Sock's Big 240sx Project Thread

[Sockington]

Before I get flamed by any of you, please understand these two facts:- The car was originally bought for $100. The transmission and engine were smoked from never having their fluids changed- The motor and transmission were given to me free.

I'm sticking in a 2.3T from a 1988 Ford Thunderbird TurboCoupe along with the 5speed transmission.

Alrighty, here's the mighty beast as it's sat for the past year. Holy **** it's been a while.

Oh my, aren't you a sexy beast!

Here's where I planned on spending my day today:

For those of you who aren't blind, you'll notice that the engine bay is white and the car is poorly painted black.

Hey there pignose.

Here's a little bit of rust.

A little bit more there.

I'm sure most of you think that this car is a rusted piece of ****. You'll be glad to know that there is actually little to no rust inside the car (as in, the floor is intact).

Your life is soon to be ended, dear automatic transmission.

Some more bits slowly removed from the engine bay:

Looks black on the outside:

White and fairly rust free on the inside:

More crap removed.

Starting to clear up.

More **** removed.

Cleaning out the inside of the car a bit.

I came across something rather shocking. I had no idea the gas tank was this beat up. I know I needed some new straps, but I guess a tank is in order too. ****ty.

Some more rust...

How I left the engine bay for today.

Oh, hello there faithful Altima!

Hello there, my amazing(ly cheap) tool set! No snap-on there.

Here's the good bits.The T5 transmission that I got for free.

The bucket of wiring I have to sort through.

The 2.3Turbo I have to install.
Modified by Sockington at 1:39 PM 4/17/2006

[Sockington]

My plans:- Get the car inside (we made room for it today)- Jack it up- Block it and put some stands under it- Take the rear tires off- Remove the gas tank

I got most of those done with a few extras tossed in. First on the bill, get it's *** in the air.

Welcome to your new home, dear 240.

Take of the driver's rear tire and take a peek at the brakes. Conclusion - very rusty.

Pop the rotor and caliper off.

I attempted to take the tire off the passenger rear tire, but it was rusted to the hub. God damn. I just soaked some WD40 in there for now.

Jacked, blocked, and some stands under it too. Classy

Down goes the tank.

Apparently I left about 30liters of gas in the tank. Jesus, that was suprisingly heavy.

Hacked off the muffler and found some tire chocks. Cool.

Found a whole assload of rust where the muffler used to be. Great. More welding.

Took off some of the exhaust.

Tackled some of the rust lightly (trying to see if it was rotted right through. Suprisingly, not.)

How it'll sit for a couple of days until I get time to work on it again.

I think I'm going to adapt the factory sending unit to a fuel cell. Then I can slap in a Walbro pump and be laughing. My fiance's uncle owns a machine shop and I know a few welders, so I might get a stainless steel tank made to fit in the spare tire well or something similar.

Overall, there's a bit more rust in certain places than I originally expected, but I can deal with that, I guess. Oh well, sucks having Canadian winters on cars like this.

[Sockington]

Got the passenger rear tire off with a little help from a long steel bar to whack it off. Damn rusty hub.



Rotor and caliper off.

Let's attack some rust on the driver's rear.

Applied a "Rust convertor/killer" layer over the sanded sections to help clean things up a touch more.

Sanded and painted inside the rot hole below the driver's door

Removed the rear prop/drive-shaft. Holy **** were the bolts hard to remove. I was considering getting the torches out, but I just strong armed it.

Got the shaft out.From bottom to top: 240sx shaft, TurboCoupe Shaft, Ranger shaft.

Looks like I'm going to need to get an adapter fabbed up (I already knew this - not being naive)

Cleaning up for the day.

I also removed the rear brake cables. I'm picking up new ones at work for $60. (The bucket is there to catch any transmission fluid that might come out of the tailstock)

Some more tools.

My "engine hoist".It actually works REALLY well for pulling out engines.

[Sockington]

The engine bay (semi-clean)

Where the ECU was.

Needs more LS1? I think not.

