Zenki S14

[sweefu]

Hello everyone,
I'm from Australia, this is my S14. It's my daily driver and will be used for drifting, motorkhana and any other events that pop up

I bought the car in May 2013 completely stock and automatic. It is in great condition, full service history and nothing broken (except the notorious centre console lid). I looked at about 12 cars over 6 months before buying this one, moslty S13/180sx but I found them all to be in poor condition, either needing work or needing mistakes fixed, mistakes made by people who don't know how to work on cars. The odd S13 I found in good condition cost as much as an S14, so for me, the S14 was better value, with better geometry, 5 stud, 4 piston front brakes and Aus delivered too, much easier for rego here.

I bought the car and it basically sat for a while, until I had time to change it to manual. I had an S2 RB25DET gearbox hanging around so I thought I'd use that for the conversion, along with a JDI Fabrications cut and shut bellhousing, 3" single piece tailshaft with Hardy Spicer parts and an Exedy Sports Organic clutch. The clutch has the silver faced centre made in Japan, it's an organic/coppermix compound - like a poor mans Nismo Coppermix! A few other parts were added too, like a Nismo reinforced clutch fork pivot ball, GKTech braided clutch line, Nissan needle bearing spigot bush.

Here are the original pictures from the Carsales ad:








As soon as I got it home back in May I test fitted a set of wheels I've had for ages, I bought them before I had a 5 stud car, so I was very happy to have a car to test fit them on. They are made by Weds, unsure of the model. 16x9 +22 with good brake clearance. Forgive the masses of suspension droop, don't forget everything is stock








As soon as I bought the car I started looking for a Kouki wing, I found a few in Japan but it took a while before I won an auction, with the right colour and condition.
Auction picture


And fitted to car, with the Weds wheels (Just realised how crap the photo is, sorry)


The car is my daily driver, and also my fun car for the track. I plan to hit up a lot of events next year, I won't change a lot on the car for a while, all my money will be going into tyres and track time so I can learn to drive properly.

I'll update a few other small things I've done in the next post.

Thanks!

[sweefu]

Sorry, didn't realise the pictures weren't working.

Another update too

I took the car to a drift day in July 2013 and blew the turbo to manifold gasket. I changed those and the hard water/oil lines at the same time. I also changed to a Midnight Mods 3" bellmouth dump pipe, thought it would be easier while it's all apart. It's only a cheap dump pipe but the build quality seems great, big outlet and ported where the flanges are welded. Welds seem strong. Fitment is a bit crap, it literally sits on my the front of my bellhousing, but hasn't been an issue yet. Overall, I'm still happy to have it and won't change it.





I got a box of bits from RHD Japan a few days ago too \^.^/
The next piece of my exhaust, 3" stainless Blitz front pipe - seems to be very good quality





Also KTS pillowball adjustable castor rods, I've only taken the car to 1 track day but one of the first things I wanted was more castor

[sweefu]

The weather is getting pretty warm now, so I bought a water temperature gauge (As everyone knows, stock gauge isn't great).

This is a digital water temperature gauge meant for a motorbike. It has a 1/8 NPT fitting and seems to be pretty reasonable quality. I originally wanted a Yashio Factory Okachan but had trouble finding one, so this will have to do instead.

This is the kit



I didn't want to cut into the radiator hose, or lose the stock sensor so I bought this GKTech coolant neck spacer which will provide a nice 1/8" NPT fitting for my new temp sensor




With the sensor fitted - looks to be plenty of depth for a good reading


I'll get it fitted soon then see what the temperature is like with warm weather, if it gets a bit high I'll look at installing a bigger radiator - probably a cheap 52mm alloy thing.

[sweefu]

My new wheels arrived today, I won these at auction in October! Very happy to have them on the car now.
They are 17x9 +9 Koenig Monster (I think). These will be my front wheels eventually, once I find some 18x10 +20ish rears to match. But for now, they can hang out on the rear and I'll leave my fronts as they are.

YAY!




Test fit, should be fine with coilovers, might scrub with stock suspension as it has now




I already had tyres at home so I fitted them up, tyres went on really easily but setting the bead took a while. 215/45r17 Ovation



And fitted!









Very happy. My original plan was to clean them up/repaint centres etc, but I was too keen to get them on the car. I'll do all that one day.

[JIMB0]

very nice!

