Gav's 200sx RPS13 1JZGTE of race car.

[~Slideways~]

Hey guys, "is my car old school"?

Ha... anyway.

I'd always wanted a 180sx as a track car while still being road legal, but over the years they got more rare and therefore expensive. I already had a stripped out 214kw AE92 Trueno as a toy, plus I had a baby on the way, and just bought a house after scrambling to sell the last one, and just got married....so what does any sane person do in this situation?

Cue "Selling my cars to fund baby"?

Nooooo, instead I managed to convince the wife it was a great idea to buy another car as a "long term race car project".

Because: "I won't have time to go to events with small baby dude duties....BUT I could still pop into the garage every now and then right?? RIGHT?"

It was true though, even though the AE92 jobbie was good to go I really wasn't going to be able to use it for ages. And I was a bit bored of it.

This all came about when I found a rolling body 1990 200sx S13, it was rough and had the interior stripped. Crucially the reg was on hold. So I bought it without an engine, gearbox, ecu or loom. It had some history with a log book and the previous owner had been racing it with an NA SR20DE, until it put a leg out of bed.

Before him, it had been R fckn B'd and before that it was an NZ New CA18DET jobbie.

So, it was rough, but it was a good base. This was around late 2014 / early 2015.

My idea was to fit a VVTI 1JZGTE since our 'family' car was a JZX100 Chaser Tourer V, of which I fell in love with the max torque from 2400 and lovely sound at 7000rpm (I recommended Adrenalin-R stuff very much).

The aforementioned Chaser was an Auto, which is actually great fun for an auto (had shift kit fitted). I had planned to fit an R154 (a few years before spawning) but the wife loved the auto and power. So I left it.

Move forward a few years and then the plan of a 1JZGTE VVTI 180sx/200sx with R154 was born, along with a tiny human.

First up was buying the 200sx.

This is how it was advertised:

 

I sold the rear wing and the steering wheel (pretty sure it wasn't a real Momo because it was floppy and I have a non-floppy Momo already).

[~Slideways~]

*insert baby chaos*

 

*time passes*

 

*chaos continued*

 

THEN, I decided that I have never imported a car from Japan or have any idea how to do so, or if it is even worth it. So I bought TWO cars.

 

Wife SO happy.

 

The reason I did this is because 1JZGTE VVTI aren't very common in NZ and even less so with everything you need. I contemplated buying a brand new R154 but then when I added up the cost of this plus Loom, ECU, Clutch bits, flywheel, sensors, etc etc. I added up so quick that I contact a place in Japan and long story short found a mildly damaged JZX100 Mark II with all of the parts I needed, as well as stuff that I could sell.

 

The JZX100 Mark II was never going to get on the road in NZ without repairs, cert etc etc because it was a low spec converted to Tourer V spec. So I decided to import for parts.

 

While looking I came across a damaged 180sx, low km's tidy interior and it looked like it might have some aftermarket stuff (I didn't mention this stuff on auction sheet). So I took a punt and got it.

 

Yay!....now wtf do I do...I own two cars in Osaka, Japan. I don't live in Osaka Japan.

 

But the guys at Stacked helped a lot and I ended up with two cars to strip and a big hole in the mortgage. A bad hole, not a good one.

 

IT STILL MADE SENSE IN MY HEAD.

 

Yes I spent far more than I would have buying an Engine and gearbox in NZ. But I would now have heaps of spares and even a front cut and rear quarter if something were to happen.

 

And before hand I had/have a spreadsheet of all the parts and a guestimate of the value to sell and how much it would have cost if I needed it anyway.

 

Of course none of these costs take into account the countless hours of stripping two cars. advertising, packaging, answering tard questions, couriering etc etc

 

THEN, I decided to part out the Trueno. I had been advertising it to fund the 200sx, but having no luck. Plus this meant I could keep a lot of parts like the oil cooler set up, AGM battery, race seat etc which again all adds up.

 

SO....stripping THREE fcking cars while with a new born.

 

Wife SO happy.

 

 

 

 

The JZX100 fresh from Japan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[~Slideways~]

The Mark II as I picked it up from the yard, very flat battery. The guy there was all 'I didn't know these things had those engines?'

Drove it up and down the street to line up with my trailer, went very well and big grins.

The diff was very locked.

Stripped shell, trying to get it on the trailer by myself. I have a trailer winch, but haven't made a mount for it yet, so chocked the trailer and tied a tow rope to the 4wd and dragged it on.

 

And the imported 180sx of max drifted into a pole, as it arrived. It looks to me as if the original owner either had very strange taste in wheels, or kept what ever was on the front. Also that front bumper, holy shit.

[~Slideways~]

Noooo I didn't see the rule about thread titles, now I can't add the year.

Anyway.

Stripping the imported 180sx.

