HarrisRacing

More news. Finally got into the engine, but I wasn't the first one. Someone at least dropped the pan and diagnosed the damage before me, but I truly don't think they really tried to fix it. REALLY BAD NEWS. Crank is trashed. Rod bearings on #5 and #6 both spun. 6 bearing was super thin and broken. Pretty much all the main bearings are trash. 5 out of the 7 of them simply "fell" out of the block on their own and would no longer hold into the spots. (see picture of strained bearings). Block and Girdle Caps look great and MIC out round very close to the stamped sizes on the block. The bearings did their job and I'll be replacing the parts completely on the ones that spun. Pistons 1-4 look great like the piston and rods complete could be reused. .012" reduction in acceptable diameter on rod journal #6...so I started debating the grind .020" smaller than factory but then... I get to the crank journal check and start with the dial on the center bearing...FAIL. Crank is bent .014" in the middle! I marked the low spot on the crank and checked the other mains next to it...both are high (not as high as .014"), but it paitned the picture of a badly bent crankshaft. Turbos are stock and both look to be in good condition (no oil, nomial shaft play). The rear one was rebuilt at one point because the name tag is bead blasted a bit compared to the front one. They are definitely good enough to sell off as spares or for someone to get cores for rebuilding. I decided while I was at it to gasket match the turbo manifolds to the old gasket. I think I'll stick with these after porting. Should be fine on the -7 turbos and later I'll likely go single as opposed to spending all that on Tomei manifolds and such. Now the big question (and I'll ask elsewhere), which stroker kit should I go with? Patrick

Thank you and keep them coming. I worked only a half day today and made it to the shop for 1pm. By 5:45 I had the engine and trans out of the car. Didn't read a single instruction online at all. These cars really aren't THAT hard to work on but YES I 100% agree with you - The jumbled mess under the intake manifold will be relocated or removed...HICAS included! someone definitely got into the bottom end as the oil pan had orange high temp RTV on it. The rear turbo was replaced at some point and orange RTV was all over that as well (honestly didn't get to look at turbos much yet) but they weren't pouring oil from them anywhere. Also someone had a different clutch disc in there, but it looks pretty worn so I'll still be replacing it. AND someone had replaced the engine mounts which is a shame because I ordered some new upgraded ones already. I'm eager to put my mic on that crank this weekend (labor day long weekend for us) and see how bad that knock was (it was still intermittent under decel...not accel), and I'm well on my way. *That's me in the white shirt and my brother in the middle and a friend (who LOVES NISSANS!) on the left.

EDIT - I wanted to leave this complete build thread untouched to show the slippery slope of the GTR build / restoration process. How sometimes things can go from mild to totally wild when attacking nearly every problem with the "while I'm in there" and "do it right, do it once" philosophies. Just so you know, this project ends with a completely new 2.75L stroker engine on a BW EFR 8374 turbo...but it's a fun and informative read throughout. AND It's still under construction. ******************* Greetings from up over?! While I'm new to the GTR world, I am not new to cars. Actually I had recently sold my MKIV Supra Hardtop TT and went to look at a used R35 GTR that a local guy had for sale. I was SHOCKED to see his shop and found that he had two R32's just collecting dust. I asked some questions and we struck a deal on a Grey 1990 R32 GTR. The car had a slight intermittent rod knock in the higher (4k) rpm range and just coming from a TT inline 6 DOHC engine I figured it wasn't anything I couldn't fix. So I bought it, brought it home, and cleaned it. So far the car looks to be in EXCELLENT condition with no signs of wreckage or anything. I am amazed that it made it to the US so recently in such good condition. This car will be 25 years old and will then be legal to drive here in the USA in Jan of 2015 so in the meantime I'm giong to address the rod knock issue and build up the car. Expect some pictures and information to follow in this thread. First night was diagnosis of AC issues. Previous owner had cut the wire to the relay and wired it to a switch to force the AC on. I fixed this wiring properly and ran through the diagnosis on the AC setup. I found that I had issue 25 (sun sensor...typical), ALL of the 3X codes (31, 32, 34, 35, 36), and an out of range sensor for the suction air temp. I fixed the suction air temp with a 2.2k resistor I had and investigated the "mode select actuator". It was stuck fully extended to the DEF position and I helped it return back to the other positions manually. After pulling it apart I found that it had one broken gear tooth at the all the way extended position and I figured it was something I couldn't fix. I found the KUDOS MOTORSPORTS website and ordered the part. While I was on the website I saw that the GT2860 -7 turbos were apparently on sale for cheaper than I can get them stateside so I picked up a new pair of those and a pair of the spitfire coils (I hear they go bad as well). I'm sure they will make for a VERY fun street car. I also realized that the car's ignition key didn't work with the doors or trunk so I took them apart, found that by switching the tumler parts around that I could use 5 of the 8 and still use the ignition key for the doors so I got them working 100% for $0. My plans so far are to pull the engine this weekend and start the tear down so I know what I need to repair and to address the crankshaft issue (collar installation) at the machine shop. If all the bores check out good (I'm sure they are the car runs great), then I will order some factory bore size 86mm forged pistons for the engine and likely cheaper conrods (might as well put some manley or eagles for the extra insurance). I tuned my MR2 turbo road race car (4th season straight sill kicking!), on an APEXi Power FC and hand commander, but I think I would likely go full Haltech PnP this time around as a laptop tune is so much easier to do. I learned the lesson on high boost and ceramic turbines with this car. Actually I learned that boost isn't all there is to high rpms...they eventually just overspin from freeing up the flow of the engine despite keeping boost under a set psi. Yep my ceramic wheel vanished and the car has since received a billet precision 557E turbo (which may be an AWESOME super-responsive turbo for a GTR if anyone would try it sometime?). Any advice or input will be appreciated greatly. Also I'm thinking of dumping HICAS while I've got the engine out and wanted feedback on how far I can go with this while it's out. Thank You, Patrick Harris