CA18DET FWD Swap Build Thread

[boost_boy]

Lastly, do not idle your engine nor continuosly crank it up to hear it run. The way I built that engine gives you a small window to get those rings to seat, so when you're ready, give me a call and I will tell you how run your motor for break-in.

[livelyjay]

What does the sensor light even do? The only time it came on was when the weather got a little cold and I had a vacuum leak that I never got around to fixing.

Dee, no big deal about the turbo. If a slight little leak at the oil feed line is the only thing I have to troubleshoot, then call me a happy customer. Very pleased that the engine fired right up after I stopped being retarded and it has no leaks or apparent issues. Hell even my transmission is leak free and shifts smoothly. I'll take another stab at the oil feed banjo by doubling up the crush washers, using new ones this time, and some copper RTV on a clean mounting surface.

Next step is building the exhaust system. I'll start collecting parts and planning and should start building it in September.

[livelyjay]

Lastly, do not idle your engine nor continuosly crank it up to hear it run. The way I built that engine gives you a small window to get those rings to seat, so when you're ready, give me a call and I will tell you how run your motor for break-in.

I cranked it a few times, total of 5 with no starts, before I figured out the MAF needed to be piped to the TB. After that, cranked it on four times trying to fix the oil leak, longest running time was a few minutes. It likely won't get cranked again until spring, at which time I'll have the exhaust and intercooler system built and the battery relocated to the trunk and everything put back together.

[mdb4879]

The sensor light is nothing important at all. It's for the oxygen sensor. But rather than turning on when the sensor is bad it goes by a timer. It comes on at 70,000 mile intervals, I think (but then again mine come on at 231,000.0 miles in my E16i car, right on the dot, too). I'm assuming Nissan was, I say was because I doubt they could nor would I go to them, able to reset it back in the day. But since it really isn't a functional part of the car the best fix is to take the bulb out. I finally got around to taking mine out just a few weeks ago, 13,000 miles after it came on. Man does that thing get annoying at night. It's so bright, lol.

I know I have one cluster, possibly two, that don't have the part in them that says "sensor" (all the other little panels are there, like for seat belts and oil pressure, but the sensor one is left blank and isn't colored amber). I've only had one '88 model car, though, and every other car I've pulled parts from has been an '87. It may be an '87 only thing, but if I have two laying around then maybe Nissan got tired of it and replaced the light panel thing with a different one that deleted it so there was no trace of it ever being there?

[Liquid_Neon]

OOOH! thats a sensor light!? yeah... okay, i know those. they basically came on to get you to go to the dealer so they could give it a quick check over. at least on 300zx Z31's the thing was to disconnect a plug (dunno what one) with the key on and then plug it back in after 30 seconds or so... and then at 100,000 miles or something you just leave that wire off and the light stays out.

Yeah, not a single one of my 3 pulsar's had a sensor light, and i had 2 GA16's and my ca18.

[livelyjay]

Took a small break because I was busy. Getting some welding tips from other forums and such, and if anyone has anything to add welding wise here feel free. My exhaust components probably could have been picked a little better, but I wasn't 100% paying attention to what I was doing. So if the materials don't bond well together I'll have plenty of scrap to practice with and I'll buy what I need to match everything up. The resonator doesn't fit back in the tunnel, so it will go where the OEM cat is supposed to go and if it ends up being too loud I'll weld a cat in right before the resonator. Here's a look at the goods:

Exhaust Supplies:
Flex pipe - 2.5" 18 gauge mild steel
180 bends - 2.5" 16 gauge T409 stainless
Straight pipe - 2.5" 14 gauge T409 stainless
Dynomax Supra Turbo muffler - 2.5" 18 gauge mild steel
Vibrant 1141 resonator - 2.5" 19 gauge T304 stainless


Struts being chopped for Koni install

[float_6969]

You chopped off the perches too, are you going with GC springs?

[livelyjay]

Yup yup. I'll be grinding those perches down to the same level of the tube as well. The rears are a bit too long, so I'm going to chop off the bottom of the rears, weld a plate either to the end of the tube or on the inside of the tube to get the Koni to the correct height. Once I get the GC sleeves I'll weld on a new perch, then send them out for sand blasting and paint.

[float_6969]

Should be nice! I was going back and forth between an adjustable GC/Koni setup and the Nismo S-tunes on my S14. Ended up going with the S-tunes. I didn't want to fiddle with it and I knew it would be matched and working as soon as I put them on the car.

