T.F.S.

dont be a prat

fitting the last bits back onto the GTR brings me to just about the last area i am yet to be happy with...the intake it has HKS hard pipes and a massive trust intercooler with water/methanol injection but it also has two generous sized filters that suck in red hot underbonnet air :bash: normally this would be one of the first things i would do but on the GTR its a pain there is a large scoop in the bumper just under where the filters live though and that could be used if we dont mind cutting a hole here or there:uhoh: the options as i see it are... 1. relocate filters into bumper scoop 2. run cold air feed from scoop into stock filter area 3. fibreglass the scoop and use it as a ram effect into sealed/shrouded filters decisions decisions.... moving back up the inlet there is not much else that can be optimised (without upgrading parts), the air flow meters are often overlooked...they have wire mesh shields before and after the wire which are really there to prevent damage to the wire during assembly as the air has already been filtered by this point, some say this is a lamina flow generator and its purpose is to smooth the path of air flowing over the element but i think that bollox TBH....i have seen an imporvement in power on more than one car that i have done this with, maybe the removal of the mesh increases airflow or maybe it actually leans the mixture, make your own mind up on this one i wonder how much of a restriction they actually represents:apoke: mesh removed here is a cheap ebay shield version sitting next to my present M's K+N the M's elbows are great for flow but with no cold air its all in vain IMO, the cheap filter has a much smaller outlet but it will be supplying cold air also if you are running hoses around the engine or through the inner wing they are going to be less than 3" for twin pipes or one 5" single because there simply isnt the room for anything bigger (again IMO) the filtration on these new filters are going to be poor at best...these i can change later on the factory AFM's have a bolt on fixture for the airbox so its not as simple as slipping a hose onto the AFM...you will need some sort of adaptor i was lucky enough to have chris make this up for me for beer tokens, its not possible to have something like this made up custom style if you are on a shoestring budget if you dont know a friendly engineer i made some gaskett out of the paper i had left over from the screamer pipes to help give a reasonable seal fitting the induction hose is easy now, i have used normal motorsport flexihose for this, about £15 per meter starting to take shape now, you can see the general idea of this is to pass the new inlet pipe through the iner wing to the passenger side bumper vent and have the filter sit there...sealed away from hot underbonnet temps the filters are open at the front...this is perfect for ram feed here you se the possible inlet holes marked out......i have opted for the position on the right for the rear turbos and ill use the original hole under the headlight for the front turbo this is where the filters will site.....some will say this position is going to catch far more dirt and water and it will.... we can take some measures to minimise this but we will come to this later hole cut for the rear inlet pipe, i painted the bare cut metal to prevent rust and fitted a cheap speaker port to make it easier on the eye rear inlet connected rear filter connected you can see the front inlet traing off under the headlight...there was a bit of cutting here and there but there was space for it the front filter was a bit tricky to fit lol, there really is not much space left over in the vent now, doing this on a single turbo version would be a piece of cake....you could go with a 5" hole and pipework no probs the vent inlet will need meshing off to prevent leaves and carrier bags getting sucked in. to stop water/rain i may need to fit some sort of shield to direct water away from the filter inlets (we are coming back to this...post under construction) overview please note these last two posts are under construction

knowing the front turbo screamer had clearance issues i dry fitted both new turbos with screamers to have a measure up this is the clearance on the rear turbo with modded elbow fitted, it also needs rework as the screamer is pointing into the chassis, apart from the obvious clearance issue it would end up making a mess of the chassis eventually with 500 degree plus exhaust gas exiting same pic different angle i always planned to extend the screamer pipes once they were fitted but now mods have to be made anyway it gives so time to measure up the length of the downpipe on each turbo so that the screamers exit under the car marked up with planned amount of extention after the flange (just incase anyone decides to do the same..), ill be making mine from copper not steel lol;) 15/20 hopefully they should exit just after where the downpipes bend and sit level with the floorpan the screamer pipe now modded to run alongside the downpipes (tacked into position just to check clearances) clearance is looking a lot better now however...the inlet pipe that bolts onto the rear turbo (on the right in the picture above) simply didnt have enough room to bolt on and was touching the wastegate pipe, it was only a couple of mm out but thats all it takes i guess:alco: i had a spare inlet pipe so i though id find out how much of a dent it would take before it broke lol it was enough to get past the exhaust leaving about 2mm gap when bolted into position almost done...had time to spray the covers whilst everything was off too:D

