33 Gtst Builds

[Noddy]

I have had a 33GTST since 2001, and it has slowly gone from the only registed car we had, to a track car still just clinging to the hope, and it was only a glimmer, of getting registered, just 1 more time. There has been a dark shadow of the shed that has been waiting, so paitently for the day I said, ENOUGH!!!! My yellow 33 now sits a bare shell, with only its rollcage intact. All the running gear, all the suspension, has been embellished appon the dark street 33.

Don't think I should write a book, would be a flop I think. However I will go back about 5 years. I had been having a crack at some street sprints and QR sprint days and a bucketload of drifting. Then 1 day the motor just stopped. The cam belt tensioner stud just snapped leaving the lights in town on my way home from work. so that started the first serious rebuild.

Pre-rebuild

The body got flared, caged, seam welded, painted and so on

helps when the miss's is a spray painter

I made some suspension mods, just the usual stuff for flush fittment, camber, adjustability etc.

The engine got a make over.

The head was ported, new std valves, upgraded springs, 256 deg 10 mm lift cams and both cam gears. no more vvt. Paul Gillbert does some fine work.

The bottom end was freshened up.

Crank and rods were retained, acid bathed &crack tested.

ACL Race series Pistions and metal bearings were used. Pistions are 0.5mm oversize for a fresh cut and hone in the block.

Main bearings std size and the bigends 0.25mm ondersize and I had the crank match ground. obiously there was the usual decking honing and regular machine work involved as well. Colin Shore did all the machining and is missed very much. RIP. He also sent it for ballancing, some guy in Toowoomba who Ballanced all his race motors. Coll never told me who, only that you cant walk in off the street.

Other parts in the mix included an N1 oil pump and coller, HKS tripple plate, modified plenum, remote engine oil and powerstear coolers, PWR radiator, new coil packs etc.

Tuning has been fun, basicly it makes 300rwhp on 10 psi. some times I ran it at 14. Power is a funny thing, all I know is it has run hard from day 1 till just a few weehs ago. Nothing wrong with it, it's almost clocked up 10 000km, has a little blowby and Unique's dyno says some horses have left the paddock..... Still caught the slotcrar in the corners at Oran though.

Racing it at as many events I can get to over the last 3 years has seen me shy away from drifting and focus on supersprints. There are 23 events crossed off this years calander, sprints hillclimbs some drifting, and with the national SS in Warwick next year (home track) I thought now was as good a time as any to rebuild and improve.

The plan is to reshell everything into a still registerable road car. This is some hing that started in ernest about a week ago. Just waiting on the motor and box now.

The head has gone back to Gillberts on the GoldCoast for a checkup, crank and rods to Darren Siddens machinist for a checkup and the pistions are getting treated to new rings. All in all it is getting big end's, rings, light hone and 2 lifters to get it back to new. Hoping like mad to have the new car on the road for chrissy.

will get some more up tommorrow.

[Noddy]

It's funny how tomorrow turns into next week. I have got all the components back and ready to re-assemble the motor when time permitts. So this is what I found out about what has worn and why.

The most worn part was the top shell in the Bigends. Talking to the machinist guy, the oil squirter in the rod is bleeding the oil out resulting in the premeture ware in the shell. He has also linished and debured the crank while cheching the match grinding is still true. The crank had a run out of 2 thou. not bad I guess concidering the work load over the last 3 years.

The pic below shows the ware on 1 of the bigends picked at random.

The block has been acid bathed, washed, honed and decked. It looked in pretty good nick, there was some slight evidence in the bore and on the pistions of some minor detination. I have had some boost controler issues over the last few events which could have caused it. There are some fine marks in the hone if you look close and similar on the pistions. No pitting on the gasket, pistions or the head so it was pretty minor.

The head had 2 Bucketts that wern't spinning and had worn the surface of the hard face. Guides were perfect on the inlet side and a very fine amount of ware on the exhaust side. Steam seals were replaced as were the faulty lifters and damaged bucketts. The best news out of the head was that the cams are in perfect condition. The pic below is where 1 of the faulty lifter/bucketts was. Not the sort of thing you thing you find untill you pull it down.

I knew there was an exhaust leak out of the head, I'm told it is common for RB's to warp manifolds and leak at the ends. I had the exhaust side of the head faced, new studs and heli-coiled where needed. some threads were a bit sad. There was an extea exhaust leak from a crack in the exhaust manifold. It has cracked once in the past which I had spray welded earlier this year. Has re-cracked in the same place. Might get it rewelded..... Maybe a new manifold.... time will tell. The inlet side had a crack too. A rubber bung under the manifold in a hard to see spot had cracked. I see now there are several places where my sneaky minituare Ninja horsepowers were getting out. Sorry, Private joke.

All up the motor is getting/has had New

Rings

big ends

fresh hone

decking the block, head, manifolds etc

Headgasket

2 bucketts and lifters

steam seals

Cam belt and

Tensioner Stud.