[livelyjay]

There aren't many options when it comes to the Pulsar. The B13 SE-R coilovers supposedly work but I wasn't very confident in the lower priced options such as K-Sport and BC. This will end up being a little more expensive than the cheaper coilovers, but will be better quality parts, and I'll learn a hell of a lot more, which is the point of this project.

My co-worker is supposed to bring in the MIG welder today so I can start practicing welding tube and eventually get going with the exhaust system.

[livelyjay]

Fun with welding over the weekend. I posted these pictures along with a lot others to the welding forums to see if the pros have any suggestions or tips. The welds are holding just fine, since a 3lb sledge couldn't bust the end of the pipe off. I'll make a few more practice runs and then try to weld the flex pipe to the pipe pictured. The other pipes are stainless, so I'm going to need to practice on those separately since it's supposed to be tougher to weld and I need to see if I need the tri shielding gas (Argon, CO2, Helium) instead of the duel for mild (Argon, CO2).

Gap fill practice, success and fail



Butt joint practice, much easier than gap filling

[Liquid_Neon]

My pulsar has eibach prokits and kyb agx struts. direct bolt in, only had to reposition rubber brake line.
This seems like a lot of silly extra work :P

[livelyjay]

If I planned on losing every event I would go with AGX and some lowering springs. I am not a fan of anything KYB after purchasing some of their products. If I want to at least have some slight chance at competing, I must run Konis and Ground Controls. GC allows me to simply swap out springs with different lengths and compression rates that are readily available to fine tune the suspension, not to mention infinite ride height adjustability. I also don't have the $$ to drop on KW Variants or Motons. I bought an angle grinder too, so I can now grind down the old spring perch to be level with the tube. Plus building the thing is half of the fun.

Welding pipe is like a billion times more difficult than welding flat plate steel. I mean the welds are solid, but they look like poo.

Filling the space working on technique



Flex pipe tacked into place

[float_6969]

Pro-kits and AGX's are a good combo for a street car, but for racing, not so much. I think you're gonna be really happy with the Koni/GC combo. It's tried and true and has been proven for years, but that's for competition. For a street car, it's overkill.

[Liquid_Neon]

Well I never intended for my pulsar to be a track/race car. It has full interior and heat and whatnot. It's more like my weekend fun car if anything, and I have ridden in plenty of cars with stiff a** coil-overs. I did NOT want that sort of a ride, even the pro/agx's are harsh on the soft setting, but crank up the struts.... its back breaking. Frankly the car always handled itself so well and still does. With the strut brace too, the car is very responsive and grippy and im very confident hitting the backroads with a little craziness.

Deff looks pretty cool jay, I hope saying it looks like silly work didnt offend, I'm a very silly guy

[livelyjay]

Isn't building a Pulsar a silly endeavor any ways? My buddies Miata had dual adjustable Konis and some really stiff springs (700 front, 800 rear or something like that) and he drove it every day. It was pretty jarring when he cranked up the struts. Who knows, maybe I'll hate the setup, but I doubt it. I'll probably be aiming for the 200-300 range for springs since the off the shelf Konis can't handle much more without a custom revalve.

I'll be adding in front and rear strut tower bars as well to help stiffen things up and depending on the rules I'll use the strut bar as the harness bar as well.

[livelyjay]

So a friend came over to drop of a "broken" transmission for a Mazda Protege and to use some of my tools to replace his side motor mount. While he was working I set up the welder and went to work.

Practicing T technique on 1/8" flat plate


Final practice run on the scrap pipe, bead at the end of the pipe
This one I rushed and was a little sloppy, hence why it just looks like a glob.

This one I was in a better position and took my time


Flex pipe attached to down-pipe

[boost_boy]

Are you using Argon and Oxygen (looks like it). I think you should've started experimenting with flux core, but your welds are not that bad as I've been there, trust me...lol

[livelyjay]

The gas is Argon 75% / CO2 25%. The carbon steel wire that was in the machine is pretty thin, .020", which isn't recommended for this gauge of steel. But it worked so that's all I care about. My boss gave me a weak 90 amp flu core machine that only has two heat settings. I was running it too hot and scorched the 5/32" scrap metal I was using. Then it ran out of flux core wire and I didn't feel like buying any more because there is no flux stainless wire, and the rest of the exhaust is pretty much all 409 stainless. That and my other co-worker let me borrow is 110amp gas welder. I might need to buy trimix (Argon, CO2, Helium) for the stainless, but I'm going to try using the 75/25 first and just see how it goes.

I might get some stainless practice in tonight, we'll see how the errands work out. I also need to plan out the hangers for the resonator and muffler, which I'll be making out of mild steel as well. So I might do that first so I'm not switching wire spools constantly.

