Duncan

Well, I got some sad news to share with the community yesterday, Neil de Pau passed away suddenly on Friday night, most likely from a heart attack. There was no prior signs of a problem and unfortunately his wife Mel found him when she returned home later that night. While he hasn’t been too active on here in the last few years, many of the longer term members will know Neil well, he was an admin on the forums, a founding member of the NSW club, active committee member for many years and club president in 2009. While I'm not going to do the whole story (and I don't know the first part anyway), here's a few key things I remember Back before SAU (both the forums and clubs started), Neil worked at Nissan parts in in the 90s when they were selling GTRs, which is when I think he really go into Nissans. At some stage as JDM cars started coming in, he bought a S2 R33 GTST (from John at UAS I think) and he, Mel and Monty started coming along to skyline events I'm pretty sure I first met Neil as part of Team Trackday, a group of us who use used to do 1/2 and full day Eastern Creek open days every month in pretty much standard or lightly modified skylines (this is back when 200kw was a big deal, now you need 1000 to get the likes). They were crazy fun afternoons with so many laps on the track, just wearing out tyres/brakes and not breaking things. Good times. Christian @PranK was there too, from memory he also had a white S2 GTST at the time, and he set up SAU Forums when SDU became unfriendly no non-members, and he also established SAU NSW where Neil was a founding member in 2001/2002. Its a bit of an aside, but as long as I've known Neil and Mel they've had great danes....big ones....here's Monty and Prank from way back in the day...and Prank ain't short. Neil always loved motorsport (watching, helping and later competing). I had the massive privilege of his grumpy guidance teaching me pretty much every good habit I have with racecar prep, nothing I could do could ever repay the time, sweat and blood (and probably tears too) that he put into getting and keeping my car (and Mark's too) on track. He first helped us out at the Wakefield 500 in 2003, and then in so many rallies, races, track days all around the country not to mention a bazillion days just preparing and fixing broken race cars. He bought his first race car around 2005-ish, a rotary powered Capri sports sedan, and while he did get to do some competition in it, the reality was it was a bit of a shitbox, not well built/engineered with lots of failures....and of course being a PP rotary the engine was a nightmare too. After a while he realised the Capri was never going to be the car he wanted it to be, and he moved onto a Radical clubsport. While the radical has been through plenty of specs and ups/downs too, he raced that hard from about 2008 to now in supersprints, hillclimbs, track days etc and had a total blast, winning plenty of class trophies along the way. In particular I remember that lunatic doing Oran Park in his open sports car, on slicks....in the rain at night during one of their "Do it in the Dark" meets.... he was having too much fun to notice I think. As if that wasn't keeping him busy enough, as I mentioned in 2009 he stepped up as President of SAU NSW.....and the year threw everything at him - we had a huge Show n Shine at Fairfield showground, plenty of the regular events like track days and motorkhanas, we supported the first running of Superlap at Oran Park, ran a massive 30th anniversary dinner for the R32 GTR with Jim Richards and Alan Heaphy speaking and sadly had 2 members who died in an accident at an unofficial cruise. It was a year packed with real ups and downs. Anyway, post all of that he focussed more on his own racing again and took the skyline off the road and had it caged and log booked for racing as well, leaving him with a choice of fixing the radical or the skyline in any spare minute. He ran the skyline at a bunch of events in the mid 2010s, but it did get remodelled at the national Hillclimb champs at Mt Cotton and didn't quite make it back to the track yet In 2019 (they must have know COVID was coming), Neil and Mel got the hell out of Sydney and moved to Tamworth for a better lifestyle, a good local car club, and maybe most importantly a proper flat shed with space for a hoist I'm not sure he spent much outside that shed since. Anyway, that's about all I can think to say now, except......Farewell mate, you will be missed. Anyone else please post up any memories or pics you might have.

