I ended up with an Origin hood that adds an extra 1 1/2" due to it's design and I've cut the filler off.

First a few pics of the clearanced frame rails for the alternator and oil filter...alternator has just enough and the oil filter loads; however this will help when changing filters as you need some space to maneuver the old one out and the new one on.
Unfortunately when i install an oilcooler i'll also be relocating the filter so at that point it will have become redundant.

Alternator shot, note moved fusebox.

oil filter:

due to placement of the engine using the ka trans there is LOADS of space behind the engine, so much that you can change the clutch with the engine in the car.
not that intend to do so...

front shot of pulley placement, as center as i could get it.

oil pan clearance of the crossmember, it sits a touch lower than the actual crossmember but its better than having it hang an inch or more below it...chopping hood is perfered over loosing all my oil if i bottom out.

quick shot of the engine mount adaptor plates to use the vh engine mounts and mount plates with the ka crossmember, very VERY simple and VERY effective.

engine in the car and on the mounts loaded up, will be pulled out and painted but needed to make sure it 'worked' before i went further with them.

to fab your own set of adaptor plates you'll need about 20"l x 3"w x 1/8"t plate steel and length of about 12"l x 3/4"w x 1/8"t.
cut two lengths of the 3" stock about 5.5" long as well as two 3"x3" pieces; you'll also need to cut two lenghts of the 3/4" stock about 5.5" long as well and assemble as shown.
you'll need to drill holes for the ka xmember and access holes but that will atleast get you going.

bronze mfp actin a foo and showing us that saftey is coo.

and for the last bit, brake master mock mounted with a mystery booster, first person to correctly guess the booster gets a cookie.
fitment is damn near perfect and is an almost bolt on application...gotta love having a good eye for fitment.
did i mention that it bolts into the factory location and bolt holes with about 1/2" clearance to the head?

any luck i'll have the factory headders on and the car rolling under its own power this week.

89 nissan 240sx coupe with a fully built sr
-to much to list

project 89 450sx
-take a seat the show will start soon. Grab some

Quote, originally posted by Carl H »

quick shot of the engine mount adaptor plates to use the vh engine mounts and mount plates with the ka crossmember, very VERY simple and VERY effective. engine in the car and on the mounts loaded up, will be pulled out and painted but needed to make sure it 'worked' before i went further with them.

How do you plan on reinforcing these? The Plate->Crossmember bolts are heavily loaded in this configuration. I'm not knocking the design, an adaptor is the easiest solution. However, those bolts and/or the sheet metal they're bolted through will not hold up long under this stress.

How do you plan on reinforcing these? The Plate->Crossmember bolts are heavily loaded in this configuration. I'm not knocking the design, an adaptor is the easiest solution. However, those bolts and/or the sheet metal they're bolted through will not hold up long under this stress.[/QUOTE]
^^^ WHS

and why did you cut and shut the trans bell housing so much?

sinfiniti - no way to chop the bellhousing off in one section or way to refrence the alignment without sectioning the bellhousing...not my favourite mod on the install but its pretty strong and should do fine.

so I've run into a few snags on the install and it looks like i wont have it running by the time i head back to school...sucks but what can you do right?
A majorsetback was the factory headers not clearing the car, the passenger side BARELY clears the frame rail (suprisingly enough) but the drivers comes no where close to fitting even with modifications to the header its self.
issue with the drivers header is the placement of the steering column, there is no space for it...i suspect this is because in the q45 the steering shaft is located a bit further out than on the s13 which makes sense due to the s13's narrower frame rails.
currently chopped the headders off at the collector tube so i can atleast crank the car and make sure the engine/wiring runs.

I did snap a few photos of the mounts and undercar clearance, oil pan is just about on the same level as the xmember which isnt bad but not what i really wanted.
swaybar clearance is tight but there is about 1/8" between the bar and the oil pan.

adaptor plate from the bottom, next revision will have a trangular plate welded between the vh mount bolts and then a piece of flatstock welded to the trangular part to bolt to the xmember.

i painted the adaptor plates and de-tetanusified the brake booster, it got a quick coat of paint too.

