Right, thought I'd start this. As some of you may know my cars a bit broken at present and I have a pile of parts ready to fit that gets bigger without it making its way to the car.

 

So lets start with what's up with the engine. Myself and gaz pulled the engine about two winters ago now, as one of the turbo's had failed. Compression was tested at this time with a very even 170psi across the board. Pulling it all apart we found a multitude of issues, egr hanging off causing an exhaust leak old sockets rolling about etc etc. We took that time to replace every damn crusty water and vac pipe and delete just about anything I considered a waste of space.

Water plenum bypass,

EGR,

AIV,

PRV,

Cruise control,

Aircon,

Think that's all. The turbos were rebuild by myself and for the first 50-100 miles things were bob on and I didn't give it too much stick. The first couple of pulls it detonated, new plugs, reduced the issue but it still did it a bit. Changed to a smaller gap and great the det was gone. The car was pulling very well at this point with virtually no lag and was dyno'd at 289hp bone stock, no extra boost no chip. Not bad for an old auto engine. Sadly it had started to smoke on over run, I assumed id cocked up one of the turbos during the rebuild. So I had been putting it off for months, well actually years now to pay out for brand new turbos. Anyways as the tax ran out I thought id do some more inspecting as the symptoms just didn't fit the pattern of failed turbos. The first thing I found was that lovely even compression was no more, cyl had a rather lame 115psi. Cue further inspection to work out exactly what block I had, manual/auto etc I assumed it was auto. That's when I found this...

That head casting reads R-10Y, wtf is that I thought. It's supposed to read 40P this was one of those penny drop moments. The piston crown sealed that moment of realisation and many dots connected.

That's right its an NA, 30p pistons are NA and 30p1 are TT defiantly no 1 on that code. Turns out r-10y is the later spec NA head aswell, so yeas 100% an NA block. Now this engine was fitted by a garage 4 years ago a few months into my ownership and we wont go into that too much but it wasn't a great experience and it transpires it was worse than I first thought. Anyway whilst they refused to reimburse me for that error, a good will gesture was sent out to me in the post of a few quid.

So a replacement engine is going to be sourced and fitted this winter. More of that and what's happening to the current late spec NA block.

 

So now more about that shelf of parts. I purchased last winter a full rear subframe assembly off Jaffa, the one off his time attack car. Loads of goodies already polybushed to death etc. So I stripped it down to bare metal and started painting it all with a few coats of lovely hammerite. This is how it stands at present;

So this winters aims are.

Remove front and rear bumpers, re underseal all of that and rip out and guff.

Delete HICAS system

Reloacte PS reservoir and fusebox

Switch over all suspension to new units from the shelf

Fit 354mm diameter brembos

Change engine out and preform various mods

It sounds like a lot, but hey winter is along time. Don't expect it to be coming through thick and fast. Im lazy haha

Give us a shout if you need a hand any time buddy.

Give us a shout if you need a hand any time buddy.

 

Cheers bud, at some point we've got that bit of metal bending to do :D

 

 

 

;)

I know it looks so squiffy in those pics, but it is actually level honest lol.

So made a quick adjustment this week, finally got my mits on a stock gear knob. Mondo is going to retrim it in due corse but a test fit shows how it nicely finishes the interior.

Over the evenings I've been stripping the sub frame down, I couldn't logically remove it in one piece. Had some issues with the hub nuts but a borrowed snap-on impact driver solved that. This morning I finished ripping out the last bits. Just the fuel tank to come out now.

Only hiccup I had today was getting the rear brake discs off, Nissan very helpfully added some 8mm threaded holes. These make disc removal a doddle except the bolts I had were shouldered making them about 10mm short of useful and they were all I had being housebound today. Easily solved though...

Balls!!!

Bit behind on pictures but I've hit all loose underseal under the car. Any surface rust has been wire wheeled with the grinder, rust converted(just for peace of mind), zinc primed & hammerited. Then I've put a fresh coat of underseal with wax oil from the handbrake connections back minus above the fuel tank which will get the same treatment next winter, which it appears it will appricate.

Rear subframe is almost ready for reassembly. Just got to collect some little bits, it's a tomorrow job although with a small box of bits from FedEx, for what arrived a little while back from mr dent.

Hopefully by the time the weekends out it should be a big leap forward.

Picked these last suspension bits up today from the shot blasters, they did a great job of the pesky fuel filler cover plate thingy.

