When I purchased my new 240SX in 1991 I was so happy. Upgrading from a 1980 Datsun 210 made me feel like I had the fastest car ever. After a while the feeling of having a fast car faded until I knew I owned a slug. This is what I did about it.
The first thing I did was upgrade the suspension. I wanted to lower the car a little so in went H&R springs with Tokiko blue shocks. I went with the non-adjustable shocks thinking I didn't need adjusability. I was wrong. The blue shocks are a little to hard for crappy Vancouver roads, too hard for good drag racing, and a too soft for autocrossing. When they wear out (real soon now) I'll replace them with something adjustable. Knowing I wanted to upgrade the power I decided to get a VLSD. After calling about 20 local junkyards I hit the jackpot, they had two. I grabbed the cleanest one. After a while I did other mods, Whiteline adjustable front and read anti-sway bars, Whiteline urethane bushings everywhere, and Whiteline Sub-frame spacers. It helps living about 10 minutes from PDM racing :-) I also upgraded the front brakes to a set from a Q45.
When I decided it was time for more
power I started by reaserching. Lots of reaserching. Over a year of
reaserch. Starting in 1999, there were a few guys turbocharging KA24DE's
but there wasn't much public info. This is what I cam up with. I
wanted about 300 crank HP, minimal lag, as quiet as possible, and it had
to pass emissions testing. These are the parts I felt would get me
there:
A complete (minus throttle body and distributor) 1992 engine to do the
work on.
Turbonetics T3 turbo. 60
trim compressor, .63 A/R turbine, water cooled ceramic ball bearing
center section.
Turbonetics Deltagate II with a 3-5 psi spring.
RevHard manifold.
370cc/min drop in injectors.
Jim Wolf tuned ECU.
Wiseco custom pistons .030 over,
9.0:1 compression ratio with ceramic heat coating on the face and moly
coating on the skirts.
Hastings rings
and Clevite
bearings.
Rebuilt head. Includes new exhaust valve guides and valve job. Mild
port and polish by Andy at Specialty Engineering in New Westminster, BC.
Modified Starion front mount intercooler.
1st gen. DSM blow off valve.
21' of 2.5" stainless steel tubing.
A bunch of 90 degree stainless mandrel bends from CPE systems.
Custom home made 2.5" downpipe.
Custom home made 2.5" cat-back exhaust.
Thrush 2.5"x28"
glasspack.
Vibrant generic
stainless 2.5" inlet/dual 2" outlet perforated core muffler.
Greddy Profec-B electronic boost controller.
Centerforce Dual-Friction
clutch.
Two Flex-A-Lite 12" fans and the new FAL
variable fan speed controller.
Miller Econo-TIG welder and associated equipment.
A big tool box full of (wait for it...) tools. Many of which I already
had.
It took two years of prepping - gathering parts and getting machine work done. I did the cat-back as a weekend project to get more familiar with welding. One summer spent working on my friend Neall's G20. Now it is time to start the assembly of the turbo KA.
I had Andy at Specialty do the internals prep including the specificaton of the custom pistons. I did the final assembly just before installing the engine.
Because I was slightly pressed for time, I didn't take many pictures of the build up. Stupid me. I have a couple of pictures of the back of the assembled KA with the emissions stuff all re-done that might be of use to some people.
Assembling an engine isn't that hard if you have the factory service manual. Take your time. Make sure that everything is perfectly clean before installing. Use assembly lube on all friction surfaces. Get a GOOD torque wrench and use it carefully. Follow the manual. Don't forget the little insert seal that goes on the inside of the lower front cover. Is seals the oil feed from the pump to the filter. It isn't in the manual. I checked. Twice. Figuring out where the oil leak was coming from wasn't hard but it sure sucks taking the lower cover off with the engine installed.
I decided to run the intercooler pipes under the car instead of cutting the fenders and relocating the battery. Here are some pictures with the rad removed illustrating how I did it.
After a careful 1000 miles or so of
break in it was time to turn up the boost. I worked great until I hit
about 7psi. Horrible missfiring with the plugs gap to .044 inches. I
didn't want to gap the plugs down for fairly low boos so I went to the
local high-performance place and picked up a Mallory HyFire 6A. It's an
MSD 6A clone right down to the wire colours. I also got an MSD blaster
SS coil and tach adapter. After installing the new ignition the engine
ran strong up to 10psi or so where I figured I was running out of MAF
voltage and fuel duty cycle. So I stopped turning up the boost and
enjoyed my significantly faster car. Then I went to the dyno and got
these results.
