180SX - THE END

If you're watching this video right now, that means that our 180SX's registration has been rejected. And the last couple of months, or last couple of years of doing this project, has all been a big waste of time. I mean, we got to hang out. Yeah, we had to fix the car, but you can't drive it. What's the point? It's not a race car. Other than the annoyance of not being able to drive the car, there is also the financial consideration that an unregisterable 180SX, regardless of its condition, is probably worth between $8,000 and $12,000. Yeah. A registered one, like what we've done, is probably worth $25,000 or $30,000, at least. More, actually. Registered and roadworthy, yep. 100%. So here was the problem. We went down to Service NSW, and they said no. They said no. They just said no. They said no. So we've registered a few cars from scratch before. I mean, a notable one would be the Mira, for example, which is something that got completely redone. The Super Turbo, imported that, had to register that. So you've got to do the same thing. Get all your approvals, get all your paperwork, get your compulsory third-party insurance, which is a thing in New South Wales, in case you hit someone. That doesn't cover the car, that covers the person. It's a way of making sure that there's medical care for everyone and paying for all that. Can I go through this, Martin? Of course. And then we're going to talk about what happened. We've done it a few times. We know what paperwork we need, but we just got rejected. This is from the actual website, okay? This is what I think we should be going off. If your vehicle's NSW registration has expired, but it's within three months of the expiry date, you're still able to renew the registration. Which is not us. Yay! That's not us. Yay for those people. The vehicle will still be registered, blah, blah, blah. If the registration expired more than three months ago, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Us. You'll need to re-register it. So start from scratch. Establish registration. What do you need? An application for registration. We did it. Your proof of identity. We did it. Tick. Your business or organisation details, if applicable. Tick. Your compulsory third-party insurance. Tick. An authorised unregistered vehicle inspection report. Blue slip. Got it. Passed. Payment and number plates. You will receive number plates when the vehicle's registered. Yes. We did all of that. We took all of that and they said no. They said no. Now, the reason that they said no, and this is the bit that I can't work out, is that they want... I'm still trying to get my head around this because it's so stupid. They want a receipt from the person who owned it before the person we bought it from to us. They want a receipt from the last registered owner. I need to do this. I need to draw it out. They want a receipt from the last registered owner, which is not who we bought the car from. So as you know, cars bounce around. You know, people sometimes choose to let their registration last because if you're paying it every year, usually you're paying over a thousand bucks a year to keep something regoed. So if you've got something off the road, maybe you choose to let it lapse knowing that you'll have to go through this process later on. It's a more thorough inspection. They're going to check that the engine numbers and the chassis numbers and everything match up. But the car, because it has been registered in New South Wales before, is on record. That VIN is on their records. When they look it up on their end, they see a person who used to own it or the last person that had the rego, and they want a receipt from that person. Except we don't know who that person even is. Martin, I've got a little scientific diagram just here that I'm going through. I love your diagrams, man. I like your drawing skills. Now, this guy here, he owned a 180SX. There he is. Now he sold it for money to this guy. Actually, I have a story about that. Unregistered. Uh, the reason his face is upside down is because I drew it upside down. I thought he was just really sad. Anyway, he sold it to him. Unregistered. So here's a number plate. No. Unregistered. Which you're allowed to do. He sold it to us for money. Unregistered. As an unregistered car. My understanding is that the RMS wants a receipt. Not from him. Not from the person we bought it from. But the last registered owner, they want a receipt from him saying that we bought the car from him. But if my understanding is correct, that would be fraud. We didn't buy a car from him. And this is where the... So I can't get a receipt from him saying that we gave him money because we never gave him money. Now, why is this a problem? That means if you bought a car like a barn find, right? You bought it and you're like, oh, I'm going to do it up. I'm going to whatever. And it's been sitting there for 30 or 40 years. And then you go, the project's too big for me and you sell it for your mate. Your mate, according to this, if this is correct, would need a receipt from whoever put it in the barn 40 years ago. Yes. Who might not even be around anymore. That's right. So I just rang this guy, who's the guy we got the car from. That's us. That's him. Don't know who that is. And said, hey man, they've asked us for a receipt from him. And he said, that's weird, as you'd expect. But he also said, I traded the car for Hot Wheels. What? And I went, Hot Wheels? What does that mean? Like the toys. And he goes, yeah. So he goes, I don't know how to give you a receipt because I swapped it for Hot Wheels. Oh, so wait on. So this is wrong. I said he traded this for money. But he traded this for a Hot Wheels car. Yeah. So then now what we need to do is we need to go to the RMS and go, this guy has a receipt for a Hot Wheels car. For a real car. Yes. Which we then swapped. See, it goes round and round. We then swapped for money. Yes. For here. Yes. Now, the person behind the counter has then told us, which I've never heard before, that I need to go and see a justice of the peace. Right. A justice of the peace is someone who is designated by the governor to keep the peace. And it's a volunteer position of somebody whose job in life is to witness affidavits. Verify documents. And verify documents. Verify that you've signed it, not verify the