What to do?

[MattFC]

First time poster here! I am about to buy dream car (FC Ute), but I'm really undecided about which way to go about it and I was hoping to get a bit of helpful advice. The ute is 90% original but in pieces and will need to be reassembled as well as repainting. My dilemma is, I have an unfinished EH project on hand with all the good gear, worked 179, celica 5 speed, HR disc front etc. Would I be better off keeping the FC running gear original or transferring everything from the EH? If I did swap everything over, would it be pretty straightforward? I know some modifications would be necessary such as the trans tunnel, but would the front end be a straight swap or would it need to be modified? Also the gearbox crossmember?
Sorry if I sound a bit naive, but, I have never owned an FC ( had a heap of EH's though!) and I really don't know a lot about them.
Thanks, Matt. ;)

[mcl1959]

Matt, the only issue with the red motor is legality, unless its a 149 red in NSW I think.
So you need to get the car engineer certified which will involve getting a few specific things like heater demister or new inertia reel seatbelts - depends on the engineer.

The HR front end should be OK if it is already set up for your EH, but you will need a half chassis kit to hang the rear gearbox mount from and the brakes will need a look at, but generally the swap is pretty straight forward. I would allow a couple of thousand for all the extra costs you will incur.

How you build it depends on what you want to use it for - no good building a stocker if you want everyday transport through traffic. On the other hand it's no good modifying it if you want a classic original example that you use for club runs and shows etc.

Ken

[MattFC]

Hi Ken, I am in S.A. so I think the legality side of things would be less of an issue. The ute would be only driven occasionally so the more I think about it, the more I'm leaning towards keeping it original as qualifying for historic reg. could be another possibility. On that note, I've been told that the motor has been changed to a 138, would that disqualify it from historic reg.? The only other mods I've been considering are perhaps slightly lowering it and I've got a set of 15" centrelines that fit as well.
Cheers, Matt.

[Glenn 'Stinky' Stankevicius]

SA Historic = Strictly STOCK.
There are/were some mods that didn't require an engineer, I got my FE Sedan registered with a 202 using a HR disc brake front-end, best to check with Regency though.