OFFICIAL: NicoClub's Rally 240SX, by Finnish Fury Rallysport

General discussion forum about the 240sx, and a great place to introduce yourself to the board!
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Razi
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Car: Moo

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FlatBlackIan wrote:Since I didn't get my fill of taking apart stuff with little pieces with the distributers, I decided to tackle another project.

Since I had an SOHC in the car prior, I had an SOHC cluster. Now I am sure most of you know that the SOHC tach will not work with the DOHC motor. Now the reasoning for this has to do with the ECU as it sends the signal to the tach. Now it just so happens that the Link sends the same style signal as the DOHC ECU, so since the swap, the tach has not worked.

Time to fix that.

Luckily the parts car had a DOHC in it at one point so I decided to rob the cluster out of that. Now a cluster swap would have been easy enough, but like I said, I was iching for more little tiny pieces....

The parts car is an Auto and I feel like someone once told me that the Auto speedometers wont work with a Manual car. Either way, the SOHC speedo goes 5 mph higher, and it would give me a reason to pull the odo. I spent some time, and scavenged the speedo and odo out of the SOHC cluster.

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Since this is a new motor, I decided to roll back the odo so I can know exactly how many miles I put on.

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Start off by pushing the little clips and removing the lense. Then do the same and remove the bezel.

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The back side.

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These 4 screws attach the speedo to the housing, as well as transmit the signal. There is also a small harness connecting the speedo to the odo drive.

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Speedo removed.

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Parts car had low miles. Too bad the motor popped. The shell is clean, and it shall become a race car some day.

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2 screws on the back remove the whole trip and odo assembly.

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2 more screws on the back of the odo seperate the drive and the odo base. This allows the odo itself to be replaced.

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All back together. Its nice to have a working tach, and the redline is higher too.

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Why does it keep deleting the last line of my posts?

?
Sweet idea!

I like the DOHC speedo much better on my car since 40/60/80 is all easy to see.

No idea why your last line is being deleted though, I've never had that problem.


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IanS
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Found a set of fuel injectors, 525cc. They should be here today or tomorrow. Also installed a glasspack to bring the noise level down slightly. The car was obscenely loud after the swap. Im guessing the bump in compression had something to do with it, but boy oh boy was it loud. The glasspack helped a lot, nocked down the rap I was getting about 2500 rpm. It made putting more miles on the car easier.

Its almost time to drain the break in oil, and get ready to go crazy.

I also picked something up off ebay. Its a surprise. Lets just say the car has 1 of something now, and when I am done, it will have 4..........

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Ajax
Posts: 1643
Joined: Wed Mar 12, 2003 3:16 pm
Car: 1991 240sx SE
2010 Mazda 5

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FlatBlackIan wrote: I also picked something up off ebay. Its a surprise. Lets just say the car has 1 of something now, and when I am done, it will have 4..........
I fail to see how 4 gas pedals will help you go any faster Ian.

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IanS
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Ajax wrote:
FlatBlackIan wrote: I also picked something up off ebay. Its a surprise. Lets just say the car has 1 of something now, and when I am done, it will have 4..........
I fail to see how 4 gas pedals will help you go any faster Ian.
Ye of little faith.

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IanS
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So there I was, working on the race car, and all of a sudden.......

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This will put a damper on getting any work done tonight. Hopefully this water recieds soon.

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Ajax
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I wondered if you'd have any flooding issues up there. Hope the water doesn't do any real damage.

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IanS
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Ajax wrote:I wondered if you'd have any flooding issues up there. Hope the water doesn't do any real damage.
I was able to get most anything that couldn't get wet off the floor. I did get a good chuckle watching the 2 front wheels drift lazily around the garage. The current was very strong outside, but the garage was calm. So far 2 pumps in the basement are paying for themselves, no water damage in the house so far.

At the moment the water is dropping slowly. If the rain holds off, that trend will hopefully continue, otherwise I'll be working on the car in shin deep water lol. The show must go on.

At its deapest, there was 8"-10" of water in the garage. I would judge the end of the driveway to be at least 2 feet deep, although I am not willing to test it as the current is quite strong. I am not entirely sure the end of my driveway is still there.

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IanS
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Spent the day cleaning up the mess left after the great Duluth flood of 2012.

I live on a dead end road, which is washed out. I won't be going anywhere for quite some time. Hopefully its fixed tomorrow so the mail can come, I need my injectors. Spent the evening welding on new sump gaurd mounts. Once I have a few more miles on, and the oil has been changed, the sump gaurd/skid plate can go back on. Then all thats left to do is tune the car, and organize spares. 2 days left, lets do this.

