So i'm committing to buying a silvertop rb20.

[NoPistons!]

Yes, it's going in the fc.

I'm really starting to hate my rotary for various reasons. What i spend in gas for how little it delivers, i could have an rb20, which would make for a good daily driven get shit done car. Even buying 91-93 octane, i'm sure i'd spend way less on gas and be able to have heaps more fun! I'm so serious that i've put paint, more wheels, cage, bushings and better coils on hold until the rotary is a distant memory. Yes, i know. My screen name. It's more or less a surprise reaction statement vs a declarative statement.

Plans are:
gt28rs or hks gt2530 (i'm kicking myself daily for selling mine for $50 when all it needed was a new chra and turbine wheel. Hindsight)
rb20 trans (lines up with fc shifter hole, no need for extension like a 1j/2j swap)
Egay forward facing manifold modded to accept stock tb
550cc injectors
rom tune
Raw Brokerage crank collar.
Raw Brokerage timing belt kit.
Rb20 new oil pump
self-assembled -an lines for fuel, power steering and clutch.
Tomei 1.5mm head oil galley restrictors
New rings and pistons (oem), supertech if i can't find oem for good price.
Apr rod bolts, main bolts and head bolts.
oem head gasket
Exedy hyper single
egay fmic, rad and fans.
Carolina Drivetrain will be doing my driveshaft.
4.10 or 4.30 final (already have the stuff downstairs, just need a diff and TII cv axles)

Most of the obvious fab work, i'll be doing. Right now, i'm in "parts gather" mode until i transfer back to my old job some time in dec/jan. I'm hoping to pick up a motorset at the end of the month if all goes well.

share your experiences with me. Like, in depth as much as you can. What kind of power you were making, mods, gas mileage for off boost driving, your rev limit, rev limiter abuse, power curve, torque curve, final drive, trans choice, build up hints since i'm tearing the thing apart anyway, even if i just get rings, bearings and a crank collar..... If you see anything wrong with my parts of choosing, want to make a suggestion or feel the need to question it, go right ahead. That's why i'm posting this! Fc weight for weight is comparable to an s13 hatch. They're about spot on.

Thank you zilvia.



Edit: I've also been reasearching the rb20 on and off for about a year and a half now and just started getting serious over the past 2 or 3 months now that i'm daily driving my car.

[karl wasabi]

Curious to know why you want to go with the RB20 opposed to something like the RB25. I have an RB20 in my S13 coupe and I love it, but if I could do it all over again I would have gone with an RB25, SR20, or KA-T.

Sure the RB20 is cheap, but finding parts for the RB20 is no walk in the park. They aren't THAT HARD to find, but it's sooo much easier finding parts for the RB25 or SR20. If you do get an RB20, I'm sure it will be a first for an FC. haha.

When I first got the motor all I did was change the timing belt, water pump, thermostat, spark plugs and other little things. I'm using a Z32 Exedy Stage 2 clutch and I love it. I had a problem with the motor not hitting a rev limiter, so I got myself a Bee-R and set the limit to 7500. Before the Bee-R it would rev past 8000K. The torque is not as good as you would think. The KA has more torque than the RB20 and so does an SR20.

Anyways, hope that helped a little. I just wrote a paper for class so I'm in a writing mood right now. lol.

[NoPistons!]

Thanks carl. Did you have any issues as far as chunking your ceramic turbine wheel running the bee*r?

I fought with myself for a bit over the parts availability thing too but with places like skyline part, skylines austrailia, raw brokerage, ebay, yahoojp and craigslist it doesn't seem as lame as i initially made it out to be. Pushing the motor to get into powerband is what i want. Otherwise i'd listen to my friends telling me "ls1 dude". And rb20's are cheap as fuck. It's not something i'm going to worry about and i can get TWO complete motorsets for the price of a r154 1jz or sr20. KA's are cool and all but the ricer in me wants that inline six sound. You know what i'm talking about....


Shit, i forgot to add. Plz lmk if you're running an aftermarket harmonic balancer and what kind of motormounts you're running. I dont plan on picking up hot dates and the vibration doesn't bother me too much but i'm worried if i go solid aluminum without ponying up for a balancer and spending more cash at the machine shop it will cause harm to the motor. I haven't really set in stone where i want to go as far as that thus didn't factor shit into the budget for it.

[karl wasabi]

The BEE-R hasn't caused me any problems yet but yeah. I've heard of turbos blowing up cause of it. If it blows its all good though. I'm going to try and get a holset hx35 later or just an RB25 Turbo or something.

