JimX

This guy offering you $50 to call it even is about as close as you'll get to an admission of guilt from him I think. He's basically trying to bribe you with $50 so that you'll forget about the $420 he ripped you off. Did he think this one through properly before making such a ridiculous offer? How could he on any reasonable grounds be only $50 responsible for something which cost over $400 all told? If he honestly didn't think he did anything wrong he wouldn't (and shouldn't) have offered you a token $50 refund. This guy knows he's done something wrong and is trying to cheap his way out.

My tacho hasn't worked for awhile now. Everytime I pull it out of the dash to do something it seems to fix it for a few days or weeks, then eventually it dies again and sometimes comes back by itself, and sometimes (most of the time in my last few attempts) whatever I do doesn't fix it at all and it stays dead indefinitely. It used to start working by itself more often when the car's been sitting in really hot or cold weather for a long time (usually hot) but again, not lately. In extreme weather conditions I'm guessing a loose contact somewhere is expanding or contracting enough to make a better contact with something else in there, but where that is exactly I am not longer sure. It could the plug contact in the dash or it could be a dry joint or failing component in the tacho itself. Does anyone know how to test a tacho with some cheap parts or a Jaycar kit? I might head down to Jaycar on the weekend and see what they have, they must have some sort of 12v variable pulse generator I can rig up and pretend it's an engine. Gravedigging this thread has inspired me to suddenly care more about my inability to read revs

I thought people might find this NGK spark plug code chart useful, I did a search when trying to find the right code for my plugs but could not find a full reference on SAU. I also saw a post from someone that thought the "P" in "BCP" etc meant it was platinum, hopefully it will also help prevent disinformation being spread. As far as I know this image isn't copyrighted, if it is then can a mod please delete it.

It sounds like your alternator's voltage regulator is broken. They often start overcharging your battery when they wear out. Use a voltmeter and check the voltage of your battery while the car is running, if it is anything over 14.4V or so then the regulator needs to be replaced. If the alternator is overcharging then you are lucky that the headlights have blown before the more expensive electronics in the rest of your car. Get it checked/fixed before that starts happening or it could get very expensive soon. The other thing if you didn't know is you have to make sure you don't touch the glass bits of your headlight bulbs with your hands/fingers. The oil from your skin causes a heatsink effect on the bits you touched and this will greatly reduce the bulb life. I don't think it'd be bad enough to cause them to blow within 5 minutes, but keep it in mind anyway. If you accidentally touch the bulbs, wipe them clean with metho or something before installing them.

If it started happening straight after you got the car back from your mechanic you should take it back and tell them. If it's too late for that now (seeing as though you posted this a week ago) check the low pressure hose under the power steering pump and see if it's leaking there. Mine was leaking due to being old and cracked, it was only about $24 for the hose but really difficult to get to so I got my mechanic to do it while he was doing another couple of fiddly things for me and had everything apart. Failing that, or even if it is the hose but you can't be bothered replacing it, try using a bottle of power steering pump sealant that you can buy from auto spare parts shops. I think I used the Nulon brand one (not 100% sure though) on one of my previous cars (VS Commodore), it started off as a slow leak that I never got around to fixing but when the car started to leak a puddle of fluid on the garage floor after parking it more than a couple of days I decided I needed to do something. I didn't expect the sealant stuff to work very well but afterwards it sealed it up 100% perfectly and was still totally sealed when I sold the car about 6 months later. I would've tried the fluid sealant option on the GTR, but a new hose was only $24 and my mechanic already had the car in bits to do other stuff, so I figured I'd just do it properly.