document, right? It doesn't matter what's in it. You just go, did you actually sign it? Show me your ID, and then they check it, right? Well, the reason that that doesn't make sense to me is that they want to know that we own the car. But I have a receipt from... But not only do I have that, it's the requirement on there. I need proof of ownership. That's the receipt that I have of the car. So anyway, I'm going to go and find a justice of the peace, and I have to write a document that says I own the car. OK. And then the justice of the peace, through their order of the governor of New South Wales, will witness that. And then we need to try and get a receipt from him saying that he swapped his thing for a car, for a matchbox car. Show the paper. A Hot Wheels car. And then I need to get my justice of the peace affidavit and the Hot Wheels receipt, and take that back. That's where we're at. I've got to go find a justice of the peace. I was good with it until the Hot Wheels thing. Now I just got so confused. Come on. I never understand the whole... I just... Hey, maybe it's worth money. So it is a whole new day. A new day of possibilities. Look at it. We're on our way back to service New South Wales, with all of the paperwork that their website said we needed, plus the additional paperwork that is not mentioned anywhere, but a person at the counter told us that we needed. Please tell me you brought your diagram, so if we need to explain how this whole thing works, you can show it. Good. Um, Martin. Just a quick idiot check. Yep. What we need. Our PDF form. Application. Yes. Proof of identity. Yes. Our organisation or business details, if applicable. Yes. We need our... CTP green slip. Yes. That one. The trick with that, which we've been caught on before, is if you're setting up new registration, get a receipt number on your CTP. Even though you've paid it, ring your insurer and say, make sure it's got a receipt number, Shannon's will do it for you, and it has the VIN of the car and the receipt number, then they can make sure it's actually been paid. Otherwise, their theory is, you might just be waving around a random document that doesn't actually exist. Yes, exactly. We got the receipt from the original owner, an authorised unregistered vehicle inspection report, which is what we call a blue slip. Your payment. They'll get the payment once they do it. Yep. The number plates will be given to us once the vehicle is re-registered. Plus statutory declaration that says, I hereby solemnly and sincerely declare and affirm that I own this 180SX. And then I've taken that to a justice of the peace, who has gone through and witnessed that I have claimed, because I do, own this car. Holy shit. So, um, on our way to service New South Wales, Martin, at this point, I just don't know anymore. I've registered so many cars over the years, over 20 years of driving, so many second-hand cars, imported cars, unregistered cars, I've never, ever, ever been told that I need to go and get permission from the Governor of New South Wales agent as a justice of the peace. Never. No, neither. Anyway, uh, we're heading on down now, and, um, we will let you know how we go. Right. Well, everybody, that did not go as expected at all. Not at all. Mostly, because... We got our retro! We are, we are legal people. We are ready to go on the streets of Sydney. Why didn't it go as expected? I'll tell you why. Because we went up to the counter with all of these random things that the person the other day told us we needed, and they're like, you don't need any of that. None of it. You just need the stuff off the website. That you brought last time. That we brought. We brought exactly the same paperwork as last time, but then we'd also got this, um, justice of the peace thing. They didn't even want to see it. There's like, just, so... Just give us the receipt. Just give us... It shows you bought the car. Same stuff. The CTP with the receipt number. The established registration form. Granted it was a different person. Yeah. We went to a different counter, and the last person said no. This person said yes. We had all the extra stuff anyway. Yep. Um, so I don't know how that works, but when we left the service New South Wales and it says, how did we do? That person got a five out of five. Yep. Thank you. Which was a, it was a green smiley face. How was your feedback? How was your session today? Well, my 180SX is going to be registered. Five out of five service New South Wales! And, for today, compared to 20 years ago, they're doing a lot better than they used to. Let's just put, let's just say that. That's true. It's still not the most pleasant experience, but, um, we can go and put these on the car. And go for a drive! Finally! We can go for a drive! Finally on the road! So good. Let's hit it, people. Let's go! We got our number plates, people, and they can finally go on. As usual, it took longer and was more work than any of us, by the two of us, that is expected. But, the outcome, I think, is also so much better than it could have predicted, in terms of how clean it looks, how nice it looks. Cleaning up all those little things, that sort of niggly things, that the project cars of this age always end up biting you in the butt with. All that's fixed. Everything works. It drives nice. It's dynoed for good numbers. Nothing leaks out of it, yet. And, otherwise, it is pretty awesome. It's still untested, other than its time on the dyno, so who knows how it'll actually go. But, it is hard to believe that it's the same car that it was a couple of years ago that we bought this, took it around the track, realized it was just blowing more smoke than Cheech and Chong, and then we're like, man, this car actually needs a bit of love. But, love is what it got, and look at it now. Like, it just, this era of cars, I'm sure you'll agree with me, I just think, it really resonates with me, I just think it looks great. It looks, it looks like it has utility, do you know what I mean? A lot of cars these days, like Honda Civics and other newer cars, just look like robot vomit, you know? For the sake of robot. Let's just add some plastic. It needs to look wild, just add some more plastic, yeah. Whereas this is all, you've got really good visibility out of a car like this as well, one of the best things about these, there's so much glass in that