Carpokes

Vaporized.
The conversion kit comes this week. Had to pay a $100 tariff on it

Yellow or green? Can the late car run the green Bilstein shocks in the rear?

Wow, vapor blasting looks awesome. Are you planning to paint or powder coat? My vote is Koni yellow.

spacecad3t wrote: Tue Jan 20, 2026 1:30 pm Can the late car run the green Bilstein shocks in the rear?

The green ones are for steel trailing arm cars, yellow are for aluminum trailing arms.

stitch2k1 wrote: Tue Jan 20, 2026 3:53 pm

spacecad3t wrote: Tue Jan 20, 2026 1:30 pm Can the late car run the green Bilstein shocks in the rear?

The green ones are for steel trailing arm cars, yellow are for aluminum trailing arms.

Bummer, sounds like yellow paint then.

Tom wrote: Tue Jan 20, 2026 2:37 pm Wow, vapor blasting looks awesome. Are you planning to paint or powder coat? My vote is Koni yellow.

Just paint them myself, I have a decent amount of experience. No heated spray booth tho, so I need to wait on the temps to rise later this year. I'll wrap up the fitting and welding once the shocks come in this week- but then go quiet until warmer weather.

Test fit. Both sleeves have about 3-5mm gap to fill. Both inserts are tightened down with 6 turns on the cap, the guide says "greater the 5". So I think we're a go for welding. Kinda hot all metal like that

And welded up. Im rusty, and was already a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ welder... but ready to paint
Edit: I gave ChatGPT an image and ask it to recommend a color scheme, got this back. I think I like it.

Found time to paint the struts. Im going to use some rubber shrink tube to cover the weld and the unpainted portion, and some Bilstein decals are on the way that I might add on.

spacecad3t wrote: Sun Feb 15, 2026 6:17 pm Found time to paint the struts. Im going to use some rubber shrink tube to cover the weld and the unpainted portion, and some Bilstein decals are on the way that I might add on.

Looks really nice -- great work. I wouldn't worry about the weld joints myself. Weld beads make cars faster.

Thanks Tom! The springs did not come out how I hoped... I should have primed them gray I think, the black kept pushing through and then it was too much paint so I'll be stripping those and I think powder coating them instead.

Anyone have thoughts on adding these decals? Im on the fence.