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Driftnaut
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Floods suck, I remember taking a canoe to our dock to keep it from floating away when Nashville flooded, but I just read all 35 pages of this and I'm impressed! :chuckle: I would buy a Finnish fury tshirt!

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IanS
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Driftnaut wrote:Floods suck, I remember taking a canoe to our dock to keep it from floating away when Nashville flooded, but I just read all 35 pages of this and I'm impressed! :chuckle: I would buy a Finnish fury tshirt!
Yah, floods are crazy, but we were very lucky, almost no property damage.

Thanks for reading. Shirts are something I have wanted to do for a while, just need to find the money, or talk some company into doing it freee/super cheap. Some day.

Got the STI fuel injectors installed tonight and buttoned up a few other things. Bumped the rev limit up to 7000 and took the car for a spin. Power band is smooth and strong, she pulls awesome. I cant wait to throw some more timing at her tomorrow and start making some real power.

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IanS
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Now that my post rally depression has worn off a little, I figure I should post a little rally recap before I get down to editing video, and hunting for pictures.

Leading up to the event everything seemed to be falling into place. The car was running well, I had a small oil leak, but nothing to be worried about. On Friday I buttoned up a bunch of little things, then took the car to my tuner. We spent about 2 hours adjusting the timing and fuel maps. The car was feeling very good, though there is a serious drop off in power in the higher rev range. When I got home I shut the car off and chatted with Dexter for a while, he and his wife had arrived from MI while I was gone. What I didn't know at the time was that when I shut the car off, I lost all the adjustments to the ECU that had been made. I was back to square 1 with the base map. I did not discover this until a few hours later, when it was far too late.

We ended up running the whole event on a base tune. Not one to give up, I decided to POR, and go for it. Its better to race a slow car, then not race at all.

On to the event, everything but the tune was working out nicely, and we headed down Saturday morning. We did a 2 pass reconnaissance so competitors could make adjustments to the notes what check road conditions. Everything went perfectly, and the roads were beautiful.

My nerves were starting to climb as we neared the start of the race. I new there would be a steep learning curve from the all new suspension, and the new engine with a vastly different power band. When we got to the start control I was shaking from head to toe. I was so nervous that when the start control worker call 15 seconds, I thought he said 5, and I put my foot to the floor. I spent 15 seconds bouncing off the launch control rev limit at 5000 rpms. As soon as I dropped the clutch though, my worries were gone. The modified dampers and softer rear springs provided a great deal more traction. Add a little extra power, and the car launched a lot harder then before. 4 miles into the stage though, I realized there was a problem. The brake pedal was solid as a rock, and the car wasn't stopping. I fought with it until 2 corners before the end of the stage at 8.8 miles when I noticed the over temp light on, and the gauge rising fast. I pulled in to finnish control, and huge plumes of smoke began to roll off the front brakes. I cooked them hard.

As we waited at the next control I re-lived the stage in my mind. My driving style needed to change. I wasn't making use of the increase in traction, and I was over using the brakes. Even with those mis-steps, we were able to pull a respectable time.

As we got ready to run stage 2, I decided on a plan of attack. I was going to try and increase my speeds and spend less time at the top of second and more time in third. I would slide the car a little more on entry to scrub speed without using the brakes. My plan worked beautifully and I started to feel the car more and more. We finished the stage with much less smoke and no overheating.

We spent our time at service checking fluids and the like. Everything was going well, and nothing was broken. I used the computer to add a little more fuel to the map so as to reduce temps a bit. It seemed to work, as I pushed the car significantly harder on the 2nd 2 stages (repeats of the first 2), to the point that I was able to shave nearly 2 tenths of a minute off each stage.

We achieved a 5th place overall, and 3rd in class out of 15 total entries. I am very pleased with how things went, and it was great proving ground for the new parts. The new engine is having a very hard time breathing through the stock intake and exhaust manifolds. Luckily, I have a set of ITBs here waiting to go on, and I am going to try and pick up a header from some where. Then if it still feels like its drowning, I will look at either doing adjustable cam gears, or new cams entirely. Besides that, I don't think the car needs much more power, I just need to widen the power band more so it doesn't bog so hard in many situations. I also need to beef up the cooling system a little, and look at getting more aggressive brake pad, but one thing at a time right.

Onward and upward. We had 3 GoPro's shooting in the car, so Im hoping I can put together a sweet compilation video. There should also be a decent amount of pictures floating around, so I will try to post those up as well.

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SX APPEAL
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95 Maxima SE 5MT
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FlatBlackIan wrote:Now that my post rally depression has worn off a little...
Doesn't sound like you have too much to be depressed about, great job!