In all of my planning and good eye for estimation i had glanced at the brake booster and thought the studs were alittle shorter than the ones on the s13 booster, the solution was to weld on some short extentions but i decided to go junkyarding again and see what i could find.
ended up finding another booster that was the same size (!) and diementions as the booster i had previously tried to use...except that the mounting studs were as long as the s13 boosters.
the center bore for the master is also the same where the old booster is slighly larger.

shot from the front of the boosters:

back shot of the boosters, notice the shorter studs on the booster located on the far left:

all i got for now, going to try cranking the engine today and see if i cant get it to run.

As in does your computer have a letter l that works? Sorry it made me laugh.

Nice project, we are deffinetly having a TXVH Club soon.

i found out why the car wouldnt crank even tho i knew the wiring was right...verified that the fuel pump went live at the relay and it does but the pump is seized, look at what fun i found in the tank:

previous owner i am now convinced is/was a FCKIN MORON.
Irritated to say the least, tank is filled with corrosion and rust, gotta locate a new tank.

A job worth doing, is worth doing right!

the real news here is that i started the car...and i'll say this open headder is some kind of phenomnal noise.
She didnt take much to fire up but WOULD NOT fire unless i had my dash plug connected; apparently these engines need the ignition start signal to run right.
Started strong with no hesitation after that and settled into a nice smooth idle, not bad for an engine thats been sitting for quite possibly over a year.
blipping the throttle yeilds not only aural delight but also a suprisingly quick revving engine...engine revved up to approx 4k with just a breath of the pedal.
Too bad i have to go back to school tommorow...i'd love to finish the headers and tool around.

Congrats man, hopefully you can finish it soon! When is your next weekend home? Labour day?

under car shot of the driveshaft and trans.

shot of the shifter, it is tilted to the right but I'm 99% sure its due to the drivers header resting on the frame rail since when i originally dropped the engine into the car it was dead center.
filled the trans with oil and the clutch engages and disengages nicely, shifting is a bit notchy but the box has been dry for god knows how long.

plumbing the radiator turned out to be simple...to reroute the lower hose i took the stock bracket and trimmed down the mount tab and flipped it upside down, then bolted it to the head using one of the thru cover bolts...worked very well.
hoses were plumbed using the ka hoses with minor trimming but i'll need a joiner of sorts for the lower hose as can be seen from the pictures; that or a single piece of hose, would be perfered but hard to find.
might be stuck with the stock radiator and stock ac cooling fan for now, a friend has a taurus sho fan which I'll try to mount for ultimate cooling.

front shot:

drivers:

passenger, note the rerouted solid pipe and connection lacking a joiner.

heater hoses, have to use two different sizes due to the differences in s13 and g50 inlets and outlets, clearance is super tight but is there.

watch this space for powersteering magic and headers next week!

Now carrying Nardi and Personal steering wheels and Works Bell hubs! Also new, SPLPARTS adjustable arms and much much more!

VERY NICE!

Carl,

Just trying to give you a heads up. There is no way that the stock radiator and AC fan will keep up with the heat produced by this motor on a hot day. I'm speaking from experience.

My cooling setup is as follows... Koyorad AL race radiator and stock AC fan. I had the lower inlet moved to the other side to ease hose routing and to promote cross core flow, which the KA setup does not. I had a bung welded into the radiator for a thermoswitch that turns the fans on at 190 and off at 170. With the car idling in my driveway, hood up, on an 82 degree day, the fan came on at 190 and never shut off. I watched my coolant temp gauge come down to 182ish from 190 and then stay there. Had the hood been closed or if there was a load on the motor I would have been in trouble. Keep in mind, I don't have a heater core at all, so that reduces my cooling capacity somewhat, but with my much larger than stock radiator I was still in trouble. I'm now looking into a custom shroud on the AC fan. If that doesn't work, it'll be a dual fan setup...

