seattlejester

May I ask where you purchased the fan?

Seems like you have some underlying problems if you blew up two motors. I would make sure to address the stuff remaining before slotting a new engine in. Make sure the coolant system is clean, have the radiator inspected/flushed new hoses, clamps, electric or new radiator fan. Have your electrical system updated a bit, relays, alternator, battery etc etc. Might help with the cold start problems and if you do end up running an electric fan it will help supply power to it. Making sure it gets good clean fuel at the correct pressure and volume. New lines, cleaned gas tank etc etc. For the engine rebuild... Throw in a new timing set, new spark plugs, new rotor, new cap, new coil, electronic ignition (not points, E12-80 module or what not), water pump, new studs (intake/exhaust), new hardware, new oil pump, and I can't imagine any problems. With the stock N42 cam and dished pistons and a fresh rebuild on my L28 with SU's, my friend driving my 240z pulled granny shifting at 5k pulled away from me driving his newer legacy. I had a 5 speed and a 4.11 gear ratio though.

I mean even if the insulator deteriorates, it really shouldn't be bouncing around if it is tightened, unless it has crumbled apart and isn't seated. The piece I posted is correct if it is your insulator, make sure you buy the appropriate one the 240z and 280z ones are different height. So either the insulator has really fallen apart and it is loose and rattling around (at which point you really should stop driving and pull the suspension), or the shock is rattling around in the shock tube and needs the gland nut tightened or a spacer inserted in-between the gland nut and the insert. I do advise against attempting this by yourself as this is suspension that keeps your car on the ground. You need to make sure that you are capable of keeping track of how things come apart and are reassembled, applying the proper torque, and replacing worn parts are all important in the tear down and reassembly. If you are unfamiliar, farm it out or bribe a more knowledgeable friend or mentor to give you a hand. Just make sure your mentor is familiar with older cars and what working on them entails.

^Those are the bushing that go onto of the shocks, is that what you are referring to? Or are you thinking of the bumpstops? So I think we may need to slow down here. Why did you want to remove the differential to change out the strut top insulators? This is not really going to work if we have to guess at what you are looking at. Do us a favor and snap a few pictures with good lighting at what you are referring to, we would hate to recommend the wrong part. I mean this would really help you get started in the correct nomencalture.

I want to say most of the wrx differentials are R160's compared to R180 for the STI. So anyone looking for a locking diff rarely wants to go down in size stock for the 240z is R180. Some 510 guys run the 160's since their cars came with the 160 from the factory, but most usually step up as well. If you are remaining at stock power levels the R160 might work for you, relatively easy to swap in, and as you mentioned quite affordable and available. Problem is you would have to revisit it when you started bumping up the power.

Or you could add weight to the front, a turbo system sounds about just the right amount of weight . All kidding aside, that spring does look like the traditional progressive style spring that eibach uses, I wouldn't be surprised if the coils that are closer together are all touching when on the car. Trimming the front or adding a spring spacer in the rear would be the solution.

4.5 is cutting it close on stock suspension. I think you might even need spacer for the front at that point on stock suspension. I would stick with 4 inch back spacing to be on the safer side. You can get away with 4.5 pretty easily with coilovers though so depending on how soon that is it is up for you to decide which set you will order. The hybrid z flare sizing for the standard zg style flare is 9 wide up front with 4 inch backspacing and 9.5 wide out back with 4 inch back spacing. You can always go further out, but you might have to step up the flare if you do so. A 10 up front is going to require quite a bit of steering effort. And it doesn't really make a lot of sense to run a smaller tire on a wider wheel to clear the fender flares, unless you are going for all style points. Then by all means.

Excellent. Thanks!

Slightly off topic, but still applicable. A friend asked me to weld a little bracket back onto his car. Doesn't seem very hard, probably will take a couple minutes, I've welded on my car before easy. But then I realized his car has a PCM, ABS module, In dash navigation etc etc. I'll just be migging, so I'm not worried about high frequency start problems, but should I be worried? Plan is... Take off ground cable of battery Take out the PCM/ECU Ground to the bracket/workpiece Then weld it onto the car Should I be worried about the other computers in the car? Am I being overtly paranoid?

