gaijin

, this looks shizen this looks ok

A mate came round and showed me what he's been doing in his spare time, over a beer and grub. Its the intake pipe ( air filter to turbo intake) I wansnt 100% with, Im looking for the japan style many welds look It would do very little to airflow vs pressure drop over the original 'digital' version, 45 degree angle styles. Looks smooth, and is a mock up. Test fit it today and works ok. We might swing the air filter horizontal, rather than up/down, being the only change.

Phoarr, anymore waiting and Ill have forgotten about this thing. As mentioned, the chrome bumper has been axed in favour of a glass unit from japan. chopped for cheaper postage reasons. Still has bolts and seams molded into the glass version. Odd. They will be smoothed over. Hard to see, but I borrowed Glenn MArtins front spare gaurds and copied the rearward support for the glass gaurds on mine, as they lacked sufficient support close to the door. Feels solid on the car now. The front wupport looks way out, but a little shaping and urethane will sort it. I picked up a pair of racetech wide's in glass with Ally mounts from Mr Black in Chch, who has helped with a great price. Seats were fresh off the press and sent that day. They fit me well, but not the car well. We will remove all the exisiting seat mounts in the S30 chassis, and look to make a section of floor lower than the rest, so my head&helmet has clearance to the roof. Ill detail this next time. The steering wheel is close enough to me, probably not requiring movement rearward, or replacement with a dished wheel. A sliding rail will sit below the alloy side mounts to give some fore/aft adjustment. The front gaurds had no face to bolt the headlight buckets to, so a steel equivalent was made and joined to the gaurds, bogged over. This will allow me to run the stock lights, buckets, chrome rings for the factory look. The gaurds are on and shaping work started. They need more work around the lower edges, but generally there. What an effort tho, chopping up the steel units would have been easier. Need to move that front bumper edge away from the flare, its too close. Inspection flaps cut back in. We had placed an oil filter and washer bottle accessible under them, so thought Id better get the flaps back in. Cut/place. A new catch has been made - area in red in pic. New old stock chrome S30 mirrors from Japan. To avoid the bonnet pin crap look, aerocatch install planned. Since the bonnet has its structural rim on the underside that covers over where I was planning to put them, another catch will be made, similar to the inspection flaps closing mount. Thye are lockable, fit almost flush, and seem to look OK on other customs Ive looked at. The front requires some 'air giudance equipment'. i.e. make sure we get sufficient airflow across the desired areas, its a pity the bonnet swings back into it all when opened.... The front inner part of the nose has been strengthened up, as it wasnt able to support itself in the right shape. The numberplate mounts will go.

Almost forgot about this thing down south after 3 weeks off. how very refreshing! Last time I talked to me man John, he said "we'll finish the metal work, then I want bills paid" Fair enough. Either that or some of the 40k odd persons following these threads globally start sending their cars to this guy...virtually immediatly Hence why the work finishes clearly where the metal stops. On the outside at least. Havent told him about a few minor things to chop later.... seat mounts, bonnet struts (eh Mike), holes Ive made in the engine bay etc etc..... All good so far. right side still ok, just needs the gas flap keyhole welded up Note that window chrome & SS into position. Had to move a couple mounting holes for the rear quarter glass windows, as cage fouled chances of getting a screw in......unles your hooked up? Save it. Few other issues at the rear.Did some costing of rear metal bar, take one dull but straight unit, de-chrome, weld up all exisitng holes and seams, straighten/smooth, re-chrome etc = $$$$ vs buy new glass bar and paint a colour and sell old dull bar. no contest. Plus minus many kgs, pity its the wrong end eh. I can break many glass bar before asking for mr dull chrome back. Chrome could always be thrown back on later if I have a spare wadss of cash. This pic is to note. What is going on here. Surley a clean body cant be painted with a skin looking like the close up of the moons surface? BEADBLAST approaching. A new step added to the build. Argh well....I might get back 1/20th of it upon sale price..... Not me talking Panle beating getting a flash boring, time to spice things up a little I reckon RSVP

The panel beater fellow is a pushy bugger, so its off for another epic drive to hand over parts that are requried to help work on the next areas. Thanks to Glenn for the gaurds, these will help take moulds for the front end work which will start next week. After a quick review today, it looks like as much time as the tin work has taken. ie. Quite a bit.... Ill explain over the next few weeks. Here's a better pic of something I mentioned a while back talking suspension, If the rear end still feels too mushy with softer tires at the track, the hard bushes you see may get replaced - rose jointed, etc. Indicator hole filled up. No warts here. Hatch likewise with opening device. Dove tail hatch area all done & sealed Left hand side continues, almost there. Rear quarter replacement panel originally from Tabco, some USA outit. Not much went back on the car. The front pillar needed a bit of love, so love applied. Few other parts/areas furthered