First up, slightly loosen and then tighten the big bolt head where that pipe goes into the pump; it is much more likely (and quick/cheap) that the leak is coming from the bolt being slight loose or the copper washers needing to be re-crushed. If that doesn't improve it an you are sure it is the line, you need to undo it at both ends where there is a fitting (and there are probably a bunch of hard lines in between, and take it to the local hose shop like pirtek. They will charge you a bazillion dollars but fix it properly. Alternatively once you have it off you might be able to find a second hand hose somewhere

Best thing I can suggest (other than taking it to a mechanic), is thoroughly clean that area with degreaser and a rag, then start the car to try and identify where the leak is coming from. The AC is just an innocent bystander in this issue

I agree the car is most likely too low, outside of the heights it was designed to run at. You should see if the top of the tyre has been rubbing on the inner guard too Also, you need to check that the shocks have bump stops on them. If they are bottoming out on the shock body instead of a bump stop that will kill them pretty quick

Good to hear it was a simple fix

My 2016 Q50 does have a crossover, and it is a twin 45mm (out diameter) system, so not exactly free flowing. Just take the car to Castle Hill Exhaust (or any other decent performance exhaust shop) and get it on a hoist for them to check out, based on power targets they will make something custom for you.

Pics resized, hopefully that works better. Straightforward job today. The existing brakes were very grabby due to glazed pads and fronts 99% done (rears about 1/3 left I guess), so Racebrakes Sydney sent a care package Front 5000 series 2 piece rotors with DBA extreme pads (I'm told these are 2024's bendix ultimates) Rear 4000 series with the same pads All on, no tricks except a few of the discs were pretty rusted to the hubs (the front had threads to push the disc off but rear did not). Also, it looks like the nav side rear handbrake had been over tightened, lots of dust, worn shoe and even a groove in the old drum....presumably it will go better now Still need to replace the fluid with good stuff (motul 600) and bed them in, but I'm confident upgraded standard size will be all that it needs for now, they are pretty generous brakes from factory

Sorry, I keep giving short answers. So the starter motor main ground is because it is bolted to the engine block, which in turn has an earth strap to the body, then the battery. The starter motor positive is a big, generally unfused wire attached to the battery +. However, the starter only turns when it's solenoid gets a 12v signal from battery positive (a solenoid is just a big electrical switch). So when you shorted the main starter power to the solenoid spade terminal with a screwdriver the starter turned, as you gave the solenoid 12v. The solenoid normally gets 12v from battery + via the starter fuse then ignition switch to that spade...so it will have nothing on the wiring side of that spade terminal at most times, and you should have 12v there when the key is turned to Start per the diagram Josh posted. So, assuming you don't have 12v at that terminal when you turn the key to start you need to check there is 12v at the fuse, check the fuse is OK, check there is 12v at the start wire when you turn the key to start, and check continuity of all wiring in between those points

The spade connector that goes onto the solenoid should only have 12v when the key is at the start position. If it is directly connected to battery the starter would have tried to run as soon as you connected the battery, which would have been quite the surprise since we generally have a car in gear when we are working on it

Well, I've got no idea how ECUtek's tuning works, but I am interested in what you learn Total guess, but I'd expect anyone tuning an existing tune file it will be a remap for a stock or mildly modified car (eg new exhaust) and will be locked so you can't see or modify it yourself

I guess next step is to confirm there is not 12v on the loom side when you unplug that connector and hit start...there is likely a fuse popped somewhere

This is an R34 right? there is some sort of engine vacuum line connected to the power steering pump (no, I can't remember why that was a good idea for Nissan), it has clearly been previously broken and repaired on your car. You will have a boost leak until you fix or replace that fitting. May in the meantime take the 2 hoses off and plug them with something like an 6mm bolt (assuming they are 6mm inner diameter)

Yeah that sounds exactly like what a big air pocket does when leaving the system....radiator bleeding can be the same. I'd say you are right to go now

haha you're not going to like my old fart advice either....don't daily drive a 400kw car. It will chew fuel (e85 or 98), drive grumpy, break down, be annoying and noisy and be absolutely impossible to get parts when you have an inevitable crash (your fault or not).....just buy a $5k shitter for daily and enjoy the car on weekends flex fuel would cost about 1000 to buy and install the sensor and to do the flex fuel tune, assuming the ECU can take it. Absolutely nothing wrong with a 98 tune, it is actually e85 you have to be careful of (specifically, when you first start running it a lot of crap gets cleaned out of the old fuel system and ends up in fuel pump strainers, fuel filters and injector baskets) and also if it sits a while it attracts moisture and contaminates engine oil.

