Jump to content
SAU Community

Recommended Posts

Hey guys,

Just thought i'd share a little project i did for a mate over the weekend, if you don't like or .. anything really, then feel free to talk up, i handle criticism well. I am not a welder or a mechanic, they're both just hobbies i that i try my best not to be dodgy at. :whistling:

The project was fairly simple: make an intercooler kit for a stock R32 GTS-T, using no more than 2 metres of straight stainless, and silicon pieces we had lying around (2 x 90's, 1 x 45, 1 x straight). I also wasn't allowed to cut any extra holes in the body, and the reo couldn't be touched. This basically left me with only one way to do it - return-flow intercooler kit.

Now i know there will be LOTS of hate for all the lobster cuts - yes they were time consuming, but we could only use what we had then and there, and we didn't have any bends - not that you could buy any that have a tight enough radius for what we needed anyway.

Pictures are more fun than words, so yeah:

48026066.jpg

These are basically the three pipes required for the whole thing. Not pictured is a 15cm straight section we also used.

99394585.jpg

21631558.jpg

All of the pipes got some little weld beads put on the end to stop the piping from popping off. Unfortunately i didn't take any photos - my bad.

14577771.jpg

Due to the weight of stainless, the long section of pipe required me to weld a bracket that bolted to one of the factory holes in the body. This bracket also helps keep the piping from touching the body of the car and the intercooler (there was probably less than 5mm space either side of the pipe with it running behind the cooler).

93562788.jpg

25993916.jpg

57151543.jpg

Once the front-bar was back on, the silicon pieces and pipe were unable to be seen. If the cooler was completely black, you'd hardly tell it was there.

84485829.jpg

Looks virtually stock!

Sorry i didn't get more pictures of the finished job; it was late and VERY cold by the time we finished.

The kit works well; there appears to be a noticeable improvement in power, but most importantly it still looks standard to the po-lice. I'm suprised the japanese brands have steered away from these types of kits, especially since they aren't destructive in any way and are completely reversible, but i guess they have to keep up with trends(?). I hope you enjoyed reading/looking, or were inspired somewhat to maybe make your own.

Love, Seamus (and Sam)

Link to comment
https://www.sau.com.au/forums/topic/331717-r32-return-flow-intercooler-kit/
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

awesome work, looks wicked. lol mind stealing the measurement off you? how much did it cost all up? what size intercooler was it? lol. sorry for the questions. im looking at using the stock piping because i dont like the idea of cutting holes and then using 500meters of piping before it reaches the engine from the turbo.

tell me everything you did. lol. if you can, Pm me. cheers.

great work :D

awesome stuff dude, loving the return flow cooler!

the welds look pretty good, but just take in to consideration that because only only fused it (looks like you fused it) that when you got around to the start there might be pinholes...usually if you fuse the whole thing by the time you get around there isnt enough material to fill the pin hole. youve got to tail it off kinda. or add a tiny dob of wire!

very impressed!

out of curiosity, how did you go with making the lobster? did you draw it out first? or guesstimation?

also did you use a dropsaw to cut it all up?

ive seen alot of people make what they call lobster backs that are shocking! yours looks the goods, better than some of the shit i see when i go on site (im a metal fabricator)

Edited by bLaQ.bOi

Thanks for the replies guys :rolleyes: appreciated

BenSm:

Absolutely. Cost all up was about $50 for the three silicon pieces, $30 for 2 metres of 1.6mm 316L stainless (we had to buy it in 6-metre lengths though), and the cooler was bought off a forum for $80. The steel used for making the brackets was just lying around, but is very cheap. I guess if you want the full price you also have to factor in cost of consumables, gas, filler wire, cutting discs etc. So basically the whole project was able to be done for around ~$200

The intercooler measurements on the box were 550 x 230 x 65. It had 2.5" inlet/outlet, which suited the standard piping perfectly.

If i was doing it again, i would definitely do it using a cooler like an XR6T unit that already has a 180 degree bend at one end, or something like this: http://cgi.ebay.com.au/SKYLINE-R32-RB20-IN...rts_Accessories

20100508_1_001.JPG

Having that bend would save hours and hours.

blaq.boi:

Yes it was all fused, but i had a length of filler wire in the other hand for that exact reason heh. Every time you stop and start without it, it leaves a pinhole, so i just made sure to do a little dab every time i backed off the trigger.

And my method for making the lobsters is preeeeetty basic haha. I used a dropsaw, set the angle to 7-10 degrees. I draw two lines going down the pipe (one on one side of the pipe, another on the opposite side)

77351605.jpg

Then i basically make a cut on one of the lines, spin the piping 180 degrees over, measure approximately 4cm down the pipe, then make another cut. You can then continue doing this over and over and you end up with heaps of little lobster cuts that are all FAIRLY similarly sized, within a mm or three. I now have a small box of unused lobster cuts, because i got a bit carried away haha.

I hope that makes sense, i'm teh shit at explaining some things.

And thankyou very much for your kind words :)

Thanks for the replies guys :laugh: appreciated

BenSm:

Absolutely. Cost all up was about $50 for the three silicon pieces, $30 for 2 metres of 1.6mm 316L stainless (we had to buy it in 6-metre lengths though), and the cooler was bought off a forum for $80. The steel used for making the brackets was just lying around, but is very cheap. I guess if you want the full price you also have to factor in cost of consumables, gas, filler wire, cutting discs etc. So basically the whole project was able to be done for around ~$200

The intercooler measurements on the box were 550 x 230 x 65. It had 2.5" inlet/outlet, which suited the standard piping perfectly.