turret, you can see really well, the seating position's nice, the dash doesn't get in the way, it's really light and nice to steer. The only thing really left, I guess, is a real proper, like, race spec wheel alignment, just so everything is done. But, that's all been dialed in, drives nice. Yeah, it's gonna be good. So, um, yeah, Martin, it is time to put the plate on, and time to go for a drive. I just, I really can't believe how far it's come. Do you remember what this car used to look like? I'm finally here but I can't breathe Without you And I know You could make it on your own But I don't wanna be without you Without you now Drowning in the fire Praying So we'd sneak out at night Hands held tight and we'd just drive Trying to hide Well I never thought we'd get this far Underneath a million stars tonight And I broke down When you go I'm finally here but I can't breathe Without you 183. Yay! So here it is, finally. It's a long time to get to this point. Now, we could have just like, done a real quick fix, slapped a plate on and gone, yay, the car works again. But it undoubtedly would have blown up in a cloud of turbo smoke. But I think the result is way better with everything being done with the paint and all that sort of stuff as well. It's, um, it is hard to get custom plates in case you couldn't work it out. This is the same, this 180, as you can see, we ordered this in advance and it's the same plate that is on our artwork. By the way, these here will be no longer available in three days. Three days. So if you want to get a poster, we will sign it and send it to you. Thank you to everybody that already grabbed one. It should be on the way to you already. But there are three days left from right now. So if you're looking at this video in the future, it'll probably say they're not available, but you have three days and then they are no longer available. Martin, here it is. What's going on? Take it, take, take that bolt, Martin. And, um, put it in there, Martin. It's time. It's, yep, should be the outside hole. Oh, they fit nice, don't they? See, back when you had your 180, you didn't get a choice of like plate sizes, did you? No. You had to like bend them. I remember I used to bend them. And some people, some people cut them and then they got in trouble and that was the only way to make them fit. Yeah. Is your one working over there, mate? No, I sorted it. If you tighten it all the way down, it probably won't go in. All right, it's still a little bit loose. You can work it out with your socket or something like that. We're just gonna, we're just gonna do this, Martin. Look at that. Awesome. In it goes. Good feeling, mate. Thanks for all your help, man, by the way. No worries. Happy to. Getting it all together. It's, um, it's funny, you know, you don't often get the chance to kind of relive one of your kind of young dreams of like, how do I do it again? And cars are a really cool way of doing that, you know, because they are time machines, aren't they? Yeah, it is. And you get in it and you're just like, oh, I remember, like, I remember what it felt like to be back then. And you imagine that if you are driving around in your first car, one of your first cars, and you're in your Hyundai i30, whatever it is, who's to say in 10 or 20 years, you might be like, oh man, I love that thing. It's the memories that you, I know, I know. It's trippy though, right? It's the exact same thing. Because I have a real soft spot for Gemini's. Because my first car was a Gemini. I just had some mad adventures. And so it's like, it's definitely a thing, man. Yeah. Let's go for a drive. 20 years time on Mighty Car Mods i30. All right, here it is. First drive in the 180. It's awesome. Feels good. Feels really good. Wait, I want to hear it, not on a dyno. I'll give you just a little bit, Mark. Sick. Love it. Wow, it sounds amazing. That's so good. I'm not sure just how low it is yet. So I still don't kind of trust any of these. It's got to come up a little bit. Speed bumps and stuff. Like I said, it's had... It doesn't do it's sing. The tune's great, man. Oh, it sounds great. Feels so good. Oh, it feels just so fun to drive. It just, you know, it doesn't have so much power that you're worried that the back's going to kick out everywhere. It just feels fun and awesome. Like the right amount, isn't it? So good. It's great. That is everything I could have hoped for and more. I'm just, I'm starting to get the red mist. Yeah. I need to get to a racetrack for a full, a full shakedown. Because I'm feeling myself wanting to do things that I can't do in this environment. And I'm going to do the right thing and try and contain that. Because I'm older and more mature now, Martin. You know it's got more. You know it wants it. Yeah, I know. I haven't even wound it out yet. But that is going to be a story for... Oh my God, unreal. It just... It's so nice in here too. Like we're not like in something where it's got the nice sounds and the nice go. It's actually a nice place to be in a 30-year-old nugget. I know. It's so good. And this, this for me is kind of pretty much going to be a daily. This is kind of what I'm going to get around in. So I don't want a really, really aggressive setup. Yeah. In terms of how the alignment is set. I just want something that is good for the street. It's really comfortable. There's nothing rattling. There's a couple little things that I can hear that kind of we need to fix up. I think it's got some, some quite stiff bushes in it somewhere. Maybe in the dip. Oh, it loves it. That's rad. It's not often in life when you get the chance to do over something that didn't go right the first time. And my original S13 from when I was a kid, well, those dreams went up in smoke, literally. So to have the chance to do it again and do it right was an opportunity that I was going to take and hold on too tight with both hands. Of course, I couldn't do it by myself, but with the help of a few mates along the way and a whole lot more time than we expected, this project truly did become my 180SX dream build. When it comes to sheer performance, fan base, ability, and historical significance of Japanese cars from the 1990s, there is nothing that even comes close to the 180SX. And that, my friends, is a fact. Well, yeah, that's all true. Unless you've got something that will destroy all Nissans.