[sweefu]

This is my roll cage, from AGI in Sydney. It's the basic CAMS spec bolt in 4 point half cage. I didn't opt for any additional bars or harness eyelts. This car is my daily so trying to keep it as relaxed as possible, and I will just loop my harness over the harness bar. I should install it next week or so, in preparation for a test and tune day at a circuit called Winton (Friday Jan 17th from memory).


Welds all look pretty good I think


The AGI slip join, very simple and effective design. Definitely a 1 up from the Cusco style of join (Not to say I don't like Cusco cages)


Feet for the main hoop. The bottom mount for the cage needs to be welded to the floor, then the main hoop bolts through that.


And the feet for the rear stays, pretty basic but all looks good



Overall I am happy with the cage, and a great price at $600. I got stung with $140 postage but it was very very very well packed, still can't complain. (All Aussie dollar figures for anyone wondering about costs).

Also paying for coilovers tonight, went with HSD HR (same as my previous car). I wanted to go with Shockworks - a local Aussie brand which are designed and tested here in Australia but built by Neotech in Korea. These have been getting some fantastic reviews and I'm sure they are fantastic - but I don't have the money to cover that at the moment, and the stock suspension is really bad - OEM shocks with lowered springs, the shocks were dead long ago. The HSD are about $1200 where as Shockworks are $1800.

[sweefu]

I'm getting all the bits together to remove the ABS from my car, it's terrible. I will change to R33 brakes at the same time.
I've got calipers/rotors/drum handbrake stuff already, an R33 non-ABS BM44 is on the way this week. I just need to find some hardlines for the engine bay (waiting to hear back from a guy) worst case, I'll make up some new hard lines.

I was lucky to find near new Bendix/Ferodo brake pads, good score. The rotors are more than half worn and could probably use a machine, but I'll put it all in as is and see how it goes.
I painted the calipers while they were out. I just rubbed them back with some 320 grit wet/dry paper until they were properly clean


I could have prepped them further but this will be good enough!

Makeshift spray booth


And done!


They all look pretty good, I don't want them to stand out but just look OK

And a couple of pictures of the car for good measure



I still haven't ordered suspension, there's a problem with the shifter in my rb25 gearbox so I'm sorting that out before I do anything else. The list of stuff to do before the next track day in about a month:

- Fix shifter issue, new gearbox oil
- Change all the brakes to Non-ABS R33
- Install roll cage
- Install adjustable castor rods + brace up castor rod mounts etc
- Buy and install coilovers
- Mount tyres

Then fun times! I've already got some tyres here, just need to work out which wheels to take and mount them up.

Cheers.

[sweefu]

Paid for a weekend of drifting at the end of next month! So excited to get back on the track.
I actually did some work today, usually I'm too lazy/unmotivated. I started on bracing up the castor arm mounts. I can't decide if I'll add another bar up where the castor arm bolts on or not. Either way it was good fun, my welding is still terrible though.

[sleepyS14se]

dude.... post some updates..this thread is amazing...and it looks like my s14!!

[juvi22003]

Coming along nicely, i love white cars lol....sucks i cant have my own build thread

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by sleepyS14se

dude.... post some updates..this thread is amazing...and it looks like my s14!!

Thanks mate! Will keep the updates coming, just been sorting out a gearbox issue at the moment, I've got a replacement box at the mechanic being checked now, if he says its OK then I can change it out and be back on track

Originally Posted by juvi22003

Coming along nicely, i love white cars lol....sucks i cant have my own build thread

Cheers mate! I hope you can have a build thread up soon.


Castor arm mounts are done now. I ran out of time, I wanted to add another brace near where the castor arm bolts to the mount, probably the most important part. Either way, this should be good for now. Put back in with my adjustable KTS castor arms. I need to find some rose joint dust boots - anyone know where I might get some?
You'll also see lots of crappy welding, I didn't clean any of it up and it was done with a gasless mig + I'm not very good at welding
Cheers.

[sleepyS14se]

Need updates

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by sleepyS14se

Need updates

Updates!

Been having some trouble with my gearbox (RB25DET), so I bought a Z32 box to replace it. When I have time I'll repair the RB25 box and sell it or keep it as a spare, at a guess it just needs 3rd gear dog teeth.

