Frankiman's street/track GTR project

[frankiman]

Chapter 37 - End of an epic summer, part 2

a couple days later, i participated in the 2nd round of the 2010 Ultraride, the ''Rewind''

and beeing one of the most recognize participant of that event, i was invited to a day of filming with the UR crew for a special DVD they were going to make

during our drive to the last filming spot, this incredible picture was taken by FuelRiders photog Guillaume Boily



at that last spot, i was the last one to leave, and the crew told me the film was missing some action, so i proposed to generate some

AWD donuts bro'



you can even see some spark coming from my front right tire that had some exposed mesh

sadly, because of some issues between the producers (FuelRiders) and the event organizers (UltraRide crew) the DVD was never released


i found out the next day the repercussion of that action

my rear tires (Falken Azenis) were now completely bald
don't be fooled by what looks like thread, there is nothing left (look where the tire touches the ground)
they were done anyways




i added a little TOW sticker



and i also started my own little trend by putting all my unused stickers inside the trunk lid



and then put the car away for good for the winter
the engine oil was swapped with cheap castrol oil, and the radiator was drained and filled with mostly prestone




---------------------------------

in retrospective, 2010 was an incredible year

i was my first time embarking on a build project of such scale, all by myself, in the home garage

i did most of what i set out to do (read : the master plan) and even more

as i said before, the best way to get into a project like this, is to make a list of goals, plan them all in advance, don't stray too far off the goals, work hard, and don't give up

i think writing all this 'blog'' here on GTRC was like a therapy for me, because alot of times i just wanted to quit, but talking to people on here just gave me more motivation


i am very happy with what i was able to accomplish with my knowledge and abilities, since i'm not a mechanic nor a genius


thats it with 2010, my most epic year ever with everything that happened, evetthing i did

but of course the project of the U.S.S BNR32 still isn't finished, work resumes in 2011 and gets even more epic

i'll keep updating this thread with stories and info regarding 2011, i hope to finish before the 2012 season starts (ugh)

thx to all of GTRC for the support

/2010

to see how the GTR looked at the end of 2010, plz go see this (2010 photoshoots of teh GTR)

[frankiman]

Chapter 37 - End of an epic summer, part 1


so before storing the car away for winter, i wanted to keep fixing some issues

a couple days after my great little 600km trip north, i called Autoworx so i could pic up the parts they had miss-painted and also those they didn't even paint, AND to get them to put my mess grill back on

the receptionnist told me to come by later that day, that everything was ready and the guys would fix my car

of course when i got there at around 6;30pm, no one had a clue i was coming since the douche receptionnist never told anyone

they scrambled around to find my parts and started putting them back on the car



i asked them for some copper spark plugs, and was told they didn't carry those type of plugs
but of course that what THEY put in my car the year before
so i told him that thats what i was using, NGK-R copper racing plugs, and was told that it was impossible, that my car wouldn't even start with those plugs, but of course i myself had put a set of those plugs in and driven over 10,000km with them
so i told them to F-off and i left
that, was the last time i went to Autoworx (or Carworx as it is known now)


-------------------------


the second thing to fix was my crazy backfires, and ''misfires''

during the 2010 Ultraride i was having major issue with keeping my speed steading as i would get tons of misfire, no power, and sometimes flames coming out the back

wanting to know more about the ''flames'' coming out the back that some people had seen, i did a little experiment

i went out for a drive on the highway, and positionned my GoPro HD camera on the rear bumper in 60 frame per second mode to catch any occurence

well....

this is the kinda of misfire / backfire i get all the time when applying very little pressure to the throttle,;



the night before, i ajusted my TPS, since then my car as been running super rich (based on my AEM wideband)
and when i left off the throttle to slow down under compression, instead of going full lean like before, now it stays really rich (12 afr) for a couple seconds (5-6) before going full lean

so this is what i got that night, in just 15 minutes of driving;

enjoy the fireworks;

having still no idea what was causing this, i tried messing with the TPS and AAC valve

oh and also, when i ajusted the TPS, my idle got down to ~500rpm ish and was pretty rough, but still idled at 12afr
tried to ajust the AAC valve and throttle cable tension, but couldn't find the right comination


luckily right after the Ultraride, i called Almasi Tuning to setup an appointment to fix this

when i got to his shop, we mounted to car directly on the dyno,

we found the problem

at first i explained my problem to Robin, he really couldn't see what it could be
i clearly explained everything that happened and when it would happen, even showed him the pics of the backfire and small blue flame (not a backfire, much worst)
he really like the blue flame one

then on the dyno, he checked its idle, then kept the RPMs at 3000
it kept doing "Pff Pff Pff" and such
AFRs were all over the place, good thing the UEGO wideband is digital because a mechanical needle wouldn't have been able to move fast enough

then put it in gear and tried to keep it at 100km/h, again Pff Pff

so then he checked the Consult on his laptop and adjusted the TPS to the correct voltage

after that was done, he just kept staring at the screen

after a couple minutes, he went; WTF

the O2 sensor signals were completely f'ed up
so he went to check on the connectors,

the O2 sensors were swapped !

