dirtbiker194

Haha, Im working on the sunlight, it may be a little bit though. Paint looks. 75%. Has a few little scratches and looks like the roof is on the cusp of oxidation. So a respray will be in its future eventually. I'm not actually sure what sway bar it is. I will find out next Wednesday when I work on it. I actually cleaned the bar all up right after I snapped that picture.

So I posted a few weeks back calling this car a "mystery motor" cause I didn't know much about it at the time. Because I have figured out more and this project has actually began now, I am re-posting. Some of you guys helped me figure out what it is, an L28ET with some other random things done to it. I have started putting in about 2 hours per week over the last few weeks. (I know its not alot, but its all the extra time I have right now). This car is one of my dad's. Its been sitting in his garage for years. About 4 years ago, I tried to help him do a mega squirt install on it, and we both got busy and it got left to rot. At that time, I got it to run for a short while before the ECU up and died completely (It was a TEC II before the Megasquirt). Now that my son is almost 4, he's able to come give me a hand on it a little and he has fun working on it with me and "grandpa" so maybe this will actually get done. So recap of the last few weeks. This was stored on a lift with another car parked underneath it. Then on top of that, there was stuff stored all around and behind the car parked below making it not possible to bring down. Week 1 So the area is clean.... er... lol. And I am able pull out the bug Week 2 Got the car down. Saw that the radiator was fried. Week 3: Got a new one and attached twin electric fans. Got it installed. 3 of the four holes lined up, 1 is 1/4" off so I had to Oblong the hole, but it worked. Week 4: I ordered new rubber radiator hoses. I am skipping on the silicone ones cause I have had too many of my friends have their silicone ones spring random leaks on them or blow entirely with very little mileage. I think the quality of lots of the silicone radiator hoses is bad. I'm sure some of them are high quality, but I didn't want to spend a fortune so I stuck with rubber. The hoses were not in yet this week so I spent my 2 hours putting air in the tires (that will need to be changed), and giving the Z a much needed wash. Heres some before and after. And that is where we are now. I'll try to keep posting each week, but it might come down to doing a mass "3 or 4 week" post like this one. -Riley

Engine bay is looking great and nice exhaust clip. It looks like you may have the exact same radiator that I just purchased.

Good link! Yeah, that looks like a good place to start with. I've done a mega squirt system on a BMW before. Its not terrible to wire. Took 5 or so hours. I've gotta finish up the mega squirt system on my car. Its got a MS II that's partially installed (70%). I helped my dad with it years ago before we just stopped working on it. Keep up the good work.

Im pretty sure you have surpassed the stock tune capabilities and are probably starving the motor for fuel, aka leaning out. These are reasons to go with a Mega Squirt unit. If you are opposed to that, there's ways to modify the stock fuel maps, but a mega squirt unit will be a much better bang for your buck.

Glad to hear its running. There's always kinks to work out. Haha. What ECU are you running on this? Are you running the same boost as you previously were? Maybe fuel map issue? Once I get mine running I'm definitely gonna look into a water cooled turbo setup too. Heat goes to cold, so if you are able to keep the turbo cool, you help dissipate the exhaust manifold heat and down pipe heat, as well as helping keep the intake side of the turbo cooler. Its not quite as advantageous as an intercooler is in giving you dense cooler air, but its definitely gonna do SOMETHING to help with intake air temperatures.

Looking good!

Not bad for 300 bucks, even if it is a very demanding project car. Looking forward to your progress!

Looking good!

haha, I am gonna try and get the Turbo car (Bergundy) pulled out of the garage this weekend and given a nice car wash. Hopefully by then I can have the garage a little cleaner to get some more pics. haha. Some info about the garage: The garage has 4, 4 Post lifts. (drive under). Because of the configuration, we are able to have (and currently do have) 8 cars parked in the garage at one time. It has 14 foot ceilings, sand blast cabinet, Heated parts washer, and some other odds and ends. I never finished getting the 80 gallon compressor hooked up, so for now, I just use a little pancake compressor when needed. It is a complete mess and I am desperately trying to organize and clean up. It is UN-USABLE currently but I hope that soon will change.

So, I did more poking around, Its an F54 Block. Here's some pics I snapped of the car (and whats below it keeping me from lowering the lift to work on it. I also took some shots of the other S30's that are in the garage. Hopefully someday I will have a chance to get to all of them. haha Today I am working on cleaning the garage up a bit to make room to work on this guy. (and make room to pull out the bug so I can work on the Z) Hopefully by Wednesday I'll get a shot of the car all cleaned up and waxed.

I'll look a little harder and see what else I see. Thanks for the tips.

lots of interesting dash repair ideas. I'll have to give this a try one day. My current project car has a good dash, but I know my dad has a few dashes that are no good.