well its been a long time coming i have owned my s13 for almost 7 years now and i drove it for about 2 of those and i've always been meaning to start a project thread, i spend most of my time on here or sxoc so i may as well contribute a bit . i'm also hoping it will help me keep up my enthusiasm to finish it. anyway this is what it looked like when i bought it, bog standard and it WAS clean no rust on it. so far i have (i tried to do it in order): rebuilt the engine removed aircon staged 1 the engine (walbro, filter, chip, exhaust ect.) blitz turbo timer (the one with the boost pressure) lowered it on springs got some uber rare s13 driftworks orange seats apex alloy rad bought some wheel (there volks but cant remember what there called) large spacers (4-5 stud converters) coilys apex gen 2 50mm origin rear over fenders magic aero sideskirts unknown 20mm front over fenders kouki front bumper + lip stage 2 the engine (intercooler, chip ect.) blitz half din boost controller + the other half din extra that does lots of awesome things i cant remember z32 tt front and rear brakes rears aren't fitted yet defi gauges boost, oil pressure, oil temp. adjustable front and rear arms poly rear sub frame bushes ive probable forgot a bunch of stuff but oh well. now this is what i've been doing in the past few weeks; from storing the car for years it got a bit rusty especially the drives side and so ive decided to do something about it and try to inject some life back into the poor old girl. so here we go the engine bay is the was the worst so i pulled the engine out as you can see not too pretty so i started chopping, one of the chassis rails where too far gone so i had to replace it. please bear in mind i only have basic tools and a home made sheet metal bender so the work is not perfect. made new wheel arches and welded up the holes in the suspension turret made new reinforcement pieces on top of the turrets replaced the bottom cross member, hoping it will stiffen up the front. made a mount for the intercooler i had to cut out another part of the drivers chassis rail under the car, this is what i had to be cut out
i havent totally finnished this yet but its half welded in i will get some pics when i finish it off tomorrow. i didnt have enough steel to copy the reinforcement so had t make do it seem strong enough these are the main bits i've cut out minus the wheel arches, they got scraped these are all the parts for the front sub frame got the tein rod ends coming next week ive also got the solid steer bush already fitted i want to get some engine mount as well if my budget can stretch. there is also the intake gasket for the engine as i think it need replacing i wanted to move the rack and mod the knuckles but i want to do track days in this as well as drift and i don't know if it affect it for track driving, can anyone tell me if it will? and do you need to extend the lower arms if you move the rack forward?
Good fabrication work Nice write up too... Why move the rack? Won't DW offset rack spacers do the same thing, without moving the rack?
thanks mainly because its free to do but i don't think i will bother, i need to learn to be a better drifter before i worry about worry about massive extra lock, i just thought as I'm doing all this it would be good to do it all together but i think the tein rods and spacers will be enough for me for now.
Good work glad to see another s13 being saved and not just scrapped keep up the good work its well worth it in the end
thanks guys here is today's work i finished off the chassis rail i also repaired part of the suspension turret then i striped down the the front sub frame de-rusted and painted and the same with the rack and the same with the lower control arms i also welded in some reinforcement and i used ballistic steel so now they are literally bullet proof lol if i don't have to do any work again tomorrow i will assemble the front sub frame and start priming the engine bay, i got a feeling the other chassis rail is rotton in the same place so i will check that out too, which means i need more steel
yea lucky me well we got work in so i haven't been able to do much. i cut out some round pieces used a magnet to hold them in place and welded up all the holes in the slam panel i then ground everything down and treated all the areas that had surface rust (i ground it all back to good steel anyway but just treated it to make sure) and etch primed everything i assembled the rack with the tein rods and ends, the new boots and bushes then i had to de-rust and paint the rack mounting brackets that's it for now i did a bit more today but forgot to take photos so will get some tomorrow.
I've had a lot of work so I'm stuck to only working on it evenings and Saturdays but anyway what i done yesterday i removed the gearbox and exhaust to get ready to spray and the gearbox needs cleaning up and spraying, ive also been doing a bit of filler work to smooth out some of the welds, and yesterday i made a mount for the rad. i then striped down the hubs and cleaned up the knuckles and hubs, i through away the brake disc covers as they were rusty as hell I'm hoping there not to important been trying to search to see if anyone else is running without them but found nothing. bit of a before and after finally Ive had all the rust nuts and bolts in a tub of vinegar and they came out clean as a whistle but within 5 mins they started going rusty again as it had striped all the anodized coating off so i sprayed them with a long term corrosion protection spray, hopefully it will do the job
been a while since i updated, i been busy at work not had much free time but back at it now so here goes. as i expected the other chassis rail was a bit rotten, its surprising as from the outside there was only one small rust bubble i was actually contemplating not doing it im glad i did, so heres what i cut out and here is only half of what i cut out, and the least rusty parts lol floor pan this is part of the front chassis rail and i was using exactly the same thickness steel this time so i copied them as closely as possible (with a few extra welds) welded in chassis rail made a template and cut out bent made adjustments and drilled holes for to weld welded in support and welded it in
made some holes for for the intercooler pipes, use some 4 inch pipe to make it look better. and made some plates for the suspension mounting points got some pipe bent to brace the suspension turret to the fire wall which im guna do this weekend
Awesome metal fab skills dude. Impressive. Remind me never to buy an s13, they are almost all rotten!lol Good luck with the rest of the build!
thanks for the comments welded in the bar filled and preped everything i cut the rad mount off because i didnt like it look a lot better without, i will have to figure out anther way of mounting the rad later test fitted the sub frame and nismo power brace to check everything is still strait and it is and so i can move it to clean the area for paint. got some dimple dies recently so added a piece to add some strength.... i think lol. it looks good anyway. a pic of about 3/4 - 2/3 of all the rust i cut its a great feeling seeing it all on the floor and not on my car. good to see her back on her feet i made my self a getto spray booth lol primmed 4 coats of jet black base coat had a problem with the paint its gone wrinkly in 2 places both in exactly the same place either side does anyone know why its done this? thats all for now
small update: got the lacquer on yesterday i used kapci lacquer which Ive read is good stuff certainly came out nice and shiny and i used some gold flake in the clear to jazz it up a bit this is 3 coats of flake and 4-5 coats (lost count i was working quick it went off quick lol) of just clear. im pleased with how it turned out, its hard to photograph when i get it rolling again i will get a pic out side with my slr.
Looked at a couple of crusty Nissans but people seem to want megabucks even for shells that aren't looking too clever at all. Walked away from a couple that were not as bad as yours. Awesome work that man!!! Just out of interest what thickness of steel were you using as it looks quite thick? I was struggling to bend 1.5mm into anything useful in my garage at home...I will be making some sort of makeshift bender before the next project I reckon. Golden flake looks well sexy
the first steel i used was thick, im not sure what exactly it was but id say it was getting close to, if not 2mm the second lot i got was 1.5 and the original steel on the chassis rail was 1.4 but also used some 1mm for the floor pan and a few other bits. i will get a pic of my home made bender tomorrow maybe give you some ideas.