Initially the car felt scary fast. Just getting used to the power took a month or so. After that month It felt not so quick again. Damn, boost is addictive.
Spring 2003 I decide I have had enought of my broken pop-up headlights. I do a custom headlight install.
Skip ahead to June. I come across
this great deal on a set of four MSD 50lb/hr injectors. I bite. The
upgrade cycle starts anew. A new custom fuel rail using Holley fuel
rail stock is made. I accquire a Z32 MAF and plug for cheap as well as
an AccuFab universal fuel pressure regulator and a new JWT program. A
weekend was required to install it all.
Now I run 16 psi. I feel quick again. I wonder how long it will last.
...Exactly one week when my radiator dies. After getting screwed over by a local supplier (brought in a single core rad and tried to pass it off as a dual core) I found a dual core copper/brass one locally for cheap. Copper/brass radiators are often looked down upon as inferior. From the reaserch I have read the copper/brass cores cool about the same as aluminum ones. Aluminum is a better conductor of heat but is weaker so the core tubes are made thicker to hold the pressure. Copper can be made thinner at the same strength so it transfers heat about the same in the end. On thing that aluminum radiators have all over copper/brass ones is weight. The new radiator weighs in at about three times a as much as the original one, but it is a thicker dual core with larger end tanks so I'm not complaining.
After installing the new rad I went for a
spin around the block. Give it some gas in second and POOF with
overheating. Crap. Take it easy back to home with the temerature needle
rapidly climbing to the top of the gague and the ECU in limp mode. After
checking the turbo hoses everything looks OK, I add about another liter
of water to the rad. Must have been an air bubble, right? Go for
another spin. More limp mode and more overheating. Double crap. Add
about another half liter to the rad (where is all the air hiding? I
removed the air bleed screw when filling the rad.) and recheck the
hoses. Still runs like crap and overheats. I'm wondering, did I blow a
head gasket? Limp home and Neall finds a turbo hose pressed but not
clamped on. Fix that. While that is happening I watch the rad suck
more water in from the overflow tank as it cools. Bleeding the air out
of the cooling system is so hit and miss on a KA. One more spin reveals
all is well.
I swapped carpets
during the summer. Mine had a hole under the driver's heel almost
a foot across. It also smelled bad. I need to remember to
roll up the windows when it rains.
After changing the carpets the brake
light was on all the time. When I went to fix it I became both
stupid and insane. After gluing the switch on the handbrake back
together I couldn't get the light to go off. I figured that I cut
a wire or something while installing the carpet. It turns out
(here's the stupid part) that the wiring was fine. Unless the car
is running all the lights stay on becuase of the bulb check. Since
I was stupid at the time I forgot about the bulb check . I removed
the interior (except for the dashboard) lifted up the carpet and started
checking the wires. Here's where the insanity came in. I
kept hitting my head on the automatic seatbelt end. SInce in
Canada 240's didn't have auto seatbelts I figured I could get the parts
without much trouble. So I removed the
auto seatbelts, and their wiring harness. I went to the
dealer the next day and found out thet about half of the parts are out
of production. The other half would come from Japan and take
weeks. Crap. Then I got luck y. Colin (Alkatraz on NorthWestNissans) had
rolled his coupe over the winter and bought it back from the insurance
company. It had the same colour interior as mine. So I
bought his interior panels and and did the swap.
I added a B&M short shifter, what a difference. I was extremely gentle when I shifted. I usually used my fingertips. Not any more. With the shorter rod and relocated pivot you have to PUSH. I hope it gets easier with time and miles. The feel is great, you know exactly where the shifter needs to go. Withe the more direct linkage I can hear my transmission internals whirring about. Weird.
I went to the drag strip In September,
after I installed and dynoed the car. My best was a
13.512@107. This was on my Dunlop SP5000 A/S 215r15/50
tires. I need better grip off the line.
This is how it stands as of October 2003, about four years after I started improving my car. Thanks to Coleen (my Wife) for her patience and Neall for moral support and wrench turning monkey work.
Current 14 psi dyno sheet:
It has been a long road to get to this
point. There isn't much I haven't had out of the car at one time
or another. I feel pretty confident that it will hold together
for a long time. Now I just need to find where the missing power
is.
Misc links:
A link to the ECU wiring harness.
A link to the Audio wiring harness.
A link to the legend to the wiring harness.
