Cason's 240sx Hatch Build

[theStig880]

Sup Zilvia, I’m not really sure why I haven’t made a build thread yet here. I guess I never felt I had a car “finished” enough to justify writing one but Im pretty bored and a little nostalgic. I bought my first 240sx on November 18, 2010 so I just recently celebrated the 8 year anniversary with it. Forgive me if its a little out of order, there's a lot to remember. I was 15 when I got the car and I found this car at a dealership in rural North Carolina. It was bone stock, 1989 manual with only 121k miles on the clock.



I was pretty excited to get a stock car even back then. Weirdly enough, the car was brought to Germany from California in 1992 and brought back around 1997. Over there, the quarter glass got broken and replaced with a 200sx glass. Kinda neat.



It didn’t take long for me to tear into it though. Being 16 and wanting a drift car, I did all of the stereotypical mods. I had a friend weld the diff and ordered some PBM coilovers. I bought a shitload of SE wheels and drove it for around a year.



I went to a couple local drift events but I mostly spectated around this time. I bought some XXRs 002s somewhere along the way and pretty much drove like this for another year. I worked part time as a waiter after school and saved pretty much all my money for car stuff. I ended up buying a set of Work VSXXs around Christmas of that year.






I remember at the time being really excited and I threw them on the car pretty quick. They were especially cool because they were 4 lug. I didn’t have an alignment in this next picture.



I attribute these to starting a fanaticism with wheels. Almost immediately, I decided to order some new rear lips to have them rebuilt. I also ordered rear overfenders and cut that beautiful stock body up. Ugh. I don’t have a ton of regrets with this car but that's on the list. My tastes now definitely lean towards clean stock body cars.






So around this time, I was a senior in highschool and I took automotive technical classes as an elective. A friend was in the autobody program so I had him paint the fenders and shave the third brake light.




I remember this being one of the few times the car had all four Works and paint. I got a flat in a front tire a week after paint and I sold the set shortly after. After graduating high school, I decided to swap the engine for an SR. I ordered my redtop and a huge list of bits about a week after graduation.




So the summer before school, I threw the engine into the car. Unfortunately, I couldn’t finish in time and I moved to Charlotte without my car. Progress halted a little but eventually I finished the swap and bought a set of Weds Cerberus 1s. Swapped to 5 lug at the same time. This is also when I discovered the Yahoo Auctions haha. Really missed out early on, I pretty much only bought new stuff until then.







So over the next summer, I hastily threw on some roller wheels and rebuilt the Weds. With the engine running, I drove this ugly piece to school with me and drove around for a long time like this. I bought some 40mm fenders with the intention of rebuilding the other pair. I never did that and I hated the way the fenders looked so I sold them off. Not a ton really happened in between but eventually I sold the Weds and bought a set of Work XT7s.







I also bought some replica 180sx skirts and OEM valances. I got the XT7s with 255-40 tires which actually looked pretty cool but didn’t steer at all. I bought new tires and drove like this for around a year.





I decided after a couple of breakdowns, I wanted a daily driver. I bought a Subaru Forester and parked the 240 back at my parents house. This was the last time I drove the car for about 3 years.






Honestly nothing major was really wrong with it. I just wanted to refresh everything and get it decent again. But with a daily and the car being a hour away, it got forgotten. Sort of, I continued to buy pieces for it when I could. Fufilling a long time dream, I bought a set of Kouki tails.





Around this time was very exciting for me. I bought a pair of 18x10 +22 Blitz 03s and a Bride Zeta 1. I also found some 17x8.5 03s and a pair of 18x9 Model 5s. I sold the Model 5s because they were cracked but it was pretty cool to have all these wheels I had lusted over for years.





More random maintenance things happened, I pulled the subframe and bought some steplip Work Equips and some more VSXXs. I told myself they were drift spares but I never kept them very long. I eventually got the Blitz 03s on the car.







The car ran this whole time but I never registered it because I wanted to finish the aero and have it painted. Kinda dumb looking back. I bought a 180sx wing and a Shine Auto Sexy Style kit.





Continued....