Dat73z

I'm currently in the process of rebuilding some Q45 CV axles. They were packed with some brown goop prior. I have some heavy duty Lucas green stuff which I had used on Troy Ermish CVs a few times before. Since I probably won't be cracking these open again for a few years and they don't have grease fittings I figured I'd ask for some opinions. Does anyone have any recommendations on CV grease? Any insight on what works well (or doesn't hold up) would be appreciated!

Waiting on parts to get back to wrap up the turbo motor so I started back on random bracket and parts fabrication. I couldn't find a crank vent tube so I made one with a 10AN fitting. It seems like ~25mm OD tube is a good interference fit for the block breather. I went with 40mm length on the tube portion but I don't think the length is a critical parameter.

Dropped off the turbo manifold to have it resurfaced about a week and a half ago and took a break to work on some house projects. Just got the manifold back over the weekend so I threw it together and torqued everything. The machinist noted it was banana'd out on the head side and somehow the turbo side was warped as well so good thing he skimmed it all on the mill. Putting it together was really time consuming but I hope it'll be worth it and the hardware won't come loose with some heat cycles. I used nickel anti-seize, grade 8.8 studs, oem nissan plate locks, nordlock washers, and copper coated deformed head nuts. Sending it out tomorrow for inconel heat shielding.

Try your local radiator shop. I went to an oldschool place years ago to have my core rebuilt. Turned out they found a brand new Z heater core on the shelf from the 80s so I used that and kept my leaking one in case I ever needed a spare to re-core.

Wrapped up the porting. I didn't go crazy with it, but much better than when it ran on the dyno. The aftermarket t3 gaskets are much larger than the OE Nissan. Most of the time was spent on the manifold transition. Also opened the waste gate some more as it looked like there was some creep on the dyno graphs. Rebello noted they had to port the wastegate as boost was spiking to 14/15psi on the dyno towards redline and it made somewhere around 450hp on that run.

Thanks for all the responses guys. Good info and it sounds like Vibrant is in the lead. Has anyone tried Ace Race Parts / Ace Stainless? I'll try some local industrial warehouses too, but where I'm at in CA most things local are more expensive than ordering online including raw materials. Or at least that's been my experience with Argon and local metal suppliers which I'll still support since they do smaller walk-in orders but they mostly serve large commercial/industrial customers. I will be fabricating this myself in my garage.

Started on finishing the porting job I started years ago. Will probably spend the next few evenings gasket matching and smoothing all the transitions. I'm gasket matching to the OEM Nissan gaskets.

Thanks Aydin, Do you have a preference or suggestion on Vband styles (ex: stepped/grooved lip) and vendors? I was doing some quick research over the weekend and there are a lot more options available now than even 5 years ago.

I'm looking to order 2.5" and 3" stainless tubing and vbands for downpipe, exhaust, and charge piping. Does anyone have recommendations on where the best places to order are in 2021? Thanks!

Had a few mins this evening to keep welding things. I had a couple of mild steel an6 bungs that I boxed up before moving but I'm still unpacking and couldn't find them but I did find a stainless an6 bung and some 309L filler wire so I started on the turbo coolant feed. The plan is to keep the heater and feed the turbo from where the SUs used to and return back at the thermostat housing. I used to cap these off with a rubber plug but the rubber never held up for more than a year of commuting before cracking and leaking coolant. Hopefully this holds better.

Quick weekend update. Welding up some brackets with the tig. Pulled the manifold off for some other prep and checked the porting. The transitions look pretty good, they're ported out to 47mm at the carbs, reducing to the Nissan gasket size at the head. Still waiting for some misc. parts to come in. This next couple of evenings I want to clean up some porting I did on the exhaust manifold before sending it out.

Last post on the driveline prep before going back into turbo stuff although I guess technically this is prepping the driveline for the turbo. Didn't find much info on the OSG damped twin or triple plate setups online so hopefully this is helpful to someone looking into it and the modifications required. The OSG throwout bearing collar is extremely short, and the stack height of the clutch assembly relatively tall.

Thanks Rossman. After thinking about it more and measuring angles I think another 45 or 30 would work with a short straight braided section in between. Just need to dig through my boxes and see if I can find one. Pretty sure I have one somewhere. I can clock my turbo a bit too to line up the angles better.

