nick-james

I built my car many years ago not knowing about suspension. I bought/pillaged a person's adjustable coilovers from their s30 project they failed to complete. I know nothing of the stats on the coilovers I bought other than it rides like a medieval ox cart lol. I'm assuming they went for some extreme track setup and its absolutely punishing on the street. Very bouncy and it seems (my guess) that the super stiff spring rates are overwhelming the damping of the strut. I've actually hit my head on the roof going over a train track. I'm wondering when my strut tower mounts are going to start cracki

People have done that before. You still have a massive area up front though. I would have also opted for the solid airdamn, not the one with duct holes. The "battle S30" also has an angled radiator. That 'battle s30' is sweet! I wanted to keep the side ducts for brake cooling. The overall goal for me is to 1) Reduce the gapping mouth on the front and only let air in for cooling and keep the hood vents to allow the most air out, hopefully reducing lift. I don't think I can hope for much downforce but I think I can at least get down close to neutral. Even with a choked down ducted

I'm trying to improve on the aerodynamics of my Z. I've deleted the size markers lights, antenna, side view mirrors (can get away without them in my area) and wipers (sunny day only car). I switched to a vented hood in the hopes of extracting some of that high pressure from the engine bay at speed. Now, my question is: Do people tie-in the MSA front spoiler to the radiator area? The Z's around my area just leave it open, which looks strange to me. It's my sense that it would be more effective to duct it to the radiator. Also, I would like to block off the sides of the duct too since that

The stock t56 mount. It would be hard for me to believe that the distance between the frame rails has changed that much because of driving fatigue. One possible explaination might be that people have jacked up the cars on the rails and dented or bent the rail. Mine were sorta bent before I added the bullydog rails.

I had to shorten the JCI tranny mount by about a 1/4 inch. It "looks" like it might bend but that metal is THICK and is very rigid. I just cut the thing in two and rewelded (bevel cut). You can take the extra 1/4 inch out of one or the other side, it didn't seem to matter because there is a little "slop" in the tranny mount and it will still be pretty much centered.

Here's what I did to convert an open R200 diff to LSD... I bought an LSD differential from a 240sx. The LSD will bolt into the S30 long nose housing EXCEPT the ring gear needs to be swapped since they are different ratios and you need to match the ring and pinion...so reuse the open diff ring gear. Like an idiot, I took out the LSD and open diff before unbolting the ring gear bolts. It's difficult to get any torque on the bolts if its out. I took it into a driveshaft shop since I don't know how to set backlash. The only hangup is one differential uses M10 bolts while the other

For the folks that have put plenty of money and sweat equity in making their hybrid beasts, what insurance company do you have? I feel that with all the time and effort I've placed into mine (still not done), I would want more than a simple bluebook calculation of it's value if the worse were to happen and it was totaled out. Thanks in advance for the reply.

Man, I like how I don't post an update for a weeks or two and I'm on page 4 or 5 of the posts! It's nice to see the project area is that busy. Well I found out that the engine cranks over ok. It was purely an accident. I was finishing up the major wiring and testing some circuits for power when I pushed the ignition switch and...whacha know! She lives (sorta). I still need to finish my fuel routing. Here is my new fuel pump relay: 60 amp relay with inline fuse. It will be nice and hidden behind the plastic insert. It would be pretty easy to add a kill switch on the backsi

With the engine bay painted, it was time to put the motor and tranny in. I'm really, really glad I got an engine leveler for the job since we had fresh paint on the firewall and I was more than a little nervous about banging the tranny against it. I used JCI engine and tranny mounts and they worked perfectly despite terrible instructions. It really hit me when I stood back and just thought "my datsun has a v8 now!" One of the nice surprises is how little wiring is showing. The only part of the engine harness that will show is about a 4" section between the motor and the firewall (I mounte

Here's some new pics: Before: After: Waiting on some headers before we put the engine in. Oh and I got my coil overs welded onto the a-arms, but I don't have any pics of those.

One thing I'll mention when using the bully dog frame rails with the JCI engine mounting kit: I had to cut about 3/16" out of the tranny brace to fit between the rails. Even then it was tight. There is enough play in the bolt holes that you can still just cut one side of it and have the mount still sit in the center. I'm basically at the same stage you are with the build. I'm learning a lot about the LS motors. It's amazing what a decent exhaust can do!

^that is a front airdam to a civic. Its ricer-ish and i wish it wasnt in the shop haha. Dont worry, im not putting that on my car.

5/3/12-we started priming the engine bay. To get the really hard to see imperfections, it helps a lot to have a uniform surface. I know its just primer but it got me excited to see part of the car one color even if its gray. If you remember when i got it, the corner had been rusted through. We patched a 1'x1' square section into the firewall. You could never tell it wasnt factory. My friend has some impressive body working skills from what ive seen so far. We left the frame rails in POR15 because the **** is awesome and i like contrast.

4/29/2012- Anthony is continuing with the body work. The most labor intensive area is the engine bay...lots of little spot welds and brackets to grind smooth and cover. The battery area was completely rusted though so we had to weld in a new patch panel and then fill in the remainder with "kitty hair" (gross looking stuff btw) and filler. It's super smooth and almost ready for primer. I went to pick up the engine. I had some question if my little truck could haul it or if the engine would make it ride on the bump stops the whole way home. To my surprise, the

Make some progress on the little things. My friend was nice enough to let me have his cool aluminum battery box. It should fit great tucked into the rear quarter panel. After some thought, I think I'll go with a full size optima. I like how small some of the new batteries are but I've heard that you really have to be carefull with the braile's and other small batterys because they can run down fast if you have your radio or lights on for an extended time. Being that this is going to be a semi-DD street car, I wanted some insurance. I've got the main positive wire routed up through the fr