Delica – Misplaced Priorities. Just drive – ignore what’s under the hood.

 

I’ve had the Delica since last May, and it’s hard to believe I haven’t really delved into it yet. Especially since I want to take it to Glacier Park this summer. Perhaps it’s because I’ve put 2,000 miles on it, and everything seems just fine.

But I’m not the kind of guy who wants to blow a radiator hose on Lookout Pass and then try to find a shop to work on it. I did five years in automotive in my youth (20s). And to this day I can never trust a shop.

Of course, I did change the oil in the first week. The stuff always looks black with diesel, and you can never tell how old it is.

The oil filter on the 2.8 is massive and interesting. Along with the OEM part number, in Japan they also include the first five digits of the VIN so there is no doubt about fitment. Japan does a lot of interesting/weird stuff, like celebrating Christmas for commercial reasons and having a fondness for Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Because of that big, ugly mystery toggle switch, I had to open up the center console. It’s the one bolted into the panel right above that really funky aftermarket stereo. I wasn’t sure what it did, but I knew it had to go. I didn’t know how far that would take me down the rabbit hole.

Under the dash, I see all kinds of splices in the interior fuse box. And electrical tape bundles. And inline fuses. And several relays. Wow. Someone was busy.

Once I started to dig (and found the speaker under the hood), I discovered that it had been a car alarm from the early 2000s. From the brand name and model, it was a pricey setup with a remote and everything—high-end for a minivan in Japan. It clearly hadn’t worked in many years.

The wires went EVERYWHERE. This bad boy was tied into not just an alarm speaker but a remote receiver, which could open and close windows, flash all of the lights, and even had heater control functions.

I found a motion sensor wired inside the rear bumper cover. In case someone bumped into the van? The guy who installed this must have had a wiring diagram (and clearly a lot of wire).

So I got everything out (except one relay that I’m not quite sure about yet) and had to make a decision: button it up and deal with the stereo later, or do it now?

Oh, and radios in Japan use 90 MHz and below, so the only stations it can pick up are on the lower end of the US frequency band. Usually, it’s just news and primarily religious. I just answered my own question. Do it now.

The Kenwood head unit was pretty funky. I found the manual online (all in Japanese) and pricing from 2001. This thing was $600 new back then (about $1000 in today’s dollars). Why? Other than the crazy disco light display, it played the MiniDisc.

The MiniDisc had a short life span. It allowed people to make their own CD mixes BEFORE standard-size discs became read-and-write, so the Mini was a modern version of the cassette. The only country that ever adopted them was Japan. When MP3s came along, poof. Gone.

But wait! This incredible machine also played standard-sized CDs!!! Something this weird has to be worth something to someone.

And I was right. I threw it on eBay and sold it for most of what it cost me for the new JVC headset I installed, which has all the modern amenities. Win/win.

I love Japanese automobiles. They standardize everything and don’t do one-offs or variants. So the stereo head plug on this JDM van, which is only sold in Japan, is exactly the same as everything Mitsubishi sells in the US. Sweet.

Also, the size and depth of the stereo head opening is a double-DIN, which stands for Deutsches Institut fur Normung e.V., which happens to be THE automotive radio size standard the Germans came up with in the early 1970s. Again, sweet!

All I know is that this modern JVC head fit like a glove and was plug-and-play in an almost 30-year-old imported Japanese van.

I popped the extra twenty bucks and got the model that plays both CDs and DVDs. That way, I can watch the cult classic “Holes” when I get back from a hike at Logan Pass when people are begging for my parking spot.

But what about this drab and plain little center console, which has cutouts for options the van didn’t come with (like electronic ride control and heated seats)? I could use some USB ports. One cigarette lighter wasn’t going to do it. Ah hell. In for a penny in, for a pound. For all of you who came after Gen X, that means go for it.

But it all came together in the end. I reworked the center console with some textured ABS and a lot of cutting/drilling/sanding fabrication time. I also did a lot of wiring research and inline fuses. In the end, I came up with three ports.

One that can output 65 watts and charge my laptop; one that connects directly to the stereo for Android Auto, navigation, and all my 1980s music from a USB drive; and one that can charge without the key in the ignition. It’s always handy to have a hotline directly to the battery.

But what is this little GPS turd from the past???? Sure, mock me. A cheesy, obsolete navigation unit that was made useless by our smart phones.

However, this hidden Garmin gem comes with lifetime map updates, ensuring it remains accurate. It works without cell service. Best of all, it gives me something the Delica lacks: knowing how fast I’m going.

The hardest part about driving a JDM is that the speedometer is metric. I cannot help but instinctively convert kilometers to miles in my head over and over, until my brain feels like it’s about to explode. I don’t need that. Plus, the old tech fits the van’s quirks.

 

And there we have it. Thank you for sharing a look into one of the many windows into GoatBoy’s mind.  So much more to come!