I sold the SR20DET which was one of the quietest SR's I've every heard or driven around the block totally legally. The engine, ecu, loom, gbox, pedals etc went to a guy from Auckland (I'm in Wgtn) who was converting an N/A auto one.

You meet good people doing this sort of stuff. Just an observation. Also some of whom you wish hadn't been in your garage. But that's the minority.

Stripping it as it was first parked. Those wheels right? 19's with terrible offset, WITH 30+ wide guards too? YES.

 

These front quarter races were a nice surprise:

As was this Blitz intercooler:

It had an engine:

It also came with an awesome Mini Disc stereo WITH awesome japanese music mini disc still in there.

It also had a reverse camera rear view mirror which I thought was a bit out of place, but I plan to put it on my Safari.

I continued to strip the bejesus out of it every time I had a spare moment amongst trying to figure out how babies work.

Stripped right down to the whole body loom front to back.

Stripping:

Strippppingnnnnggggg:

MTHRFCKN STRIPPPINGGG:

 

RAAAAA:

aaaaAAA:

That'll do:

[SiRge]

How do you convince wives of this whole spending money on cars thing? I need dis. I want to import the least most practical cars ever, one day.

[kyteler]

Awesome combo, would love one the same.

[M M]

How do you convince wives of this whole spending money on cars thing? I need dis. I want to import the least most practical cars ever, one day.

Cool project Slideways, will be following.

[~Slideways~]

Cheers guys, I'll put up some more updates tomorrow.

Wife wise I guess I just got lucky and/or she knew that cars/projects weren't a just a hobby and I've never been stupid about it throwing money away. My car projects have almost always started off as cheap fixer uppers and I've done most work myself, instead of going out and buying a $30k car which we couldn't afford.

Blah blah back to building race car haha

[~Slideways~]

For the hell of it I test fitted my Enkei RPF1 17x9's, the tyres aren't the right profile here but they would suit it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I then sold a lots of things from both imported cars to get some of the money back.

 

 

Here is a list of the things I've sold so far, the descriptions are directly from my spreadsheet so not overly good:

Sr20 + gbox + dshaft + pedals

Window Switch + rubber seal

Wing mirrors

Gtr seats

Teins 1

Strut Brace jzx

19" wheels

SRS sensors jzx

Front indicators jzx

Boot + lights jzx

180 coilovers

Brakes 180sx

Dshaft jzx

Cltuch pedal jzx

Clutch master jzx

Gbox trim jzx

Centre console jzx

Hbrake + cables jzx

Teins 2

Rear subframe + diff + shafts JZX

Front x-member

JZX bonnet + Pass guard + seats + lights

GTR 16x8's x2

 

JZX brake pedal

F/R guard + dash trim + cup holder

Bumper indicators JZX

Rear windscreen JZX

Visor Clips

1jzgte alloy mounts

Caster arms jzx

JZX passenger guard 

Airbag sensors JZX

JZX rubber bonnet seal

JZX shell + radiators + cat's

CT15B turbo + manifold + j-pipe +dwn

 

 

 

Here is a list of the parts I know I will keep from the imported JZX and 180sx:

JZX Engine + ECU + Loom

JZX Gbox + Clutch + Flywheel

 

JZX Dash cluster and loom

180sx Dash Cluster and loom

180sx rear bumper

180sx LSD

180sx carpet

180sx carbon bonnet

180sx front 30mm+ guards

180sx 3" stainless exhaust

180sx front arms

180sx doors

180sx strut brace(S)

180sx front 1/4 braces

180sx front chassis brace

180sx after market lights/carbon/trim

 

There is also a long list of parts I sold from parting out the Trueno but that's less relevant to this, but it did provide a large chunk of the race car budget.

 

I did keep these from the Trueno:

Oil Cooler

Speedflow fittings,

Braided lines. 

t_bolt clamps

2L custom oil catch can, twin breathers 

Remote Oil Filter 

GFB BOV 

AGM lightweight battery

3” downpipe to 2.5” 

I/C Plumbing

 

Silicon Joiners

 

 

 

 

[~Slideways~]

So then after a bunch of research I found some engine and gearbox mount that would work and they would allow me to fit it as far back and low as possible. These came in from the States and were a pain in the arse because the supplier wouldn't send to NZ. So I had to use NZ Post's You Shop thing, that worked pretty well apart from a guaranteed GST bill...

 

The other pain was that the US site wouldn't take my Credit Card payment because the billing address was different due to the You Shop "fake" warehouse address. Gahhh so I ended up having to use PayPal, and because NZ PayPal is dumb, you can't top up from your bank account...more fees....yay.

 

These work with an SR20 crossmember and mounts. I will be filling the mounts with urethane though, since they are pretty soft. If that doesn't work out I'll buy some 'race' SR mounts.

 

 

 

This was pretty much the only 'bought' part of the conversion, I've done a lot of welding, wiring etc etc to come.

