Category: Cars

Yeah, i probably should. But ive already heatshrunk those, so im not overly concerned about it. Probably sort out some better stuff when i do the 2JZ conversion.

Speaking of which, i seem to be alternating my time between the Spoonter and the upcoming Supra conversion atm. Last night i spent a bit of time getting the Supra stuff sorted out.

First thing last night was getting the engine mounts sorted out:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29946-1/IMG_1097_s.jpg[/IMG]
Thats the fourth pair ive made, and hopefully the last, getting sick of cutting steel into smaller bits of steel and welding it together like some modern art piece.

Next up was getting all the engine back together, which went quite smoothly:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29952-1/IMG_1099_s.jpg[/IMG]
Ancillaries are all on, just need a belt for them, but that can wait for a bit, as i want to run it without the PS hooked up at first to make sure all is ok. Plus the PS there is attached by only two bolts, one to a thin tab on the engine and the other to a bar which leads back across to the intake mani reinforcement. To say im a bit sus about that is an undestatement, so ill be adding a third attachment point where the aircon compressor used to sit. Probably do it out of 10×25 bar Alu as i have some around.
I also repaired the wiring on the injector rail, and cleaned up the cam covers and painted them wrinkle black, replaced the cam cover seals, spark plugs and a few other bits.

Started work on the exhaust manifold too:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29955-1/IMG_1100_s.jpg[/IMG]
I havnt drilled the holes yet as my holesaw arbor snapped, and ill need to get a new one before i can drill them out.

Plus i built a simple merge collector:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29961-1/IMG_1102_s.jpg[/IMG]
Not the best welding in the world, as i kept blowing through, so i was moving quite quickly. Should have switched to 0.6mm wire, but i dont have any handy. Wish i had a TIG….

Oh yeah, this is the exhaust manifold im using:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29958-1/IMG_1101_s.jpg[/IMG]
The stock 2JZGE VVTi manifold is really quite a nice piece of kit.

Now while i had the oil adaptor out to put the engine mounts on i noticed these couple of plugs in the casing:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29964-1/IMG_1103_s.jpg[/IMG]
Im guessing from their location that they go straight into the gallery behind it. Im currently wondering whether i should simply tap a 1/8NPT hole into one of them for the oil temp sender, and tap the other for a fitting to attach the oil pressure sender.
Thoughts? It will be certainly much easier than welding a plug to the sump. I guess the real question is do those plugs actually lead to the gallery behind?

And finally:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29967-1/IMG_1104_s.jpg[/IMG]
Thats the 2JZ inlet manifold compared to the RB26 one. Dave of the Tomato has suggested that you can simply swap the runners in a 1/6 and 2/5 fashion and it will simply work. If i do that itll be a matter of figuring out how far down to swap them. Ideas?

Thats about it for now. Just gotta clean up the wiring on the engine, and sort out what will be plugged into the body loom, and terminate them into a plug for the body. All looking quite on track for an April start to the actual conversion.

Not much done over the last little while. Alarm installed, but no pics of that for obvious reasons, just driving it around a bit.

However ive started workign on the 2JZ to get it ready to go into the bay soon. Now that my timing belt and bits have showed up i got them installed:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29904-2/IMG_1085_s.jpg[/IMG]

Plus while i was cleaning things up i popped the cam covers off to put new gaskets on, and wrinkle coated them:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29922-2/IMG_1091_s.jpg[/IMG]

Plus i picked up the bits for my new exhaust, thanks to Drew at AAA Exhausts and PLAYA for the ECV:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29925-2/IMG_1092_s.jpg[/IMG]

Oh and a cheapo set of spanners to leave in the car 🙂

Once the wrinkle coat dries ill be able to pop the cam covers back on and put it all back together again, but that can wait for a bit. The weekend has pretty much been spent on the AE86 anyway. Ill probably start the 2JZ conversion in April as thats when my wife changes rotations to a more single car friendly roster.

One thing i do have to do before then is figure out how to cut this:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29901-2/IMG_1084_s.jpg[/IMG]
Basically i have to cut it down to just before the injector mounting bosses. Ive given an abrasion cutting disc a go, but it just tends to cake up. Ive heard that using soap on the disc helps though. Maybe ill try that, anyone have other suggestions?

Finally got around to sorting out the knocking, was a combinaiton of a few things.

Anyway looks like this now:

[img]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29875-1/IMG_3345_s.jpg[/img]

[img]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29878-1/IMG_3346_s.jpg[/img]

[img]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29881-1/IMG_3347_s.jpg[/img]

Looks quite high at the front, so i think ill need to sort out a lip there. But it handles like its on rails, although ill need to figure out the dampening as its a bit over damped at the moment.

Currently im patching up the aerial hole and waiting for the coat of bog to dry over the patch. After that it needs a wheel alignment and ill drive it around for a while as it is to let stuff settle in.

So speaking of the 2JZ, i got started on pulling it down last night. After an hour or so it looks like this:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29866-1/IMG_1080_s.jpg[/IMG]

Nothing too drastic found. Couple of leaking cam seals which have spilled oil down the entire block, and worse in the spark plug valley.