i mean, the connectors are different so you can't swap them this way, the actual sending units were each plugged into the other's dump pipe

un-ending loop

when sensor#1 was rich, it told sensor#2's injectors to go lean
then sensor#2 runs lean, and tells sensor#1's injectors to go rich
thus the un-ending loop

thats why i had a blue flame constantly coming out the back
3 cylinders were running FULL RICH
3 cylinders were running FULL LEAN
thus creating the perfect mixture of air/fuel in the exhaust

and a blue flame is very bad news, it means the flame is extremely hot, much hotter than an orange flame

so instead of physically swapping the O2 sensor back, which would have taken the whole afternoon, Robin simply swapped the pin-out in the ECU board, which took 2 minutes for the exact same result

another thing i already knew and everyone should know, is that the GTR ECU uses the O2 signal only when its under ~4lbs of boost, after that it only relies on MAF and boost signal

thats why i had absolutely no problem under boost

then fired the car back up, and it ran PERFECTLY

did a couple pulls and ALL my issues were gone, and almost no more turbo shuffling either
YEY

than Robin re-tuned the car with the proper boost controller settings while i was setting up the EVC-S myself from the passenger seat


the bad news, driving 500+km with that issue hasn't been good on the engine, either the spark plugs are destroyed (completely burnt or fooled)
or as Robin said, maybe i melted something in the cat back (HKS Legal) and made it much more restrictive
or i messed up the compression in some cylinders,

..because i lost 26whp
even with a much MUCH better looking boost curve


then i drove home, and i must say the car has NEVER ran so well, its unbeleivable how smooth it ihad become,

and another good things is that i'm still doing small backfires, but the usual "correct" way, just when i let off the gas completely,
thats because of the decat
then it immediatly goes to full lean like it should

the man, the legend




when i got home, i checked the sparks plugs



they were messed up, so i didn't take any chances i put a new set of BKRs back in

and i also did another compression test



the average had gone down a tiny 3 psi since the beginning of the summer
but i also found out much later that i wasn't really doing the test properly


--------------------------------

another thing i wanted to fix was... my brakes again..
my fix didn't really fix them because they still wouldn't brake and they were making even more noise then before, it drove my girlfriend crazy during our trip up north

i say byebye to the AMS rotors and put the good ol' stockers on



and the Anti-Squeak i put on the back of the brake pads didn't last long since there wasn't a back plate to spread the brake force



so using a piece of sheetmetal, i cut a set of backplates shaped like the pads




-----------------------------

then i wanted to finish my center console

so i bought a piece of carbon fiber, already cut up ti fit my controllers, from Nelsonmxmarc



but then i had to find a new spot to put the A/C control, how about the glove box...

i started by removing it, which is already a huge PITA



then drilled a huge hole in the back of it, took the wiring harness for the a/c control and passed it behind the console and thru that hole



then put everyback in place, but because of the lenght of the wiring harness, i couldn't put the control right side up,
so upside down it was



after that i used lighter fluid to clean the back of the CF panel and using industrial double sided tape, placed small blocks of wood behing the panel



then using small strips of metal and even more tape, i placed all 3 controllers in their respective hole, and secured them to the panel from behind to make it super clean





and finally fixed the panel to the back of the console trim with yet again double sided tape

Skylab TSC
HKS Type-1 turbo timer
HKS EVC-S boost controller

RESULTS




overall look from inside the car

[felix yuen]

Love this journal !

[bobbo]

Franki you're hard as PHACK. Keep it up man!

[frankiman]

yup nistune, Almasi installed it

[bellis_GTR]

What chu talkin bout willis. Lool I didn't say anything.

I always forget to ask, but what ecu are you running? Nistune?

[frankiman]

^^ spoiler

[bellis_GTR]

Haha I really don't want to change that hose.

And I'm almost positive there was not a spacer one mine lol There wasn't even a belt. Maybe when who ever took the belt off they forgot the spacer if there was one? Haha not sure, but I'm happy you improvised and got the job done! Nice track pics too, I like

I have to get my car up there for some track days. You should also come done to some of ours!

[Skym]

I like.

[frankiman]

Chapter 36 - The fix

so in the last chapter, i described how i had a huge p/s leak, and that my a/c belt had came off

but i kept driving the car around during the following week, so i did what any smart person would do in that situation...
my p/s pump was going to burn out because there was no fluid going thru it
and i didn't have to time to remove the radiator and a ton of stuff just to remove the belt
so i just cut it... i had another spare one anyway


the thing is that exactly 1 week after the track day, i was going up north to my chalet, a 4 hour drive,
so i really wanted my p/s and a/c to work for that trip

during that week i drove the car to work, without p/s, on the highway, it was a freaking pain!!! i couldn't feel my forearms when i got to work because i had to hold onto the steering wheel so much, darn 265 tires


the first thing was to figure out why my brakes weren't doing crap, so i took the whole thing apart to inspect it ;

the rotors looked super glazed, no wonder why it wasn't braking



i took the pads off, and all the cylinders boots looked fine, no sign of damage anywhere