GTR turbo replacement/removal/installation/actuator testing this GTR has covered around 8 thousand miles since rebuild, running at 1 bar... before i done the rebuild i didnt have much time spent on boost and after the rebuild the turbos started to leak oil on boost now, they seemed ok at first but 12 months of high boost has most likely taken its toll so eventually i have had to come back to these lots of oil evident in the inlet side, breather hose from rocker cover was disconnected just to make sure it wasnt that leaking the oil into the rear turbo inlet insert oily intake pic i ordered a second hand set of ceramic turbos from ebay, some shaft play but better than the ones that are fitted typical budget stuff as per usual, a set of steel turbos or larger new items would have been nice:o the first parts to remove will be the obvious ones...airfilters and assorted pipework, twin turbo pipe, just as much stuff out of your way as possible really water pipes and lambda sensors are better removed, removal of the exhaust rocker cover is optional (i dont like the risk of contaminating the head with dirt or worse still a rogue washer/bolt so left it attached) there are 4 nuts on the downpipes to remove, whilst you are there its a good time to attempt to remove the bolts in the block that hold the lower turbo brace on...they can be removed with the braces still attached to the turbos downpipe connection the power steering pump needs droping back too, just remove the main bolt and hold it back with ties next up are the manifold bolts.....the two bolts under the manifold look really hard to get at a short ratchet will however reach under it provided the power steering pump is removed to gain access;) with all of the bolts on the turbo removed there is a last connection behind the turbo, once pulled forward a bit its also reachable front turbo removed this is just a pic of the DIY ported head (mentioned in page one of the rebuild guide) with the front turbo removed i dry fitted the new turbo with modded elbow to check for clearance....its wastegate pipe is pointing directly at the power steering hoses and will need rework:crazy: :uhoh: , guess we will come back to that then removal of the rear turbo is the same as the front one and a little easier with the extra clearance gained whilst you have the turbos out you can check the shaft for excessive play and also check the actuators to check the actuators you simply connect a footpump to the actuator and apply pressure, it should start to open at 0.5-0.6 bar and be fully open at about 1.4-1.5, if it has got lazy these readings will be lower, if you have uprated items they will be higher the turbos dont really need to be off the car to check actuator movement like this....you can also use this method to set up adjustable actuators or manual boost controllers (MBC)

to make sure that the engine is not taken over 6800rpm i have fitted a ignition cut rev limiter, BEE-R, this safeguards the engine/turbines and it makes some serious flamage out of the exhaust which i like very much ill also be keeping an eye on EGT, anything above 600 degrees after the rear turbo (where my probe sits) and ill come off the throttle to allow turbos to cool having a free flowing exhaust will also help a lot, it will lower boost threshold and help prevent heat buildup which will in turn allow a higher turbine speed (well...in theory at least eh) so as mentioned next up on the mod list is a decat and elbow swap, i have opted for XS power elbows (£120) and a second hand decat off ebay.....its just a straight piece of pipe and use of a second hand one is actually better as i know that it will fit and it does not require time for the exhaust note to settle (as its already coated internally with carbon/soot) from the cat back the car already has a 3.5"-4" straight through with middle section and back box these are the stock turbos and elbows here are the uprated elbows, the shape of the pipe is far smoother and is better in terms of flow, the wastegate and exhaust gasses are seperated and rerouted back into the exhaust pipe this is not the optimum position for the gasses to re-enter the exhaust...further downstream would be better and an easier option is to seperate them from the exhaust altogeather this will be really loud on boost (when the wastegate opens) and great for flow...it will also sound as quiet as ever off boost around town, these are known as wastegate pipes or screamer pipes due to the sound they make getting these pipes to seal however is a nightmare:shakehead: the wastegate/turbine exhaust seperator was not deep enough to touch the back of the turbo and would allow gas to pass out of the screamer side, its wasnt like it was going to seal after warm up neither as it was about 3mm too short here is the supplied spacer and also a custom spacer made to fill the 3mm void TBH you could get away with using gaskett paper sheet cut to size maybe, i still had to use some of this to pad the assembly even after using the spacers even when you are sure that no gas can get under the assembly it will get around the sides.....i decided there wasnt any real hope of sealing the pipes correctly with the assembly attached to the elbow so i removed it and welded it to the turbo itself (unconventional i know lol) many thanks to Christopher McAnulty who modded these XS elbows