The Z32 gearbox needed some repairs too, a sleeve and dog teeth for reverse, but the rest of the gearbox seemed to be in good condition. It's from a stock Z32 N/A so hopefully it hasn't had a hard life. The Z32 gearbox is being repaired by 360 Gearboxes and Diffs in North Bayswater (not relevant to you guys, I know) and should be ready on Monday or Tuesday. Very excited to have a strong/working gearbox!

Here are a few pictures of the Z32 box (lying down, return to be pulled apart)


The gearsets etc, hard to see from this picture but there is a trap/door/gate in the centre plate to help with oil under hard acceleration/deceleration.


The housings before cleaning. I only cleaned the small case as I will be using my RB25 cut/shut bellhousing, so I'll store the Z32 bellhousing for now.


Onto something on a smaller scale, wheels. These are the wheels I plan to use for Winton Matsuri. 17x9 +38 Enkei NT-03. They are in OK condition structurally, but have been painted many times (very poorly) and one of them has a lot of gutter rash (right wheel in this picture)


You can see the different layers of paint, newest is light blue, then bright pink, then what I imagine is the original white. I should get them blasted/coated but they were cheap and I want to keep them cheap, so I'll just sand them and paint them white at home.




I spread a thin layer of JB Weld on the wheel with the most rash, I'll knock it down with a file when it's dry and it should be good enough. Sorry for the bad picture.

[juvi22003]

Those wheels look pretty bad, blast them and powdercoat them over and u should be good to go.....

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by juvi22003

Those wheels look pretty bad, blast them and powdercoat them over and u should be good to go.....

I'd prefer to spend the money on more track time at the moment :P I started sanding them back and fixing the gutter rash but got tired of it, so just going to run them as is I think. More in update below

Matsuri prep sort of continues, but I haven't really done much. There's a fair bit to do. I'm waiting on a Z32 shortened shifter bracket to arrive from the US before I can put the box back together properly. Once the bracket arrives I will try and work quickly to get it done.
I made a list of stuff to do before Matsuri, 2 weeks to go

Fit rear tyres – test fit wheels
Bleed brakes
Change rear wheel studs
Install roll cage
Change gear box
- Remove rb25 box
- Switch bellhousing onto z32 box
- Install shortened shifter bracket (once it arrives)
- Put box in car
- Fabricate or modify X member
- Trim trans tunnel
- Measure tail shaft length, take shaft to Knox Driveshafts, have shaft re-tubed to right length
- Reinstall everything,
- Choose oil, buy oil, fill oil
- Test
Buy steer tyres, fit wheel spacers
Wheel alignment
Install coolant temp sensor and temp gauge

So, still a lot to do in 2 weeks, once the shifter bracket arrives I'll get into it.

Anyway, here are a few pictures. Some parts arrived from GKTech - 25mm wheel spacers and a new fan blade


Spacers look great


Proper grade studs


They seem pretty long too


Started fitting up some tyres, I bought a pile of Ovation 215/45r17. I've been using them on the street for a little while, they are OK.
I will use my Koenig 17x9 +9 and my Sparco 17x9 +38 on the rear, both with the Ovations.
Ended up getting pretty tired of sanding back those Enkei's so will probably just run them with the multi coloured half sanded paint.

It was hot today, fittings tyres with a crowbar was a pain and I gave up. I'll do it when it's not so hot.

And picked up my Z32 gearbox from the gearbox place. I gave them the box with the housings already removed, they disassembled it further and inspected all the components. They seemed to think it was all pretty good except for a sleeve and dog teeth on reverse, so they replaced those.


Hard to see with my bad photos but some of the dog teeth on reverse were flattened out, others weren't as bad. I'm not sure if I would have replaced it myself, but it's good to know I have a solid box now.



Happy to hear any recommendations for gearbox oil, at the moment I'm leaning towards Redline MT90 or Amsoil GL4 75w90 (forget the name). I've been doing a bit of reading and I think i'll steer clear of the GL5 oils now, supposedly not that great for synchro gearbox.

More updates soon!

[sweefu]

Picked up an exhaust today
Mild steel, 3" with two mufflers. Hopefully it won't be too loud. Giant rear muffler, not sure if that makes it louder or quieter.

Pretty happy for $180!

[sweefu]

Creep shot


I also took my RB25 gearbox out today, you can see the cut/shut bellhousing on it which I have transferred to my Z32 gearbox.

