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Thread: Almost-a-Kouki 180SX

  1. #41
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    What size tyres are you running in those first pictures?

  2. #42
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    This looks lovely! Kinda makes me want one



    I know they are two different cars and one is much newer, but how does it compare to the E46 on track? Im eyeing one up to replace the Megane next year but I'm still not 100% on getting one

  3. #43
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by bikerboywill View Post
    What size tyres are you running in those first pictures?
    225/45/17 all round on 9.5" wheels.

    Quote Originally Posted by -Jamie- View Post
    This looks lovely! Kinda makes me want one

    I know they are two different cars and one is much newer, but how does it compare to the E46 on track? Im eyeing one up to replace the Megane next year but I'm still not 100% on getting one
    I never took my M3 on track as I was able to cook the brakes on some of the roads round here and didn't fancy the 3k bill for a worthwhile upgrade.

    On the road, this is much more involving. IMO, M3s show their weight quite quickly when pressing on and they don't feel all that composed when the road gets a little choppy, but that has been the same on every single E46 I've been in or driven, M or no.

    Thing with this on track is that I can literally do whatever I want with it. I would never have said the same about the M3. I think the fact that this is a little under-tyred helps, and it will remain that way as it makes it much more fun to drive. It can be stonkingly fast round a lap or a bit loose and entertaining.

    The engine in the M3 though is an utter masterpiece. From 2.5k to 8k it's just a solid wall of power. That's the only thing I really miss. I don't care much for the rest of the car dynamically compared to this car. I've no doubt it would be faster, but it would cost far more to get there (brakes mostly but tyres too, which it ate at a stupid rate) and there is always the potential for an enormous bill round the corner if something goes wrong.

    In other news, I laid down an offer on a house yesterday and it was accepted Got a garage and a shed so tinkering will be prolific once the house is furnished! May even revisit my space frame that I started designing a year or so ago...
    Last edited by zeppelin101; 28-01-2014 at 08:57.

  4. #44
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    Probably due a small update...

    Not used the car much recently, moved into my new house a couple of weeks ago so that has been taking up quite a bit of my time.

    However yesterday, I went for a spin with some friends through Wales. This promised to be an excellent day. Unfortunately, the car conspired to make things difficult.

    A small list of things that went wrong in the 8 breakdowns I had over the day:

    Split boost hose

    Lost jubilee clip on said boost hose which stalled the engine as the pipe came off

    Lost reverse gear

    Electrical gremlins returned with a vengeance

    Lots of oil smoke, suspect turbo seals

    Gearbox is scrap I think. I remember coming out of a junction going for 3rd and it wouldn't engage then when it did it made an awful noise. Next time I pulled up reverse was gone. Suspect the syncro has disintegrated and jammed the gear or the shaft is damaged.

    Boost hose was fixed with copious amounts of tape. Which had to get topped up every now and again as the hot gas burnt through it after a while.

    Basically I think the car needs a bit of an overhaul so I've got a few ideas lined up:

    Stick a meatier gearbox on it

    Rewire the whole front end and the kouki lights at the back

    Heatshield the bay

    Investigate turbo options

    New brakes and ditch the rose jointed arms for bushed ones

    I quite like how it drives power wise but would like a bit more bottom end torque so I'm going to have to have a think about that one for a good solution.

    In for the long haul on this one now!

  5. #45
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    Started stripping the car down yesterday now that project house has started calming down a little bit.





    Love old engines, hardly any electrical connections compared to the nightmares I work on day-to-day

    Plan of attack is this:

    Yank engine and box out
    Strip all the front half of the loom down and re-route anything that goes through the wheel arch with new cable
    General clean and tidy (look mega grubby right now)
    Get the front part of the chassis legs protected - they weren't done with the rest of the car presumably because there was too much in the way

    It'll probably be worthwhile investing in a new radiator while I've got it pulled apart. The standard one I have is in very good condition but the temps were creeping on my last track day so I'd like to avoid that next time.

    I want to get the air conditioning working again as well, but that may be a job for when it's back together so a specialist can look at it. I'm aiming to make this car more comfortable for longer distance driving. To that end, I will eventually get a new exhaust made up, probably stick some more of the sound deadening that I have in the garage in the rear half of the car and I'm also going to play with spring rates a little as it feels a little underdamped for what is currently on there, particularly at the front.

    Plenty to be getting on with!

  6. #46
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    With the engine about ready to come out (just the prop to disconnect) I drained the oil from the box...



    I definitely gone done and broke it The oil came out glittering so whatever I've broken I've done a proper job on it by the looks of it!

  7. #47
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    Engine is out and on the stand. Going to pull the head off and see what state everything is in. Going to have a good look at the ports (mainly exhaust side) and see how much room for improvement there is. I'm not planning on going to the extent of a full rebuild as I'm not planning on pushing the engine much further than it already is. That does depend on the condition of the engine as a whole though, if it's looking a bit ropey on the rings / bores then I may well look into some other options.

  8. #48
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    Nice to see things still progressing with this

  9. #49
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    Slowly but surely. Not in a hurry to get it back together, would rather take my time and do a neat job on everything. Gives me a chance to pull the engine bay apart properly and give everything a good clean and rustproof the bits that weren't done back in October.

  10. #50
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    I snapped a stud in the turbo in starting the strip down



    Annoying, but given that this turbo is unlikely to see this engine again, perhaps not so bad.