+1 for exhaust manifold porting around the turbo flanges to match the upgraded turbo flange size. I did mine at home with a Dremel at home (die grinder would have been much quicker but I had nothing else to do at the time anyway) and it could have possibly been the best bang-for-buck mod I've ever done. I'll never know for sure though, because I did it at the same time as I upgraded the turbos so I couldn't do any before/after testing. But it doesn't make any sense to put bigger turbos on without increasing the turbo flange size on the manifolds to match. I have seen a photos of stock and Nismo manifolds next to each other, and the only difference I can see between them is the turbo flange size. So I presume that I have basically done a free upgrade to Nismo manifolds. Also with your idle problem, have you adjusted the screw thingie underneath the plenum? Mine used to idle around 1200 as well (I think for pretty much the same reasons yours is) but I managed to get it to normal (before I got my PowerFC) after someone on the forums told me about this adjuster screw under the plenum. The thing is if the adjustment is maxed out then you'll have to try something else. I forget all the other details because it was a few years ago now, but searching the forums should turn up my old post about this issue.

Oh no am I too late! I got an SMS from Anthony a few hours ago asking him to put my opinion of his tune of my GTR last year. Not to talk it up but just to say something, which I presume to mean my honest opinion. I have to say I am VERY happy with his tune! I drive sedately most of the time, but when I do give it some stick I am not kind to the car when I do (although I am kind to the triple clutch on launching and gear changes to avoid blowing the gearbox). The car just goes better across the whole rev range after the tune, and it also got rid of my compressor surge/turbo shuffle. Even should my engine die from here I will not blame GT's tune. The car had a fairly tired engine when I got it and the compression across the cylinders was a little uneven before I did installed the new turbos, I just decided I was feeling lucky enough to be able to save up for a rebuild by the time she goes. If anything my car is the real acid test as to whether or not a tired engine can stand up to GT's tune and so far so good. It was a road tune only so I don't know how much power it had before and after. Just that the car gets more power and uses less fuel now than before. I think I may have to threaten violence on someone/something if I can't get Anthony to tune my car again with my next upgrade The fact that he lives 2 minutes away from me by pure coincidence is a bonus. Car is an R33 GTR, 3.5" turbo-back exhaust (except for one dump pipe - don't ask!), bigger FMIC, 780cc Sard injectors, HKS intake plumbing, HKS 2530 turbos tuned at 20psi. Oh and it's midnight purple which I think is good for +5rwhp

Consider the cam gears sold! pm sent.

Oh something I found a few weeks ago but forgot to mention in here, it seems that there is a reason to be doing this mod. Looking at the pic that I've attached, the N1 manifold seems to simply be the factory manifold with the same bits ground out. Pic found here - http://gtrusa.blogspot.com/2007/11/rb26det...ths-truths.html Also I'm wondering if the people who I have heard complain that the 2530's are laggy on GTR's are running the stock manifolds? (this includes the person I bought them from, I think he changed to GT-SS's). Because I find it hard to tell that my 2530's are any laggier than the stock turbos. There are times where I think they are even more responsive than stock. Some of that would be due to the ball bearings vs plain bearings, but I also think the ported/matched exhaust manifolds would have a lot to do with it. Anyway looking at this photo, I think that if anyone is thinking of buying N1 manifolds, don't pay any more than you would for a good porting job because they seem to be exactly the same thing aside from the size of the turbo flange hole.

I am using the Sard 700cc injectors with 2x2530 turbos and they get up to around 80% duty cycle at full throttle and 20 psi boost. I haven't dyno'd the car yet (only road tune) but it'd be well under 500rwhp. I would think that you'd need to go larger for 500rwhp, but I am also running standard AFM's which max out, and I think once that happens the ECU will start dumping in more fuel than it needs just to be safe. So maybe my 80% duty cycle is more than it should be. Also I'm running the standard fuel reg, you can squeeze more fuel out of them with your turbosmart reg but I don't know if it'd be enough. Speak to your tuner who would have a better idea about sizes and brands and how much extra flow your reg will get you. I have an adjustable Nismo reg but haven't installed it because I don't need it yet. I really like these Sards though, they're smoother than I expected and idle very nicely even when cold (when the ECU is behaving, it stumbles 2-3 times when aircon kicks in but it did that on the factory injectors too, need to re-program the PowerFC's idle soon). I couldn't tell these aren't factory injectors, and bigger injectors are meant to be a bit rough at idle/cruising. I'm not familiar with the HKS rail, I'm using the factory rail (RB26) for these injectors if that helps at all.