Interior **** and misc. stuff that has been removed.

Where the driveshaft/transmission/engine used to be.

Go further with the walk around.

The caliper bolt that snapped off in the spindle.

The freshly sandblasted caliper mounts.

The mighty 2.3Turbo.

The mounting brackets.

The 240sx cross member.

The ECU harness removed the 240sx.

Engine going in!

Checking clearance out back. Good.

Check upfront clearance.

View from below the engine bay.

This is what happens when the motor started swinging..into the rad.

Trying to get it as far back in the bay as possible.

Still a little more to go.

Clearance on the passenger side. That fuse box will have to be moved.

Driver's side looks good.

Lots of front clearance!

The engine bay will rest empty tonight.

The car will also rest empty tonight.

[Sockington]

Finally, I got out the torches to get that damn caliper bracket off.

It begins!

Liner removed along with lower resonator.

To the junk-bucket with the likes of you.

Left fender off - much swearing over this weird front fender bracket.

See the little bracket at the front? ****ing whore to get with the bumper on.

Fenderless! Bumperless! Hoodless!

****ing rotten dust shields. I removed the front hub to pull that ****er off.

My friend, torches.

Caliper bracket off.

The bumper's new home.

Some front end shots.

Good metal! Wow!

Sanded the rough spots, applied rust killer/primer.

Junk pile.

Passenger side got the same treatment.

Old fenders. They could be repaired, but for $100/side, I might as well get new ones. The old ones have seen so many different layers of paint. Jesus christ.

[Sockington]

Got some more done today. I'm planning on taking out the front crossmember to make my motor mounts out of the vehicle. I figure it'll just be easier that way.

Front sway bar? Out you come!

Next, the "tension rods"

Jesus Christ! That bushing looks horrible!

A little leverage working for me

Tension rod assembly removed

How in hell does the arm and mounting bracket come apart? The bolt is supposed to just slide out - no threads holding it into the arm... or so they say.

Damn that's really in there. First round of torch work.

Next round with success!

There's the little bastard that took me an hour to remove.

Some parts back from sandblasting.

More parts to be blasted.

Closed up for the night.

It's clear that a bushing set is first purchase for the car. Every piece of rubber on this car is rotted. Hello Energy poly bushing set.

[Sockington]

First off, removal of driver's side strut/tension rod. Easily done.

Mr. Crossmember, you're next.

Jesus! I found a huge rot hole on the driver's side rail.

Clean up time.

The rust that was on the floor after the hour of grinding.

The front crossmember hanging out behind the car.

When I was shuffling around below the car, I noticed that the front wood blocks were no longer supporting any weight. Since the engine,transmission, and crossmember was removed, the car became VERY titly.

I jacked up the front and added some wood blocks for safety's sake.

That hole certainly looks nasty.

If you look at the hole, it's like the car is frowning about it's current condition of neglect.

Time to make some patches.

Now, please don't mock the following pictures. I'm using a 220volt stick welder for the welding, and this was my first time actually welding. Ever. Advert your eyes.

Test fitting.

Completed patch.

I must admit, welding on your back while trying to hold your head up, a trouble light on where you're welding, making sure you mask stays down, and trying to not burn holes through the rail was very difficult. At this point, I may have actually had about an hour since my first weld was done.

That nice flat spot gives me a good spot to jack from. I know it's not pretty, but I'll be damned if that isn't the toughest spot on the whole damn car.

I'm going to seal up the holes around the patch with Goop or Seal-All, and then undercoat my new patch. I don't think I did to bad for not knowing how to weld at the start of the day, using a stick welder, and trying to weld on my side for my first time welding.

[Aworkinprogress]

Wow! Bet your having fun. keep it up.

[Sockington]

Wow! Bet your having fun. keep it up.

More than you know. Let me tell you, a nice set of torches have been my friend when it comes to getting all the rusted bolts out.

[One_Love]

award for the biggest post goes to Sockington.