Pardon the delay, the panelman has begun some work. Its been about 1.5 weeks work for 1.5 men roughly so far. In no specific order. Butt welded everywhere, minimal filler rod used - (oxy acetylene) 60% metal work complete. Few holes to recover in places, otherwise Im happy. Car was treated with Tectyl?, spray on goo stuff to help minimise rust , from new. It looks like rust , on the inside of panels, but its just this tectyl stuff. OK? Welder could tell, weld bead wouldnt look like that, welding to rust alright...already Enough of the boring rusty 'looking' stuff, Arches at the rear. Folded lip flat, and butt welded again, so that the inner arch comes flat. gives the tire more clearance. if the chassis hits (not gonna due to bumpstops etc) the tire wont be hit with a sharp edge of the gaurd. ie. no crazy high speed blowouts from this scenario. One side of the (metal) car almost complete, The rear end is looking 50% done. Ill get the sparky to wire up a solenoid for the hatch release/lock. Left side has started, but requires the fundamentals. Nice section constructions around the pillar. Nice butt welding on the door.

Broken links damm

Lets check my 'off the cuff' front spring rate choice last year..... Arm chair engineering Motion ratio at the front is not far off standard, even with lengthened arms +50mm roughly, as top mounts have also been pushed out a fair bit. Spring rate, as a function of motion ratio, corner weight and desired suspension frequency. Could back up this pile of gobbledegook by pulling out the strut inserts and measuring the natural frequency doing the bounce test. This would include additions of bush and movement frictions. Google has the answers as usual. Corner weights are guessing within a range, as is suspension frequency. Looks like the current 250lb springs will be too SOFT, giving lower frequencies than desired.

My day job has stepped up so the car has been lonely. better post something - keep the thread alive eh... Mike again comes to the rescue for the new light covers. They are mint. Perfect. Let the panelbeater make them fit nice. Blame the truck body for taking time - worked on by the customer, then brougt back to the shop, jumping the queue. RUDE ! Never mind. Once the truck cab is out, Im up.

- Its got a face finally Its all stock I promise.... Cut and paste exercise required, as gaurd is 75mm north, Gnose outta place. Red line is average effort to show where the cuts are. Cut bumper out and move forward to keep the same distance to the over-fenders as a stock zg front. Cut the lower section of the gnose to form to new gaurd Cut the newf.glass headlight cones out, blend with gnose headlight thingies. Butcher! Make a re-inforcement to the chopped gaurd to mount to gnose around the headlight areas. Make it all look factory fresh and un-molested? Hope the hammer/dolliers are more skilled than this jpg editer.....

. There aint no panel beatin' starting until the cars ride height is set front and rear. As a requriement for the street, min. 100mm clearance is required. This was my starter, front and rear lowest parts hanging off the car. Rear oval superflow type muffler looks ok. Sure takes up some height.... Take the rear struts out, RR tire sitting on the roughly cut gaurd. LR doing same to stock inner gaurd. Clearance about right. Heaps of suspension geometry going on. Note the wee chop into the chassis to ensure max lowering efforts, and no chassis hitting suspension parts. Take into account sag and we have penty of suspension travel available. better remember the dimensions next time.... speaking of a travel limiting device, Rear struts, B4.s revalved with 300lb spring For the front, oilpan the lowest (ergh, this wont last long , better thing about a gaurd/sheild?). Wound the front up, using the full strut section moving out of the strut housing, keeping the overall travel the same. I finished with 110mm ground clearance to the under side of the oil pans lowest point. Sus arms are horizontal roughly eyeing. To sort the castor situ with wheel lagging in the gaurd space, dug these japanese castor arms/tension rod from Import monster a while back, when it was affordable with rates. Nice quality stuff, plenty of beef. They offer a little more total length than the modified stocker. It still isnt enough. Will get the stock modd'd ones lengthened again. Wheel further forward, but lets keep going. It would probably be prudent to get a hold of a castor/camber gauge, would make life easier. Hello, a change of face? frog face

Right, the car sits at the next venue, on the outskirts of Auckland where the panel beatin' rates are much less than the usual joints, not to mention their outstanding skills with sheet metal, raging enthusiasim etc etc. Remembered why I waited for ages to get the car in (mostly my fault), once I walked back in with the car, top crew from first and second impressions. Enjoyed checking out the other classics? and reviewing their butt welding, no added rod/metal. = little to no body filler used. Lets see what they can manage with this old girl The fuel rail didnt fit the standard er34 squirters in, so holes machined out, and new collars made to suit the new bosch 6 hole 600cc injectors er34 squirters sold on, good time for a quick + (crap) pic. A few oldies also hanging about. Looks like lots of $ spent on these. Front gaurds dont have any internal support nearest the door. There is still the existing panel closer to the front wheel. Once together & bolted on we can see if its too flimsy.

