Project purplyness

[Kev]

Im writing this how i remember it, the order may not be entirely right, and to be honest some of the figures may not be bang on the mark, but my memory sucks, and its been done over the last 16 odd months, so erm dont expect it all to be in perfect order

Been meaning to write down my meanderings of the past year or so for a while, so gonna have a wee start on it tonight.

First off let me say thanks to Kieran E1 and Sambo
As although most of this was my own work, these guys all helped me out at some stage with the car.


Well 2 years ago i decided to build a garage in my fiance's driveway, the idea being that when it was finished i would get my burgandy s13 into it and get the major re-build underway, that i had been plotting and planning for years.

Most of my postings in s13 tech have been about bodges, but i decided if i built the car once completely and correctly there would be no need for bodges(apart from proper ones), and so i would have a reliable s13, to prove that u can have a reliable s13

6 months later and the garage was finally finished enough to drive the car in.

However a 10 min inspection of the chassis, doors and sills proved that the old girl did not stand up to 6 months of Scottish weather, without turning a wheel, well at all
All the places i had plated already had all the metal surrounding the plates rusted away, door skins were seperated from inner skins etc etc.... basically the old girl had given up on me and died, and so i had to wave goodbye to H71 USO, and trust me this was a very sad day,

as we had been through some scrapes together, not least the fuel tank falling off on the Mway, the suspension strut collapsing on a track day, a few clutches turned into balls of fluff etc etc
i still miss her

But she still lives on in many ways as all of the panels on the Bodged Barby cooler are donations from H71:-



And so the search was on to find a decent shell, ebay it was.....

and i ended up with a dull as dog shit facelift grey s13:-

in i think october of 2005

Check out the funky wheel eh????

and so the work began.

[Kev]

First off i junked the stilted suspension in favour of the lovely KYB AGX's that i robbed from H71 and the thing handled so much better, but really didnt feel like my car.

As soon as possible i junked the blue wheel and got myself a lovely Momo millenium EVO steering wheel, after trying out Jonnyspeedbumps and loving it instantly.

Not much happened after that for a few months as i recall, as other stuff had to be done and other cars took priority.

However with them out of the road, the serious work began.
The Engine.

I had from H71 an ND gas flowed and ported head and planned to give it a going over, but time did not allow at this stage, and so it went on pretty much as was with a big of a clean up.
But the bottom end was something a little differant

After months and months of waiting finally arrived the super expensive Tomei CA20 Stroker crank (Bren at Apex manage to secure me the very last one ever to be made by tomei )
Tomei Pistons, Crower H beam (not I beam) rods and Tomie flywheel.
And Sideways Danny sorted out a reputable machine shop to Balance everything on the bottom end, including the clutch and fly and the crank pulley, a set of ACL bearings from Mad K and i was set.





However these were not the only tasty bits to be added to the tuning parts list
The standard plenum was ditched in favour of a custom made plenum from Australia, which not only flows shedloads better and gets rid of the problem of the standard plenum sitting high and hitting off the strut bar, but looks dam sexy too
And an inlet manifold smoothed for better flow by Jezz S13 with some evo 560 injectors fitted, all bought from Buffy for a very nice price completed the inlet side(almost)

Pictured on purplyness Mk1 which unfortunately turned kinda pink over the years
The re-build itself was very slow with everything being over oiled by about 3 times
So much so infact that when i went to empty out the running in oil after 500 miles there was nearly 5 liters in it
I did say i was paranoid, and made 100% sure that oil was coming out of every orofice it was supposed to before i put the head on the engine.

At the same time i got a ford 60mm TB to go on the plenum but its given me nothing but bother and so this year im ditching it in favour of an RB25 one which should fit just nice.

[Kev]

Due to the standard throttle body and the standard plenum going in the bin, some re-routing was needed for the water pipes.
I consider the water cooling to the turbo most important so did not want to loose that, but did want to loose the monstrosity pipe that goes under the plenum as they are generally pretty rotten and have been known to cause leaks:-

the one with the blue line i mean.