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Razi
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FlatBlackIan wrote: Luckily, I have a set of ITBs here waiting to go on, and I am going to try and pick up a header from some where. Then if it still feels like its drowning, I will look at either doing adjustable cam gears, or new cams entirely. Besides that, I don't think the car needs much more power, I just need to widen the power band more so it doesn't bog so hard in many situations. I also need to beef up the cooling system a little, and look at getting more aggressive brake pad, but one thing at a time right.
Bueno. :yesnod

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IanS
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SX APPEAL wrote:
FlatBlackIan wrote:Now that my post rally depression has worn off a little...
Doesn't sound like you have too much to be depressed about, great job!
Thanks. The thing that is depressing is the race being over. Whether things go go good or bad, once its all over I get a little depressed. I would bet adrenaline withdrawal plays a part in it.


Im looking forward to the next event. The car is coming together, now its time to focus on tuning me. I need to become a better driver. I also need to do some endurance training to keep from getting worn out on stage.

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AndyG
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Car: 1990 nissan 240sx Hatchback KA24E

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I just read all 35 pages of this and i think your build is awesome! Great job!

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IanS
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AndyG wrote:I just read all 35 pages of this and i think your build is awesome! Great job!
Thanks!

In other news, I just signed up for Ojibwe Forest Rally on August 25th. That gives me just under 2 months to install and sort the ITBs, beef up the cooling system and brakes, as well as acquire some new tires. Ojibwe will be a very tough event, it will consist of 100 Stage miles done in a single day. A normal nation event has between 100 and 150 stage miles over 2 or even 3 days.

This is going to be a throwback to the old days of rally. 100 miles through the woods at wide open throttle. This will test not only the car, but competitors. Even short events are taxing on the body, and I plan to start working on my endurance so I dont get too worn out and start making mistakes.

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DeXteR
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If I can figure out a way to manipulate my schedule to fit Ojibwe on the tail end of my vacation in August, my wife said, "We'll all ready be half way there; we might as well go. You'll owe me."

So the biggest hurdle in planning any event is out of the way. Just need to work out logistics. I'll keep you posted.

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IanS
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DeXteR wrote:If I can figure out a way to manipulate my schedule to fit Ojibwe on the tail end of my vacation in August, my wife said, "We'll all ready be half way there; we might as well go. You'll owe me."

So the biggest hurdle in planning any event is out of the way. Just need to work out logistics. I'll keep you posted.
About that........

Well, a big part of the reason I signed up for Ojibwe was a hard push from Jenny. She wants another ride in the car. I didn't think you would be able to make it, so I gave her the tentative ok. If you can't make it, don't sweat it. If you can, I urge you to get a hold of Mark Holden. He is signed up, and has co-driver listed as TBA. Sorry if this rains on your parade, but really thought your next event would be LSPR, which is still on my schedule. Jenny still isn't positive she can make it, so I will try to get all the details nailed down asap.

Basically what I am saying is you guys can fight each other for the seat. And GO!!!!

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4cefed
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Ian,

How the hell have I completely missed your rally efforts for like the last three years? I'm going to read all 35 pages of this thing to catch up. I've got some background in rally car construction and preps, my friends and I used to be the crew for this guy:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Iorio

Ojibwe is a fun event. That was one of the longest days of rally from what I can remember, I think first car to finish was about 11:30 at night.We ran a group 5 dodge shadow turbo and I don't think we realized we grabbed second place in the national until like 2:30 in the morning.

Well, I subscribed to your facebook and I'll keep tabs on your efforts. Some of the best times I've had in my life was at a rally somewhere. Have fun with it!

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IanS
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4cefed wrote:Ian,

How the hell have I completely missed your rally efforts for like the last three years? I'm going to read all 35 pages of this thing to catch up. I've got some background in rally car construction and preps, my friends and I used to be the crew for this guy:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Iorio

Ojibwe is a fun event. That was one of the longest days of rally from what I can remember, I think first car to finish was about 11:30 at night.We ran a group 5 dodge shadow turbo and I don't think we realized we grabbed second place in the national until like 2:30 in the morning.

Well, I subscribed to your facebook and I'll keep tabs on your efforts. Some of the best times I've had in my life was at a rally somewhere. Have fun with it!
Awesome. I actually worked on one of Matt's old cars. The one sold to Cowboy Kenny.

Im very excited for ojibwe. I have serviced spectated, and marshaled the event, so I have gotten to know it pretty well.

Enjoy the read when you get around to it. I have big plans for the car leading up to Ojibwe.

