Project: S13 24 Hours of LeMons Racer

[lbreevesii]

Back when I heard about the 24 hours of LeMons I knew it was something I would love to have the chance to do, but I didn't think I ever would.

Edit- Seems there are a few uninitiated among us. The 24 hours of lemons is a race series held at many tracks around the country. The tl:dr is that you have to buy and prep your car for <500 bucks. Safety does not count, brakes do not count. You generally run two 12 hour days of racing. The costs are relatively low, you just gotta spend the cash on a rather beefy cage, quality seat, harness, and racing duds. http://www.24hoursoflemons.com

A few months back I started shopping CL for a rwd, 5spd beater to have some fun hooning on mountain roads, and for my buddy to learn to drive stick on.

Eventually I was offered a 1993 240sx hatch for $300...and the saga began!

Why so cheap you ask? It got into a fight with a mailbox, the previous owner needed a truck for the coming winter, and the transmission was dying a slow, noisy death.

Since it was so cheap, we knew it could make a great lemons entry so we started moving this project in that direction. For those who are not familiar with LeMons racing. It is a race series where you run two 12 hour days of racing, get humilated and punished for bad driving, and you have to buy and prep your car(some exclusions apply) for less than $500

The car came with an S14 trans to swap in(130k on it), megan racing strut bars all around, an Apexi N1 exhaust, steelies, replacement quarter window, and a set of 16" enkei's.

As I mentioned, we hooned it around the blue ridge mtn's for a while before retiring it to the garage in my new home of Abingdon, VA.

Enough blabbering, on to the build pix!



Extra ventilation and body modifications are free courtesy of a mailbox I think the dents will stay to keep some character.

Once we got it home we started ripping out the interior behind the rear seats.

There's that big a** apexi. Got the receipt for it, $550 bucks! It makes a helluva drone but Its nice and deep. Because exhaust does not count towards your lemons budget, this is up for sale and a custom catback w/ a cheap glasspack will replace it.

More aftermarket goodness!

here are the enkei wheels that it came with. A couple are warped a bit, but I bought some sumimoto rubber for them a couple of months back.

After putting a couple thousand miles on it the trans finally gave up the ghost. We had to run down to Charlotte to pick up the new transmission that was included with the sale. The new trans came out of an S14. We had tons of issues getting the new trans in due to tunnel clearance issues(and having never done it before).

Once it was in, we realized that the dust cap on the end was 2.5cm longer and wouldn't clear the drive shaft. Out came the trusty sawzall to cut it down...

Back at thanksgiving I drove the S13 home so I could start installing a few bushings. I bought a kit from energy suspension. About that same time the rear brakes started scrubbing. I pulled them and found this on the left side:Stuck caliper pin ftl. Took me two days of soaking it, a propane torch, a 5lb sledge, and a chisel to get it loose.

While I was home I still made time for bushings. I replaced the front traction arm bushings as well as all the sway endlink bushings and the rear sway bushings.

Old out and ready for new!


Modified by lbreevesii at 4:32 AM 3/1/2010

[lbreevesii]

While I was off for christmas break I did a bit more work.

Since i'm home with a pressure washer I figured i'd take off the front clip and wash everything including the underside.

Off with you damned bumper! Hate those damn nuts inside the fenders... That thing is heavy! So much metal!

Like these...whyyyyy?!

There, fixed. Why the hell didn't they do it this way in the first place?!

Took out the center support for the bumper cover. There goes a couple of lbs.

wrung the heads of a couple of bolts off taking off the fenders. This one was stripped and had to be cut off.

:tup better

eww mud

all ready for her date with the pressure washer. Bet a got rid of 5 lbs of crap with that thing

[lbreevesii]

I got settled in VA at new years and started working again.

Out came the fan

Then the Rad. Yick! my floor is nasty now...

Ditch that stupid leftover intake resonator.

Off with the aux fan

nom nom break time

Out came the condensor and the rest of the AC piping

Looks like i've got a pretty recent water pump. Nice and cleanish and no real bearing play.

Lots more space to work.

For my next round of work I didn't want to get into anything big, so I just d!ck around and did some small jobs.