Pretty productive day, RB box was out in 2 hours and the Z32 box went in so easily, only a few minutes.
Tomorrow i'm taking my tailshaft to be modified which I hope will be ready Wednesday, while that is being done I will do all the other stuff needed like shifter, x member etc and get the car as ready as I can for drifting this weekend!

[sleepyS14se]

I am in the process of boxing in my front LCA's and also boxing in my front castor rod brackets also!

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by sleepyS14se

I am in the process of boxing in my front LCA's and also boxing in my front castor rod brackets also!

Good stuff mate, worth it if you're as good at coming off the track as me!

Got a bit more stuff done, being held up by the wrong bolts I need for my gearbox cross member, I'll get the right bolts in the morning and hopefully be largely ready by lunch time.

Picked up the modified tail shaft, ended up having the RB25 front half re-tubed to be 30mm shorter.




Gearbox in the car, bit of a mix now but hopefully it all works well. Bellhousing front is SR20, rear is RB25. Small case/gear sets etc are all Z32. Using RB25 slave cylinder and RB25 (same as SR but different to Z32) release bearing/clutch fork. Retained the RB25 speedo sensor too which reads accurately in my car.


RB25 slave


Terrible picture but a standard Nissan A type gearbox cross member will fit here, just need to space it down a bit (hence the need for longer bolts)


And the xcessive engineering shortened shifter linkage (and bracket, not shown) Pretty good shifter placement, much better than RB25


This is my RB25 gearbox, some synchros are badly eaten. I'm not sure of the Lightweight Shockproof gear oil has contributed to this happening, apparently GL5 lubes are no good for synchro boxes. I'll stay away from them now and see how I go



I test fitted the wheels, I'm getting a pair of tyres tomorrow - going to try the Nankang NS2-R in 225/45r17. I was going to go with 215/45r17 RSR but wanted to try the Nankangs so I'll manage with the different size.




I don't really think the front wheels will fit very well but I don't have any smaller wheel spacers. Hopefully it's OK or I might be a bit stuck.

Plan is to get the remaining stuff knocked out tomorrow:
- Get bolts, suss out X member and bolt it up
- Tighten bellhousing bolts
- Clearance/fit shifter bracket and shifter
- Fit tail shaft
- Fill box with oil
- Change rear wheel studs
- Bleed brakes

I'm cutting it much finer than I'd like, worst case I can get to the track on Saturday morning instead of Friday afternoon - about 3 hours drive from my place.

[sweefu]

Made it through Winton Matsuri!


It was a tight squeeze to get everything done before Winton but I got there. I didn't get to finish everything I wanted to but the car was reliable, although very boat like. I got to Benalla late Friday night and made it to the track early for scrutineering on Saturday morning.
The car was reliable and didn't break which is good, although it did get a bit hot. The 155 000km old OEM shocks are really not working at all, and it hasn't had a wheel alignment in a long time so it handled a little bit weird. Didn't enjoy 3rd gear all that much so once I got the hang of things (and got some tuition from a friend) I found myself using 3rd gear for entry speed then changing down to second for most corners.
Love Winton, great circuit. Very excited to go back there with a few suspension tweaks and a wheel alignment.

I don't think photographers looked at my car much, much cooler pictures to take than of my car but I found this one with my friend Dave in his ballsontheground low R31 - which he drove from Sydney to Winton while towing a trailer full of tyres to fry.


Here is a few pictures of Dave's car, he was smashing it at Matsuri. His car is really well setup and he isn't scared to drive it hard!


From Sydney to Winton like this - about 900km / 560miles


Then Winton like this


What a dude!

I drove the car for another week before putting it back on stands and seeing what it looks like underneath.
Inspection mode


I started to develop a problem where the clutch would not disengage evenly/smoothly (link is above) so I tried changing the clutch slave cylinder which seems to have helped. Instead of using an OEM RB25 slave with the 3/4" bore size (~$60), I bought a Toyota Hilux slave cylinder with the 7/8" bore size (Same size as RB25 Nismo slave) for $19 from Bursons - all you need to do is drill out the mounting holes from 8mm to 10mm and it fits straight up - great upgrade and so cheap. The PBR part number is JB4130 for anyone looking to do the same thing.
Here it is fitted up


The line does fit up in a different place but I still had plenty of length with my braided line.

I was checking all the bolts and found this at my tailshaft to diff flange


Not really what you want to see. These are new high tensile bolts and nyloc nuts - should have bought cone locking nuts. I'll order some. For now, I just nipped them back up with some Loctite which should hold it.

