So my cousin has bought this. He is looking after my zed atm too so has an awesome driveway.

 

Problem is he bought is a bit blind, it seems a really good car but we don't know anything more than this advert. (It was a suprise to me by the way I knew nothing till the picture came through)

 

 

Im a but concerned that it has an aftermarket turbo, exhaust and intercooler and hasn't been mapped at all. And it has BOVs.

 

I will be grateful for any advice or knowledge you guys may have to help us make this car all it can be.

 

Thanks.

Get it plugged into a Consult and get the standard readings.

Have a mooch on GTR forum or Skyline owners and there'll be some threads there with baseline readings you need to be looking for.

Good idea Lex, it's probably OBD1 in 1995.

I always wanted a skyline, any model other than the r33 that is.

Don't get me wrong, they ain't bad cars but they are by far the least pleasing on the eye.

I have only been in a few (only lightly modified) and can honest say that although I was expecting something a bit exciting, was extremely disappointed and underwhelmed by their performance.

I was thinking of trading my daily drive in at some point for one but just to be different and still practical it would have to be a 5 door version :thumbup:

How does it drive Tom?

I am making my way home from Chiv at the minute, spending tonight at Brize with Sarah, so I don't know yet.

 

He reckons it feels like a modern car, doesn't give much away to the people inside that it's anything out the ordinary... but it is really fast. He said it is less lairy than my zed, but it's 200bhp down so it will be.

 

Do not worry, I will find out this week :)

:tank:

All r33's are consult, and yes it definitely needs mapping if it's got a different intercooler, turbo and whatever else. The standard ECU can't even handle a boost increase all that happily, so I'd expect it currently has a lovely flat spot at 5k rpm where the ECU pulls the timing back to 5 degrees.

If you need any help with it by the way, just ask, I'm in Harrogate, and I'm also on skylineowners.com since I've had one for the past five years now and fixed plenty of them.

Cheers Stu :thumbup1: hopefully I can get it on a laptop tonight or tomorrow.

 

I expect it has perhaps been chipped at least. Who in their right mind would change all that and just run the car!

You'd be surprised mate, I've seen loads do it over the years, assuming the ECU will just learn and adapt...

I have driven it, about 30 miles, at midnight on a Sunday, in the wilds of the north east.

 

It's quite a nice car. Initially it gives off a lot of positive vibes as everything you touch in the first minute has a feeling of quality. Deep clunks from the locks, a secure door shut by your side, a slight but solid wheel to wrap your hands around and a reassuring solid engagement into first.

 

At this point I will say, It is ****ing loud!

 

It pulls away easilly with no desire to stall and drives like a normal car. Once fueled and warmed I started to do the car equivalent of warm up lunges, testing the waters around 40mph in third massaging heat into the brakes and engine, listening to the turbo shrieking, a sound like a passing train with a stuck brake, miniaturised and doing laps of the glove box. It had a slight hesitancy on/off throttle and a rather indecisive yet eager response to boost, I feel there was some room for better mapping as it starts to go, slacks off a bit, then hits the low boost limit of 9psi but then pushes very smoothly round to the red line, by which time it sounds like a dentist drill, both in tone and in the way the sound seems to be inside your head.

 

So how fast is it? Quite fast, about 260bhp by my backside. It has nothing like the response of a zed, gutless would be too harsh, more like a top end rush than a bottomless bottom. It also feels ver long geared, I was looking well down the road but it seemed to do at least 60 in second and I short shifted. A fairly high rev limit and a lack of torque make the gears feel even longer.

 

It handles quite well, but has a very intrusive feeling HICAS, I think because it is the electronic HICAS system, it seems to be rear steering all the time, rather than the more subtle way a zed does. This made the GTST very nimble but a little numb around the centre of the steering, it is very low at the rear and some feel may be regained with some suspension adjustments. The one time I started to squirt myself round a bend the wheel guided itself through my relaxed hands and is probably a real hoot once you get your eye in, but the lack of torque and 'ridonkulous' exhaust stopped me having a look more than once.

 

In other news: The brakes are rubbish, a deep pedal and a rumbly nose.The gearbox is very very good. And it used to be an auto.

 

A remap, some suspension changes and some brakes and it'll be a hoot :)

It sounds not to bad Tom :thumbup1: good but with some updates it would be a great car :)

The hicas acting as you describe could be down to how the speedo is converted. To do it properly, you remove the clocks, take the speedo out, then remove j4 and change the calibration pads. I wrote a thread covering how to do it on the skylineowners forum if you fancy a look.

The brakes are rubbish, a deep pedal and a rumbly nose.

 

They mentioned on an early Top Gear that the R32 or R33 had an issue with the brakes exploding! :pinch:

Never heard that one, but yeah they're shite. :)

The brakes, well, they are ruined, so they are warped and worn. But I get the feeling they won't be that good in full working order. They feel very very servo assisted. The booster in the engine bay is enormous and the deep pedal I think would be there on good brakes.

 

Am I right Stu? What are his options for replacements?

 

We could have a poke about in the back of the clocks but they appear to have been converted fairly accurately. Not to say it has been done correctly.

To be fair, they're better than standard zed brakes normally. As for options, what will fit a zed will fit an r33, so gtr brembos, etc. Got r34 front brakes on mine, which are a bit better, just had to drill the hole out by 2mm.

 

As for the speedo, it doesn't matter if the gauge is accurate, the speed signal to the ECU and hicas can still be wrong. Consult would show that up.

Stuart, have a green bar :thumbup1:

Old thread so probably irrelevant now, but tell him to lock the HICAS. It's cheap enough to do with a lock-out bar.

 

You really don't want a 20+ year old car trying to steer its rear wheels. It doesn't add to the driving enjoyment when it is working, and if it isn't working properly then it will throw you into a hedge, or worse.

 

How is it running now out of interest?