This car has been HELL for wrung off bolt heads. BOTH radiator mounting bolts wrung themselves off....and now there is a broken bolt extraction tool broken off in both of them....this is gonna be hell to take care of. I broke off an easy out in one, and a grabit in the other. Any suggestions?

So I moved on to the interior. Removed the door sills, kick panels, and the dash.

Removed some more of this damn insulation+p0ker chip s***. I've gotta remove the rest of it. This stuff adds up to quite a bit of weight.

I'm still trying to figure out why my consult cable refuses to see my ecu. I was hoping it was that the broken mode selection potentiometer on the ecu was the culprit. So I pulled the ecu and found the proper settings again. Why they didn't make this a switch I don't know. In normal mode it should have 0 ohm between the leads that are actually used. In diagnostics it should have ~50ohm across them. No dice...at least know I know i've got a bad knock sensor!! No wonder it runs rich! :

Work has kept me busy(well more tired than busy) so I haven't had time to do a lot of work. I've got a new friend who is experienced helping me with the engine stuff now though.

We did a compression test. I forgot to open the throttle and it read 180 across the board. No way in hell that's luck on what was sold to me as a 200k+ motor.

So I started tearing down the top end for inspection and such.

This is looking clean!

Now the intake manifold. Those brackets underneath suck monkey nuts. Couldn't see them until after I had gotten pissy.

Gay a** vacuum lines that wouldn't come off. I finally just yanked hard. No idea where each one goes now -_-

Tada! No good pix, but i'm replacing the PCV hoses, ditching the EGR, ditching the tb heater lines, heater core lines, etc. Less points of failure, less weight. Win.

I've never had a KA apart. Does that look like factory porting to you guys? Either way i'm porting and polishing this biznatch while its apart.

Sorry, I got lazy. But off came the upper timing chain cover

Then magically the head came off.

Did I mention I love seafoam? Thats how it looked when we first pulled it out.

Very little carbon on the pistons too.

I'm stoked at the condition of this thing. I'll go ahead and inspect the valve stem seals while its apart, but I think they're good. I think we lucked out and got ourselves a damn fine <500 racer.

Coming soon:Some seals, more weight reduction, more parts for smale(fully working auto belts anybody?), maybe some stitch welding, oil pan baffling, tie rods, and bushings!

[lbreevesii]

As I mentioned before I recently started work. I had to give myself a little cube decor.



Since we got a break from the <30 degree temps I had a chance to wheel it out of the garage and start degreasing the engine and bay. I still have a LOT of work to do there, but its cleaner than it was.

This week: The engine goes back together, I port the intake, inspect the valve seals, finish getting out the tar, and who knows what else!

[gnvarnadore]

good luck with the build and remember to lie and bs your way though all the inspections and pray your car doesnt get taken from you as the rules state can happen.

[lbreevesii]

Thanks. If you guys will buy more parts we won't have to do ANY Bs'n on inspections.

The claim rule has only been used ONCE by the guys who run it. That was because these guys had gotten an S500 benz'(legitimately) and he wanted the engine to eventually swap into something stupid.

I'm more worried about us getting into trouble for being bad drivers and getting the peoples curse.

[OM3GA]

[SxMachine]

Wut the hell is a nom nom

[user name!]

Haha sweet. I saw a craigslist ad in my area with a hideous 240 on stock height with se wheels painted black and a huge wing. It said it was "a fully prepped 24h's of lemons race car" (er something like that) and i laughed so hard. I thought he meant le'mans but now i get it.

[gnvarnadore]

i have a buddy that ran a civic in it last year at the Carolina Motorsports Park but i happened to miss it cause i was working on my car that weekend. Its an awesome track and you should most def bring the car down and run it there, i havent checked the race schedule to see when its going to be there but i always try to make it out there for LeMons.

[lbreevesii]

^ we're running CMP. If we have time and money we'll take it for a track day before the race. I'm going to go volunteer to help with the February race--"southern discomfort".

On a side note guys:

Spare parts don't count towards your $500 limit, so anybody with spare parts laying around they would like to donate or sell cheap it would be highly appreciated.

[gnvarnadore]

i have a stock 5 speed driveshaft laying around if you want it as a back up, other than that i dont really have any spare parts laying around. i could meet up with you when you come down in feb and give it to you.