on a long stroke engine the piston has to travel a further distance than in a short stroke version, that means travelling faster and causes more stretch on the rod which means tougher materials or a lower rpm limit

more to follow..

here is the waterpump for the WI system, it found its home under the air filters for the moment but eviction looms in the air as that position will soon be filled by an extra cold air intake for the filters/relocation of the filters so they sit in the bumper vent here is the injection point just before the plenium, you cvan see the intake temp guage wire poking into the hose from the top of the pic? im sure i will need to try different jets to obtain the best ratio

all we know at this point is that the engine blew from a suspected lean condition (see piston ringland pics on page one) we cant really run this at anything other than idle without first checking and confirming fuelling is correct here you can see a AEM UEGO wideband controller, a "pyrometer" for exhaust gas temprature display and a oil pressure display (it has one in the spedo as stock and TBH ill be swoping this over for a oil temp guage ASAP) i also installed a "knocklink" display in the upper part of the speedo to monitor detonation, these are not "that good" really and in my experiance they tend to monitor misfires more than anything else so ill be checking for detonation with "det cans" (we will come to this later), far cheaper, more professoinal and far more dependable if you have a good ear we also have a intake temp guage, it was a cheap ebay item i must admit but i do not expect intake temps to be that high with the size of this intercooler and the fact that ill be using a maximum of 1BAR pressure, the install is a bit "crap" lol, ill have to do that properly in the future here we have a fuel pressure guage, its just for monitoring pressure at idle but will come in handy if i need to install a fuel pressure regulator to increase fuelling slightly the fuel guage T piece.....an easy and cheap way of hooking the guage up to the supply, here we see it prior to installiation a boost controoler is obviously a must, the car came with this controller and ill give it the benifit of the doubt and use it to help set the car up i needed to get a load of wires into the cockpit for these guages.....the bulkhead wire point is just behind the passenger wheel arch, quite easy to get them through when you know where it is, you may need to remove the passenger footwell plastics to retrieve them from the cockpit side the wideband unit and pyrometer will both need to be installed in the exhaust, really the pyrometer should be installed before the turbo, here you see it right after the rear turbo wideband sensor pic to be added

so its time to fit the belt pulley and fit the belts for the power steering, alternator and air con pump! i used a new keyway as mine was "lost", the stock torque setting for the crank bolt is 340-350LBFT (jeez!) so the engine is pretty much finished now.....its been removed, fully rebuilt and reinstalled compression was 140psi across the board quite a difference from the previous incarnation of what lurked under that bonnet i think you will agree? (also note the fibreglass and spraycan repair of the bumper from the engine install post lol) the finished article? ticks over nice too!