Spotted neat looking silver R33 GTS-t heading south in traffic jam in Parramatta around 3pm, WPN 33R I think, SAU sticker across back windscreen. I was on my way to Westfield but the traffic was banked up so bad and most of it seemed to be trying to get into Westfield that I quit while I was ahead and went back home.

I found the torque specs I used for the Suzuki Swift GTI that I changed the gearbox on recently. A completely different make/model, but it seems to have the same sort of large tapered fit plug into an alloy casing so I imagine these should be fine. I'm going to use them anyway. Oil filler/level plug: 36 to 54 Nm Oil drain plug: 25 to 30 Nm

This is mostly just a warning to anyone that has bought a Skyline and never changed the gearbox/diff oils or let the workshop's apprentices do it. Make sure all your gearbox and diff drain and fill plugs aren't done up too tightly or it can split the casings! My story: A few months ago I noticed a small but growing patch of oil under the car in the garage. At first I thought it was just spillage from my general servicing but as it grew I realised it was transmission fluid by the smell. So I decided to have a better look under the car while I was upgrading my turbos and noticed a very thin film of oil over the whole gearbox. The leak seemed to be coming from the top of the gearbox. There were 2 leaks in the gearbox! The first one was the rubber boot on top of the gearstick had split over time, so it was no longer sealing and there was oil leaking out around the top and splashing down all over the sides of the box. This was a $20 part from Nissan I think (2 days for it to arrive) and very easy to fix. I thought that was that, but after a quick test drive I noticed it was getting another film of oil starting from the drain plug. Long story short, the compliance yard had done up the filler plug too tightly and it had created a hairline split next to it over time. However it had only just started to crack it enough to start leaking oil after about 20000km of driving, so it was only done up a little too tightly. Over around 3-4 months I had lost around 300cc of gear oil, which may well be too much to lose even with normal driving. Fortunately gear changes were still very slick and I didn't have too many gear shavings on the magnet and the oil itself is very clean, but I still feel there are more than there would be had I lost no oil. There are few ways to fix the split casing (as I found from searching in here), from dropping the box and welding it properly from the inside, or using some sort of putty or welding it in place from the outside. Since my leak was very small and I got several months warning about it, I went the cheap and nasty fix to see if it works. I cleaned the whole area around the split, applied some thread lock into the fracture, smoothed it down and pushed the thread lock into the crack as best I could. Then cleaned the surface again and smeared on a thick top coat of JB Weld and let set for 24 hours before re-filling the gearbox (I'm about to do the last stage now). I will check it every few weeks to see how it holds up over time and report in here. The funny thing about the split is it doesn't start right at the threaded part of the filler hole. There's a 1cm gap of flat unbroken metal before the split starts and goes for about 2cm. I did plenty of overlap with the JB Weld to make sure I covered any splits that I couldn't see yet. I do have one question which I couldn't find an answer to after a lot of searching and will be useful to anyone changing their gearbox/diff fluids and not wanting to kung-fu chop their gearbox/diff housings like a bonus stage in Mortal Kombat. Does anyone know what the torque settings are for the drain and filler plugs are? If I can't find any information I'm going to treat them like a taper-fit spark plug (just a pinch of a turn with the socket after finger tight or so) One last hint for anyone unable to crack those over-tightened drain and filler plugs. Heat them up with a little butane blowtorch. I used a $30 one I got from Jaycar but a cigarette jet lighter might be enough. I was unable to budge the drain or filler plugs at all, so I tried heating the plugs uniformly around the edges for about half a minute and then they both undid very easily after this. Many thanks to wrxhoon who helped me find the sources of these leaks and their likely causes.

Well it's roughly in the middle, kind of up the top but a bit off centre and you have to poke around a little until you find it. Feedback from the owner is usually necessary... Hang on what are you talking about again? I forgot already.

I have often wondered the same thing! Especially in the for sale forums where people make an offer for something posted 5 years ago. Oh, and please don't ask me how I found this thread or why I replied to it. Trade secret!