Backyard Build FJ-S13

Cheers mate! Was stoked to finally hear it with the fresh tune.

All the testing stations and certifiers are shut for at least the next two weeks, making it impossible for anyone to get certed or a Warrant of Fitness. So from what I have heard, for the next 14 days or so there will be no enforcement of cars driving without current certification, registration or WOF.

The car's in a rural area anyway and with the lockdown I've seen maybe 1 - 2 cars on the road per day for the last week. Should be no problem if I were to test drive it. Only issues are the earths are a bit inconsistent and the battery wouldn't hold charge to let the car run. In that video I was using the battery off our tractor and it ran no problem so pretty sure it's battery related. Ordered a replacement and am going to sort out the earthing issues as well then it should be fine for test drives.

I don't plan on driving it too hard since we never did finish the tune and that was for a 1990cc not a 2150cc, not sure how much that will affect it.

 

Nothing says over-confident like putting fresh paint on your valve cover and spending a week ordering and cleaning up almost completely unnecessary parts.

Quick update. Ordered a replacement battery since all of ours were toast. It's taking ages to arrive for some reason so I've had to chase down the couriers and hopefully will be getting some updates on it soon. In the mean time I gave the valve cover a coat of VHT wrinkle to match how it came from the factory and found a used Splitfire engine earth kit for a Subi wrx that I will be using to sort out my grounding issues.



After wire wheeling and cleaning the cover, gave it a light coat of etch primer before the 3 layers of wrinkle paint.





When the paint goes on it's super glossy and has a pretty heavy orange peel texture, but after going over it gently with a heat gun for about 10 mins the wrinkle finish starts to show up.



Gave it a full day sitting on the heater then another couple days to cure. Had well over a week now while I wait for this battery. So I sanded back the lettering and temporarily put it back in place.



Really liking how it looks. Red gives it a good bit of pop without looking too far from factory. It's really vibrant, almost hoping it dulls down a bit over time.

The next thing I chose to waste my time on was the earthing kit I ordered. Basically we were experiencing issues with the engine not starting or running like shit, which we were able to change by swapping around some of the earthing cables on the car but we didn't really have the full solution.



Found some guy selling this earthing kit of his old wrx for dirt cheap since it was missing one of the cables. (fine by me, not using it for it's intended purpose anyway) Got cleaning and had to replace one of the fittings on the end where one of the cables was removed as it was a bit loose now. Figured out my pipe flaring tool also doubles as a heavy gauge terminal crimping tool. Neat.





I'm really just waiting for this damn battery at this stage. Still can't be sure if that's the only issue. I'm suspecting that with the higher demand from my upgraded fuel pump and the rest of the S13 wiring system, the FJ20 alternator might not be able to cut it. Looked into RB30 replacements as apparently that's a more or less bolt in swap but don't have a spare $200 lying around for something I'm not sure will even fix the problem.

Once the battery arrives and if we're still having issues I'll salvage the alt from the original SR20 and make some custom brackets to hold it in place to see if that will fix it. Unfortunately that's all for now. Still waiting to take it for a proper drive.

 

Yeah I'm loving it eh.

So updates. I got to the bottom of the battery situation. Turns out it got sent to the Whangarei depot and was just sitting there for 2 weeks, no attempt at contacting me, not moving at all. Rang them up about it and said that I could pick it up from them. Cheers guys, really appreciate you letting me know that I have been waiting 2 weeks while you sat there with my package.

A little not happy about that because I paid shipping to have it sent to me, not for me to drive over an hour north during quarantine to pick up a car battery. I wonder how they expected me to get there when they knew my car was broken.,, Walk or something?

Anyway they finally agreed to send it out to me and I was able to get some more progress done.



The terminals on the battery where smaller than what I expected or had on my old ones but at least the battery fit in my tray. I rooted around through some spare wiring harnesses and was able to find some new battery connectors the right size so got it all bolted in.

Then I started connecting the earthing kit. Since it was a custom kit I just connected it to what I thought was most important; starter motor, alternator, engine block near the dizzy, chassis, intake plenum (there was one there previously so I just replaced it) and then I connected the last fitting to another large earth cluster to tie it all together.





The finished install was super clean. I was able to get rid of the original battery - chassis cable and mounted a new one straight onto the earthing kit to hide just one more wire and keep it looking nice.



With that all installed we fired up the car and other than the fresh battery actually getting the car to start every time now, it was still rough and still a bit rich. We noticed that the car smoothed out a bit up at around 1500 rpm so I adjusted the idle up a bit. Not ideal but at least the car will idle without stalling.

With all that done I started reassembling all the panels and gave the car it's first wash in 5 years.



Pretty happy seeing it all back in one piece, hopefully it stays like this for a while.

Nothing left to do now but get in touch with A1 Turbos and see if they can finish off the tune or if we have to wait till level 2 lockdown. Might even start driving it up and down the road a bit to see how it goes.

 

Cheers guys. I'm really happy with how where the car is at right now.

So a quick little update. Took it for a test drive last night and just again this afternoon. Got it up to 100km/h, went through all the gears and everything is really smooth. I fucking love this car. Feels so damn good to have it running again and to be able to just get in and drive it without being a goddam mission every time.

What I've noticed is that this suspension is trash. The car is running BC Reds and they've been in it for over 10 years and they have always been to stiff for my comfort. I've opted to upgrade to some brand new BC Golds (BR Series) I did a lot of research and for my price range and what I can get here in NZ it came down to either Tein Flex V's or BC Golds, since reviews tell me that the golds are the softer choice that's what I'm going for.

I'm also looking at getting some new wheels since the 15x6's or whatever I currently have fitted really dont have the grip that I need and coupled with the old and cracked tyres I really need to replace them. I just found a pair of SSR mk3's for sale for $500 NZD that I was super keen to buy but they sold just before I could get them. If anybody in NZ has some sick oldschool JDM wheels in nissan stud, 15x7 or wider, let me know

Not much else to say except holy shit my car is driving again. For real this time! Fucking awesome