very nice…
I hope you come out to the Glen with Niagara PCA this spring 
I miss that car. 
I’ll just be happy when this one is burning tire.
Got a bunch of work on the car done over the past few days. Cleaned up and pressed the hubs into the new bearing assemblies, also got a PILE of parts which I worked on installing today.
Ebrake caliper brackets test fitted onto the hubs.
Due to the hub and brake rotor being spaced out from the knuckle, I had to get some longer bolts and aluminum spacers to accommodate the difference. The new calipers I’ll reuse the stock hardware with and the spacing will be correct.
Put all new front arms in (the old ones showed some signs of various hits and being cast aluminum I didn’t want to take any chances). Plus it gives me fresh ball joints except for the one in the knuckle. I decided to forgo building crazy new arms after my first set didn’t work out the way I had planned. The season is just getting too close and the angle I had last year works well anyway (nearly bottoms out the knuckle on the control arms). Just need to play with the stops a bit and redo the spacers inside the rack.
Installed my new diff, cleaned/painted casing, nismo cover, carbonetics 1.5way. Looking forward to driving with a REAL differential. I went 1.5 way as I feel it suits my driving style a bit more and will be easier to control at standard track events/hill climbs.
Removed the old wing (lots of adhesive still to remove but I ran out of adhesive remover), which was a complete pain in the ass, two bolts inside the hatch, two clips, and some industrial adhesive. Painters tape is with 0.250" increments drawn out to center the new wing on the car.
APR GTC-300 on the 350z/370z/Titan hybrid, lol. Don’t mind the trunk adhesive.
Trans reassembly with the modified bell housing. Hopefully we’ll be putting the engine in and firing it this coming week, behind schedule (injuries, parts delays, etc) but these things always are.
Really coming together, Mike. I can’t wait to drive it 
Wow, Mike. That looks fucking amazing. :tup:
Love it :tup:
:tup:
for the double side tape on your deck lid
http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=3m+eraser+wheel
Burnouts!
sideways burnouts!
DOOOOOOOOOOOO like!
:tup: Mike can’t wait to see this thing.
Thanks everyone. It’s really coming along and the recent parts showing up have helped a lot (as well as my shoulder being much better, hell I even played a decent game of golf the other day with minimal pain). It still hurts to drive aggressively but I’ve got some stuff through physical therapy that is helping with that.
Anyway, to the car, today I spent a large chunk of time going through the suspension. Put a very basic alignment on the car, redid all of my angle stuff (eeked a bit more out than last year) on stock arms. As I stated in another post I decided not to make custom control arms right now as they are to much on top of an already closing deadline. However while playing with steering parts today to get maximum angle I noticed I’m now at the limit of my steering rack/tie rod location and very much on the verge of going over center with the suspension. Basically I’m at that point where you see the leading (steering) wheel on drift cars start to wobble. Which means I need to work on some steering rack/knuckle mounting points in order to get more angle anyway, so control arms would be a waste at this point.
Currently at max angle.
Still lots of clearance for trailing wheel to the frame rail. (that’s with 25mm spacers, which is the only way I’ve found to get enough space to run bigger angle on a 350z with a large wheel 18x9.5" Nismo LMGT4)
Also did my bumper tuck today, should help clean up airflow, exhaust routing, and make jacking the car by the diff easier. (before/after center of rear bumper)
I had to laugh when working in the hatch today when I noticed I never removed the 2.5# hatch weight or rear wiper motor. Granted the car still has power windows and keyless entry! :lol:
Back on the ground, ready for the engine. Hoping to get started on the install Monday.
(wheels, so dirty they don’t even look the same color!)
Startup next week maybe?
Looking pretty rad. I love it when things finally start to come together after months of what seems like NO progress even tho you are working your ass off.
Dan
I know the feeling alllllll too well. ahahha.
Big progress, small photo update. Spent a ton of time getting the motor into the chassis, figuring out the best way to make things fit, centering the driveline so the driveshaft angles aren’t all wonky, etc.
Big :bigtup: to Mike and the guys over at Innovative Tuning without them I probably would not have gotten this done.
The passenger’s side header I purchased fit perfectly, I need to move the fuel lines SLIGHTLY and fire sleeve them, but other than that it fits great. The DRIVER’S side did not fit great, the collector hit, as well as the #2 runner. I had to hack them off to get the motor in but it looks like extending them down and keeping them away from the steering shaft should be a fairly easy job.
Unfortunately to fit the engine with the trans attached the crossmember has to be dropped. It was a bitch the first time as I’m not sure it had ever come out of the car before, but only takes 15 minutes or so now that I’m practiced. The lower oil pan is entirely too low with the way the motor is mounted (which is the only place it really fits well) so I’m going to have to come up with a shorter oil pan with a nice baffle in it. It’ll reduce capacity some, but I’m also putting a big oil cooler on it and probably a small accusump (as much as I don’t like them, I can’t afford and don’t have time to call up ARE and have a nice dry sump pan made, maybe next off season). So going to have to do that with a fairly beefy skid plate, the sway bars are still the low point on the car. Need to finish up the trans mount, but that’s pretty easy, and hopefully I have most of the wiring done (I think I need to extend like 6 wires and I’m done).
It’s crunch time, 23 days until DMCC round 1. Still a TON to do.
People do this on the SRT as well. on your car, could you just zip tie the middle part of the bumper up to the body? It works very well, and looks SO much better if you don’t run that factory duel exhaust.
–mark
The bumper core support is RIGHT behind it (really low). So 5 self tapping screws with washers, an impact, DONE!
:tup: man ill come check it out tomorrow if you are there. text me bro