The bolts for the front half of tail shaft to centre bearing were good, they are imperial but fit well. High tensile and nyloc nuts here too


This is probably contributing to why my exhaust hangs so low


Yep, split


Although the cat back exhaust is averagely made. I plan to take it to a shop and see if they can tuck it up a bit

My front pipe hangs pretty low as well, not sure why. It's a new 3" stainless Blitz pipe - could they have sent me the wrong one? I thought it would fit better than it does.


Tempted to cut the flange off, cut 20mm out of the top and weld it back together. Should tuck it up I think.

It came with a bracket which would have mounted to the gearbox x member in a normal situation, but because of my odd gearbox arrangement it did not fit, it got in the way of doing up the front pipe to cat bolts so I cut it off

You will see a lot of incorrect bolts used here (such as in this picture) I ran out of time to get proper bolts for everything before Matsuri but I'll fix it up soon.

Cat back fitment, bit average


I like the exhaust though, the tip is just a big stainless piece coming out of a rear muffler, sounds good overall. Made a massive difference in performance to the car


This is how the gearbox x member ended up. Not ideal by any means but it hasn't created any problems yet. I'd like to say I'll make up a better solution soon but I probably won't unless it causes problems.



Much spacing needed. Extra nuts would be better than washers, that's something I might change. The height is good though



Not sure what mount I used, I just grabbed a few from my collection of gearbox parts and found the lowest profile one. This isn't an RB25 mount, I know they are taller, I think it's Z32.


Dropped the gearbox oil, I used Redline MT90 (GL4 = no bad additives for brass synchros) but there is a bit of Lightweight Shockproof still mixed in there, that's why it's turned such a dark colour


I got the Redline MT90 from Harold at Perfomancelub He is a really helpful guy, he offered a lot of advice and time so I chose the right gearbox oil and had it delivered to my door in 2 days (I left it last minute to order the oil) can't recommend him enough! Definitely try him for any oils or lubes at all, he has Amsoil, Redline, Royal Purple, Castrol, Mobil... all the good stuff!


These are the tyres I used for the front, from Inverse Tyres. Great price and service! Highly recommend this place to anyone looking for tyres in Melbourne. https://www.facebook.com/InverseTyres
Nankang NS2-R. I've wanted to try these since I saw them come out, unfortunately they didn't have 215/45r17 like I wanted so I went with the 225/45r17. This probably contributed to my odd handling characteristics, there was just way too much grip up front compared to rear. I compensated as well as I could with changing tyre pressures which did help.



Great tyres, grip is different to RS-R but not necessarily worse. These were on sale at $135ea + fitting, definitely a good price.
Fitted to my Sparco 17x9 +38 (Used 25mm spacer = +13). These wheels have seen better days but are strong, lightweight and not buckled


Grabbed an engine bay shot too, stockness at its best


At the end of last year I blew a turbo gasket, so I changed all the gaskets, blocked off the EGR and changed to an S13 manifold too


Added a set of Earls braided lines while it was out, so much easier to put back together than the standard hard lines would have been


My old waterneck was corded and the thread for the water return line was damaged, so I ordered a new one through Taark


Also using a Midnight Mods 3" stainless dump pipe, the fitment is OK but the welds are very good and it was ported after welding too. I'd recommend this for anyone looking for a dump pipe and only ~$115


While I was taking pictures I took a few extras. This is my pile of broken gearboxes. RB25DET, SR20 and CA18 in various states of disrepair


Accompanied by a collection of shifters, mounts, forks and misc gearbox bits


And the matching bellhousings/small casings


That's the write up! I'll finish fixing up the car then keep driving it every day like I always do. The next event is a Calder practice day at the end of March, just need to scrape some cash together.

Obligatory my car didn't break and I'm happy pic


Cheers guys

[sweefu]

A few pictures have turned up!

[sweefu]

Hey guys,
Been a while since I've updated. Not a lot has been happening, after my last weekend at the track I eventually changed the oil, took out the roll cage and kept driving it every day.
I put in my rear Bilstein suspension which isn't amazing but it's much better than what was in there before.

I'm going back to the track for another weekend this month so I figured I should start getting the car ready.