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DeXteR
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Such a small world. A few of the guys in my car club including myself serviced for Paladin Rally at Snow Drift during their last season.

On another note, I just friended Jen on the book of faces. It's on like Donkey Kong. :mad:

I'm really kicking myself for not bringing that header... I'll get that pulled soon and try to get a quote. Consider it yours though.

It's just like this, only not shiny anymore:
Image

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IanS
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DeXteR wrote:Such a small world. A few of the guys in my car club including myself serviced for Paladin Rally at Snow Drift during their last season.

On another note, I just friended Jen on the book of faces. It's on like Donkey Kong. :mad:

I'm really kicking myself for not bringing that header... I'll get that pulled soon and try to get a quote. Consider it yours though.

It's just like this, only not shiny anymore:
Image
The secret is not out yet on Her co-driving, its as they say "provisional", so feel free to bug her about it lol.

Its ok, shipping shouldn't be too terrible, and Im willing to pay it. Look at it this way, this is your chance to get me back for my GoPro packaging after LSPR. Although keep in mind, you didnt get it as bad as James did when I sold him that turbo. That was epic packing lol. I have all the video off those memory cards, I hope to send them out Monday. Lot a good its doing my currently. I can hardly open the video files without my computer hanging. Fail.

In other news, those of you on Facespace will have noticed that the intake manifold is off the car, and the great throttle body multiplication has begun.

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Lets get this party started. I have the couplers to connect the two pieces, I just need to get over to Eric's shop to use the big band saw. I dont want to cut the runners all crooked using a sawzall. That would be crossing a line into redneck land that Im just not will to cross, yet.

Then I just need to plug the injector holes on the ITBs as I am still using the stock rail and STIs, make support and throttle cable brackets, then hook it all up. Once I have gotten it running, I need to build a catch can setup (since there is no where for the valve cover vent to go, and plum that in along with the brake booster. I may end up drilling out one of the runners to add a large nipple so the booster doesn't act sketchy from lack of vacuum under quick and repeated brake applications.

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Razi
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I demand more videos once it gets running again. :D

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IanS
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Razi wrote:I demand more videos once it gets running again. :D
I am working on it. We were running 2 GoPro HDs at Nemadji. I have all the video, but can't do anything with it at the moment. Something in my computer is dying on the hardware side. If I try to render the videos, the computer either hangs, force closes the program, or shuts down completely depending on that program I am running. I moved to a new distro of my OS, cleared my hard drive, and downloaded 2 new video editing programs, all trying to solve the issue. I have come to the conclusion that my 10 year old laptop is just due for replacement lol.

In other news. I am happy to announce that I will officially be the RallyMaster (clerk of the course) for the upcoming Nemadji Trail 2 event. Time to give back to this awesome sport. I will be in charge of pre checking the stage road, leading recce, driving the 0 car, and then running the course. Time to get my learning hat on.

In even other news, I chopped the runners the other day. Just need to grind off some of the ribbing so I can mount up the ITBs. I have a few pictures, but its getting late.

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IanS
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Show and tell time!!

Stripping all the unneeded stuff off the throttle bodies.

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Ready to cut.

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Hello band saw.

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Just need a little trimming.

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Test fitting with the raw couplers.

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Runners back on the engine.

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Test fit

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I got almost everything hooked up. Need to build a throttle cable bracket, re-wire the TPS, and figure out a system for the crankcase breather. I just couldn't wait any longer. I shot a video, but cannot upload it to anywhere but the book of faces, so if you'd like to see low quality cell phone video of the old girl revving, you know where to look. I will try to shoot real video of it running once the TPS and stuff are hooked up and I can free rev it more smoothly.

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Razi
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Soooo awesome!

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IanS
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One of the guys I race with just posted a video of my launching that he caught on his in car. Sounds so freaking sweet. Can't wait to get it tuned better, and try launching with the ITBs.

I <3 launch control.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucBw4TVI ... ure=colike[/youtube]

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Razi
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Haha that's sweet!

Are you going to try and mount velocity stacks on the ITBs?
Different lengths and adjust the powerband right?

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IanS
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Razi wrote:Haha that's sweet!

Are you going to try and mount velocity stacks on the ITBs?
Different lengths and adjust the powerband right?
Have not decided yet. I hope to build a sheet metal box that incorporates a set of velocity stacks. That way I can pipe it up to the front of the car for cooler cleaner air, but for the time being I may just end up running stacks with filters on them.....

If only rally wasn't so dirty, I could run a set of billet trumpets with screen filters. That would be epic.

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Razi
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Indeed!


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