I’m a full-on Daihatsu nut, so what better to update my collection of Charades that with a Rocky
It has 198Kmiles, got it for $1200 up north 100 miles or so. Changed the coil, and am slowly trying Charade parts to fix it. Its pretty awesome, although it has its issues at that price!
Pix here
Hi again. Hopefully you found us through Jalopnik or perhaps Googling “Daihatsu Crap Race Car” or something. Anyway, the race is drawing quite near and I’d like to plug my sponsors as a good capitalist should!
Thanks to PCI Race Radios for radio rentals and some of our safety equipment. Plus they are good people, if a little weird for once giving me a job!
Also a big thanks to KitschStickers.com for the great deal and quality on all of our sticker/decal printing!
Last, but not least, I’d like to thank Evil Genius Racing, for their $850 cage deal! Their service was incredible given their insane workload, great guys, and I hope to kick their asses at the race!
I’m currently 400+ miles from the car, but I’ll post lots of pictures of the final preparation and of couse a video of it running!
I haven’t been updating like I should, mostly working on the Fiat and my parents 69 RHD Morris Traveller.
Anyway, here’s a pic dump of the last few days…
Hood Pinz
Hatch Pins
Added a second fan, now its 10″ and 12″ with auto and manual override
Masked off ugly all-black bumper
Much nicer!
Seam welded because the jack slipped and bent the fuck out of the floor 
Legit (and not so legit) racing stickers!
Beat the wheelwells and notched the strut tops for my required 1.5deg camber and to make the wheels fit!
Butt-shot with semi-mounted spoiler
Lowered the car 1.2 inches and added 12 inches of spoiler!
Driving the car on the street, quite racing. DONE AT LEGAL SPEEDS AT ALL TIMES
Video #1
Video #2
Imagine this with some gigantic Team Dynamics wheels and huge spoiler and thats about how the car should be.
I gutted the dash, finished the battery cutoff switch, the requisite alternator cutout relay, and got the gauges situated. I need to rig up some defrost vents but otherwise its just now to finish fitting the rear wheels and tune the engine!
Gronk make post
What am I doing to this perfectly good engine?
Pulling the head…
Grabbing some parts from the, uhh, other parts engine (pulled my VERY decked head)
Reassembled with the new head! (and bright blue paint!)
Art!
Basically I got my headgasket kit way before I thought I would, and spent the day putting on the high-compression head, running the water hoses, and generally reassembling the engine. I should get the other parts orders thursday and Friday, so the engine should be in Monday or so. I should be getting the coilover collars on Thursday and can do the install on those. I’ll drop the car as low as it can go so I can be cool!
$48.75 in eBay coilovers for an Eclipse or something shitty and heavy
Whale Dong Intake ™
Racing Parts!
New engine and transmission, axles, etc
Old engine
Why we’re not using the old engine
The crew got together this weekend and got the old engine out, removed some weight, and had a generally good day
Before:
During:
After:
Engine bay cleaned up nicely:
I’m looking to use the 3M WindoWeld I got to fill the rear torque mount. The manual conversion wiring harness, pedal box, and shifter assemblies are installed, and I ordered $250 in brake(most of stuff was safety related) and engine shit to get the engine all prepped and ready to go! I got some $20 harbor freight oil press and water temp gauges, and I’m on the hunt for a decently sizedtach. This car will be LIGHT when we are done with it.
In 1987, the Daihatsu Charade hatchback 3 door was released in the US. It was priced higher than the Geo Metro and Toyota Tercel that occupied its similar market segments, and might have caused its sluggish sales and eventual demise of Daihatsu as a US brand 4 years later. 3 Trim levels; the CES (base), CLS, and CLX (high fearure) models went from the basic 3 cylinder 993cc engine (CB90) with a 5 speed manual gearbox to the 1.3L HC-E engine (with optional 3 speed automatic), and ranged from manual windows to power everything. A sedan was released in 1989, only being equipped with the 1.3L HC-E engine. In 1990 the trim level denomination was changed to the SX ad SE, low and high feature respectively. 1990 also introduced door-mounted seatbelts, a dashboard knee pad, and other features. Daihatsu also released a min-SUV called the Rocky, using the similar engine as the 1.3L Charade, but punched out a bit. The two Daihatsu models sold poorly, mostly due to their cost and the fact that gasoline was cheap at the time. Daihatsu sold their last models in 1992, then exited the country as quickly as it had come. A shame, really.
It would be really interesting to see some of the newer Daihatsu models here in the US, with gas prices slowly rising and a renewed interest in small cars at higher prices than before, thanks in part to the BMW Mini Cooper, Smart FourTwo, and the Scion xA and xB models. Maybe Toyota could bring some over and badge them as Scions, I would love to have new Cuore or Materia.
The LeMons car is a 1989 model, 4 cylinder equipped CLS with the only options being power steering, and an automatic transmission. I’ve done a factory-perfect manual conversion (all plug and play with factory manual parts), and am de-powering the rack as its a power hog and the assis won’t be neceassary on the track.
I’m looking to sell the DC header and downpipe I have, I don’t want to deal with trying to weld through ceramic coating. Its for any B series and had a nice flexpipe welded on the end of the downpipe. $150 OBO local to Simi Valley…
I’m also selling the SC14 supercharger, its off a lower miles Previa and has the bypass motor and inlet/outlet piping. $180
Email me at daihatsufans@gmail.com if you’re interested or want to sell me parts!
Racing Seat Covers
More like Cha-Rad!
Heart of the Beast
Light Weight!
Aggressive Cleaning
I hate that part
Interior and Bonus 323 GTX
Acheived Race Weight
I pulled the automatic dash harness, replacing with a manual one, which included removing the fenders to do the headlight/turn signal/parking lamp harness. I installed the manual pedal cluster, and will install the clutch cable and manual shifter sometime next week. My brother is getting married, so Congrats!!!
Drove 750 miles on Saturday to pick the car up. From Simi Valley, CA to Sonora, CA took most of the day. Sunday we started removing the interior and I gave the engine a look. 
The Coveted (to me anyway) 16Valve 1.3L SOHC Daihatsu HC-E. Its not a bad unit, making stock power in the high 80s pushing through a manifold pre-cat and somewhat crappy stock airbox. Suprisingly the car was equipped with power steering, I think somewhere near 2.7 turns lock to lock, and a very quick ratio. I’ll be removing it and depowering the rack similar to what Miata owners do. The engine might only require a head as the timing belt is broken, but it will likely get one of my spare engines pulled from an older Charade I owned years ago. Manual conversion is simple, the only wiring harness changes are plug and play and shifter/clutch stuff bolts right in!
Bought the Car Its an 89 Charade, unfortunately is an automatic with a blown engine. I have most of the parts for the manual conversion, I have to figure out a clutch cable (its not sold anywhere in the US), and see if I can get a rising rate FPR for the supercharger. A manifold flange needs to be made and welded to that DC Header I got, maybe I’ll sell it and get a cheaper header that fits better, this one is right right spacing but exits at less than a 90 degree angle and I’ll lose some primary straightness making it work.
This Blog is for the Daihatsu Charade team (referred to as Team DaiHard) for 24 Heurs Du LeMons race at ThunderHill in November 2009. Updates on the car build, team member info, tidbits about Daihatsu, and other shit will be posted irregularly and likely will be illegible, so continue at your own risk!
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