I'm using the stock harmonic balancer. It even has a couple chips in it. Haha. Actually I didn't know anyone made an aftermarket one. I'm using the stick RB20 motor mounts with Top Hat mounts so I can use the stock 240 crossmember. They are holding up just fine. Have no idea how the RB would fit in the FC or what mounts to use. Completely custom I'm guessing.

[Feast Japan]

Torque as mentioned is quite poor. So if your updating turbo and plenum, then you should get into the cams a little. You won't regret it.

Used spares available if and when you are ready. Off my old car. PM at any time.

[codyace]

5.3 swap, why look and a 2.0 RB??

[NoPistons!]

Torque as mentioned is quite poor. So if your updating turbo and plenum, then you should get into the cams a little. You won't regret it.

Used spares available if and when you are ready. Off my old car. PM at any time.

Used spares as in cams or wheels? Lol.

I've heard ALOT of good things about poncams and did read a few vague posts about people using 26 cams in 20 heads but i dunno if it's reality or ricer bs or even practical. Lot of mixed shit going on.

I will not and refuse to put v8 motor in my car. I'm sure it would be cool and fun but i love handling my car. Reving it and shifting around constantly is fun to me. "easy" buttons are nice but i dont want to yawn in 4th gear on a second gear turn i should have heel-toed twice before approaching. I love driving my car and the engine characteristics, just not the bullshit that comes with. lsx/t56 is too much for my little boy racer ass on a hobbyist budget anyway.

Karl, thanks. You're giving me so much confidence in this. Any oil mods or "overfilling" being done? Do you believe that the overstressed obvious issues are just hype and the minority vs the norm? I'm guessing your motor is still pretty much stock. How many miles of abuse you got on that thing? I imagine a holset doing much damage (good damage) strapped to an rb. They tend to spool hard and fast and you have so many wastegate/housing options.

[Feast Japan]

Used spares as in cams or wheels? Lol.

I've heard ALOT of good things about poncams and did read a few vague posts about people using 26 cams in 20 heads but i dunno if it's reality or ricer bs or even practical. Lot of mixed shit going on.

I will not and refuse to put v8 motor in my car. I'm sure it would be cool and fun but i love handling my car. Reving it and shifting around constantly is fun to me. "easy" buttons are nice but i dont want to yawn in 4th gear on a second gear turn i should have heel-toed twice before approaching. I love driving my car and the engine characteristics, just not the bullshit that comes with. lsx/t56 is too much for my little boy racer ass on a hobbyist budget anyway.

Karl, thanks. You're giving me so much confidence in this. Any oil mods or "overfilling" being done? Do you believe that the overstressed obvious issues are just hype and the minority vs the norm? I'm guessing your motor is still pretty much stock. How many miles of abuse you got on that thing? I imagine a holset doing much damage (good damage) strapped to an rb. They tend to spool hard and fast and you have so many wastegate/housing options.

Spare set of used cam shafts.

For 26 cams, some guys stuff them in the 20DE versions for a bit more pep. But for 20DET motors it would be a waste of time.

Tomei pon/procams are good quality. This is after all the main engine part they originally started marketing.

[karl wasabi]

Karl, thanks. You're giving me so much confidence in this. Any oil mods or "overfilling" being done? Do you believe that the overstressed obvious issues are just hype and the minority vs the norm? I'm guessing your motor is still pretty much stock. How many miles of abuse you got on that thing? I imagine a holset doing much damage (good damage) strapped to an rb. They tend to spool hard and fast and you have so many wastegate/housing options.

No problem. The motor is pretty much bone stock with just newer OEM parts. When I got the motor it supposedly had about 60,000 km on it, so I changed all the normal 60K items. Don't have any oil mods done to it just yet, still haven't hooked up an oil cooler, but I guess I'm saving that for next summer.

[frankiman]

if you need parts for RB20, come check us out at GTRCanada.com
since for us, anything else than the 20 is an upgrade, theres ALOT of cheap parts always for sale, and most of it on the west coast

[NoPistons!]

Frankiman, site is down/cached?

Edit: aren't you guys the place where that fool got hunted down by every car forum in the country for stealing one of your cars? Lobsterclaw bandit iirc?

[roboticnissan]

[QUOTEThe KA has more torque than the RB20 and so does an SR20. .[/QUOTE]


im 100 percent sure that your wrong here unless you mean ka t?

sr has like 5 more tq if anything


ive been beating my rb20 to the ground for 2 years with a bee r and still got the same turbo that i got the whole motor set with from pandagarage.


dont know why ppl are saying its low on torque, its not bad at all.