The main question was, Do I put the motor back in the race car and keep on racing it till the new motor is ready, or, put it straight into a street clone of the race car? I decided on the latter so I can start working on the new suspension and other parts as early as possible. The Yellow race car has been reshelled into a street registed 33 GTST. Soon the motor and box will be in too. I'm aiming to get to the final Oran Park day on Jan 14th. Fingers crossed.

[BOZ22N]

Is your car log booked?

Very nice mate, go the ol faithfuls.

[evil_weevil]

Nice build up Noddy!

Kinda makes me wish I kept my r33 and built it like yours!

[Noddy]

I have all the paperwork inorder to sent off to Cams. It can go in 3D sportsedan or 2A sports... Just never decided which 1 I wanted to go with, untill recently. Going 2A sports with a 30/26 which Has been in the works for a few months now. The head was damaged when the #1 ex valves fell off. The damage was repaired, 1mm oversize supertech valves and springs, Ported and should have been flowbwnched last week. The figures from that should be going to SureCam where a pair of billetts are waiting. Hoping to have that motor ready around July allong with the rest of Yellow car to get it sorted for the Super Sprint Nats late next year. keep an eye out for progress updates.

[W0rp3D]

What is the censored bit?

[BOZ22N]

I have all the paperwork inorder to sent off to Cams. It can go in 3D sportsedan or 2A sports... Just never decided which 1 I wanted to go with, untill recently. Going 2A sports with a 30/26 which Has been in the works for a few months now.

Sweet I have been trying to decide what categories to go in as well.

What are the benefits of going in 2A other than never having to race with the off tap 3D cars.

It will be good to see two R33's out and about.

[Noddy]

Sweet I have been trying to decide what categories to go in as well.

What are the benefits of going in 2A other than never having to race with the off tap 3D cars.

It will be good to see two R33's out and about.

2A and 3D have basicly he same min weights to work to, around 1100 or 1200kg, Its been a while since I had a good look at the rulebook. basicly the way I read it 3D is heavily biased to single cam, 2 valved/cylinder, 6000cc V8's. Multi cam/4 valve, turbo engines have smaller/limiting hoops to jump through.

It's as if this happend in the Old Fogie dep at CAMS.

"It's not fair that our favorite yank & pom 1950 technology engines cant keep up with the more modern engines..... Lets tie thier shoelaces togther.....Dam there still fast, right, let's tie their hands behind the back too!"

There are other advantages with aero and material choices. At the end of the day I will probably get my ass handed to me by a 1300 sports but I want to mixup the GT3's etc on rwd platforms.

I was gaping Ring thismorning for the rebuild 25 race engine. Top rings were comming in at about 0.35 - 0.45mm not too bad. the 2nd ring were gaping up around 0.6 - 0.7mm. Working on the old 0.1mm gap for everu 25mm bore size is looking a little out of wack. I will wait till monday and give the supplier a call.

[BOZ22N]

2A and 3D have basicly he same min weights to work to, around 1100 or 1200kg, Its been a while since I had a good look at the rulebook. basicly the way I read it 3D is heavily biased to single cam, 2 valved/cylinder, 6000cc V8's. Multi cam/4 valve, turbo engines have smaller/limiting hoops to jump through.

It's as if this happend in the Old Fogie dep at CAMS.

"It's not fair that our favorite yank & pom 1950 technology engines cant keep up with the more modern engines..... Lets tie thier shoelaces togther.....Dam there still fast, right, let's tie their hands behind the back too!"

There are other advantages with aero and material choices. At the end of the day I will probably get my ass handed to me by a 1300 sports but I want to mixup the GT3's etc on rwd platforms.

I was gaping Ring thismorning for the rebuild 25 race engine. Top rings were comming in at about 0.35 - 0.45mm not too bad. the 2nd ring were gaping up around 0.6 - 0.7mm. Working on the old 0.1mm gap for everu 25mm bore size is looking a little out of wack. I will wait till monday and give the supplier a call.

Yer I was hoping to chase the GT3's around also in the Porsche car club next year.

The cams manual does not mention any thing in the 2A section about engine mods or weights? As I am sticking with the RB25 I am going for as light as possible.

Are you running molly top and intermediate rings?

Here is a link that one of the Porsche blokes sent me last night, GT3's off tap

[Noddy]

What is the censored bit?

I was experimenting back then with making my own version of the Ikea Formula lower control arms. I was also playing with stearing linkpins and stuff to control things like track/camber, roll centure, bump stear and lock angle.

In the end I cut the end off std skyline arm and added a big ass Rose joint. I turned up sleve/spacers to fit the crossmember and redrilled the crossmember for better roll C. Bump stear was fixed with a long pin bolted through the stearing arm and again using rosejoint as a rodend. The stearing arm has a plug in the original hole and has been redrilled vertical. All of this is now comercialy avalible out of JP and in OZ at places like Just Jap, not to mention a wholelot easier than what I did 5 years ago.