The 1JZ with R154 (non remote shift) looks....BIG when sitting out of the car: 

 

 

 

Empty 200sx:

 

But it fits! And much lower than the SR would. Also further back and lower than an RB would be when people use the Nissan parts bin for an RB crossmember.

 

 

 

Sorry about the image size, they aren't the originals because I'm at work. Working.

[~Slideways~]

The R154 is a non remote, even though JZX100's were meant to have the remote shift. The Mark II was converted in Japan.

 

But the shifter position only needed a bit of cutting to the tunnel and the lever to have an s-bend and its perfect.

 

 

 

 

 

Test fit of a radiator, this came with the 200sx rolling body, its a decent-ish Redline thing but I will be using the radiator that came in the imported 180sx. It looks brand new and is a triple core (think it was a Koyo). 

 

Either way, not much chance of using the 1JZ viscous fan....

 

 

 

Test fit on the fibreglass front guards from the imported 180sx. These are excellent quality, perfect fit. They are branded 'WONDER' inside, which apparently is a good Japanese brand.

 

 

 

 

 

[~Slideways~]

The front guards are +30mm wide each side, I wanted to find some suitable rear quarter wide body 'over fenders' because I wanted to fit wide wheels.

 

Plus the added bonus of cutting out some rust and dents when I cut the rear arches.

 

So out comes the angle grinder:

 

 

 

 

I welded these up to seal and I think I did a pretty decent job.

 

Then I bought some Origin Lab +55mm rear over fender:

 

 

It makes the GTR 16x8's look tiny. Doesn't matter, I only had a pair anyway. 

[~Slideways~]

I do have a set of 17x9 RPF1's, but no tires so I would be needing those.

 

I then came across a set of unused 17x9.5 -20 RKR's with some awesome Yokohama AD08R's 245 wide, with the cost of new tyres I couldn't pass up buying these.

 

I had Watanabe's on my old race car so snapped these up. They aren't Watanabe's but neither is your mum.

 

I am still usign the RPF1's, but will probably be with some Semi Slicks.

 

17x9.5 -20 is a pretty aggressive offset but they fit the +55 rears perfectly, the 30+ front...not so much...but I have a few idea. Do not want stupid camber though.

 

 

This is up on axle stands so big gap, the car won't be super low anyway.

 

[~Slideways~]

Before buying the RKR's I test fitted them because the Nissan 4 pot calipers often don't clear lots of wheels.

 

These JUST touch the raised NISSAN lettering, so is fine with lettering removed.

 

 

You can see the calipers have been shaved in this photo, sort of. But also the quarter braces fitted after repainting the area under the guard black.

 

[~Slideways~]

Those with an eagle eye will have noticed in the list of sold stuff, the factory CT15B and manifold etc was in there.

 

And the photo of the quarter brace has a little surprise poking out.

 

Yes, after much deliberation, even after buying a laser cut flange in order to make a better downpipe to free up some free powers from the ct15b. I decided that I'm going to fit a better turbo.

 

Lots and lots of research and I ended up with a Holset Hx35 with twin scroll 12cm exh side. These have been confirmed to work very well on 1JZ's and are capable of 500+ powers of horses.

 

But this was never going to work with the factory log manifold, it looks so very restrictive too.

 

I know the standard turbo is happy to supply 220kw atw but then they are also happy to throw ceramics at you.

 

So I sources the Holset.

 

It looks huge compared to the CT15B which is apparently the biggest factory turbo from Toyota.

 

 

 

 

Holsets are designed for diesels and to last half a million km's and they are built like brick shit houses with large shafts and huge housings. But through pure magic and jimi hendrix guitar solo's, they spool fast and flow like mofo's.

 

Anyway...that's what I read on the internet. So it must be true.

 

But to make this happen I need an aftermarket manifold, but I also need to buy food and 1000's of nappies.

 

So I decided, based on zero experience at all, that I would attempt to make one myself. 

 

And with the power of Google Images I had a design in mind.

 

Thus, bits arrived:

 

 

I also decided to controversially use 25nb pipe, when every man and his dog uses 32nb pipe.

 

The reason was, that the VVTI 1JZ has small exhaust ports to increase velocity and therefore response. So why fit pipe that is bigger?

 

The reason is 'YOU'LL LOSE TOP END POWERS'

 

Well at the top end, that may be true, but the negative effects of going from a small hole into a sausage in 6 hall ways, then trying to squeeze back into two (twin scroll) small holes again doesn't make sense to me.

 

So I'm going against the grain and making it out of 25nb sch40 stuff. 

 

My goal is making this turbo spool while supporting 300-350kw at the wheels. If I wanted more, then maybe 32nb would help the top end. 

 

To help with spool I have also opted to go through the effort of making the manifold twin scroll, because why wouldn't you?