I do have a unicoil left over somewhere from redoing the gas tank lines, might give that a shot if I can't find my box of an tube nuts and sleeves.

Alright so no dice with the push lock fittings and hose but man they are so easy to work with. Assembly is a 3 minute job. May need to use them for my oil cooler and vent hoses. Hose kinks too easily. Since I already have all the flaring and bending tools from the stainless hardlines the new plan is to do the bend in hardline and run a short straight section of hose to absorb any movement. Although I'm not sure how much movement there will be seeing as the oil pan and turbo should not move. Will update when I get it together.

When I pulled the setup apart I was surprised to find the RTV on the head still looked reasonable. Maybe because the head is water cooled. On the turbo hot side all of the rtv had turned to dust. I agree long term (more than a few hours?) there would be no RTV left so the seal would need to exist from both sides perfectly flat. Im leaning towards running the gasket. And on the turbo side it'll all be stainless crush gaskets. I'm still curious if any turbo hybridz members run RTV and how that holds up over time. If this was a race only engine and my service intervals were a few hours I would actually prefer the RTV since there is virtually no cleanup after inspection before resealing. If this was a non-turbo motor I would probably also consider the RTV.

I'm doing the final preparations on a turbo motor before dropping it in and wanted to solicit some opinions on using a gasket versus RTV for the intake/exhaust. On my Rebello built turbo stroker motor, it was recommended to me to run grey RTV for the intake, Red RTV for the exhaust. If both surfaces are true there should be no leaks. I've attached a picture of what the head looked like after removing the manifolds, the motor was run in on the dyno so likely only ran at most for some hour(s). Leaks are either due to improper rtv application or flatness. I'll do finals checks for flatness and get things decked as needed. In my parts bin I have a new spare Nissan OE intake/exhaust gasket with the metal inserts for the exhaust side. If I run this I could probably put some copper rtv on the exhaust side to ensure a good seal if there are any surface imperfections. This will mostly be a street motor with some track days perhaps a couple times per year so a few 20 min sessions across a couple days, canyon drives, etc. Probably no more commuting with this car. I have run RTV only on motorcycles bit the service iterval for me was measured in hours so I don't know how well RTV holds up over time to the extreme turbo temperatures. Any thoughts on if it's better to run RTV or the OE gasket? For those running RTV what is your service interval and how do you drive the car?

Finished modifying my transmission input cover and flywheel bolts. For the OS Giken dampened twin plate 4mm needs to be removed from the input shaft area of the cover, and bolts ~8-8.5mm head thickness. The bolts are actually around the same head thickness now as the 240mm turbo/2+2 flywheel bolts but I gave those to the buyer of my old clutch setup so they could bolt the setup right in. Next step is to finish prepping the turbo manifold and send the assembly off to ATP for their inconel heatshield treatment.

Thanks rossman, good suggestion for plan B.

So I gave the angled fitting a try and no dice, the angle is close but stainless braid really doesn't want to give. It was actually a 30* fitting I think, the 45 would've been too tight from the T3/T40E to the AZC pan. I went ahead and ordered some 10AN push lock fittings and Parker hose. Hoping that'll bend a bit better. Will update when I get it all together.

Does anybody have an extra they're willing to part with?

Thanks, yeah no pressure more concerned about the kink causing oil to back up. Good point I may try the 45 approach on the bottom line which would take up some of that kinked area. Looks like the top angle may be too extreme.

Hi all, I'm wrapping up my turbo plumbing and wanted some feedback on the drain. I assembled 2 ends of Earls 10AN fittings. It looks like the stainless braided hose is about to kink with the bend and curve it needs to run from turbo drain to pan. This does not look legitimate to me and I'm looking for other options. I was thinking maybe if I can find some shorter hose ends to reduce the pressure on the hose or maybe just go to a push on/push lock style system for the drain which would give the hose more room to run the bend without kinking. Any thoughts? Or am I overthinking this and it looks ok. Thanks!

Images in the thread above didn't work for me but what was discussed made sense. For reference I ended up drilling 4x 3/4" holes on the windage (passenger) side of the tray.

Thanks zbloke!