JimX

It depends on how the dyno is callibrated and what gear the run was done in. What was your torque out of interest?

What does doing a dyno run in a lower gear do to your figures? I assume the torque will read higher because there is more of a mechanical advantage, and the power will read lower because the engine is physically doing less work to get the extra torque. Does anyone know roughly how much I should adjust the figures if the dyno run was done in 3rd instead of 4th? Assuming factory R33 GTS-t gearbox ratios (I don't know what the ratios are).

I gained about 15kw and around 60Nm with my S-AFC tune. But even if I didn't get the extra power I would still appreciate the better fuel economy and power delivery. There used to be a big flat spot in my power curve from around 4000-6000rpm, so you can imagine how quickly I needed to react to change gears when flooring it as the thing just took off in the last 1000 revs up till redline. All I can say is thank god for rev limiters. If you can afford a Power FC I would rather go with that, but if you can find a cheap S-AFC it is definitely a worthwhile investment to use while you save up for the Power FC. Anyone clued up on electronics can install it themselves (my advice - melt a portion of the ECU wire shielding and splice the new loom in directly rather than cutting the old wires and making new joins) and it'll cost about $140 to tune from a place like Hills Motorsport. The S-AFC will also help prevent stalling if you have an atmo bov, so it also acts as a safety (and anti-embarrassment) feature in that regard.

Bilsteins are probably the best value performance shock you can get and they are rebuildable as well. Ohlins may be better but if they're priced anything like motorcycle shocks they will be hella expensive (Try >$800 for *one* Ohlins shock for my motorcycle!) Should be around $1100 for all 4 corners for Bilsteins, but if you're replacing shocks you may as well get new springs too for another $200 or so. My old springs were rooted as well, the back was lower than the front, and the left side sat lower than the right! I was originally looking for Koni adjustables which are around the same price as the Bilsteins but apparently you can't get them for R33 GTS-t's at present.

I don't know the specifics, but keep in mind that a GTR has almost 200kg more weight to push around which probably accounts for most of the price difference.

Have a look at my dyno readout. I was actually mistaken, the torque was 641 when power was at its peak, but the peak torque occurs earlier and is over 700 Anyway this is why I asked the question about it being in 3rd gear rather than 4th.

The A/F ratio varies, deliberately. Mark kept it in the high 11's in the high RPM range because he said he was worried about detonation. He said he could have pushed it into the 12's, but with the last tweak he did there wasn't enough of a power gain to warrant increasing it further. I trusted his judgement on the matter But on the most part, until it hits around 100kph in 3rd gear (whatever RPM that is) it's low to mid 12's. Originally it was mostly high 11's and heading towards low 11's at the top end. I'll scan the dyno chart and upload it this weekend. Cost was only for the tune, because I'd installed it myself a couple of weeks ago. That was $140, I don't know what he'd charge for installation. The dump pipe he uses is built by him so it's fully custom. He talked about running an external wastegate as well, I think I might go with that, but it depends on how much extra it costs. I don't actually know why the dump pipe is such a separate item from the front pipe, to me it looks like they should be the one and the same piece. I guess it must have something to do with the wastegate.

Ok, got the S-AFC tuned, and picked up an extra 15kw and 60Nm at the wheels. Now, this is weird because the power seemed to be quite low (166kw after tune) but Mark said that it was quite a good amount of power and that usually the other Skylines he tunes come up with around 145kw. But also, the torque seems to be monumental, it was around 640Nm! The thing is he did the dyno runs in 3rd gear, because he said in 4th you run into the speed limiter. Am I right in thinking that having a higher ratio (3rd gear) would increase your torque and decrease your power, when compared to a lower ratio (4th)? It seems like that to me anyway, when considering the figures and Mark's comments about them. Also considering that the stock torque of an R33 GTS-t is under 300Nm, there's no way that I'm running double that right now. The car still blows a bit of black smoke, but that's because he deliberately left it running a bit rich when I have the hammer down so that it doesn't ping on really hot days. The PowerFC as far as I know has temperature compensation so it can be eventually gotten rid of once I can afford that. Next step is going to be a custom dump pipe, with dyno runs before and after (he said he likes to show the customer where their money is going - big thumbs up for that!) and eventually, either new intercooler plumbing or a new intercooler (my current fmic is very average). Watching my car get sideways on the dyno was a damned good sight indeed

You can, it depends on the insurance company. But yeah, most of the ones that offer it in other states don't offer it in NSW. Western QBE will insure my bike 3rd party/fire/theft (didn't ask about car), for about $50 less than full comprehensive. When you're talking about a $1200+ premium here, who the hell would bother?!