Does look like fun

[rico05]

Cool project! It is nice to see someone being somewhat original (I have seen that motor in an S13 before, but i digress) and very thorough. I wish I had the time to strip my car down, but there is no real need since I live in the South, and there is no rust.

Keep us updated on your progress! Good luck!

[Sockington]

award for the biggest post goes to Sockington.

Series of large posts; it wasn't one single large post. What's the point of just putting one picture per post and fill thirty pages, rather than a couple large posts that summarize a particular day's work?

[BobWithBoobs]

awsome presentation!

never seen so much rust on a s13....

Great job man.

[Toshima]

Man looks lile its coming aound nicely. Much much HP are you going for? And +1 for the south not having anyrust.

[dickie]

thank God i got the **** outta the north... im guessing ontario is about as bad as detroit as far as salt-based rust goes

[continental_drift]

I sincerely hope that all your hard work pays off.

[Jiggyfry]

Hello fellow Canadian!

+1 for you doing everything yourself

+50,000000000 for another 240 surviving the harsh Canadian climate!

by the way, how much boost you planning on running? Will you be building this engine up?

"I wonder how much deeper the ocean would be if sponges didnt live there?"

[stev0]

Jeez... this thread doesn't need a 56k warning.. it needs an "everyone but T3 fiber connections gtfo" warning

Good luck, it's looking good so far.

[crzycav86]

Man that project is not for the faint of heart! I'm glad to see you bringing an old 240 back to life though

What made you go with that motor?(aside from that fact it looks like you had it lying around)

Keep us updated. This is really neat stuff.

[continental_drift]

well, for starters its a 2.3 litre turbo with a lot of torque that was intendedfor use in a larger vehicle so it will probably pull strong...

that and he had it lying around from when his thunderbird broke down.

amIright or amIright?

[GhostDriver]

I sincerely hope that all your hard work pays off.

Fo' real.

I commend you on all your hard work. I know I don't have enough patience to do all of that. I won't even knock the fact that your using a Ford motor in a Nissan because of all the work going into the car itself. So far so good. I wish you the best with the project. Btw, what will be the purpose of the end result?

[nvrplzd240]

WoW

now THATS a project

i dont know if i could handle all that rust

mad props to ya man

good luck with the engine too... is this a revolutionary first for 240s?

[PapaSmurf2k3]

reminds me of my current project.. rust rust rust, and yet, way more fun than anything els i would be doing.

[Sockington]

that and he had it lying around from when his thunderbird broke down.

amIright or amIright?

Actually, a guy was moving and offered it up to me for free. I'm sure his Thunderbird broke down though.

As for boost, it was running 18psi when the engine was pulled. I'm probably going to go with a T3/4 later on rather than the small IHI on the motor now. If I'm really feeling daring, there's always a Holset with my name on it.

The car is going to be completely restored to running and better than factory condition. I'm going to pickup a poly-urethane bushing kit, Tokico/AGX shocks, and springs and a few other suspension things. I'm pretty sure that the factory diff is going to explode in a ball of awesomeness with the torque the 2.3T will be putting down.

Every bolt I take off it being replaced/reinserted with a nice coat of anti-seize.

[drifter_for_life06]

why is there purple periodically all over the engine bay

[Sockington]

why is there purple periodically all over the engine bay

The car was originally white, then painted purple-ish pink, then finally black.

Really, it makes little-to-no sense to me either.

[continental_drift]

looked like the inside of the fenders and under the hood were red.

[hudy]

With all that rust you need begger hammers and prybars.

[boj240]

cool man nice stuff lots of rust tho thats gotta suck... i still dont like fords becase ur just going to have to Fix Or Repair Dailyheh but good lucks

[Zion8561]

WOW. What a tremendous undertaking! There is a lot of rust, but I would pay $100 just to be able to tear into an S13 like that (if I had the space) and also learn to weld.

I thought it was funny that you wanted to replace the fenders when each would cost the same as the whole car did! Well, I gotta give you lots of respect for jumping into such a project.