You ca see the Rose joint easily on the arm here. The thread is around 19x2m and the nut is a big looking sucker. It is plated a welded in well.

I didn't want to move the arms out at all because this messes up the geometry relationships too much for my liking. However I have seen a drift car or 2 at a national level redrilled about where th X is.

I have messed around in the rear a fairbit and found some good gains in the grip dep. I find I can get the power on earlier and carry a little more corner speed than most other nissans I've run with. I ave replaced the old diff bushes with a 6mm plate section when the bushes died. Jacking on the diff didn't show the problem for a while and I spent a good 3/4 months trying to workout whre this axel tramp banging was comming from. My own Hicas bar too. dont play with It location too much either. can be scary.

[Noddy]

yes, top ring is molly and 2nd is black. the old ones were both Molly.

Love the clip. Off tap jumping GT3' is awesome!!!!

[Noddy]

I dropped my turbo off at MTQ yesterday so they can give it a look over. Today I get a call, they and Garrett Aust don't have any listings or part numbers that match? So I tell them that as far as I know it is a garrett T300. Armed with that info they go hunting some more. A 2nd call from them to say that it was originaly built/designed for a John Deer tractor????? More puzzled than ever, they ask If I know any thing else about how it ended up on a car. It was part of a kit that HKS Japan did about 15 or more years ago for RB20's i think and they are looking into that lead.

I wonder what tomorrow will bring?

[BOZ22N]

Cars are funny some times.

[zebra]

You should add some Green paint to the car and throw a few john deere stickers around then haha.

Also, where did you get the front lip from? or did you make it?

It looks trick and I want one for my car.

[Noddy]

Hmmmmmmmm green on a track car. Maybe not.

The old front lip was the bottom of a series 1 bar, cut off, turned upside down and screwed on. The next 1 I made from FRP and included a full undertray. The 3rd lip which is in the pipeline now is for a series 1.5 or 2 bar with better ground effects.

new lip mkII

underside of the new bar plug and splitter mkIII

top inside, remember this is just a test dumby

happy with the test modle, the new splitter mould has been made.

Some thing I thought to share is the keyway modification to the crank. the bolt on the front can come loose and do lots of damage to the snout on the crank. I had the 2 1/2 moon key slots joined and a single key put in place. works well.

[Noddy]

A couple of weeks down and there is some news on what a Garrett HKS T300 is. It's basicly a TO4B style turbo that has a 3" inlet, 2" outlet, A/R.6 front housing with a .64 rear housing, 52mm front wheel and a 55mm rear wheel, plain bearing oil cooled turbo. And exturnaly gated.

Inspection showed there is some damage to both wheels and the core is a bit long in the tooth. Parts are available in the US out of HKS USA. All said and done total repair cost was close to $1600. Bit much I think to be spending on a bushed turbo.

So? what to replace it with?

Looking purely at wheel sizes a Garrett 3076R in the GTBB series comes kinda close. 57mm/60mm & comes with a .64, 4 bolt rear cover. The front cover in dimension is a little too big to fit the hole. The T300 cover can be machined to fit with a total cost... $1500 ish.

Did I mention Space is an issue? the old turbo was a tight fit with only a few mm between th front cover and the engine mount. I had to modify the mount a little to get it to fit in the first place. Obviously this is why I cant have the bigger sized front cover on it.

Any Ideas on what else to do?

Edited January 22, 2010 by Noddy

[zebra]

could you use a .5ar front cover off a gt3071? they are quite small iirc

[Noddy]

The title says builds. To put it simply the race car is getting up graded in nearly every aspect. She's a pertty sad sight at the moment, empty as shell on jack stands. Any how, I have a spare shell in the corner, why not put all the old stuff into it? that is all the running gear suspension and brakes. Basically everything that came off the race car.

I think I can get all the suspension mods through a RWC but Transport Dept might flip without a mod plate. Pretty sure I can get that sorted. It will even have air-con, hehe rego and air.

I know it looks pretty average in the pics below but it will come up ok with a bit of paint and a polish. I have it entered for Gatton Sprints so I better get it together and sorted pretty quick, there only about 6 weeks to go. just need to put the motor together, get the turbo sorted, bolt the engine and box in and we are away for RWC & mod-plates. OH, and painting the front bumper too..... 1 day I will tackle the slight Hail damage and repaint it yellow.

[zebra]

what size and offesets are those drift-teks?

they sit way better that my 17x8 +30 ns-01s

Im jealous

[Noddy]

17x9 +30? I will have to go look for the real offset. I normally run 33mm bolt-ons front and 28mm on the rear with these on the yellow car. No spacers here, all natural baby.

Painting the bumper today if the weather holds up