Nigel Posted June 13, 2006 Author Share Posted June 13, 2006 Well, I know I started this thread two and a half months ago, but I've only been able to put in two actual weekends of work between then and now. I forget if I mentioned it, but I store my Z at my dad's place in the winter which is in another city 400km's away. But I try to plan everything in advance of my visits, and do as much of the fabrication work as I can in the machine shop at the office. Anyway, here's what I've been up to... I got the oil cooler remounted. It's now placed between the intercooler and the rad. The intercooler fits nicely between the brackets. If you look closely, you will notice that the brackets actually offset backwards slightly. I did this so that the oil cooler would not be too close to the intercooler. All I did was notch the tubes on opposite sides, bent them and then welded them up. I got to try out my $60 auto darkening welding helmet for the first time and I can't get over how much easier it makes welding! I wanted to convert over to a 60mm throttle body because my intercooler plumbing is 2.5". But the way I wanted to run the intercooler piping meant that I couldn't use a 1" spacer for the throttle body and keep the mechanical linkage. So this meant converting over to a thottle cable. I picked up a Lokar 36" universal throttle cable and set about figuring out how to install it. I ditched the linkage they supplied for the gas pedal end of the cable and I made a little barrel adapter to use with the linkage on the throttle body, just like the stock setup would have been. This reversed the way Lokar expects you to use the cable, but who says you can't improvise. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of this. The next challenge was figuring out how to support the sleeve of the throttle cable. I thought I would have to attach something to the intake manifold for the throttle body end of the sleeve, but that would have meant waiting till my next trip to work on the car to design something. I had the throttle body with me (From a '92 Nissan AXXESS by the way), so I decided to design a bracket that would attach to it instead. This ended up working out much better: Here it is with the throttle body installed on the engine. Note that the bracket also turned out to be a perfect mount for an intercooler pipe support clamp!: I now had to figure out how to secure the cable sleeve to the firewall. This turned out to be really easy. I just picked up a couple of 5/16" fender washers, and I made some gaskets out a rubber sheet that were the same size as the washers. The fender washers were big enough to cover the hole in the firewall where the original throttle link went through. I put a washer and gasket on each side of the firwall, stuck the throttle sleeve through and installed the nut on the other side. Finally, I had to connect the other end of the cable to the gas pedal. I bent the arm at the end of the gas pedal 180 deg, so it was now facing the back of the car. I drilled out the ball adapter on the end of the arm and attached the end of the Lokar cable to it. I had to bend the arm the other way because there would not have been enough room for the linkage on the end of the Lokar cable: Since my last visit, I've had all of the intake tubes welded up, and I made a really cool flange for the BOV (forgot to take a picture of it too). I borrowed a bead roller from our local Z specialist, Whitehead Performance, and rolled beads on all the pipe ends, so I shouldn't have any problems with boost leaks. I've started the final fit of all the pipes. Unfortunately, I didn't quite leave enough extra material on the pipes for the beads, and my pipes ended up being a little on the short side, but I think everything will work out ok. So, I'm about 85 to 90% there as far as getting the car running. However, our first club drag event is less than 2 weeks away, and I won't be able to work on the car this coming weekend! My plan is to take the Thursday and Friday off before the race on Saturday to try and finish everything off. I have the feeling I'm going to be starting the car Friday night, going for a quick shakedown run and then leave for the track the next morning. That should be quite the adventure... Nigel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dapiper Posted June 13, 2006 Share Posted June 13, 2006 Bootyful. Nice work. Now I am inspired to clean up my act. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KTM-EXC Posted June 13, 2006 Share Posted June 13, 2006 looks great! I wish my engine bay looked nice and clean like that. Were did you get those nice clamps and how much did they set you back? Mine are pretty crappy, I would like to invest in some like that.. Rob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel Posted June 13, 2006 Author Share Posted June 13, 2006 Thanks guys! Were did you get those nice clamps and how much did they set you back? Mine are pretty crappy' date=' I would like to invest in some like that..Rob[/quote'] http://cgi.ebay.ca/10-X-T-bolt-clamps-clamp-Turbo-Intercooler-Silicone_W0QQitemZ8072715899QQcategoryZ33742QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem Nigel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
proxlamus© Posted June 13, 2006 Share Posted June 13, 2006 I have to admit.. im jealous.. that is superb work! Did you do those welds yourself? how'd ya make em look shiney? are those pipes Stainless or polished aluminum? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel Posted June 13, 2006 Author Share Posted June 13, 2006 Thanks! It's been a hell of a lot of work. The piping is all aluminum. I cut all the pieces and then had our machinist at work weld them together for me. He has his own tig welder at home. I wish we had one at the office! The piping came polished, but it gets scrached up really easily. I've already gone over them once with a buffing wheel on my bench grinder with some rouge polishing compound, but it's going to take some work to make them really sparkle. I was surprised at how easily the aluminum welds polished up though. Nigel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nathaust Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 That looks awesome. Why did you have to re clock the turbo? was it just to get the heat shield on there or are you running something other then the T3? I think the throttle linkage looks very professional, especially coming through the firewall. What is the purpose of "bead rolling"? What does it mean exactly? Forgive my ignorance. Anyway, it looks good, make me feel motivation to start mine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel Posted June 16, 2006 Author Share Posted June 16, 2006 Hi Nathaust... Thanks for the compliments! The heat shield I bought is held on by two bolts, which attach the center section to the turbine housing. Unfortunately, the center section interferes with the bolts, so you can loosen them but not remove them. In order to remove them, you have to rotate the center section (or conversely, the turbine housing, but it's bolted to the manifold and downpipe, so it's not moving), to a point where the bolts can be removed. This means that all of the bolts have to be loosened which is a major PITA!!! In retrospect, I should have just either slotted the holes in the heat shield, or removed the whole damn turbo! In the end, the center section and turbine housing were in the same orientation. I did reclock the compressor side though. I needed the compressor outlet pointing up at a shallower angle so that the turbo to intercooler piping would run under the intercooler to throttle body piping. Here's a link to a bead roller sold by the Eastwood company with a picture and an explanation of why you do it... http://www.eastwoodco.com/shopping/product/detailmain.jsp?itemID=10882&itemType=PRODUCT&RS=1 $400 for that thing though! And it says you can only do up to a 2" dia. tube, although I don't see why you couldn't do bigger. I've seen one for $100 dollars that doesn't look as pretty but does the same thing. It's still a lot to spend for something that you may only use a few times though. Nigel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZR8ED Posted June 17, 2006 Share Posted June 17, 2006 That looks great Nigel! I just hope your ecu tuning won't be too hard to correct...at least you can correct yours. hehehe I too have gone to a cable throttle (ala z31) I actually just took the entire gas pedal assembly and bolted it in. Just don't get too caught up in the "while I'm at it" syndrome. Good luck! Scott. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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