And so i cut part of this pipe off leaving enough of it on for one small bore take off to feed the turbo, and brung this part of pipe right behind the turbo.
the other pipes were then very simple.
Main outlet is the y type spliter level with no.3 chamber.
One of these comes out and feeds the heater matrix, the other feeds the oil regulator (some call it and oil cooler, but really its a regulator as the water heat helps to heat the oil up quicker also) and then the other side of the regulator feeds the main inlet to the water pump.
the only port left is the inlet on the side of the inlet mani and one hose runs from the heater matrix out, to this port. using the one small bore take off to take back the water from the turbo also.
I find that this lets the car heat up alot quicker, even though its really only a few small bore hoses that have been gotten rid of
*ill get a pic of this when i remember*

the breathers obviously needed to be addressed as the standard s13 arrangement is crap:-


so i got some 22mm copper pipe and bend it by hand to the shape required to go under the det sensor, then over the water pipes,(cant go under as starter sits there) and connected a 90degree bend to it, then instead of the standard pipe which goes from a 22mm pipe to a 15mm pipe therefore more than halfing the flow, i soldered on a 22mm to 2x 15mm tee piece take off.
1 side of which goes to the bottom of the inlet side cam cover as normal, and the other goes up and above the engine to join the other breathers, so the flow capacity is near as dam the same


On the exhaust side i stuck with the good old T28, as i wanted a good low stress run in period for the engine, as i was mega paranoid about the super expensive bottom end going, so everything was taken slowly.
But the legend that is French weapon managed to develop a mild steel manifold which actually fits the CA (not like that ss autochrome shite) and so i used this to hold the turbo and not the standard mani:-


On the back of the turbo was a dano dump pipe, which although not the best, seems to be better than the standard ones, so iv'e stuck with it till a better one comes along, and found it was also time to say goodbye to the good old faithful mongoose 2+1/4" exhaust and hello to the Apex single box 3":-


Though it doesnt look anywhere near that shiney now

So the engine spec from a year ago is:-
Tomei Stroker crank
Tomie pistons to suit stroker crank
Tomie flywheel
Crower H beam rods
ARP head studs
Gas flowed and ported head
Custom plenum with 60mm tb
Ported inlet manifold
560 injectors
Mild steel custom exhaust manifold
T28 from an s14
Dano dump pipe
Apex 3" triple box exhaust
Apex infront of rad intercooler
Bailey dump valve
Nismo engine mounts
Usual samco's etc

and all controlled by a Power FC and PFC boost kit(which can be wired to work on the s13 contrary to popular belief)

Gearbox is standard and using a 5 puck paddle clutch(the one everyone is using atm cant remember its name)
And a nismo gearbox pivot, as iv'e had 2 shear on me before

[Kev]

While the engine was out it was a good time to give the engine bay a good scrub and sort out new brake lines.
I had already decided long ago to ditch the ABS because its a bloody liability on the 13, and downright dangerous for drifty stuff.

So ABS was removed, new brake lines were run, bay was painted satin black, and a few other jobs were attended to.
Useless box thingy junked on the clutch slave and new line ran from master to slave flexy.
Z32 Non-ABS master cylinder was fitted.
steering coupling replaced with polyeurothane equivalent (Cheers Wak, and yeah i still use it mate )
Engine mounts were replaced with Nismo items.
Steering rack mounts were replaced with poly eurothane equivalents.
Nismo power Brace was fitted to replace the TC arm mounts.
White line ARB was fitted up front.
Both front lower arms were removed, re-enforced with extra plating and their ball joints replaced.
New Z32 steering arms were fitted with spherical drop links, and steering spacers for more lock.

S14 calipers were fitted with braided lines and retainers.
Small note about the retainers as i see alot of people running rip ties still to hold the braided brake flexy lines in place.

What i do it take the original flexy line retainer and cut away the flexy pipe from the retainer, then put it in a vice and run a grinder through the top vertically, this leaves a slot in the retainer:-



Now slip it over the braided line and into its holder on the strut and use the U clamp as before to retain the line.
If u have left rubber in the retainer then it will hold the line, if not it will let it run though, but still stop it getting tangled in anything

I was still using the facelift discs basically out of lazyness, as i have a set of 330 alloy bells and rotors and the bracketry to go on, but i just need to slot the holes for them like so:-


I also took this time to fit some apex coilovers:-


and some spherical rod ended chrome TC rods:-


so thats the front end pretty much sorted out

[Kev]

And so it was onto the rear.

Suspension was all ripped out, including subby diff etc.

the subby was then stripped and the bushes removed.
It looked sommat like this:-


It was sent away to EPS in Glasgow along with fuel tank straps and all the subby brackets for a bit of shot blasting and power coating purpley goodyness
:-


A 1.5 way cusco diff was bought and fitted at the same time as were chrome arms with spherical joints for all except the lower arms on the multilink system.