I'm sure any local govt is going to work off your rego papers weight, not a spec list

The tyre makes a massive difference. A 245 semi will be wider than a 255 road tyre

good call, always worth doing (or at least removing) when you get a car

hmm, thanks mate. I'm not sure how else to reduce them without loading them as attachments; the problem is some of the migrations in the past have resulted in lost pics in threads so I'd rather host them myself. Does the size cause a problem? David the driver assist stuff is one reason for the ? in the thread title (along with durability of the auto box even with rebuilding). In theory everything can be turned off but in practice it will be a hassle as you have to remember to turn traction control off and set either Sport+ or Personal mode every time you start the car. Even when we were racing the 350z back in the day you would have those frustrating moments where you'd leave the line and it would not let you turn the TCS off until it stops interrupting for a moment. Other option is to pull some fuses and see how much it complains. There are a few modern cars in prod cars these days like M3, A45 etc. The BMWs are running OK but the A45 has been a non stop issue. And the auto Mustang that did the Bathurst 6 hours ran well but killed the trans 5 hours in.

So to the wiring for the LEDs, this should suit pretty much any modern car too. I did some precision hacking of the dash in a flat area with space behind (and left a nice scratch too) There I mounted a Narva 63169 On/Off/On switch with the following pinout I wired 2 and 6 to ACC power that I tapped into near the fuse box, 7 to earth, 4 comes from the Hi beam power in the IPDM via the firewall and 5 returns through the firewall to a relay I mounted near the battery. This means with the switch up the LEDs come on (as long as ACC is on), with it down they come on with high beams, and there is an off setting in the middle. The larger light on the switch comes on with it up, and the smaller light when they are set to come on with high beams (usual setting). Getting through the firewall was a bit of a mission. I mentioned earlier that most of the wiring sits in a compartment behind the engine and outside the firewall. The main loom runs through there and into the cabin through a big grommet conveniently (not) located under the ABS module and master cylinder. Thankfully there was also a small blanking plug there that I could just get to just above the main grommet but still very tricky, so I stuck a pick through to identify where it came out inside Inside, it came through just above the throttle mounting (you can kind of see the shadow where it came through). There is space there for a couple more wires in future but not many. Then, with the magic of straightened coathanger I ran twin core wire through. From there one wire was connected to the IPDM High beam wire and the other is the + trigger for the relay. I used a 40a 5 pin normally open relay Narva 68032 (the LEDs are rated 30A) wired as follows: 85 (earth trigger) - to earth 86 (pos trigger) - to pin 5 of the switch 30 power in - to the battery + via a 40a maxi fuse 87 / 87 - one wire to each of the LED + LED - is just earthed at the front reo Took a lot of stuffing around trying to see how to work with a new car, but it ended up OK. Lights in place Lights on

Yeah 3.0 twin turbo direct injected - VR30DDTT. Makes 298kw factory (or 400hp if you prefer). Compared to the 32 GTR which makes 250kw at the wheels in production car trim it should be in mid pack somewhere despite weighing 1700kg.

You are right, there are 2 ways to approach it, you can go for wheels known to fit well on the car, or measure from what you have. If you jack up the car and check the distance from the inner side of the tyre to the first obstruction (generally the control arm, or a shock) and then do the same from the outside of the tyre to the guard, that tells you how much wider you can go or what offset you can use. I'd note that 9.5 is huge on the front of a 33 gtst, if they are not scrubbing anywhere including fuil lock then don't change anything about the front width and offset.