Look around, some of the japanese companies used to flash ECU's (Tom's, Mine's come to mind), but I think you can buy a megasquirt for the prices they wanted if they still offer the service. It would be advisable to look into a fully programmable ECU (megasquirt, AEM, etc etc).

Both are old school bandaids. Fuel cut defender stops the car from cutting fuel at a certain boost level and a boost control solenoid allows you to run more boost. You would need both for it to "work," a boost control solenoid will keep the waste gate closed and allow you to build more boost, the fuel cut defender will allow the stock ECU to keep adding fuel instead of cutting out, but as everyone is saying it really isn't the best idea. These are older work arounds when aftermarket ECU and reflashes/programmable things were much more cost prohibitive, an aftermarket ECU even a megasquirt would be able to read the additional boost and add fuel and timing changes to compensate. If you were adamant on going the old school route, you might as well upsize the injectors, add a bigger throttle body idle circuit and all the other work arounds people used to run.

The strut isolator bushing is exactly as it sounds, it isolates the strut from the chassis so it doesn't transfer as much NVH. There's a strut cartridge on our cars, so it isn't one unit, but it shouldn't bounce around. Can you take a picture? I'm kind of worried you might be referring to the mustache bar bushings on accident. Couple things to note. A diff is fairly heavy, be prepared for when it falls. If you tilt the diff more then 45* it will spill oil out of the vent hole. Make sure your car is very securely mounted. I don't recall if you have to remove the LCA mount at the moment, but best to support the chassis not the suspension. Jack up the car and securely put it on jack stands. Once you are sure it is not going to move on you head under the car. If you are just removing the diff, remove the nuts on each half shaft and drive shaft 12 in total. You probably won't have enough room to remove them quite yet, don't worry. Support the rear diff and undo the front and rear diff mounts, two bolts in the back and two bolts in the front. You can undo either the mustache bar bolts from the chassis or you can remove the diff from the mustache bar, I find the mustache bar itself easier to remove and reinstall. Now slowly lower the differential, you should be able to free the front by moving the drive shaft forward into the transmission. Installation is reverse. It's real important that you don't call the bolts or nuts. They are especially thin nuts and the bolts are special D bolts. If possible having spares from another diff would be ideal as it is difficult to remove all the nuts without rounding one or two of them. I might edit this tomorrow morning, but enough to get you started.

You can actually run that by a cam manufacturer like delta cams and they can give you their recommendation based on your induction. I highly suggest the "how to modify/how to build your nissan ohc engine" books, they cover a lot of the basic questions and have a lot of helpful suggestions in building your motor. E88 vs N42 not a huge difference if I recall. E31 have higher quench areas, P90 can have a little higher flow but suffer from low compression, but E88 vs N42 is not a huge difference. I want to say a late N42 might not have bronze valve seats, but If you want to hit 200hp, you are going to want to have someone work on your head some and they can swap out your seats then.

'grats sir.

Decided to finally get rid of the cover and make the rear a little prettier. I think it can use some black paint and touch up. Found several loose bolts in the rear. Either the old lock washers are past their prime or the welded diff is causing enough of a vibration when it is shunting that the bolts are rattling out. Will have to set aside some time to get some new washers and some locktite. Also decided to go ahead and install the boost control solenoid. Silly to have paid for all that and just have it lying there. 300hp here I come .

Hmm I think it will stay 17 for a while, then maybe up to 18 in 5 or so years, but I don't think much larger. Even accords and camrys come with 16's with optional 18's from the factory, but to get bigger then 18 would mean a change in some lower end shops tire changing equipment without much benefit to ride comfort. I mean I've been in a normalish car with 20's, it really amplifies divots in the road. So unless they make the roads a lot smoother or make a breakthrough in tire compound, I can't see them going much above 18's.

Don't worry, the main problem people have is when the poster doesn't take an effort to search. In this case it seems like you put in the effort so no worries. Without camber on a hard dip you may hit the fender. As long as you have good struts and you don't have a lot of squat it should be fine. If you have a little camber it will help angle the wheel inward to help avoid a rub on dips. A 215 tire will tuck nicely, but they don't make many in the 50 profile, a 205 will tuck really nicely, but not very much tire.

Good job on the write up. Question, if you wouldn't mind, so the way you have it installed, are you getting any more travel? Or is the higher spring rate just allowing you to sit lower in the stock travel?