The lower arms had their bushes replaced with poly bushes as replacements for these are silly money.
the same was done with the uprights, which by the way are a PITA to do.
Whiteline rear ARB was fitted also.
Then skyline gtst rear discs and calipers were fitted and braided hoses too.
The subby bushes were replaced with powerflex ones from H71 and it was all put back together:-


and a view from underneath with it all on:-

dont show up well but the tank straps are on too

U will notice the apex coilovers complete the rear suspension.
So the suspension spec list from last year is:-

Front
Apex coilovers
Nismo power brace
SPL chrome TC rods with spherical ends
SPL Z32 steering arms
SPL steering spacers
SPL spherical steering rod ends
SPL steering rack poly bushes
Wak 1 off poly steering coupling
S14 4 pot calipers and 280mm discs from s13 facelift
Ds2500 pads and braided lines
Lower arms re-enforced
Whiteline Anti-roll bar

Rear
Apex coilovers
Cusco 1.5 way diff
SPL chrome camber arms
SPL chrome traction arms
Apex chrome toe arms
Powerflex subby bushes
Upright polybushed
Lower arm poly bushed
R32 GTST rear disks and 2 pot calipers
standard rear pads and braided lines
Whiteline Anti-roll bar

[Kev]

Other things i did which dont really fit into any catagory were bonnet struts.
ebay, either £10 or £20 for a mk4 astra, do the job just fine, but i have them mounted a little low, so they dont have as much holding power as they need.

Electric power steering, heh just noticed that was from a mk4 astra also, cost me £50 for the pump including top mounted fluid pot which held alot more than the standard one, and £20 for hoses to get made up.
Got from Scrap yard obviously, originally went for the usual saxo/106 one, but was told they fail all the time and are more expensive as a scrap item because of this
Ran this pump all year but found it let me down badly on drifty stuff where it was tight second gear transitions, or basically any low speed high steering wheel movement scenarios
So going back to the standard pump this year, but with a few ideas to get more fluid in the system

Tried pannelling several differant ways to see how it would affect airflow through the intercooler and rad, and found making side channels was most singularly effective, to stop the air going around the rad, but was far better to completely box in the rad so the air could not go under or over either.

The interior at the moment has gauges for air/fuel, EGT, boost, Oil pressure and oil temp.
these are split between a dual A pillar and center vent.
I have skyline GTST seats in and they are super comfy, but unfortunately will need to be replaced this year as i need a bucket for the new competition regs.
Had to fit a towbar to her, so i could tow the Barby to events as well, which makes the rear look shit, but hey ho

Apart from that its been the usual welding of sills and other such mundane jobs that everyone has seen 40 times before so i wont bore u (any more than already) with the details, the thread is in 13 tech if u wanna see it

I think that pretty much brings me up to date with where i am at, and so all that is left now is to show u whats about to happen as it happens

a few choice mods to go on, and a couple of unusual things to happen also.

If anyone wants pics of anything in particular on the car, just ask and ill do what i can to provide them.
Engine is out just now so any dissassembled pics or engine bay pics wanted just ask

Kev

[Jeff]

Dunno if you're not wanting people to post on here but OMG

Well impressed with the time and effort that's gone into all this Kev Hope the rest of it all comes together quickly and easily for you

[Kev]

Cheers mate, and yeah its in projects now so feel free to post

and i hope the rest comes easy and quick to, but i bloody doubt it

[sarefeet]

Having sat in the passenger seat at the Ingleston drift day i can vouch for the performance of project purplyness! Never realised that so much work had gone into making it that way, hats of to you

[sroberts]

Very impressive

Si

[Kev]

dunno how the hell i managed it but i forgot to include a picture of purplyness mkII in her spagettie junction form so here it is:-

[Sideways Danny]

Finally the CA20DET is fully unveiled

good to see all this in one place, makes me realise how little I've gone to mine since getting it on the road.

[The Big Yin]

looks good Kev


i to never realised how much had been done to your car

[mushtafa]

Looking good mate , and I love the spec too

How much difference does the stroker kit make? Torque and power wise?
I didn't even realise there were any for the CA.

Any pics of the overall car?

[Parker]

Looking good Can you explain what all those wires and pipes do in that last picture?

[Sideways Danny]

Looking good Can you explain what all those wires and pipes do in that last picture?

stuff

[Parker]

Excellent, I know as much as Danny

[twaiter]

did'nt realise u had put so much into it must have cost a fair bit what power u goin for and turbo u gonnae end up using

[SM]

Glad to see it in this section Kev

[Fake Ben Taylor]

i love that car.......and want that inlet manifold