I cooked the brake pads a few months ago but never changed them. Now the front rotors have surface cracks and are badly glazed. To rememdy this I ordered a set of QFM A1RM pads and some new front rotors, DBA T3 4000 series 'Club Spec' rotors, to fit R33 GTS-T - I figured this was a good opportunity to put the R33 front calipers on. Pretty keen to have the car pulling up properly, the brakes have always been crap on this car.

You can sort of see the cracks here



The rotors are still close to new in terms of thickness so I probably could have had them machined and kept using them, but I wanted to put the R33 stuff on some time and it's fun to have fancy new parts.

Also a shot of the front brakes so I can compare when the R33 fronts are on.



I'm running a Z32 gearbox in my car with a cut/shut SR20/RB25 bellhousing. I opted to use an RB25/R33 slave cylinder with this setup and the holes for the slave cyl. were tapped straight into the bellhousing. There wasn't a lot of meat for them to bit into and after changing my slave to a 7/8" bore, the bolt holes were stripping. I took the car back to the fabricator who did the work and he was more than happy to fix it up for me (no cost). The solution was a block of alloy with some new threads tapped in, lots of thread to bite into now.

Here is the section cut out of the bellhousoing


New block of alloy welded in, can also see the 7/8" slave cylinder here


You might remember the Bilstein gear I picked up a while ago


But the previous owner didn't have any locking collars on the fronts at all, he was trying to stop them moving by using a combination of fencing wire, hose clamps and silicone. Pretty bad.


I looked around for a while but couldn't find any new locking collars in Australia to suit these. It's an OEM S14 strut with a threaded sleeve welded on (coilover kit). I eventually realised I should just call a Bilstein retailer - this should have been my first thought.



Shiny! New locking collars. Turns out I have Bilstein dampers with a Koni coilover kit, these locking collars are a Koni part.


Before ordering the new collars I bought some blown HKS coilovers to try and salvage the parts I needed but the threads were different



You can see the fronts have Noltec camber/caster plates, the use an M8 bolt but my S14 uses an M10. I'm not sure what the previous owner did about this (spacer maybe?) but I bought the bits to tap an M10x1.25 thread and put new bolts in to fit the S14. Does anyone know of a better solution?

Few random bits because I have the pictures
I had lock nuts on the back wheels and lost the key. These are on so tight that welding a nut on won't work, it just snaps off. Best solution we came up with was to drill them out, such a crap job. Started at 3mm and it come out at 11mm in 0.5mm increments.


Lastly, Nulon! Love Nulon gear. I used to use Penrite but I think the Nulon is a step up. This brake fluid is great, rated to 270deg and only $8 per bottle.


Thanks for looking, I'll update more regularly now as I get the car ready for another weekend at the track.

Cheers.

[sweefu]

It's dark and cold outside so I'm not working on the car tonight, so here is a bit of an update about where it's at.

I'll start with the end of the Bilstein stuff

The Noltec camber/castor tops had M8 bolts, but S14 uses M10. I'm not sure if the previous owner was using a spacer or something but they wouldn't fit properly for my car. To fix this I drilled/tapped M10x1.25 threads into the plate (alloy, nice and easy) then fitted M10x1.25 40mm bolts. I don't have a work bench or vice at my place so it was a bit more time consuming than it should have been.

I like to use Sutton bits for cutting when I can, this is the tap (carbon, tapered) and a 8.8mm drill bit


No vice = clamped to old table


Overall it was pretty easy


Top assembled with the correct bolts


Coilover finished with new locking collar/modified top






I cleaned all the gunk/glue out of the threads with a wire wheel, came up very well


Done!






Fitted


After dropping the car back on the ground I found that the springs compressed a lot. Thanks for the help with this guys, turns out the springs are too long/soft for my application.


Because of this reason, I decided I needed to take a different approach to fixing the suspension. With my weekend at the track just 1 week away, I settled on this solution.


Can't beat that.


I used these same coilovers in my last car with great success. Nice build quality and all spare parts are available locally. I opted for 8kg/mm front and 7kg/mm rear.


The front mounts are offset for negative camber, plus camber tops. Dampers are adjustable (rebound, 16 clicks). Base height adjustable and spring preload adjustment too. Great gear, it's very exciting to have these and finally put an end to my suspension problems.