If i was doing it again, i would definitely do it using a cooler like an XR6T unit that already has a 180 degree bend at one end, or something like this: http://cgi.ebay.com.au/SKYLINE-R32-RB20-IN...rts_Accessories

20100508_1_001.JPG

Having that bend would save hours and hours.

blaq.boi:

Yes it was all fused, but i had a length of filler wire in the other hand for that exact reason heh. Every time you stop and start without it, it leaves a pinhole, so i just made sure to do a little dab every time i backed off the trigger.

And my method for making the lobsters is preeeeetty basic haha. I used a dropsaw, set the angle to 7-10 degrees. I draw two lines going down the pipe (one on one side of the pipe, another on the opposite side)

77351605.jpg

Then i basically make a cut on one of the lines, spin the piping 180 degrees over, measure approximately 4cm down the pipe, then make another cut. You can then continue doing this over and over and you end up with heaps of little lobster cuts that are all FAIRLY similarly sized, within a mm or three. I now have a small box of unused lobster cuts, because i got a bit carried away haha.

I hope that makes sense, i'm teh shit at explaining some things.

And thankyou very much for your kind words :(

nope explained very well... not far off to how i would have done it aswell! for someone who isnt a tradesman i like your thinking, alot smarter than some of the ppl that are passing as tradesmen these days lol

the first lobster i made was for a v8 in s14 conversion.

i had to re-weld over existing welds because he wanted the welds to be bigger... dont ever do this. welding over welds is terrible lol

i had to cut mine out with a 5 inch grinder!!! as i didnt have a drop saw handy! need to invest one asap!

heres finished pics after i polished it

post-22208-1282139248_thumb.jpg

There's an excell spreadsheet for calculating the pie cut size/shape. Allows you to make perfect pie cuts

pie_cut_calculator.xls

Where abouts did you get you piping from. iv called everywhere but no one seems to have any. lol. I live in Darwin

  • 2 years later...

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Similar Content

  • Latest Posts

    • I know why it happened and I’m embarrassed to say but I was testing the polarity of one of the led bulb to see which side was positive with a 12v battery and that’s when it decided to fry hoping I didn’t damage anything else
    • I came here to note that is a zener diode too base on the info there. Based on that, I'd also be suspicious that replacing it, and it's likely to do the same. A lot of use cases will see it used as either voltage protection, or to create a cheap but relatively stable fixed voltage supply. That would mean it has seen more voltage than it should, and has gone into voltage melt down. If there is something else in the circuit dumping out higher than it should voltages, that needs to be found too. It's quite likely they're trying to use the Zener to limit the voltage that is hitting through to the transistor beside it, so what ever goes to the zener is likely a signal, and they're using the transistor in that circuit to amplify it. Especially as it seems they've also got a capacitor across the zener. Looks like there is meant to be something "noisy" to that zener, and what ever it was, had a melt down. Looking at that picture, it also looks like there's some solder joints that really need redoing, and it might be worth having the whole board properly inspected.  Unfortunately, without being able to stick a multimeter on it, and start tracing it all out, I'm pretty much at a loss now to help. I don't even believe I have a climate control board from an R33 around here to pull apart and see if any of the circuit appears similar to give some ideas.
    • Nah - but you won't find anything on dismantling the seats in any such thing anyway.
    • Could be. Could also be that they sit around broken more. To be fair, you almost never see one driving around. I see more R chassis GTRs than the Renault ones.
    • Yeah. Nah. This is why I said My bold for my double emphasis. We're not talking about cars tuned to the edge of det here. We're talking about normal cars. Flame propagation speed and the amount of energy required to ignite the fuel are not significant factors when running at 1500-4000 rpm, and medium to light loads, like nearly every car on the road (except twin cab utes which are driven at 6k and 100% load all the time). There is no shortage of ignition energy available in any petrol engine. If there was, we'd all be in deep shit. The calorific value, on a volume basis, is significantly different, between 98 and 91, and that turns up immediately in consumption numbers. You can see the signal easily if you control for the other variables well enough, and/or collect enough stats. As to not seeing any benefit - we had a couple of EF and EL Falcons in the company fleet back in the late 90s and early 2000s. The EEC IV ECU in those things was particularly good at adding in timing as soon as knock headroom improved, which typically came from putting in some 95 or 98. The responsiveness and power improved noticeably, and the fuel consumption dropped considerably, just from going to 95. Less delta from there to 98 - almost not noticeable, compared to the big differences seen between 91 and 95. Way back in the day, when supermarkets first started selling fuel from their own stations, I did thousands of km in FNQ in a small Toyota. I can't remember if it was a Starlet or an early Yaris. Anyway - the supermarket servos were bringing in cheap fuel from Indonesia, and the other servos were still using locally refined gear. The fuel consumption was typically at least 5%, often as much as 8% worse on the Indo shit, presumably because they had a lot more oxygenated component in the brew, and were probably barely meeting the octane spec. Around the same time or maybe a bit later (like 25 years ago), I could tell the difference between Shell 98 and BP 98, and typically preferred to only use Shell then because the Skyline ran so much better on it. Years later I found the realtionship between them had swapped, as a consequence of yet more refinery closures. So I've only used BP 98 since. Although, I must say that I could not fault the odd tank of United 98 that I've run. It's probably the same stuff. It is also very important to remember that these findings are often dependent on region. With most of the refineries in Oz now dead, there's less variability in local stuff, and he majority of our fuels are not even refined here any more anyway. It probably depends more on which SE Asian refinery is currently cheapest to operate.
×
×
  • Create New...