Found that at some point in the past a wire had been crimped between the manifold and the plenum:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29863-1/IMG_1079_s.jpg[/IMG]
So ill have to solder that up before i get it going.

Oh and the one bit i already knew:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29860-1/IMG_1078_s.jpg[/IMG]

Plug is broken off the VVTi solenoid, so that will need to be replaced.
I have a new timing belt, exhaust cam gear and water pump coming for the engine, and soon ill pull the sump off to weld in an oil temp sensor bung.

All in all it needs a tidy up, but nothing drastic.

Also i ducked out and picked this little guy up:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29872-1/IMG_1083_s.jpg[/IMG]

Ill shelve that for a bit later, about when it gets some 272deg cams and an aftermarket ECU… 🙂

Tonight i got a bit bored and couldnt sleep so i went out and did some machining for an hour or so. Turned up two things, first was a pair of steel spacers for the tierod ends which i was having troubles with before:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29781-1/IMG_1052_s.jpg[/IMG]
Pretty simple, just need to find my split pins now.

The other is a boss kit spacer:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29784-1/IMG_1054_s.jpg[/IMG]
First time i had used the autofeed on the lathe, and boy does it make chips, and fast. The only problem is that being aluminum they fly quickly and are bloody hot. I now have 4 decent burns on my neck and one on my upper lip which are going to cane for a while 🙁

Not much news on the Supra as ive been working on the Spoonter. Just finished the steering spacer though:

[img]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29812-2/IMG_1062_s.jpg[/img]

Pretty simple.
Gotta pull the whole rear brakes apart though because i forgot to adjust the handbrake before i started… DOH.

Just a quick little update before i go out for an Aus day BBQ. Yesterday i got the brake lines made up, and then set about getting the rear suspension in.
Springs, easy, just drop them in. Rear AGXs on the other hand, sweet pain in the arse getting the hard poly bushes into the hole on the AGX rear which is slightly too small, from the pics on another guide it seems that they have updated the Focus rear shock slightly with the outer bushing tube now being integral with the housing. So i had to grind that off and then i made up a little die to push in the bush with:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29763-1/IMG_1045_s.jpg[/IMG]

After that i bolted up the suspension and then put the rear dogbones and discs on followed by a lot of swearing when i realised that the idiotic machinist who had turned out the center hole on the discs had it off center so that the runout at the edge of the disc was 1.8mm on one disc and 2.9mm on the other disc…. so it was fouling on the inside of the caliper slightly.

After much mucking around i decided to see whether my lathe really oould machine out to 308mm, which it can…. JUST
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29766-1/IMG_1046_s.jpg[/IMG]
In that position the disc is about 2mm off touching the slide, and about 10mm off the ways. The cross slide is as far back as it can go, and the compound as far forward. Either way it worked, with lots of patience i now have discs which have about 0.2mm runout around the entire disc, i cant get them any better than that because of how the tooling sits and chatters slightly.

Either way it bolted up and worked.
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29769-1/IMG_1048_s.jpg[/IMG]

That was last night. This morning afte rmy wife left for work at 7:30 i did some quick tidying up, and mirrored the rear setup on the other side, and then after a quick boltcheck, lowered it back onto its wheels:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29772-1/IMG_1049_s.jpg[/IMG]

Looks quite good IMHO. Im yet to set the front suspension properly, as its not sitting on level ground there (its slightly slanted towards a drain which you can see by the rear wheel). Regardless i have to bleed the brakes anyway, as my speed bleeder has borked the valve in it, so that will have to wait until my wife gets home so she can operate the brake pedal.

Finally a couple of gratuitous shots of the new brake package:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29775-1/IMG_1050_s.jpg[/IMG]
This is with the new meshies i bought, they are a 16×7 stock Nissan wheel, no idea what they are off.
Im going to paint the R32 wheels the same charcoal as the rear, and these meshies the same leaving the outer section silver.

And then the rears:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29778-1/IMG_1051_s.jpg[/IMG]

Also, anyone know whether the front arches are actually higher than the rears? From a rough measurement it looks like they are, as the sills are roughly equal height there.

So i had some time today to get some stuff done on the car… and unlike Ed, i actually work on the car 😛

First up was finishing off the suspension struts:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29724-1/IMG_1031_s.jpg[/IMG]

Pretty simple all up, painted the little top hat spacers the other day too.

Chucked them in the car:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29742-1/IMG_1037_s.jpg[/IMG]

Added a healthy dose of RCAs:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29745-1/IMG_1038_s.jpg[/IMG]

Bolted up the big rotors and brakes:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29757-1/IMG_1042_s.jpg[/IMG]

And then realised how much castor im going to have to pull out of the front struts:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29751-1/IMG_1040_s.jpg[/IMG]
Because thats a ridiculous amount of lock.

Need to get new brake lines made up at this point, as the ones i have are perishing and are a touch too short. I have tomorrow off so ill jack up the arse end in the morning and get some brake lines for there too. I have rear springs and shocks ready to go in there tomorrow along with the UZZ30/R33 brakes.

Oh yeah, and i got longer bolts for my mini bosskit:
[IMG]http://gallery2.plebeians.net/d/29730-1/IMG_1033_s.jpg[/IMG]

More updates tomorrow or Wednesday.