There are two major players in cooling system capacity. Fan CFM and fluid volume. My setup has volume but limited CFM. Yours has neither... start saving the pennies!

if you hadn't read it i sudgest that you take a look...
http://home.satx.rr.com/nissan...t.htm

I'll proly use the stock fan/ac fan to get the junk out of the vh's cooling system and make sure its working ok before switching over to a spal fan/aftermarket radiator, as stated in that article and from personal experience i'll be fabbing some airguides for the radiator once it is in and running properly to get the most airflow out of the engine.
also keep in mind with that article that the people who wrote it are using large frontmount intercoolers which block a significant ammount of air...so the results are not exactly comprable to the non turbo vh.

I completely agree with everything you've said with the exception of this point. While the water pump flowrate vrs RPM curve dictates the radiator inlet and outlet flowrates, the size of the core dictates the flow velocity within the core. If that "x GPM" flow entering the inlet now has twice as many cores to flow through, the velocity within the cores will be halved.

Convective heat transfer increases with velocity, so we reduce the transfer rate out of the coolant into the radiator body by increasing the number of cores. However, since the coolant is flowing slower the air passing over the radiator has more time to cool each part of the fluid. So while larger radiators most certainly increase the total thermal capacity of the cooling system, they can increase efficiency as well.

Edit: I just read that page you linked, and I'm going to refrain from commenting on it.


Modified by SuperHatch at 9:50 AM 8/27/2008

raw materials pile, the exhaust is the super cheap ss autochrome 200$ shipped to your door special...cheaper than buying a muffler and piping to suit with a largeish center resonator and two individual mufflers it should be quite nice.
Sounds good on a friends ka so i'd imagine it will do fine on the vh.
for what its worth the finish is nice but fitment is absolute crap, piping is in the right place but the hangers are not; still not a hard fix.

here we are with the header just about finished and bolted to the head:

welding up the collector,took a while to fill in the large gap in the middle.

completed header with me looking like a total loon, dad insisted on a smile.

back shot of the header with me looking less than enthused:

for those of you who have kept up with nick's thread (who hasn't?) you'll remember that he sourced out a maxima powersteering pump.
Since the stock vh pump will come no where near close to fitting between the s13 frame rails i figured it was worth a go.
Low and behold it fits perfectly with about 1/2" clearance to the tc rod bracket...pic is bad but you get the idea.
have to swap over the vh mount bracket as well as the ps feed from the resivor.
I plan to cut up the pressure tube and weld on a -8 or so an fitting and having a short piece of line made up to link the ps pump to the rack while allowing for some flexibility in the system.
definately needs a shorter belt due to the smaller pulley but all in all should work out fine.

thats it for now kids, i'll have pics of the drivers header (the start) tommorow.

Manifolds look good man, how much time was put into that one?

I don't care what any of these other haters have to say, good yob!

Did you get another burn from the welding? Looks good!

That header looks absolutely great.

drivers and passenger from the back of the head forward:

same shot but again from the front:

headers upside down so you can see pipe routing:

and again from the front:

I will install o2 bungs in the 'y' pipe right after each collector they should be far enough apart to give decent readings from each bank while avoiding as much turbulance as possible.
I also forgot to install the egr tube pickup so that will have to be done as well...the list is never ending but atleast the end is in sight.
hopefuly an update in a week or so.

I was not all that happy with the exhaust note on mine however, and have gone on to build a new set with even length runners. I recommend using a crossover pipe somewhere in your exhaust system, should hopefully improve the sound.