Anyways, after so much toying around, its time the car started going hammer and tongs with the hammer and dollys. Picked up thanks to John.

Plenty of work to go, Panel Paint Electrical/ECU install Interior ECU Tuning and brake/suspension setup Cert WOF/REGO more or less...perhaps not much considering the journey so far... Anyways, Tried the lock to lock with the steering using the MR2 PS rack. Looks like 2.8-ish turns of the 2nd hand Momo wheel purchased off Ebay.au a while back. I will measure up the angles of the wheel at full lock, something the drift crowd increase for greater tail out action. More recently, after a chat with Ricky Cooper (races a nice L series NA 240z in Auckland), I was keen to have a look at some fibreglass parts for Gaijin for the two usual reasons; - lose some easy pounds - save money at the panel beater but also picked up the great feature of (in the case of the front gaurds) moving the arch 75mm further forward, which will allow much greater castor angles. This will give me more camber thru steering change, and a greater self centering effect with the steering. V8 supercar will run 8 deg+ roughly (did 8 years ago when I turned the spanners for Team Kiwi). The current castor arms may not be long enough for this, but this is an easy cut/remake/TIG up operation. Current rough install position a little way out. Also picked up a bonnet, which is a light (for glass) unit, covers the inspection panel, has mounts included. Headlight buckets are moulded into the gaurd, metal originals are on Trademe. Overseas shipping not a worry Also check my other listings for more S30 bits PM me for manufacturer of these fibreglass parts inc. bonnet and other body parts.

. Local USA old school Road Race Rally Ltd. Ron has helped me with shocks and bushes. Bilsteins, revalved, 200+ lb (cant remember) springs, spherical bearing top mount, ajustable threaded collar height - so a show 'dumping' of the car another 70+mm - not safe for road use... Ron also sweated out the old rear subframe bushes for harder types, two rear points have eccentric bolt for further camber change point. Bushes didnt come in plain non adjustable variety, and were economical.

The club in progress Speaking about welds 3" SS pipe between resonators, middle of exhaust -ish Tiller of HMS 'Gaijin' Autogauge rev and smokey speed meter 3 - 6 other 60mm pending. 3 on dash, 3 mounted in glovebox behind the lid. these didnt fit. Left one is not what I want, its r34, mine requires a R33 gtr for some reason as on the right. Eh? Ron Millan getting all bushes into rear end, and shock manfacture. Top spherical mount, lower to rubber mount attachement on hub assembly. With left over 4" ally intake pipe in hand, an intercooler top up tank, mounted higher than the rest of the coolant in the system. Get rid of some aeration issues - Noticing the radiator connect only tack welded. handy

Attempting to decide on paint and external appearance is daunting really, easy to make or break the cars looks. Here are some cars that take my eye, that may look similar in some ways to what we can produce. In no specific order, apologies already if links break plenty of lovely s30's ive missed out on, cant post them all...sorry Ive not got the gnose, so thats out for now. New chrome front bumper. 2nd hand chrome rear, avg condition Chrome or painted? Flares 2 tone to body? Out to take more high res pics tomo and the local photoshop expert tomo.... Also looks like one of santas elves has been identified as Mike Lucas (thanks Mike - hugely!). Will begin play with bonnet gas strut mod for the fibreglass lid arriving next week from Wayne Croft, he makes them, along with other fibreglass goods for zeds, spoilers, gaurds etc. Christchuch based.

Oil blow by 2 litre catch can in, with lovingly welded bracket. Hoses attached and completed. Shroud made for the rear of the radiator to intercooler. It is structural, holding the cooler, along with a bottom support, all in ally. Bosch cobra water pump for cooler sitting in its home. This is a stock order pump from USA, from a GReddy type R BOV in its possible home. Will recycle hot filthy air back into the turbo intake, for max response, and turbo spooling The cooler is made of 3-4mm plate ally, so we can fit directly to this, with maybe only a little strengthening required. and everything STILL fits under the stock bonnet... Intake pipe nice n tight The whole lot there is rubber mounted, so no cracking. Wouldnt mind the JP style hundreds of welds style inlet pipe, using sections. sure looks fat next to the little engine Thinks its 4" ID The car is out of here next week, so the clock is ticking! Next mission, PANEL & PAINT