Kinda. There's lots of different types of "sandpaper", but you never actually ask for that at the hardware store. You ask for emery, or garnet paper, or glass paper, or wet and dry etc, plus whatever grade it is. I had woodwork teacher in highschool who used to rub a piece of it across any student's nose who said "sandpaper" instead of the correct type it was

Steve, what will the part number be of the GTS-t kangaroo paw rotors? I wanna keep an eye out for it

Try if you can really afford it to get satellite tracking for your car. It's a lot of money up-front ($2000) and around $350 per year after that, but you can transfer it to your next car for minimal cost. If you're not going to get full comp insurance I reckon it's almost an essential item on any car worth more than $10k or so (if it's a thief-target like a Skyline anyway). I have full comp but am seriously considering going the way of 3rd party property plus a tracker when my renewal comes around, unless I can somehow scam some fleet-priced insurance or something.

Enthusiastic street driving with the occasional track day maybe? I was originally going to go for slotted, but then heard that they tend to wear the pads out a lot quicker because of the sharp edges on the slots. Then I read about the new kangaroo paw type, which are meant to cool better than regular slotted rotors, and I was thinking that this should probably be enough because of that.

I'm very interested in new Skyline rotor developments. Kangaroo paw style rotors are what I'd mostly be interested in, but I can't decide if I'd want slotted or not (depends on the pads I upgrade to I guess). Steve, is the DBA website updated often? The last time I went there a few weeks ago, I couldn't find anything other than standard rotors for Skylines. Maybe I just wasn't looking hard enough, is there a direct link to new models of Skyline rotors?

The interior isn't a huge issue, but it's something to consider. I know a few people who think the cloth trim cheapens the whole look of the interior of the series 2, but it's just a personal opinion. And of course they're not "just" cutting costs. They have to cater for the market, which at the time they decided dual air bags was necessary. But that could be one reason why they decided to cut costs in other areas (ie turbo and interior), to help keep the price down for the new standard features. Personally, I think a passenger airbag is next to useless anyway based on most of the crash reports I've read. If your head was close enough to the dash that it would hit it you'd probably be more concerned about an air bag inflating in your face. In all the tests I've seen, when a passenger is sitting a normal distance away from the dash, their head slides forwards and down and hits their knees, and the air bag does jack-all. This is why passenger air bags didn't come out at the same time as driver's air bags. The manufacturers knew it wouldn't be nearly as effective as a driver's air bag so they never bothered developing it, but after a few years the marketing people decided to add in passenger airbags just to help make it look like they were improving vehicle safety and help win the market with a gimmick. Side air bags would have been a much better thing to have developed earlier IMO. I don't have anything against the series 2. If it was a more reasonable price I would have bought one instead, just because it's a newer car. But the price is usually artificially inflated, mostly because of the passenger airbag and what most people perceive as better styling, plus the "it's a series 2, it must be better" mentality, in the similar way that all series 1 Commodores are duds. The only series 1 R33 issue I can think of is the peeling door handle trim, and that's hardly in the same league as what series 1 Commodores have had wrong with them in the past. I'm glad I prefer the series 1 styling and don't attach any value to a passenger airbag, because that means I win all round

Probably because it's newer and less worn out I haven't heard anyone say that the series 2 is better. It's got a plastic wheel instead of ceramic, how could it be better? I'm guessing along with with the cloth trim "upgrade", it was a cost-saving measure by Nissan. At only 5psi or whatever the factory boost is, it doesn't matter if it's ceramic or plastic.