[sommmatt]

I love the 24 hours of Lemons!

I participated in a Lemons race in October. We used a 95 Dodge Stratus 2.0 5 Speed, swapped in a 2.4L to the manual, and we've got the most hot rod stratus ever! Here's a pic from late in the race, with penalty lines written all over the car, a tire bolted to the roof, front end beat up a bit and the hood off to help prevent the crank sensor from over heating.

[bigs]

Wut the hell is a nom nom

[lbreevesii]

hahaa I <3 lemons. Murilee asked me to come up with a new penalty for southern discomfort'm still working on it. They've already done such great stuff, its hard to match it!

Edit: On a side note. I do have one guy from work helping me(as I mentioned) but I could use extra hands from anybody in the tri-cities area. I'll provide (regular or alcoholic) refreshments and a place to crash. All of my other lemons team members are scattered across NC.

[lbreevesii]

i have a stock 5 speed driveshaft laying around if you want it as a back up, other than that i dont really have any spare parts laying around. i could meet up with you when you come down in feb and give it to you.

I would appreciate that! Hopefully I'll remember to hit you up before I come down.

[ZootedS13]

looks like a fun project.

so do you have any plans for the car after the lemons thing?

[lbreevesii]

More lemons i'd say. If things fall through and we don't have it ready for the May race we would do September. If we do get to do May, and the car survives, we'll do September as well.

Other than lemons, might try to do some auto-x with it.

[lbreevesii]

I'm tired and buggin out to go see a movie tonight, so I didn't do much.

I did replace the steering rack bushings.

Old bustedness out.

Cleaned up the brackets. New bushings ready to go in.

Anybody know wtf this is? Its bolted to the firewall and shares a bolt with an evap line. Its just a block of metal...

[RustspecS13]

I'm tired and buggin out to go see a movie tonight, so I didn't do much.

I did replace the steering rack bushings.

Old bustedness out.

Cleaned up the brackets. New bushings ready to go in.

Anybody know wtf this is? Its bolted to the firewall and shares a bolt with an evap line. Its just a block of metal...

That last thing is a part to reduce NVH so its completely useless. Thought the one on my buddies coupe gave up the thin part to weld his lower core support back together.

Nice project though! Id love to compete in lemons some time it looks fun as h***!

~Alex

[lbreevesii]

I've been too lazy to do much lately. Saturday I rebuilt the head. Popped the valves out redneck style, lapped the valves, and replaced the stem seals.

Last night I got out some more tar and started removing the remaining HVAC stuff.

Out with the ducting...

out came some p0ker chip crap.

and out came the AC crap and the blower.

Out came the last of the vent ducting

Rather than do it 'right' I just loosened the dash mounting hardware and ganked the heater core and vent stuff out that way. Nothin left!

Yet another full trashbag of tar and other crap that came out of the car. Probably 10lbs there.

Now i'm free to remove the last bit of tar that is up under the dash area, start cleaning up the wiring, making cluster and gauge brackets, etc.

[J14cm7]

Hey man looking good. Ive always wanted to do that but have never had the time. My buddy did it with a del sol but it died 7 hours in haha.

[Caveit77777]

Never heard of Lemons before haha sounds like it would be fun as hell though. Keep us updated.

[lbreevesii]

Sorry for the lack of recent updates. I've been lazy on the picture taking/uploading and the work in general really.

I got a spot weld cutter and I have been removing some dead weight with that, pix to come soon.

My dremel died while I was making some parts. It basically shot fire at me -_-

I called up dremel. It was nearing the end of the warranty period, but they told me to send it in. Yesterday I had package on the stoop. They sent me a 4000 series. :-D Dremel's customer service is pretty top notch. I had my flexy extension break once(the drive cable inside snapped). A 5 minute phone call got me a new one.

My friend that is helping with the engine work has been busy recently, so we got stalled there. Once that gets finished i'll get it out for an exhaust, then back into the garage to drop the subframe and replace allll the bushings.

Pix and info to come in a day or so.

[lbreevesii]

Alright time for a few more progress pix.

I cleaned up the engine a bit the other night. It had a ton of grease and dirt on the bottom end. No pix of that. Who cares??

