nut being stripped out. (I think it however installed the aftermarket speakers stripped it out) SO the passenger door panel is being held in place by one relentless bolt. Go figure with my luck. I will probably have to pound a torx head into it to get it out.

My box of removed parts is quickly filling up. My first instinct was to throw a lot of this stuff away, but then I looked at replacement prices...I figured it might be best to keep them around in case I changed my mind. Replacement value of this box is honestly about $1000.



One other project I did was clean the lifetime air filter the previous owners put on. It had absorbed an extensive amount of oil because the oil overflow blow off valve is very close to it. I did not think that it was malfunctioning or limiting air flow...but better safe than sorry. The refreshing oil turned it red:



Price for this installment of the blog:
Door panels: $200
Brake pads, fluid, caliper rebuild kits, sensors, etc: $258
New racing seats (I just ordered them): $299
TOTAL (too much to bear): $757

This installment of Project Porsche was brought to you by the tax man...who gave me an incredible return this year.