Zinc primed;

Hammerited, well one side anyways, takes years to dry that stuff;

And I picked up a Jiffy bag of joy from Z1 :D

An hour or two this afternoon and were getting a little progress sorted in the bay. Should be ready to pull very soon, fitting it in around other demands.

Need to remove the lower plenum from this block for the new one and the exhaust cam and CAS as it's a late style CAS, some joy ey.

Why haven't you finished her yet?

Come on hurry up..... show season is a coming...... lol

I just want to see you back on the road with that big beaming grin in my rear view mirror and your camera hanging out of the window...... lol

Hope your okay, will be nice to catch up with you sometime soon.....

I know mate it's scarey. A few months ago I had ages to finish the garden, do some bits in the house and finish paying for the wedding...suddenly the wedding is like 8-9 weeks away and japfest is like 7 weeks away. I feel like I fell asleep and woke up three months later, scarey. By this time next week though il be a way forward all things being equal, I can work pretty fast when the motivation takes me haha.

I'm sure we will see each other over the show season. Your always welcome to have a cuppa if your in my county as well mate.

Well yesterday wasn't quite as smooth as I intended. I had to go get my hair cut for starters, which just destroys the morning them runaround picking up supplies such as some 75-90 for the diff. Anyway, the subframe was a complete bitch to fit, weather that's because it's on solid mounts or that's just how it goes i don't know. I even dropped it at one point and give myself a bloody nice mark all down my neck, apparently it looks gangster so that's fine. There's no way it would have gone into position as an assembled unit with the facilities I had to hand. But some very slow inching in, patience and persuading saw it home. Hubs refitted, driftworks hicas delete fitted, and all other arms aside from the camber arm(needs some work). That's sadly it right now because that diff oil I brought was gearbox oil doh! Less haste more speed.

The arches have been cleaned and re under sealed since this pic and the brake calipers will be coming off they are just finger tight so they arnt hanging around or in the way. Sadly I think il have to reuse the old discs which are within spec for a month or so due to the budjet, they are perfectly functional and that is a big factor ATM.

Nice work there Stephen ( or is it alcapone) now haha

Actually it's mother f'er Jones... :lol:

Edited April 6, 201510 yr by Stephen

Pretty :thumbup:

Looking good keep up the good work ;)

Believe it or not after about 4 hours of work in total the engine is almost ready to pull. Just the starter, ps pump, alternator, engine mounts and bell housing bolts to go, oh and slacken the subframe an inch or so. So by the weekend it will be ready to come out.

Well I've been working a lot recently, spent a fair portion of last week comuting back and forth from South Wales. However I did manage to fit in some automotive based worked. The cam belt has been changed, all for the better really. It was done fairly recently according to the literature that came with the donor car, despite this the cam belt pulleys were all noisey and the the one on the tensioner had started to part with it's grease. Soon sorted that though.

Got some bits holding me up though;

1. An injector which is toast, infinite resintance, dead. So that needs replacing.

2. After finally getting to the bottom of the lower plenum/fuel mystery I have a pair of gromits missing.

3. I can't assemble the upper water pipe as one of the short hoses has a crack, only in the outer but still only a few years old...

This is how the block stands ATM, I'm a bit further ahead than this but yeah.

Nice little PCV delete.

That's about it ATM, lots of little bits to finish up on, I'm getting there though.

Tried this yesterday and failed, I only had a three hour window to do it and I was going to have to change the hacking positions to finish up safely. Anyways I formed a plan after chatting with gaz. So I got up sorted myself out and went for my Sunday run then straight home ready to pull the damn thing. By 9am the gearbox was on the floor and the engine tucked out back. This stage saw a sigh of relief.

its 11.30 I've got up, been for a run, dropped a gearbox, pulled an engine, tidied up, showered, dressed, done the food shopping and had a well earned bacon and a fresh laidly egg sarnine. Productive morning. Always nice.

The new block is ready to go in, all dressed aside from the alternator and ps pump, which I like to do in situee.

The rear end just needs the coilovers popped back in and the hand brake assembled. Nearly there now, really nearly there. I'm on call this weekend so fingers crossed I will manage to get some more done and all being equal the block will be in. Hoping to mot it next weekend.

Oh and this is way more of pain to fit than I had in mind, I thought it would take all of five minutes...wrong!

Good work on the cam belt Stephen :thumbup1: do you want to do mine? :biggrin:

Er no...lol. TBF that was one of the easiest jobs I've done recently. Time consuming but one of those things you can just relax and tinker away. I did consult the FSM and text gaz a few times for reassurance but yeah, Nissan made it pretty user friendly.