progress of my s13 shell

[White Comet]

I don't often post on here, but i figured i'd take a few minutes to share my project that's been keeping me busy. to get a little background, here's what i had before that i'm putting down

it's a 1993 se. sr swapped with type x aero. a few other upgrades, nothing really impressive and basically it was too rough around the edges to keep. It has MASSIVE frame rust and it's not worth taking the time to fix it so i'm starting fresh.

Back in september I found a 1990 base model shell (no motor or trans but everything else intact) with 91k miles on it and no underbody rust.




it's a little bit of a fixer upper but basically clean. there was however minor rust on the body.

the seller was asking $800, but after inspecting it I decided it was worth maybe half of that. I offered the guy $300 and he wanted to wait a little since someone had offered $500. After a week of waiting the other person that had offered hadn't been heard from, I reminded him that I had cash in hand. The next day my dad and brother came with me and we left with it nice and secure on the trailer.


I got it home and immediately started working on it after unloading it. My brother removed the batter tray as i stripped what was left in the bay. after cleaning, scrubbing, sanding and prepping it was ready for paint.



I won't bore you with all the pics and details, but i started swapping the good parts form my type x replica as well as purchasing some other nice pieces. i picked up a z31 bmc and swapped over my new remanned q45 brakes and ss lines. I spent hours under the car scouring the underbody and coating it with truck bed liner. since it was to be daily driven i had to prepare for bad weather and protect against rust.



I originally planned on doing very basic work and having my sr swapped in in less then a month, but once you get in there its easy to keep going until everything is PERFECT. a firend convinced me to drop the gast tank and subframe. i cleaned the tank and truck bed lined that as well.

i picked up the energy suspension master bushing kit and replaced every bushing on the car. I also picked up the ES subframe pienapple bushings.


subframe dismantled and being cleaned


looking fresh to be put back together.


pineaple bushings

every suspension arm was removed, had the bushings pressed out and was wire wheeled before being painted semi gloss black and having the new bushings installed. I also took apart my vlsd and reshimmed it using the thickest shim you can get (1.49cm) in a nutshell, it'll make it look harder. i also cleaned everything up and installed my jdm vlsd diff cover with the vents!


i bolted everything up to teh subframe and torqued it all to spec




i got the subframe and gas tank reinstalled and covered the interior with fatmat

i got the rear carpet cleaned and installed with the kai project battery cage and the lower mount for the cusco tri brace bolted in


It's not finished yet, but i also started doing major work with the electrical system. with the help of a friend and fellow forum member we swapped the entire body harness in favor of an SE harness so all the power options could be added. before putting it in, we traced and removed every single wire that wasn't needed.

to really clean it up we did a tuck that removes any unneeded wires from the engine bay. only whats absolutely necessary is in the bay at all.

as you can see the bundle of wires is very thinned out, and with a little bending of that lip the wires will run up where i'm holding them, so i don't shread anything when i slam it.

type x cluster is also ready to go. i used maxima plugs and built the harness myself, repinning everything where it was needed


the front and rear also got new moog ball joints. at this point the rear end is finished and back on the ground...


and the front end is just waiting for me to put the flcas with new bushings and ball joints on as well as truck bed line the front wheel wells and install my kyb struts


wheel wells wanting attention

my plan was to do everything except for actually swapping the engine outside, but considering its 5 degrees outside, i plan on sanding the wheel wells (so i don't have a mess inside) then wheeling it into the garage for the rest of the project (reinstall interior, get front end on ground, swap engine and other little things).

I plan on putting the type x aero on but not until i get to the body work and get the car professionally painted. Until then i refuse to rock the pignose bumper so i'll be rattle canning this chuki bumper i got for free.

well technically it wasn't free, i wired up type x bumper lights in return for it.

That's basically it, theres a few mods i haven't bothered mentioning since i don;t want to make this too long or detailed. feel free to ask questions or give opinons, thanks