one major thing i did was to refit the q45 pump to the block with the maxima pulley on the pump, this is not a direct bolt in affair as the shank on the q45 pump is slightly larger than that of the maxima's so the maxima pulley would not go home on the q45 pump.
grinding bit and a little bit of time i was able to enlarge the hole enough so that it slid over the shaft properly and sat home.
here is a quick pick of the q45 pump fully bolted to its mount:

since we're on the topic of power steering parts i also fabbed up a line using xrp fittings and hose available from a local speed shop...however any good hydraulic shop should have comprable fittings and hose.
I used the q45 pump outlet to allow for some play when positioning the hose as the maxima outlet ran right into the oil filter assembly after the hose was on.
hose consists of an m16x1.5 to -6 adaptor (thanks to djbutton), a bump tube m14x1.5 to -6 adaptor, a 90* -6 fitting, and straight -6 fitting.
sorry for the poor shots but it was terribly hard to get clear shots.
hose was routed between the engine mount plates and the block and wraps around near where the lhs lca bolts to the xmember.

pump outlet:

rack inlet:

ps belt had to be improvised as there was no belt available that would just 'bolt on'...belt is a 5pk1235 that was cut down one rib to fit the 4 groove setup...however it was very hard to get on so i'd sudgest finding a 5pk1245 if possible.

Cooling system was also addressed, radiator is a r32 skyline radiator off ebay (140$ shipped!) and a spal high performance 16" fan that pulls 2300cfm, once rigged up to my electromechanical control it will switch on automatically to regulate coolant temps.

all emissions are being retained on this swap except for cats as they are terribly expensive and did not come with my engine; so this means that egr had to be modified to work.
I ended up using the stock egr tube and welding a bit of straight on to it and then rotating the header fitting some...only is fed from one cylinder but it should work decently.

The headers have been painted as well as installed for good, however i took a few shots of the headers installed to give an idea of clearance.
steering rack does not bind on the header at all.

passenger side:

drivers near the oil filter housing:

drivers near the brake booster, note that the steering shaft DOES NOT touch:

back shot of the block, you can make out the egr tube near the steering shaft.

when fabbing the headers i made the mistake of building them independently without having the passenger bolted to the car...since the heads are slightly offset i tried to correct for this but over estimated resulting in the drivers sitting a bit higher than the passenger and the passenger being a hair bit longer.
name of the game i suppose but it will be fine when the y-pipe is made.

brakes have been fully reinstalled...booster and master placement will make changing plugs quite interesting but it clears without any modifications to the firewall, this is a bolt on nissan booster out of a VERY old sentra.
brakes feel good using the smaller booster but i suspect that there is some air in my rear lines giving the pedal a slightly spongy feel.

some hoses for the booster vac feed as well as routing of the accelerator cables:

quick shot of the air tube, need to find a maf adaptor of some flavor or i may just cut the tabs off and bolt a filter directly onto the maf body...not sure yet.

overall engine bay shot, fusebox and fan wiring are incomplete as i havent decided yet if i want to bolt the fusebox back in its stock location or to move it to where the battery was.

next time i go home i should have it finished and driveable...the quick turn up the street doesnt count much.

Couple comments:

Do you have any concerns with overdriving the PS pump as much as you are with a smaller pulley?

With the brake booster, if there are any issues you might want to consider an S14 auto booster, mine fits with no issues.

here is the finished product:

a shot down the vband flange, unfortunately there was no way to expand the piping to reach the full id of the flange, so this will most likely cause some turbulance but i cant imagine enough to make a noticable difference in hp output.

the whole header back exhaust, i had to cut the mounting points off of the exhaust and reweld them for it to fit properly...had poor fitment when i started.

undercar shot of the exhaust, sorry for the poor lighting but was hard to take a picture at the time.

quick shot of what it looks like from the cockpit, fuel pressure gauge is there to diagnose the hesitation issues i was having:

instumentation, stock cluster works perfectly without fail, hud unit its self has failed but the digi speedo works correctly; tachometer has been recalibrated and i offer this service along side my wiring services.

sideprofile:

tail shot:

here are a few shots of the 95% complete engine bay, a few things to clean up here and there but very close to being complete.
need to wire wheel the rust off of the battery tray area and seal to prevent more rust as well as clean up the power supply wire.
dont mind the mountain dew bottle, have to source out a new catch tank as the one on the car is beyond dead (suprise suprise).

have to source out a new fuel pump, mount the battery properly, and modify the hood and she'll be on the streets!