then i turned my attention to the rotors,



in an attempt to reduce the awfull awfull noize the Hawk HP+ were making (at that time) i chamfered the leading edge of each front pads



i also drove past AutoWorx and borrowed some leftover cans of Wurth Anti-squeal



after applying a good thickness, i put everything back together



i then check the wear of my front tires and quickly realized i couldn't finish my summer with sooo much camber wear



the problem wasn't actual camber, but way too much toe out, because like an asshole i had changed the alignment front VAG Motorsport's settings because they were a bit too extrem



so i went to a tire shop that my dad often deals with, and had both front tires flipped, meaning that the camber wear would now be on the outside of the tire rather than the inside

it looked like ****, but at least i could drive for the remainder of the season



---------------------------------

the next day, i checked what my p/s and a/c problem was

and sure enough i had lost the complet a/c tension pulley assembly, so i got on GTRC and found another one, rather quickly



i then saw that my main p/s hose was cracked open,
after looking under the car i realized that line was part hardline part hose, but 1 piece all the way from the p/s pump tp the rack&pinion head



so, seeing this was going to be a real PITA to fix, i enlisted the help of my father for a rare occasion

first i had to remove the radiator, argh



both of us spent a good 3 hours underneath the car to remove the line without bending it too much since i didn't want to replace the whole thing
we had to snake it thru the subframe, motor mounts, swaybar, etc, etc...

and this is what the whole fawking thing looks like



believe me you do not want to replace this line, it is by far the worst job i've ever done on my car

the soft part of the hose was completely torn open, even though its super thick and solid



i called Nissan just for kicks, and the line was worth something like 300$
and would take 3 weeks to arrive from japan



since i didn't have time to get it fixed myself, my dad brought it to an hydraulics shop
they didn't have the same fittings to go into the p/s pump (DUHH) so i told my dad to get something as similar as possible
and also, the facilitate the "putting it back on" part, i told him to get the line cut into 3 section and using fittings we could assemble it back on the car

but, just my luck he had it cut just a couple inches from the spots we had discussed

this is how it looked



how the assembling fittings look



the crimped section



and the end fitting, which looked completely different




problem is, we had received the line on the friday, when i was supposed to leave at the break of dawn on the following day

so on friday night, my dad and i went back under the car to get the line back into place

but since the assembling fittings weren't in the right spots, it actually made it even more difficult to fit because we couldn't reach the fittings with tools to tighten them up

it took another 3 hours just for that

but out of luck, the standard banjo fitting at the end of the line was just the right size to fit on the p/s pump and into the bracket that prevents it from rotating



while working on that, i saw that the dust cover on top of the rack&pinion was cracked, and that the rack&pinion itself was leaking just a bit



but i realized, that it would have been much smarter to simply replace the whole line with a complete soft line (high-pressure nylon braided line), it would have been much easier to re-install, and much more reliable (as you'll see later in another chapter)


after that, it was already pretty late, but before putting the radiator back on, i wanted to fix the A/C

luckily i had received a pulley from Brian Ellis (Bellis)



quickly i bolted the pulley assembly onto the car, but since the original one wasn't there at all anymore, i couldn't compare
i fitted the spare A/C belt over it

reassembled all the other belts, the fan, and put the radiator back on

then i filled the radiator simply with (inexpensive) distilled water, and a bottle of Redline WaterWetter to make the water more viscous



filled the p/s system with good quality fluid




after everything was reassembled, only then did i start the car to see if there was any problem

there was no leak, but a loud ''squeak'' could be heard
it wasn't coming from the p/s pump
but when i checked underneath the car, the sound was louder
so i stopped the engine, and started it again
it was clear the noize was coming from the freshly installed a/c pulley
i could even see rubbing marks on the support right behing it
only when i saw the pulley jam, and the belt still turning and .. smoking did i yell to my dad to stop the engine
it was clear i was missing some sort of spacer between the pulley and the support

so i sent a text to Brian, asking if he had sent everything related to the pulley's assembly and he replied that he did

my dad was looking at me, with a look that meant 1 thing; ''son, we're going to have to take it appart again''
ohhhhh no

by taking the nut of the pulley and prying it a bit, i was able to take it off the shaft without having the belt slide off the pulley

so at first i slid a 1/2" washer on the shaft, to space the pulley outward, and tighten the pulley back on

started the car, and saw that it wasn't enough
fuuuuuuuuu

so i did the exact same thing a second time, and with two 1/2" washers, the problem was resolved




even though it was close to midnight at that point, i still decided to check the spark plugs, since it was a 600km ride in the following days

i cleaned the plugs, and everything was fine!





so the next day, saturday, i got up at 6am, and drove my perfectly functionning car all the way to my chalet

[allwheeldrifter]

nevermind....i just saw page 80

[allwheeldrifter]

what happened at 1:55 ? looks like the corolla lost a wheel!?!?!?

[RWD_GTR]

why 2 years behind? its 2012 now. lol

[rb26addict]

[QUOTE=nimblestix;505084]

^ 0:49-51 backfire

[frankiman]

When you just rent a track with a group of people its usually 50% cheaper than clubs, but the overall events are much better organized with clubs


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