I fitted up the new brakes too. I now have
R33 GTS-T front calipers
DBA 4000 series T3 296x30mm front rotors
QFM A1RM pads front/rear (standard rear brakes)
Nulon fluid




I need to bleed them again and I have a slight squeal occasionally - is there something I should check for this?
I cleaned the hub face with brake cleaner and a wire wheel on a drill. I didn't lubricate the slide pins in the front caliper so I'm going to do this and see if it helps. Is there anything else I should check?

While the Koenigs were off I gave them a quick clean. Later in the year I would love to have these refurbished and find a set of 18x10 +20ish for the rear. These are 17x9 +9 with big brake clearance. They clear my R33 brakes with miles to spare


I did some more work on my day off this week. I made this bracket to hold my fire extinguisher (last time I forgot about this and had to use self tapping screws into the trans tunnel, far from ideal).

Very basic bracket



I used M8 bolts/nyloc nuts. Overkill but it's what I had laying around




Fitted to the car. It bolts in using the front seat rail bolts.


That pretty much brings me up to date for now. Tomorrow I will fit the new suspension and check the brakes etc. I still want to stiffen up my gearbox mount and do a few small things like plugs and fuel filter before I head to the track.
The car is also booked in for an alignment on Wednesday, I'm very excited to have working suspension and a good wheel alignment for the first time in this car.

Cheers.

[s0fa king]

pics aren't working.

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by s0fa king

pics aren't working.

Sorry about that mate!
Pics are working on my end

[jr_ss]

You need more bandwidth. You either have to upgrade your account or host at a different place. They aren't working on NRR either.

[sweefu]

Man I suck at having a build thread, I haven't updated it since the last weekend at the track which was months ago.

The car hasn't change very much since then, as always I've been driving it to work every day and it's still proving to be reliable.

I started to fix up the mess of wiring behind the headunit. The car had a whole stereo and alarm install from a 'professional' shop and it's all complete garbage. I should just rip it all out and start again but I couldn't be bothered for the moment. I did get rid of the DVD headunit and install an Alpine 9887 though.

I'll let the pictures do the talking because I've almost forgotten how everything went the weekend I was at the track.

I do know that the same week I went to the track I got new shoes, wearing these to a track event in Winter was never a good idea but my feet did stay dry!


I fitted up my new brakes and suspension


I pumped my flimsy OEM gearbox mount with Sikaflex




I got an alignment, it was pretty out of whack before after lowering. I don't have any adjustable arms in the rear so I couldn't get everything correct properly, I'll buy arms as soon as I can


Packed up and ready to go! There's a photo at the bottom of the page to show how much junk I crammed into it


But you can't leave for a weekend at the track without delicious, delicious sandwiches (I spent all my money on my car = no money for food)


I met up with my mate half way


Then we could cruise down to the track together. We encountered plenty of 'traffic' on the way there, including a really cool Kouki S14


Got to the track, set up and made it through the first day. Although, the track conditions were very poor, wet and the track got covered in mud pretty fast


There was a skidpan which was good for practicing, I was a bit scared to hit the full track hard when it was busy/wet, too scared to bin my daily car!


This is turn 1 halfway through the first day


Yep, muddy. That's my buddy Dave's sexy 15x9 0 SSR MK3


This guy was killing it too, check out his Facebook page for more videos of his car - Brutal all out VE Maloo! https://www.facebook.com/tracktime



Lining up for the skidpan, car looking used


More mud, everything was mud


Bought this wheels for drifting as I didn't have many 17" spares. They are an Australian made 3 piece in 17x8 0 offset. Sorta cool, don't suit the car though


Nankang mud



Back in the pit bay, my friend munched his front lip on a cone


Gotta fix it!


We had a great setup that weekend


Hot food was a bonus, it was pretty cold


More mud, constant mud


I was trying out my Ram Mount, pretty sturdy and has never fallen off - used with my Panasonic FT-3 camera


I'll continue the update in the next post

[sweefu]

Back at the track on the Sunday and the weather was clearing up, great news



After dinner on the Saturday night I washed my car at a local carwash, it was so covered in mud and looked pretty rough, plus it's hard to spot broken/bent stuff when the car is covered in mud


She still cleans up ok!