    Rocker cover off to see what the state of the cams are. There is some corrosion on both cams in the middle, but fortunately not on the lobes. I suspect the spray bars are partially blocked, but it's strange that it's such a defined band. I'm hoping to be able to tell more when I get the cams out.



    Finished up the night with this. Tonight I will probably start stripping the front end off the engine so that I can remove the timing chain / sprockets / cams and start removing the cylinder head.

    I started stripping the transmission as well but didn't get very far. I'll need to refer to the service manual to tear that down I think as I haven't done any gearbox work of any kind before now.

  11. #51
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    That's what was left of my reverse selector

  12. #52
    Now with 400bhp....
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    Proper job on that gearbox.
    1998 Nissan 200sx s14a , 2000 std 5 speed with nismo supercoppermix clutch bn6 Sapphire Blue

  13. #53
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    Yeah, I'm quite chuffed with how broken it is

    Still struggling to get the bellhousing off though - snap ring and bearing bits are off but it won't shift. I've cleared out as much of the sealant used between the plate and the bellhousing as I can but it's not shifting

    The engine strip is going well though. Head is off, I just need to get hold of some valve spring compressors to get the valves out then I can look at getting it cleaned out and possibly taking some moulds of the ports to work out what improvement can be made.


  14. #54
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    - mostly nonsense -
    Last edited by zeppelin101; 07-05-2015 at 10:15.

  15. #55
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    Further update - I got a quote from a company called AET up in Yorkshire to get my turbo modified. Essentially take my turbo, bin the compressor wheel and machine the current compressor housing to match the new compressor. £529 + VAT which is pretty spectacular in my view given that the whole CHRA with a new housing is over 1k from most places!

    I'm not sure it's as simple as machining the compressor housing however as the inducer size on the GTX wheel is smaller than the current wheel on the turbo which will introduce some weird flow effects and stresses on the edges of the blades I think. Unless they know something I don't! As far the head porting goes, I think that whatever I do, the turbine housing will present a restriction first and since I have no desire to take the engine much further than this turbo will allow me to, I think I'm going to leave the ports alone for the time being.

    Unfortunately things are a little on hold right now as I came to the realisation I'm in pretty unsustainable levels of debt to various institutions so I'm going to make an effort to get all that shit out the way first. At the very least I will probably try and get the engine back into roughly one piece and then hold out until I can free some cash up.

  16. #56
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    Bit the bullet and bought the bits I need to stick the motor back together in the short term. Last thing I want is it sat out in the garage open to the elements for months on end especially with winter approaching.

    Opted for a Cometic 1.1mm head gasket as I wanted to retain as much CR as possible along with some ARP head studs. Seemed a no-brainer really since the head bolts are out of spec and I'm planning on running some additional boost.

    It'll be nice to stick it back together though. I can look at pulling the loom and repairing that first before putting it back in the bay, but at minimum the car should be in roughly one piece again before the weather gets too nasty.

  17. #57
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    Damn. Wanna see more updates

  18. #58
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    Quote Originally Posted by humidade View Post
    Damn. Wanna see more updates
    I have a small update

    Started putting the engine back together at the end of last week.



    The head is now back on but I forgot to put a few of the little bolts in that go near the timing chain to secure the head to the block so I need to take the rocker cover off again The one bag I managed to overlook!

    I'm debating whether it's worth getting the knackered stud replaced and just reusing the turbo for the time being until I can get the money together to get it upgraded. At least if I do that there isn't that much additional cost to get it put back together, most of it is in getting new brake discs and pads really. Could be back in one piece in a few weeks if that's the case.

    Really can't wait to drive it again!

  19. #59
    Guest zeppelin101's Avatar
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    Finally managed to wrestle the gearbox back onto the engine yesterday. Took me a while on my lonesome!

    I just need to extract the knackered stud from the turbo and get a replacement in then it's already to go back in and see if it fires up.

    I'm trying to decide on some wheels to eventually replace the Rotas. Won't be any time soon, but at least if I know what to aim for then that's a good start. Would like something with a bit of a lip, but not too bothered if they are single piece / 3 piece etc.

    Any suggestions in 17" flavour? Enkei RPF1s are a firm favourite but the internet keeps dragging me off to CCW as well to look at Classics or LM5s...

  20. #60
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    Engine ready to go back in the bay and then...





    On Sunday I spent the day just working through all the ancillaries / electrics etc making sure I'd not missed anything. Thought I'd do a compression test first before I fired it so cranked it up to get oil pressure and got a load of worrying results.

    Cyl 1 - 11 bar
    Cyl 2 - 3.5 bar
    Cyl 3 - 1 bar
    Cyl 4 - 14 bar

    1 bar on cylinder 3 was just wrong - stinks of valves staying open to me. Concluded it was probably something to do with the lifters. Maybe not getting enough oil from cranking only? Equally likely that the compression tester is boned.

    Wouldn't have thought that would be a problem... so I fired it anyway just to see if it was only running on 2 / 3 cylinders. It fired right up, held a good idle and rev'd cleanly! Can only assume either the gauge is duff or something lifter related.

    Unfortunately I've got no display on the climate control so bleeding the coolant system is going to be tricky as I'm not entirely sure if it's even doing anything so it probably won't run again for a little while now while I chase a few wiring gremlins down. Hopefully that won't take long though so I'm hoping for it to be road ready by November!
    Last edited by zeppelin101; 13-10-2014 at 14:51.

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