Getting back to the business end of the car; Electric water pump arrived with controller. Mounting under the intake manifold, probably. Its the bigger 110l/hr, with fan on the back. Controller is micro-processor. Very 80's... I jest, but it will be a good addition to the car. Turbo timer, whatever! Run the pump once the engine has stopped for a few minutes. Good solid fast trips to the corner shop then. Enough of that for now, 10" fan fits ok. Will get two in there. My pikes peak escudo sized K&N is too big to fit now intake pipe roughly done. Ill play around with this later this week. Ignore the coolant hose yah. Grill aint looking too bad considering. Would prefer the Fairlady version, mesh style. Perhaps someone has a new/nice one in their garage they could sell to me? swap, please, hello?

Right then, its been such a long time between posts, thought best to update the situation; ER34 rear bushes from Noltec. Trademe (better NZ version of ebay) have some reasonable prices for these. Frank De Jong is the contact, helpful, delivers for free too. There is a few missing, kids eh. Rear subframe bush ready for transplant. Rear camber arms back in. Bought off trademe, for a sniff over $100, the welding was poor. Ground the welds back, re-tig'd them, and sent back to the Xrayer man for OK. Phew. Dont expect the stock ones to pass certs, WOF etc. Only the sway bar to go back in, more or less. Oh yeah, struts as well. Ron Millan in today to measure up. Better lose that hand bud. Big dog tailshaft hoop installed. Tailshaft by Beatties, spec'd for 700hp. Nothing re-used from old skyline, as itll be too weak for thrashing. Hoop required for certification. Hard to see, but, handbrake mods to bracketry. Single cable to twin, made custom mount.

More nostalgia. The mk 1 plans called for NA. It was the L series build up, aside from the L24 stocker seen previously. L28 stock insides, cleaned up, Mikunis 40PHH, ex manifold 6-2-1. elec ign. May have made 180 flywheel hp's. Carb rebuild....gaijin would be quicker to build than those carbs. But the sound ! Something a turbo will never acheive.

Thought best to get some panels on to work out some colours for the car. Got the right front gaurd roughly on, prob a little low. Steel gaurd will be sold, and a fibreglass one in place. Chucked the spoiler on, Rolled it back for a rough ride height = ok. New bumper arriving from santa- thanks Mulderghini! We sprayed up the gaurds in primer to get less contrast with Photoshopping when doing colour schemes. Or probably just my wobbly eyes. cant ignore the left side. Ive picked up a full nolathane bush kit for the rear including more adjustment opportunities, on all sus arms and subframe to chassis mounts. Sway bar adjustments also provided for. Ill get these in once im out of bed.

Getting exhausted, another mention of the existing wastgate point, welded up. Wastegate dump 38mm enters into main exhaust after 1 metre. Gas flow less turbulant there = less back pressure = more power Keep it tight boss could wrap it in heat wrap or get some coating on.

Some progress of late. stock er34 injectors replaced with Bosch 550cc x 6, which will cover me for some way over 400hp's at the wheels, turbo/engine strength permitting. Gaijin back from the brake hose crew, and it looks neat. Wilwood master cylinders have replaced the Trojans, only due to difficulty in finding the resevoirs for them. Groan. Just for luxury sake, a rear proportioning valve position is included in the rear pipe line inside the cabin. Ignore the interior sound deadening, efforts from the past require restarting. The engine bay completion continues...

Right, more detail shots. - Petrol tank. Standard unit modified. Pic has details. Welds have sealed tank. Will add POR15 type tank sealant internally. Carter lift pump pushes fuel through low pressure filter into surge tank. Not shown. Then EFI bosch pump draws from surge tank, through high pressure filter to fuel rail up the braided lines. When the tank is in the car, it looks completely standard. Access through the existing spare tire wheel bay, with a flat cover over the top. No spare tire then. So the surge tank is not connected to the main tank, and the extra vol is. Just testing... - PS rack/cross member mods, in case your interested. Pic shows the mods, new mount for the bottom seat of the rack, a braced top mount, and a cut out for one of the PS lines. Rack is a Toyota MR2 job, so not exactly a limo turner. Similar car weights, so shouldnt be too over assisted, can change the PS pump revs through new pulley, will adjust this a little way. - Rear tire/brakes completed. Rebuilt, new discs, calliper seals, hoses, project mu drift pads and plenty of BBQ black to hide the crud. not exciting unless its making smoke...eh