My mate Dave blew a hole in his block


Video of said hole in the block can be found here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyYFfp79kIM

Dave had to tow home, he drove it about 700km to the track while towing a trailer full of tyres! No one will be as committed or as ballsy as this guy


I gained a bit more confidence on the full track after it dried up a bit




Brakes doing well on their first track weekend


At the end of the weekend I had to pack all this back into my S14


Don't forget room for me too



This is the aftermath of -3.5 camber on the rear, I really need some adjustable arms


I had to run stock wheels for a while on the front after drifting too many tyres away, I still love this car, even though it looks like a Camry


A nice photographer grabbed this shot while I had matching wheels, a very rare occurrence


Here is a video of me and my friend with the white R31 - pretty poor driving from me
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRkq...DJos8W_aiZiSEw

I also found that guy with the Kouki S14 - the one I saw driving down the highway on the trailer. I didn't know him but we nodded and went for a slide
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiqW...DJos8W_aiZiSEw
It's weird trying to tandem with someone you don't know!

This is me having a crack at the dry skidpan (sort of dry). I've pretty much lost all my driving skill from a couple of years ago, back to basics for me. Still a bunch of fun though!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndS7...DJos8W_aiZiSEw

Cheers guys

[sweefu]

Long time, no post!

I've got a bit of spare time tonight, all this week I have been getting ready for my first tarmac rally event. I'm only entered into the touring class as my car is way off meeting the regs for the competitive class.

A couple of months ago I invested in a good set of daily tyres on sensible (boring size) wheels. These will double as my tarmac rally tyres too, should be fine for the touring class + rain is forecast

Michelin Pilot Sport 3 in 235/45r17



The fronts are on 17x8 +35 wheels and the rears 17x9 +38. Ideally I would run spacers all round but there isn't any real need. The tyres definitely sit better on the 9" rims, comparison picture below




Next up I changed the rear discs. This was cheaper than machining them. When I changed pads last time I didn't machine the discs and apparently my new pad compound didn't mix with my old compound or something, anyway rear brakes didn't bite and they needed a clean surface. Solution = new RDA rotors and scuff up my old pads on concrete.




Pads did look a bit shiny/glazed


This is what the rear pads looked like after a scuff up, they seem to be biting well now


Also cleaned up my rear hubs. I don't have a runout gauge so I just assumed a good cleanup would be OK


Next up was camber arms, the car was running -3.5 camber static which was bad for everything. I was only using about 1/3 of the tyre + uneaven wear. I wanted to get some decent arms but chose China because they were cheap.


As you'd expect, they didn't go in that easily. Some of the bolt holes were too small (1mm) and they didn't come with longer bolts which are required for them to be safe.

Comparison


And installed


New bolts, I tried to get these from Bunnings after work which was a bad idea, right size but wrong thread pitch. I was just being lazy and trying to save going to a bolt shop. I also bought some goop to fix up some exhaust leaks


Last week Repco had a sale on so I got a bunch of oil filters cheap, happy days


No more of my Pitworks filters left


New air filter too, I have a K&N in there (previous owner put it in) but it's annoying to clean so I'll try a normal filter for a while


One of the last things left on my list to do before heading off tomorrow, bolt the cage back in!


I'm taking my camera this weekend so I'll get some video and post it up when I'm back


I'll try remember to take some pictures and get decent video, and update more often than once every 4 months.

Cheers

[sweefu]

The Snowy River Sprint was awesome! I had so much fun, overall the car performed well and I managed not to bin it in the wet.

Numbers on



First off, here is a video of half a stage on the second day. After posting this on Facebook I've had some good advice about how I use the steering wheel, in the video I don't pay much attention to how I'm holding the wheel. That's something I'll keep in mind for the next event.

The brakes got a bit warm on some of the bigger stages (36km no stops) and so did the tyres (still running 235/45r17 Michelin Pilot Sport 3).

an FD RX7 was running 17x9 Buddy Club P1's with 255/40r17 R comps all round, this is some inspiration for me, I'd love to fit that size wheel/tyre to my S14 in the future. I know from looking at some other build threads on here that lots of you US guys seem to fit it ok!


The car seemed to unload/load the front tyres a lot through fast S bends, this makes me think I need to upgrade my swaybars - would that be correct? It seemed like the car would lean A LOT from one front wheel to the other. I know my springs were too hard too, I have already been planning to switch to 7kg front and 5kg rear for a while, this should be better for street + rally.

The only things I broke all weekend were rubber exhaust hangers (still need to get my exhaust fixed up) and a steering rack boot.



Numbers off and ready for the drive home, the event was about 5 hours from my place.


Thanks.