 

 

Cutting pipe!

 

 

Looking at pipe!

 

Looking at three pipes that became one pipe:

 

Making pipe into sextopus:

 

 

By the way, I am mig welding the lot. Because I don't have a TIG. And well, I have a MIG.

 

 

Collector tacked together:

 

 

Positioning the turbo, using zip ties and a piece of wood:

 

 

From the above, I was able to tack some scrap metal between the head flange and the collector to make a sort of jig thing:

[~Slideways~]

Many many hours of cutting, shaping, fitting, refitting, testing for clearance etc etc it started to look like a manifold:

 

 

Welds don't look too bad (at least until I ran out of gas...)

 

Even so, smoothed it out anyway, there is plenty of penetration and all joins are 45deg tapered etc:

 

6 runners done and test fit number million:

 

Turbo bolted to manifold:

 

I still need to make the wastegate outlets and plumbing but before doing that I need to make a downpipe.

 

3" would work, but that's too easy says my stupid decision making process 'that's tight...MAKE IT BIGGER'.

 

3.5" would be doable, but 4" would touch the steering shaft.

 

But I couldn't find anyone who sold 3.5" mandrel bends, the only thing I could find was donuts with that horrible weld down the centre.

 

So I decided, again on zero experience, that I'll try out 'pie cutting' and I made this:

 

Inside because I thought it looked cool:

 

 

It's now 3.5" from the turbo down to the bottom of the fire wall, but since this is a Toyota engine in a Nissan chassis it was never meant to have an exhaust on that side. 

 

So I looked at it for ages thinking, can I fit a 3.5" flexi? That's going to be tight... gah just buy one and make it fit. So I bought a 3.5" flexi (surprisingly hard to find), I will probably shorten it as much as I can then see how much longer I can keep going with 3.5" before joining up to 3".

 

The imported 180sx came with a nice stainless 3" exhaust so I'm going to use the back section of that. It'll need to cross over the transmission tunnel to the 'normal side' and join behind the passenger seat somewhere.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[~Slideways~]

Along the way I fitted a Rocket Bunny rear wing, I've attached this and the rear quarter wide body stuff using M4 stainless steel button head bolts and rivnuts.

 

The wing needs a bit of trimming because of the rear quarters, but its almost there.

 

It turned out pretty good and I wanted the rear quarters to be easily removable. When it comes to certification time I will need to show the cut and welded rear arches.

 

 

Fitted white drivers door from donor (the car is going to be white) and the front guard to see how it looks:

 

EDIT: oh and also fitted Blitz intercooler and used a combination of 180sx intercooler pipes and some from the JZX one. Only needed to cut two pipes. I now need to put a bead on them.

 

There is not Throttle body on here too:

 

 

And with wheels and bonnet on to test for turbo clearance:

 

[~Slideways~]

To make it a nice curve from intercooler pipe into the throttle body I've shortened it by cutting out the ETCS Traction Control throttle body jobbie:

 

 

I'll need to get this TIG'd back together, at the same time I'll need to get a 90deg aluminium bend welded onto the turbo outlet.

 

Also, random photos:

 

17x9.5 -20's stick out a bit much even with +30mm guards:

 

Intercooler fitted, plumbing semi done:

 

Space for custom manifold and turbo when factory stuff removed.

[~Slideways~]

The plan is to get it running on the standard 1JZGTE VVTI ecu while still using the MAF sensor. I'll run it on 7-10psi and check AFR's are safe.

 

This should net an easy 200-230kw and lots of torque, I could maybe run more boost but I'll see. 

 

I do have an Apexi SAFC II which previously was tuned for a pretty standard one of these engines and ct15b, that made 220kw on 14psi from memory.

 

I'm undecided on whether to use the Air Fuel Controller but I will hold off on fitting a Link ECU because of budget reasons.

 

Plus once it starts making much more power I will be in for a lot of upgrades/costs:

- Link ecu

- tune

- injectors

- clutch

- blah

 

And I still have lots to do, including:

- wiring ecu

- body wiring (a lot was removed by previous owner, which is why I removed everything from donor)

- heater and controls to be reinstalled. Maybe just a simple on/off set up.

- speedo / tacho

- driveshaft

- swap diff and shafts (because imported one is better LSD)

 

 

Even with 'just' 200kw it should be pretty lively, it has a 4.3:1 diff while the JZX's were either 3.7 or 3.9 from memory. Plus it'll be a lot lighter.

 

Other things:

- roll cage, because its too easy for things to go wrong and I want to be playing trains with my boy forever.

- paint, undecided if I can do this myself. I have a cheapy 2.5hp compressor and another 2hp on I could join together... or just pay someone to do it. I figure white is the most forgiving colour too.

- a million things I've forgotten.

[~Slideways~]

Well thats about up to date really. That's about 20 months worth? Amongst being a dad and work.