Zenki S14

[first_choice]

a lot of DIY, nice thread

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by first_choice

a lot of DIY, nice thread

Thanks man!

Small update, I bought some Whiteline gear second hand. Front strut brace, 27mm fixed front swaybar, 22mm fixed rear swaybar (I don't know if I will use this or not, might put it up for sale and get a 20mm or something adjustable for the rear).
I've got the bushes for the swaybars too, just not in the picture


Before


Strut brace installed


I'm not sure if I'll notice any difference or not, can't hurt either way.

I've got some preventative maintenance coming up, I'm going to put the heatshield back on the exhaust manifold and fix up the wiring above it, at the moment it's just pouring heat onto my brakelines


I saw this photo on Facebook too, you can see my car in the back. The MX5, Golf R and myself all stuck together for the first day of the tarmac event, good bunch of guys who were quicker than me so it was good fun to chase them


Cheers.

[Hoonigan19]

nice modss man.

[sweefu]

Originally Posted by Hoonigan19

nice modss man.

Thanks mate! Hopefully I'll get to do some more driving soon

Well, it was 41° degrees yesterday (106° f?)
I was lucky and my car didn't melt


Not much else has happened. I cleaned my car 3 weeks after the rally, it was genuinely pretty dirty and still has lots of melted rubber/bitumen on it




I ate some steak too


And that's about it. I'm not sure when my next event will be, possibly late Feb for another Tarmac Rally.

Cheers guys

[sweefu]

No updates since January?! Surely it hasn't been that long, scary.

I'll try fill in the gaps from the events I've done over the last little while.

To get the ball rolling please enjoy these two videos from a drift event last month
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8sjTJyjvjM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd132g18kbs

Moving back a bit to earlier this year, I've moved cities and started a new job. Plus side of the new job is more money, down side is no time to work on the car, so a mechanic has been doing some things for me which is OK for now, but very expensive and I really enjoy working on the car.

First of all (mechanic job) I had the rear brake calipers rebuilt, one of them was leaking and it turns out that both the rear pistons were pitted and not in good shape.

Finding new rear pistons was hard but the mechanic found some to suit - hand made things from the US! Fancy stuff. We also put through a complete genuine Nissan seal kit with new clips etc.

The calipers were torn down and sandblasted too, they look great now and the car stops well, much better than before.
This is what the old pistons look like


I also changed spring rates in my suspension. I have gone from

Front: 8kg/mm 200mm spring --> now 7kg/mm 200mm spring

Rear: 7kg/mm 200mm spring --> now 5kg/mm 250mm spring

Going for the softer springs all round has made a big difference, the car drives much more nicely on the road and it has heaps more grip in all situations. This has made it better for daily driving and better for drifting - the car transfers weight much easier now and I find it much easier to control the car.
It's more predictable and using momentum it's easy to manji once or twice before a corner, the car feels planted and easily controlled. I'm really happy for such a small cost, the car feels awesome. Plus, I wanted more droop all round, especially in the rear. This will help for events like Tarmac Rally/Hill Climbs + daily driving in and out of driveways without lifting the rear wheel.




All done and back together, the coilovers are around 10k kms old but still scrub up like new. No leaks, seals look good. We also lowered the car a bit, not sure how much but I'm reasonably happy with the height, some fine tuning will be done when I get a chance.


Here is the car packed up for the drift weekend

I can fit 6x 17x9" wheels with 235/45 tyres plus big low profile jack, tools, spares, esky and clothes. Not bad huh!

Arrived at the track and it looks like someone has chucked out part of their gearbox - standard bin find

I chuckled at this

Wheels and tyres ready


The car performed well over the weekend, very happy with the new handling (as above) and no big issues. Before the track the car got new gearbox oil (Redline MT90) plus new brake fluid etc, engine oil and filter. The clutch started playing up at the end, pretty sure this is due to super old dirty (watery) fluid and the clutch needing adjustment, it's at the mechanic now being fixed up.




And probably my favourite shot, demonstrating one of the rare times I grow big enough balls to throw it in fast (ish) near the wall.


Headed home a little early on day 2 because of the clutch, re-packed and ready to go. I always get happy leaving the track with a working car after a weekend of drifting


I ran my street tyres on the front which I don't usually do but I didn't have time to sort out new front tyres, I ended up scoring one badly. I was disappointed but I am still happy enough to use it on the track, so now I have a pair of wheels/tyres to use on the front at drift/motorkhana events. Michelin Pilot Sport 3


To replace the damaged tyre a bought a pair of new fronts, again Michelin Pilot Sport 3's in 235/45r17. Absolutely love these tyres for street duties


Plus new wheels, Rays Volk VR GT-P I think, more brake clearance than my Sparco's but the size is a bit weaker, I plan to run some spacers when I get time to sort it out


Somehow tore out my inner guard at the last event, will sort out a new one eventually


I had a weekend off with an unhappy clutch so no possibility of going driving. For the first time ever I started to polish the car, it came up surprisingly well. There's a lot of scuffs and little marks from driving the car like I do, but I'm ok with that, I'd prefer the car to get scuffed up having fun racing than sitting in a garage getting polished every weekend.




I still love this car even though it looks a bit worse for wear


Cheers guys, as always I plan to write an update more regularly, check back soon.

[sweefu]

Two updates in the same month?! this is what spending weekends at home does to me

Repco had a sale recently so I've stocked up on oil filters again - I would be curious to know what brand oil filter others use? These end up being around $7.50ea from memory which is good for me as I change the oil regularly - depending on how often I go racing, I change my engine oil/filter up to 8 times per year.


Next I borrowed my Aunty's driveway to do some work on the car - pretty lush area! I had to sit and have a beer too, what a view


Car working time - it was definitely a longy day


Work neat of course, you know me


I'm still using Nulon synthetic 10w40, I use to use Penrite Ten Tenths racing but I found the car to idle smoother and not hate cold starts so bad with the Nulon, plus it's cheaper too, around $10/L.


Brakes and suspension still looking OK, I'm looking at brake pad options for later in the year, looking at either PMU or Endless - something more street oriented next time


Next job was to finally put the heat shield back on my turbo manifold. I never put it back on after doing the turbo gaskets and changing to an S13 manifold last year.
The problem is, S13 and S14 heat shields are different. I switched to the S13 manifold to get rid of the EGR stuff.

So, trim time



Fitted! Hopefully this will help keep engine bay temps down. I also bought some heat wrap for my dump/front pipe but I didn't get to this yet



Dodgy photo of the screw that doesn't line up, the back of the heat shield rubs on the water inlet pipe, so I just left this bolt off. I should trim it further but for now it's OK, I will trim it more and paint it one day.


Another bolt different from S13 to S14


I also don't know what the normal deal is with this thing. Mine has always been like this, the bolts/bracket are still there but assuming the brackets should mount onto it properly? Mine are just cable tied on, the brackets must have broken. Can anyone confirm/recommend the best course of action here?



Also still trying to work out the best way to secure tools in my boot. Thinking I'll just build a plywood box which fits neatly in the boot - what do you guys do for tools in the boot?



I think my next track day is in two weeks too, all I've been doing lately is work and I'm going crazy.

[Dolph_KYAS13]

In my R32 I got some rectangular buckets (theyre usually sold with car wash supplies) and I bungee strapped them to my rear strut bar. It seemed to hold all the random tool and fluids I used to carry around nicely.