Quitting's for quitters.

I honestly haven't been up to much lately. Kidding, kidding.

As you all know, the motor is out of the 240SX. I've been squeezing in some work time here and there, but not too much has happened since we pulled the motor.

First off, I removed the CA18DET's exhaust manifold to take a look at the turbo. I had noticed earlier that it appeared to have not been clocked as it should have been. (When running the SR20DET T25 on the CA, the compressor housing must be clocked to clear the exhaust manifold). The guy in Japan who installed it just cut off one of the outlet holes entirely, as you can see here:



And he butchered the hot side outlet:



He also cut up the inlet for the air intake tube. The replacement from the blown turbo is pictured for comparison.



So, I opted to buy a blown turbo for the parts that were damaged and replace them.

The blown turbo:



Last night (Friday) I spent a good two hours making a tool to release the snap ring that holds the compressor portion of the turbo to the center section. Tomorrow, I should be able to release the damn thing and get it apart. The tool I made was originally a crappy pair of needle-nose pliers—I cut off the tips, bent then to make "claws," and then used part of an old bed frame to make extensions for the handles. Now, I didn't have any power tools at my disposal (hack saw FTW) so I'm extremely sore. But worth it? Yes. I did buy a set of snap-ring pliers from O'Reilly Auto earlier this week, but they're too weaksauce to take apart a turbo. :(

Last Saturday, one week ago, I went to Budget Pick-N-Pull in Belton. While at the junkyard I was able to get some good deals.

Uncracked dash (which was a pain to remove)—$15:



Electric radiator fan—$10:



I picked up some other random stuff there too. But all in all, I did well. Now to find some power steering lines and a gauge cluster...

And this is what the CA18DET looks like right now... it's awaiting more parts:



My dad's house also made progress and is looking pretty good:









I've got Solo & Ensemble for band next weekend, which I'm honestly not looking forward to. Ensemble? Check. Solo? Not so check. But we shall see.

Thanks for reading.

The motor is out.

Pictures can be seen here.

240SX Overview

Small changes I suppose.

In case you didn't notice, I changed the title of the site and domain name. I didn't like the name I had before, so I apologize if it was bookmarked and the new name threw you off. I made a few changes to the template; let me know if the fonts are too small or anything like that.

David

+1

Everything seems to be in order for the 240SX, and I leave you with this:



(click image to enlarge)

It (finally) begins.

The CA18DET has been ordered from Jhot and is on its way. It'll probably be here tomorrow.

Also planning on getting some other parts soon:

Buddy Club Spec II
Project Nissan Down Pipe
Intense Power Dump Pipe
Catco 3" Hi-Flow Catalytic Converter
Koyo Aluminum Radiator + Koyo cap
Zirgo 14" electric fan w/ thermostat
ARC SMIC
Nismo FPR
Walbro High Pressure Fuel Pump
HKS Type-0 Turbo Timer
Ziex 512 (205/55/15) tires mounted on the teardrops
Autometer boost/fuel pressure gauges
Circuit Sports inline water temp. sensor adaptor (my car came with the gauge but not the adaptor)
DOHC power steering lines and tachometer (damnit I've gotta find a chuki in a yard soon... or maybe a part-out)
other stuff like water pump, thermostat, belts, hoses, etc. AND a million other things I'm probably forgetting...

Then it's time to start the swap. :)

I also decided to clean out the garage even more. I've spent a total of TEN HOURS cleaning the thing. It's now ridiculously awesome: full 8 feet of work bench FTW!

"Knock"

Brake ahead.

I put in about forty minutes of "quality" time into the car after school Thursday. I decided to check the brakes for fun, so I pulled of one of the wheels and had a look around. I also put on one of Mitchell's wheels—which I actually kind of like—so I'll talk to Mitchell about them. If I end up using them they will be painted gray, so don't worry about the clashing shades of white or anything. They're 16x7 +40 all around I think, so they may be a little sunken... We'll see...















And if I am able to use the wheels, this a hopeful photochop of what they will look like:



In other news, I've seen Borat twice now. "High five!"

The House, as seen through the crazy dream world of a camera phone.

...a basketball.

David Zucker is my new hero—Airplane! and this?!

P.S. I made this. :D

Doodles #1

‽

That, my friends, is the interrobang. Enjoy.

Snakes on a Blog

Snakes on a Plane = the best movie ever. Let it be known, then, that I saw it the Saturday after it came out and proclaimed its coolness before anyone else in the high school. Let it be known.

Another white car.

(click to enlarge)

It's a 1989 Nissan 240SX SE with 208,000 miles. The motor's bad, but everything else is good. Got a pretty good deal on it too, only $500 and the interior and everything else is in great condition. The guy I got it from said he listed it in the classifieds yesterday and it sold today! Right now it's still sitting in Killeen about 20 minutes away from my house, waiting to be towed home tomorrow. I think I'm gonna get a nice new CA18DET to replace the mal-treated KA24E. The deal with getting the car is that my twin brother was handed down my dad's old 1984 FJ60, and my parents told me they'd match the value with my car. The FJ is worth around $4,000 tops, so I've got $3,500 to spend on my car to get it running and safe. Better get my license and get started. :) (Probably not much time for anything else now.)

P.S. Sorry for looking sleepy in the pic. My dad closed the shutter before I knew what was going on... heh.

