project 180sx

[alanjuggler]

right.. update time. bit more exciting than just chassis work now

well. this is the final shot of the finished chassis work - bit more stonechip needed in a few places and some dynaxing of the box sections to do but apart from that, finished




as my signature has given away over the last few weeks, my engine plans have changed - i'd never really been tempted by the RB25 route, purely because i was relatively happy with the CA... and then Bahnstormer came on the FS section with the RB25 bits he'd been accumulating with some rather other interesting bits.

so take one of these..



two of these



something like this..



and then.. the more I read about the RB, the more i heard of people whinging about the short oil pump drives on the early '32 GTR cranks and RB25DET cranks - shearing oil pump drives etc.

so i've gone from this..



and i managed to pick up a standard '33 GTR crank that looks like this..



the final interesting piece to the puzzle is the gearbox. not fancying smacking the crap out of my nice 180sx chassis, i figured since I already had my os giken box that *should* support the power.. and since the RB20 uses the same box.. and since the RB20/25 bell housing pattern is the same..



so all being well, i'll be rocking an RB25 block, RB26 OEM crank & rods (with ARP rod bolts), some wiseco forged pistons (when funds allow), the RB25 VVT head, GTR twin turbo conversion and my close ratio OS giken box.

i'm hoping with the torque of the RB, the giken box will be less of a pain to use at lower speeds in first gear.

i'll also be sticking with nistune - there's a hack on the nistune forums to use the early Z32 TT ecus with some modifications - which supports controlling the VVT too

[marteh]

good progress mate, ill be keeping an eye on this thread.

is it a straight forward job removing the box from the bellhousing?

[alanjuggler]

just picked up a clutch too that needs rebuilding. an OS giken STR2CD twin plate push clutch

[moff]

Any updates

[alanjuggler]

good progress mate, ill be keeping an eye on this thread.

is it a straight forward job removing the box from the bellhousing?

woops, missed this one.

i don't know - i didn't split it - jdm garage had already done that bit. i'll tell you when i split my giken box

some parts -

thanks to dave100 & MIKEGTR off the GTROC & moff's lovely moffshop over on skyline owners club i have some more of the parts i needed.




i also took another picture, i've called it 'losing grip on reality'



two s13s in a state of not moving, i must be mad

apologies for the telephone pics, forgot to bring the camera with me

[Paulpen]

Just read through this and fair play

I think thats the RB25 that I sold to Bahnstormer - was going to be my spare one but thought I might not need it

[alanjuggler]

'tis indeed

do you know if the block had been touched at all? the restrictors in the block don't seem to be 2mm like they're supposed to be as standard - i tried popping a 1.6mm paperclip (measured with a micrometer ) and it wouldn't fit.

[Paulpen]

Well I got it off ebay - only as it was local and cheap

When I picked it up off the bloke he didnt really seem to know what it was.

He reckoned he put a piston and rings set in for his mate after it started missing. Then it lost compression so he swapped it for his mate.

From looking at it I was thinking more that it might have lost compression but one piston head was nice and clean and that same bore had score marks (think it was cyl 5). That made me think they had some issue with piston 5 and upon refitting scored the bore so got another block.

Weird though as it came with the bottom pulley on and the belt still round it behind the cover so almost like it was removed to swap before any inspection

[alanjuggler]

well, it's going to be tidied up now and bored out to 87mm so there shouldn't be any issues with damage done.

ill hopefully have the block assembled by the end of the year, not sure after that how long it'll take to get running.

[alanjuggler]

right. here's the essay of how it's going so far but a summary is: bad.

the '33 GTR crank I'd originally picked up in the S13 frame of mind of 'big end spun, it'll take a grind no bother' was cracked on the journal where the big end had spun.

it turns out that this isn't an uncommon occurrence and the '26 crankshafts seem fairly fragile. picked up a machined crankshaft from a GTR breakers, turned out to be straight between no.1 & no.7 main but then when came to balancing, bent between no.7 and the flywheel flange so that's been returned.

aand thanks to Kris C - have just spunked the money on a brand new RB26 crank from Nissan. I'm hoping to hell that a brand new crank can't have anything wrong with it

pics will follow when the engine is back from the machine shop

[Pete C]

Exciting stuff, makes me with I had the time/patience/money to do stuff like this

[Si]

Oh bumcakes That's a real arse about the crank I had my fingers crossed!
Still, onwards and upwards

You're doing this car proud man, keep it up, I almost don't feel so bitter about you beating me to it now

[alanjuggler]

Exciting stuff, makes me with I had the time/patience/money to do stuff like this

I wish I had the time/patience/money to do it too

I'm just hoping that going this far first time, any subsequent mods will be smaller and on the side of refining it, rather than significant changes.

the reason I'm continuing with my folly is that I went out in an R33 GTST with GT3076 RB25 with a 2.7l stroker on it and the torque pickup was immense - it hadn't even been fully mapped and wasn't running any serious boost.

the noise, the noise

[Pete C]

I wish I had the time/patience/money to do it too

Somehow I knew your response would be something along those lines

Personally I'd have stuck with the CA as I felt with my RB S13 that the weight upsets the handling a bit. That said, there's no denying that the RB makes a fantastic noise, and it's very smooooth if that's what you're after, and undeniably easy to tune!

Pros and cons innit

[ChrisS13]

Like this thread a lot

[ADZS13]

Great work, can I ask why you prepare the paint work using that electorlyte stuff? I am about to do similar to the underside of mine. My plan was to wire brush and then apply underseal. Is there a product/process I should throw into the mix to ensure a good job?

Many thanks

[alanjuggler]

electrox is a zinc primer so offers a good amount of sacrificial protection before the base metal starts rusting (if the paint is damaged, for whatever reason) - the only thing to bare in mind is it's quite fragile, so does need a good rubberised underseal. (like the 3M stonechip i've mentioned earlier in the thread rather than using a thinner schutz as the first overcoat)

basically it goes electrox > 3m stonechip > 3m schutz (or in places, I've used dynax UB)

[T.J]

Just wondering are you planning on using a sr20 gearbox with os giken internals bolted to a rb25 bell housing or did I miss something?

[alanjuggler]

bolted to an RB20 bell housing I believe from some research it may be ~1" shorter than the RB20 box even though they're the same part code.

I know the RB20 box can be used on the RB25, so should work out - in a fashion

[alanjuggler]

brand new RB26DETT crankshaft arrived with my machine shop -

much appreciated Kris