On to what i have actually been up to--Removing the rear seat brackets and other misc crap with my spot weld cutter. Once I started this I quickly realized that just a punch divot wouldn't keep the cutter centered. So I picked up a small dewalt twin tip cobalt drill bit. Works wonders, Keeps the cutter from wanting to wander off on all these odd surfaces.

I got rid of the roof brace that holds the dome light

Moving on to the seat brackets. I've got the lower spot welds cut here.

Might as well make some use of this crap while i'm here eh? Quick tap and the cap pops right off.

Yummay!

unlike flatblackian- I still have my glass intact. So I can't get a drill onto a couple of these spot welds. I used a dremel grinding disk in my new dremel 4000 for that.

A few cuts later and tada! Its only a couple of lbs but it makes a difference and will make welding in a good strong cage easier.

Moving on to the other side. I apparently got my spot weld cuts off center a bit as they held on tight even after I got carried away and cut out the underlying metal... Oh well thats what a mig is for.

Wash, rinse, repeat on the other side and a quick tug pulls this one out too. I've got to get some sheet metal shears to cut the cable loose before I can chuck this one though. No need to waste dremel cutting disks when I can buy another tool!

That is about it for now. Its not much I know--Like I said, i've been a bum.

Hopefully the engine will get finished up soon and I can move on to the rear suspension.

[sr20deTsomeday118]

interesting build! keep us updated!

[lbreevesii]

I'll make a real update tonight or tomorrow, here are some administrative updates.

I think we have our team name.

Deuce 40s racing aka: 2-40s :-p

We may not be able to do lemons until september. Funds may hamper our ability to get it caged in time. The gov't is supposed to be slow getting out first time homebuyer credits . :-/

Lets not let that put a hamper on the awesomness shall we?

I am going to keep on track for getting everything mechanical done, in fact I am pushing UP the timetable a bit. I am going to get everything ready other than the harness and seat and take it for some shake down.

The plan is to go run a couple of NASA HPDE 1 events, so the stock seats and belts can stay as a cheap way to get some track time. I am shooting for running the event at the NC Center for automotive research(near charlotte) on the weekend of april 10-11 which is coincidentally my birthday!

The timetable should look something like this by next weekend-finish up the motor the next week get an exhaust madethe next weekend pull the subframe and replace all the bushingsSometime in there fab some cluster brackets and get the gauges mounted and hooked up.

I need to find some affordable Z32 front calipers and some used struts w/ springs asap as well.

[IanS]

Man, I dont know how I missed this, looks like you are having just as much fun as me.

LeMons is an awesome event, I hope to get in on it one day. Maybe once my rally car is done.

[lbreevesii]

Thanks Ian. I've been slowly 'working' on this thing since I got it back in september. First thing we did was strip out the rear seats and stuff.

I got the garage and really got started on her about the time I saw your rally build. Its been an inspiration. I wouldn't have even thought about taking out those rear seat braces!

[lbreevesii]

Update time!

Its not a lot but here goes.

Since i'll have a welder on hand soon I'm going to go ahead and stitch up the strut towers and other load bearing structures. So i'm taking off the paint with a drill mounted scotch brite and some paint stripper.

I also started replacing studs. They count under safety eqiupment. We don't want to end up like the torqueless rotards RX-7... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcfqH4W2 ... ckVTztcGsk

Since I got my new dremel the other week I was able to finish cutting out my EGR block off plate. I decided to make one that removes the base of the EGR rather than just the guts of it. I've got to get a bigger drill bit, but other than that its done.

Yumm shes neekkid! :-p

I'm pulling the motor and trans for some inspection and stuff this weekend. I pulled the driveshaft, disconnected the trans harness, etc to get ready for that.

On a high note, I found myself some Z32 brakes! pending final transaction and pickup, got a pair of 30mm alu. calipers, some old pads, a couple of sets of rotors, lines and some other random bits(suspension parts and a brake booster) for 150 bucks! w00t. Makes me happy.

That is all. I promise i'll start taking more pictures and doing more updates.

Modified by lbreevesii at 7:07 PM 2/17/2010
Modified by lbreevesii at 8:17 AM 2/18/2010