tlai909, thanks! My collection is once more complete

I don't know why everyone thinks the series 2 trim is better than series 1. The series 2 trim only came about due to cost-cutting by Nissan. It's got cloth in the middle which is much cheaper than velour. It may seem to be more durable than velour, but my series 1 trim is 7 years old now and still looks brand new. So while it's personal preference as to which looks better, it can definitely be said that the series 1 trim was more expensive and cannot be said that it isn't durable. Also, Ex-static's series 1 pic looks a little tame. Compare it with my series 1 in the attachment. Looks a lot meaner with a better grille and bigger front bar doesn't it? Of course it's still personal preference as to whether or not the series 2 looks better, but I think my front end looks mean-as and I wouldn't swap it for a series 2 bar if you paid me (well ok, maybe if you paid me LOTS ) The series 2 turbo is definitely weaker than series 1 (shouldn't matter if you plan on upgrading it anyway) and I haven't heard of any gearbox changes. My box is fine either way. Personally I see the last of the series 1's (ie, '95 model) to be the best value. They are a fair bit cheaper than series 2, have the more expensive interior (IMO nicer), stronger turbo, series 2 titanium boot badge (without a doubt nicer than the previous plastic ones), and series 2 wing and larger front bar option (I think earlier ones have the wing and bar options too though). About the only thing you miss out on is the passenger air bag, which is mostly just a gimmick item anyway. And since they were built before 1996, you can also get away with having too-dark tints on the windows. I don't know the exact laws but I think if you get busted with too-dark tints on pre-96 cars you just get defected with no fine, whereas if it's post-96 you also cop a hefty fine because that's when the new laws came into effect (either way you have to replace it obviously). Edit: Oh, that missing badge on my grille has been replaced now. Before the respray it had a fugly "NISSAN" badge there, and I got it replaced with a proper Skyline one. But it had to come from Japan.

Yeah if anyone can put The Follow up somewhere I'd be very appreciative I used to have it, but then accidentally deleted my entire movies folder, and would you believe that the BMW films were the only thing my file recovery program couldn't recover?! So I've re-downloaded all of them but can't find The Follow anywhere

Really, what is the point of that statement? Are you feeling sorry for yourself that you can't rip the poor guy off? He rejected your offer, just deal with it. White_r33, sorry about your dad. Put the car in the Trading Post, you should get a much better price in there.

NFI. That could be the reason why they didn't refer me to them though, if they parted on sour terms.

Well, since I had to book my car in almost 2 weeks ahead, I guess they have all the work they need and don't need to be in the white pages. L33t mechanic! I find it funny that UAS referred me to Silverwater Automotive instead of Hills. Must have some direct competition going on there or something.

Out of interest can someone tell me why Hills Motorsports aren't in the White Pages? Not on the website anyway (I don't have a phone book handy). Someone told me about them and I couldn't find the phone number so I thought they must have gotten the name wrong or something. But since then I found websites with links and stuff and got their phone number that way. Although if I had been looking carefully enough I could have gotten it from Prank's sig

Ok, we've got a bit of a late comer here My name is Jim (if you couldn't tell from the nick), age 31, and I live in West Ryde and work in IT desktop/network support. Been into cars for well over 15 years now, had a bunch of Toranas and Commodores (6's and 8's only) plus one XY V8 Falcon, but have been musing over Skylines (and Sierras) ever since I was watching them race at Bathurst in the early 90's. For some reason I thought I'd never be able to afford one, and so I never paid them too much attention other than drooling over them whenever I saw one. Then sometime last year I heard about GTS-t's which were about half the price of GTR's but more than half the car, so I researched them more and started seriously thinking of getting one. It took me until June/July this year to get everything sorted out - sold the Commodore (for less than I wanted), found the right Skyline a short time later (for a better price than I thought, so it balances out!), and now have it sitting in my garage. I absolutely love it! Unless I won the lottery or doubled my salary I wouldn't dream of selling it, and if I did, it would be for a GTR But the GTS-t makes me very happy and I don't "want" for any other car. What else? Oh yeah, I also like motorcycles. I ride a Suzuki TL1000R (V-twin super sports bike if you're not familiar with it) which I love as much as the Skyline, if I had to get rid of one I wouldn't know which to choose! I'd sell my house before either of those, if I owned a house to sell

Thanks for the info guys I'm kind of thinking that it's a roll-on effect with Croydon. They charge a lot and everyone is happy with them, so that makes more people go there because they think they must be the absolute best because they charge so much, etc. I'm not doubting the quality of Croydon, but it's hard to understand how they can be *twice* as good, even when compared to a workshop with a good rep like Hills. But anyway, I'll see how I go with Hills, should be pretty good. It's kinda funny that I'm going there, because through no reason other than pure coincidence I also bought my cold air box from UAS, and gotten my motorcycle repaired at Castle Hill Motorcycles, all 3 of which are at 2A Victoria Ave! My one stop motoring shop