Saturday's job was simple on paper: four BC Racing coilovers in, four tired factory struts out, done by lunch. The fronts cooperated. The rears spent six hours teaching me why this car was cheap. This is the full log — times, parts, and the two mistakes that cost the most.
Quick context if you're new here: every build-log post runs off the session data in the rail — clock-on to clock-off, with time attributed to whatever system was actually under my hands. Hours marked logged were captured live by the timer. Guessed numbers don't appear on this site.
Clock on, fronts first
Front struts on a S13 are about as friendly as suspension work gets: three top-hat nuts, two knuckle bolts, brake line bracket, done. Both sides out in under an hour, and the BC units went in almost as fast. The only adjustment from stock procedure: I set preload and ride height on the bench before fitting, per the coilover prep guide, which saved crawling under the car twice later.
By 16:30 the front end was torqued, marked, and sitting on its new springs. I logged a 20-minute gap here for food — the app calls it a break, and it counts against the day's ratio. The number doesn't flatter you, which is the point.
Fig. 02 — Paint-marked after torquing. Cheap insurance against the 2am "did I tighten that" spiral.
The rear: where the day went
Rear lower mount bolts on a 30-year-old chassis. If you've owned one of these, you already know. Both rear bolts had seized into the steel sleeve of the original bushing — the bolt turns, the sleeve turns with it, and nothing comes apart. Penetrant, heat, an impact rated for more than my dignity: nothing.
Driver-side lower bolt seized into the bushing sleeve. Two hours of penetrant, heat cycles and impact attempts before conceding to the cut-off wheel. The bolt, the sleeve, and one cutting disc did not survive.
This is exactly the kind of time that vanishes from most build threads. "Fitted rear coilovers" — sure, eventually. The honest version is that the wrestling took longer than the fitting, and it's logged as labour against Chassis & Suspension, because diagnosing and fighting a system is work on that system. It's not a coffee break, and pretending the rears took 90 minutes would make the area total a lie.
Once the carcass of the old bolt was out, the passenger side got the preventative treatment immediately: heat, shock, and out in 15 minutes before it could dig in. The BC rears then went in without drama — bench-set like the fronts, torqued at ride height on ramps.
On any chassis this age, assume every suspension bolt through a bushing sleeve is seized until proven otherwise. Soak them the night before the job, not during it. One $9 can of penetrant applied 12 hours early would have bought back two hours of Saturday.
Settle, torque, clock off
Rolled the car back and forth to settle the suspension, re-torqued everything at ride height, and set a rough string-box toe so it can drive to the alignment shop without eating the tyres on the way. Clocked off at 23:12. The review screen got dealt with Sunday morning before the next session — one 20-minute gap to label (the break), everything else attributed live.
Parts & consumables fitted
Consumables sit in build overhead, not against the parts — they're part of cost-in-car, but they're not bolted to anything. The cutting discs died for a good cause.