The point of all that for me was to get to the PDM (yes, v37 is as fancy as a haltech) which is between the battery and the front inner guard. In there, pins 80 and 81 on connector E125 are for hi beam according to the USDM manuals. I chose to intercept the high beam signal there as it is next to the battery and firewall so it is a good place to mount the fuse/relay for the LEDs. Unfortunately because you can't access the PDM with the battery in the car, it is difficult to test those wires are correct. The fuses for Left and Right high beam are marked on the PDM cover, so I checked continuity from the fuses to those pins with a multimeter, and it seems to be right. From here I need to splice a wire into one of those 2, and run it into the cabin for a switch, then run the trigger wire back to that general location for the relay. So, I removed the driver's side guard liner to check out where the wiring leaves the engine bay and enters the cabin. Turns out, that does not happen behind in guard liner at all....waste of time, nothing is routed through there, so that was another 5 pin clips, 4 screws and a bolt of wasted effort All of the wiring is actually run across the separate compartment between the engine bay and the cabin under the cowling...so off with the windscreen wipers after all....

So....the good news is you don't have to remove the windscreen wipers to replace the 12v battery in a v37 (just). You do however have to remove: 1. Battery area cover (un clips) 2. Battery area trim (pin clips) 3. Nav side windscreen cowling (more pin clips, plus the trim between the cowling and the front guard, and half of the cowling to bonnet seal All of that gets you to here, with clear access to the battery While there, it is worth clearing out the leaves and dirt that run from the cowling into that well, my car had a lot of crap there and it is a guaranteed future rust hotspot

Onto trickier matters....this time of year a LED light bar makes a massive difference to avoid skippies etc, so that was the first main priority. Unfortunately unlike both the Cima and the Fuga, there is no chance for a large central light bar inside the grille due to all of the redsport bits already there (intercooler radiator, extra water pump, sonar stuff). So this time I've gone a pair of 8" light bars which does have the benefit that they can be angled outwards a little as well. First, bumper needs to come off as there is no way to access the space behind the grill with it in place. Unlike the R32 which is (now) held on with 2 screws, the v37 had about 30 pin clips, 20 bolts and also 6 clips holding the damn thing on. Basically you remove the intake (clips), the top side covers (nasty clips) to get at 2 bolts, the front of the undertray (about 15 bolts and 3 clips), the front side inner guard covers (3 bolts and a couple of clips each) to get at the bolts at the rear of the bump in the wheel well, and then 3 clips near the headlight (outside, then under headlight, then above headlight) As part of that process the car got its first "race" mod so you can get at the top bumper bolts without removing the trim. There are also about 8 different electrical connectors which are in grave danger of being cut and replaced by one multi pin deutsch connector one day. On the bright side it is clear the bumper had never been off by how tight the connectors were. Once off, you can see there is very little space to work with. The lower section was not an option as the angle to the road would suck, plus the sonar module would push everything too far to the centre So I mounted the left side bracket to just clear the water pump (a miss is as good as a mile, they say) and the horn has been moved backwards too. The brackets on these Narva lights were a nice height to clear the front reo, and I just drilled and rivnut-ed into the reo (angle drills suck, but at least it made the job possible) With both mounted Minor adjustments to horn locations but everything else cleared. Those horns may well get moved / one deleted depending on how the cooling is on hot days, they were moved well to the side in the R32 Next, onto the wiring which will be a pain...

OK, next order of business, very much not important but I didn't like how like how it looked (and, we can pretend it restricts airflow if that makes this better). Both the front number plate, and more importantly the holder are pretty ugly. Step1, replace bent old plate with new one in blue cf style with new values Step2, unlike the Leaf where the bumper was flat enough to remove the holder altogether and just mount it on the bumper, with the v37 I decided to chop the hell out of the mount to retain the flat mounting surface. Step 3, much better (needs black bolts I think)