[Corbic]

[QUOTEThe KA has more torque than the RB20 and so does an SR20. ]


im 100 percent sure that your wrong here unless you mean ka t?

sr has like 5 more tq if anything


ive been beating my rb20 to the ground for 2 years with a bee r and still got the same turbo that i got the whole motor set with from pandagarage.


dont know why ppl are saying its low on torque, its not bad at all.

Drive a car with torque and it will become very obvious.


For the coin, 1JZ is where it's at if you want an import motor. 290whp with BPU, $2k buy in price, turbo is on the "correct" side of the car, and a R154 which is a hell of a lot stronger then the sissy SR/CA/KA/RB trans.

[frankiman]

Drive a car with torque and it will become very obvious.


For the coin, 1JZ is where it's at if you want an import motor. 290whp with BPU, $2k buy in price, turbo is on the "correct" side of the car, and a R154 which is a hell of a lot stronger then the sissy SR/CA/KA/RB trans.

a good friend of mine is making 280whp on his RB20 with BPUs and a tune with a Nistune board, with stock turbine

its a good reliable motor, but the rb20 tranny is butter

another friend is running a stroker rb22, gt30 turbine, nistune, making 355whp
but exploded his 3rd gear on the track the other day, quite funny

on the other hand, the rb25 tranny is pretty solid and the 26 is rock solid,

but i can see how the exhaust side beeing the side LHD is problematic versus a JZ

but i've seen so many rb swaps that i don't think its a major issue

in all honesty, i really don't see the point of swwappign an RB20 in anything, its crap
KAs and SRs are sooo much cheaper/easier to build and can make just as much power, AND both are lighter engines

a 25 or 26 might be more insteresting though

[NoPistons!]

I see mention of torque. You say drive a car with moar and you'll notice. This is true. My mom's buick pulls harder than my fc. You can FEEL it pull. My car is like "meh....atleast it's low and obnoxious".

Trust that anything is a torque improvement over the 13b na.

I should be fine with the turbo stuff on the steering/hydraulic side of the car. Heatsheilds, heatshields, wrap, heatshields. Maybe even a scoop to draw air into that area to push the heat down the trans tunnel and keep it from getting too hot in that area.

You have to think, people with lhd cars (90 percent of zilvia) have their exhaust stuff right there. What about s2000's? What about jdm 1j/2j cars? I think that's all rather insignificant and i should have plenty of room. Turbo/dp clearance near the bmc might be a small issue but if i have to, nothing to stop me from buying some mild steel weld el's, busting out the mig and making a log manifold that sets the turbo further forwards.

Really, all i'm super worried about as far as install goes is getting it wired up. 240sxforums has pinouts and wiring diagrams and i have the rx7 fsm's downloaded on my pc but it's still going to suck.


Edit: I had a feeling other swaps would be suggested over the rb20. I'm rather cheap and a diy guy (within my means) so i really dont want anything else. 1j would be nice but it's too expensive to start out with (cheaper in the long run but hey, i'm an instant gratification kinda guy). I dont want an sr20. Forsberg already did that in an fc... I dont like the way they sound either. rb20's sound BEAUTIFUL! That shouldn't be grounds for choosing an engine but i'm just a hobbyist, not a boy racer trying to come up or prove anything.

[silviaSGP06]

I like how you are insistent on doing what you want to do. Thats the only way to do anything on a car you build with your own hands and own money. I have an RB25 and love it.. You will always here "the RB is Heavy" "a toy motor is cheaper" "V8 or die.." "sr kat blah bla blah" BUT Im with you on the SOUND, I was on the fence on all possible motors and hearing a RB25 at a drift event sealed the deal!

If you can find a deal on the RB25 motor set Ide go with that. But what ever fits your budget. RB25s run about $1000 more per motorset but if you look into it it may save you money right away, on the tranny, Intake manifold possibilities, and stuff(since your an instant gratification guy) but you loose on the RB25 ecu(not tunable) The extreme easiness of finding RB25 parts, plus you get more displacement for the weightbut most of the added weight of the 25 over the 20 is in the STRONGER tranny anyway. Your are right, its is "a little" difficult to find things for the RB20 but not hard. Plus you have already stumbled across RawBrokerage.com so I wouldnt be worried on parts anyway lol. What ever you choose I'm rooting for an RB! The RB motor section on Nico will be your best friend.

Good Luck