[PlusarNx]

I'm just finishing reading your build. Very nice build! Keep doing it the good way, one thing at a time.

Your welds are pretty good! Been there done that too. Btw I made the Excel spreadsheet for the ca18det swap in a '87 se ca16de Pulsar. Don't hesitate to ask if you still have some question.

If you want i can provide you my personal spreadsheet with my annotation.



First I was not sure what to do with the TPS Too, but I think I did it right. Let me know if you need some help with it.

[livelyjay]

I followed your spreadsheet already, got it off of the EXA forum and it was very helpful. The only things I ran into were:

Pin 16 on the CA18DET on mine was R/B instead of the B/Y on your sheet.
Pin 11 on the CA18DET on mine was R/L instead of R/B on your sheet.

For the TPS:
EGR Solenoid Pin #4 - GY/L -> TPS Ground #30
PRVR Solenoid Pin #19 - G -> TPS resistance #38

[PlusarNx]

The colors on the spreadsheet are the colors at the ECU connector, It can happen that the color of the wires on the probe/parts plug are not the same, since in some case the plug's wires are connected with a "T" on the ECU wire.

I don't think the EGR or PRVR have something to do with the TPS. Personally I remember I had to switch 1 wire between the idle switch plug and the TPS and to add 2 wires from the TPS plug to the ECU. I will check my notes tonight at home.

[livelyjay]

I am talking about the wire colors at the ECU plug. Mine were different for some reason. We are also talking about the same thing for TPS. Since there aren't any wires on the OEM loom to handle the extra wires for the TPS, you have to source them from somewhere else. Since those two solenoid valves are no longer being used, I just used the wires from them and hooked them up to the TPS, and moved the wires at the ECU connector.

[PlusarNx]

Ok I understand now! It seems about right. My loom was different too, I had 2 more wires connected to the ECU that show in the FSM. These 2 wires were connected to the pins #12 and 41 of the ca16 ecu, but these pins are supposed to be blank by the FSM.

[livelyjay]

I had two extra wires that didn't connect to anything on the CA18DET loom as well. I labeled them so if I get some motivation I'll go out to the garage and check and post what they were.

Ugh, I was feeling like crap all weekend and just took it easy to get over this damn sinus infection. Today I'm feeling a bit better and took a stab at some stainless steel welding practice. My tube cutter broke, so I only had two rings of pipe to work with. I have a much nicer tube cutter on the way and it should be here before the weekend. The settings on the welder still need some fine tuning. The new wire is way thicker than the previous one, and the stainless pipe is thicker and of course a different metal. The first few runs I burned right through the pipe. I turned the heat down and changed the technique to an ugly but effective one and got the bead to flatten out and not burn right through. Once the pipe cutter gets here I'll rip off a few more practice rings and I should be able to dial in settings and technique.

New Tube Cutter


Stainless Practice: Top 1" is 14 gauge T409 stainless, bottom section is the 16 gauge mild steel

[livelyjay]

Got some work done today. Resonator, forward pipe, V-band done. I also got the rear pipe welded on but no pics (tomorrow I'll post them).

Practice - Bottom = First bead, Top = Third bead




Hanger bracket attached



Resonator to forward pipe (2nd pic = fixed some burn through)



V-band to forward pipe



Middle section coming together

[livelyjay]

Some more work done tonight. Got the second section of the v-band welded, which will lead to the flex section. Because of the way I angled the other side, I might not need many angling pieces to get it put together. The back 90 degree sections are tacked into place. The last piece might need to be re-positioned though. I lined it up and tacked it, but it ended up curving up instead of being on the same plane as the rest of the exhaust. OEM exhaust is flat all the way till the over section hits. Tomorrow or Sunday I'll take another look and see what my options are.

V-band section going to flex pipe started


Back 90 degree section

[float_6969]

Looking good buddy!

[livelyjay]

Downpipe tacked together. I welded most of the joints but they look like poo. The welder was not behaving. Very sputtery contact in most places and in others I had a nice smooth puddle going. Not sure what the problem is. I have a lot of grinding to take care of when I'm finished to at least try and make it look acceptable. Pictures of that when it's all done.

[Liquid_Neon]

Yeah, looking good mang! cant wait for the N13's to increase their numbers in large percentages :P

In other news i found my dump pipe had wiggled itself a little loose. It would explain why i felt like the car had lost response and was seemingly running a tad leane then normal. HA! added soem thread locker and retightened them bolts and the car drove great again!