I can't wait to get started...!

Learning the animated GIF; still learning to cartoon.

Started with a copy of the Dave Chapelle show on DVD, ripped the scene with Handbrake as an .avi, converted it to an iMovie friendly .mov, added subtitles, saved, opened in Quicktime Pro and saved as image sequence, resized with Automator, booted into XP, animated as a GIF and finally saved and transferred back into OS X with a memory stick reader.

Latest photochop:

Suzuki Forenza (aka Chevy Lacetti, the "Reasonably Priced Car," in this season's Top Gear.)

Before




After




(click images for magnification)

Yes, that is an R34 conversion. :D All the grey lines were done by hand with the line tool. I was planning on ricing the car out from the start, and couldn't figure out anything more ricey than an R34 Suzuki for JDM d0riFT0 tyTeNEss. Hehe.

Damn AE86's, A Confusing Line of Nissan's, and RHD?

The 1985-1987 Toyota Corolla Sport GT-S costs way too much. I can't afford it, and in all practicality, it's a 20 year old car. So, I started looking around for a newer, cheaper, RWD car — and I found one. The Nissan 240SX:




The top model is the three door hatchback, whereas the bottom is the two door coupé. Those particular models are based upon Nissan's S13 chassis, which was their cheapest sports car sold from 1989-2002. The S13 was marketed as several names around the world. In Japan, the S13 was offered as both a coupé, and a hatchback. The coupé had fixed headlights up front, and was branded as the Nissan Silvia. The hatchback had pop-ups and was called the 180SX. Both were introduced in 1989 with a 173 hp 1.8 liter turbo-charged straight four known as the CA18DET. When they brought the car over here in the same year, they dropped the turbo charged motor because insurance on it would have too high for their target market, and put in a 145 hp single overhead cam straight four, known as the KA24E. They also opted to replace the fixed headlights on the coupé with the pop-ups from the 180SX and branded both cars (the 180SX and the pop-up nosed Silvia, both featuring the KA24E) as the 240SX. In 1991, the CA18DET was replaced with the then-new SR20DET, 2.0 liter, 205 hp, turbocharged straight four — but in North America, the 91' and newer models were given the KA24DE, a new dual overhead cam version of the KA24E. Many 240SX owners opt to replace their KA motor with the SR20DET as it makes more horsepower in stock form and has more aftermarket support. Others opt for the high-revving CA. Some people turbo the KA, but most KA's have over 200,000 miles and would need a rebuild anyway, so they'd rather buy a Japanese motor.

I have several goals, of which possibly none will be accomplished, but here they are anyway:

• CA18DET
• RHD (Pointless, complicated, and impractical conversion, but cool nonetheless.)
• S13 Silvia conversion
• White, with GANSTA TITE CARBON FIBER STICKAS YO

Just kidding. :)

It's just a tad subjective.

Cars

Two relevant car stories, one concerning the popular Pixar Animation Studios film, the other concerning what I shall be driving and working on for seemingly the rest of my life.

Cars, the movie, was good. Better than I thought it would be, as cars seem like a hard thing to turn into a suitable replacement for a human being. But it worked, and a 911 does fall in love with a race-car, and that's that.

The other car, the more important car, is the subject of my thoughts right now. I have several options here, but A) no sports-cars and B) no domestic's. I'm not a GM/Chrysler guy, period.

What I'm currently looking at now is the Toyota AE86, known here as the Corolla GT-S, a rear-wheel drive sport coupe/hatch known for its drivability and poise. (Not brake-horsepower. It has 112.) You probably know it as the Trueno, Sprinter, or some other variant. I believe it was in NFSU2 as a Corolla, so there ya go. It was also in Gran Turismo. Anyways, it's a rare little car (the hatches are impossible to find around here), but it's fairly cheap compared to *ahem* some other people's cars— about $3500 for a decent one.




The reason, you see, that I want this auto is that I want something to do. Working on a 'Yota that's been out of production for 19 years and that no one knows what the hell it is: priceless. It'll give me something to do, while you drive your fucking Jeep Liberty.

Have a nice evening.

608 Cliff Drive

Coming March 2007.

Bloody miser.

General Update:

• As of 31 May 2006, Belton Super Wal*Mart is verified to have at least (8) white Nintendo DS lites in stock. The launch date is technically 11 June, but screw the technicality. Wal*Mart can do whatever the fuck it wants. Also: (2) Xbox 360 premiums were in stock as well.

• This is going to be my next R/C. Then probably a TLT/Pede/Bruiser hybrid. That'll be a fun build. The one there is from a guy over at R/C Crawler.

• I've gotten stickied over at Ultimate Traxxas in the E. 'Pede forum concerning the Jato wide conversion. This is how my truck looks right now.

• This is probably the sweetest Bruiser ever. And it only costs $830!

• My very own Mantis has been looking very photogenic as well.

• Top Gear is the greatest show ever. Can't wait till Monday morning for the BT widescreen rip. :D

• The MacBook Pro's screen crack is completely normal to me now. Even if I'm watching a crappy show like American Dad on it.

• I'm still in love with this desktop I made a while back:



• Dudley called. I don't have to go to graduation. (Umm yay for being in concert band.)

• Speaking of concert band... *sigh*

• Last day of school today. Now it's boring summer.