Need more info. With the assumption that you have had the welded diff for a while and this is relatively new. It would be caused by slack in the differential or suspension. Anywhere from diff mount bushing, mustache bar bushing, control arm bushing, spring perch condition, loose strut, worn strut insulator mount, and yes even a loose u joint or axle could cause a jerking sensation. This is also of course with the assumption that it is felt in the rear and has nothing to do with your front suspension. It really isn't hard on our cars to lay on the ground and pull on the u joint to check. A welded diff definitely will amplify any of the slack in the system.

You are referring to the stamp on the differential casing such as 11080? I think it is just a manufacturing stamp. The for sure method is to take the back cover off and take the information off of the ring gear to determine the identity. You can generally determine the identity (R160, R180, R200) based off of the physical size of the casing, that will correlate to how much hp it will be able to hold.

Sure thing, feel free

I hadn't realized there is a pocket in the sun visor, tablet fits perfectly in the pocket and still displays all the needed displays. Drove around this weekend with it and it seemed sufficient. Definitely very foreign to look up for information. I think it will eventually migrate downwards, just so it isn't too strange looking, but for now I like it. Trimmed most of the fuel cell cover off, looks much much cleaner already. Still need to cut one more piece off and reroute the lines, but very pleased so far. Also developed a loud clanking noise during sharp turns. I looked for any loose bolts and didn't see any, I think maybe the spring popped out of the perch when I was pulling out of a friends driveway (his driveway has so much camber my rear hatch wouldn't close). Definitely need to get the ball rolling on suspension fixing/replacing. During my drive I decided to test full throttle for the first time and rolled into it on a nice wide stretch of a one way road, boost peaked at about 9 psi, but easily started blowing the tires off in 3rd on a moist road (it rained the night before). I gave a couple friends a ride and boy it almost makes the long haul worth it to see people having a good time. I even rode shotgun and had a friend drive the car. The sound of the exhaust, followed by the whine of the turbo as it spools, the feeling of speed as it picks up, and then that silly whoosh as all the excess air vents out through the blow off valve, I don't think there is any radio that could do better. To top it off, I looked at the display while he was driving and the point I had been shifting at was apparently only 5k, still 2k more to go. I can't imagine it at full song. Even on my way home I rolled into it in 5th and easily picked up speed, and I'm still at stockish power levels. Definitely makes me feel like I don't need to install the boost controller for now. I mean I have driven cars with more power, but I still have a hard time fathoming how someone can use more power in our chassis. I'm just a big pile of smiles right now.

Summit Racing 16 gallon with fuel sender Cutout spare tire holder made cross bars and a little retaining box Vented through the top of the cell routed down through where the stock vent came into the vapor collector, hose then coiled 3 or 4 times. behind rear wheel. No filler, just standard fuel cell latch. You can get a remote filler kit and route it to the stock filler location, but you will have to cover the remote filler if you plan on doing any racing as that is considered exposed and in the cabin and will need a sheetmetal shield. I would do a baffled aluminum fuel cell with an in tank pump if I had to redo it. The only real benefit I see to an external fuel pump is that you don't have to drop the whole cell to swap out the fuel pump or the pre pump fuel filter. That and price I suppose.

Don't think that is how the sender is built. You are essentially trying to wire the sender backwards. I think if you do that it will only read full until you hit empty and then it will drop to E all of a sudden.

No worries, quite a bit of an amateur myself. The books NewZed mentions are very good books to read/browse. Not a bad call on being hesitant on the compression test due to fluid. Although next time, if you are in a similar situation, drain the coolant, pop out the spark plugs and crank it over without fuel or spark to force the fluid out of the cylinders, then put the spark plugs back in and run a compression test, it would really help isolate where to look for a problem, granted we have a pretty strong grasp on the problem cylinder, it might have shown some other weak cylinders. As you said, next time. From the picture of the head it looks like cylinder 4 was not happy either. The circumference around cylinder 6 also seems to be real unhappy, although there isn't a visible mark at least from the pictures that leads me to think the leak is from the head gasket, granted that style of head gasket can crack if you bend it out of plane a bit. Hopefully the shop has some news, I want to lean towards punctured water jacket via intake/exhaust stud personally given the quantity of fluid, followed by cracked head gasket, then cracked block.