with the engine now fitted we can address the valve clearance the cam cap bolts were stuck inside the cam caps, needed hours of penetrating fluid to release them....be really careful here, you dont want to snap one inside the cap...if you do it may requitre drilling out and if you dont do it just right it will kill the cap and you will be paying £1200 for a replacement head!, caps are not interchangeable! (or so i am led to believe, never tried it TBH) youi can see here that the valve closest to the camera has a shim and a bucket installed, you may see on valve no2 that only yhr shim is installed, note that the shim is the wrong way around so that the impact/pecussion mark from the valve is pointing up rather than down towarsds the valve, this will help bring it to the standard clearance inlet cam placed into position here you see the cam in its natural enviroment, clamped down to the head its really easy to bend a cam doing this...make sure that you take it down equally with the cam clamped down we can check clearance between the bucket and the cam, rotate the cam so the valve is closed (with the lobe pointing up) and insert a feeler guage under the cam, clearance is 1-18 thou, mine came up at 10 thou acroos the board on the inlet side.....some people will always want to go to the high end of the clearance "so they know the valve is fully closed" but this will do for me, middle of the clearance is fine IMHO rocker cover fitted exhaust cam fitted, clearance on this side is 1-16thou for the valve ready to do the timing now!, we are almost there!! this pic just points out the stock inlet cam timing mark the white line on the belt is positioned next to the crank timing mark all marks lined up now, belt fitted and adjusted for tension with the adjuster, rotate the engine twice and line the marks back up to assure timing is correct......i had to redo the timing on my first go at this so make sure you rotate twice and check!!

the engine has a lot of stuff that needs to be connected before the engine is fitted, because they were all cleaned beforehand it only takes a couple of hours to refit and TBH if i wasnt too sure where something went i just checked the earlier pics i took on its way out i did have a rather noisey nismo paddle clutch fitted, its being replaced by a single plate exedy uprated version heres a set of shots of the engine dressed an input shaft from an old skyline gearbox is the best tool to line the clutch up with as you clamp it down but they are not easy to come by...this one was lent to me by tony of abbey motorsport rigging the engine to the crane is pretty important with a fully loaded RB26DETT, the engine is very heavy and it will snap chains as i found out shortly after taking the three pics above the rigging broke and the rebuilt engine fell approx 1 meter into paving slabs and into the front of the car, i expected serious engine damage but the block was untouched....it came down on one of the bottom corners and just took a hole out of one of the slabs before resting itself on the front bumper, scarey stuff really the 250kg engine stand we used during the rebuild was also bent by the weight of the block when the head and sump, turbos and inlet etc were connected...be careful out there lol so with some upgraded rigging we started to reinstall the engine (please note that the pin on the gear fork should now be fitted!!) i found it was far easier to get the lump into position if i had the front of the engine raised above the fly end, it lifts out real easy on the way out and that isnt easy to duplicate on the way in once i had the engine where i wanted it we had to play with the height of the gearbox/engine to position it correctly so the splines would be at the correct angle to the splines.......i didnt think that it "felt right" at first, there was far too much resistance as the spline went in for my liking but thats how they are on these, once you get this far you know its in, bolt the fecker up! after that you need to refit the rest of the equipment, driveshafts, pumps, various wires hoses...all straightforward really back to the head then!

here is a valve in the process of being cut, paste applied to the back of the valve after you have cut 24 valves the seals are next on the list, if you dont have a press to fit these you can do it with a socket, extention and a small hammer, not a job for the ham fisted! oil seal then place seal onto "stem" and tap in, i removed all of the seal springs first to avoid damage and refitted them after oil the valve and push it gently through the new seal into its home then install the washer/spring/cap and compress with the valve tool getting the collets back on is a hell of a lot easier with some grease applied to them first one they are home just release the tool and everything should fit snug, it takes some time to do them all well the block is already prepped we just gave it a turn or two so the pistons were on average half way down their bores (to avoid any piston/valve contact when the cams are fitted later on), and fitted the gaskett a bit of oil over the tops of the new pistons before we lock them away thanks must be given to "JohnB" for the practical and theory input on this thread and on this engine, a pleasure to work with also thanks to "JohnA" for putting up with persistant questions lol the shims and buckets are yet to be measured and fitted before the cams go on to have the tolorances on them checked but i will come back to this...for now i am more interested in fitting the engine

so the last time we saw the head it was clean and measured, the next stage is to "cut" the valves in and replace the seals if you have not done this before you will need these the idea is to clamp the valve spring down and remove the "collets" from the top of the valve with the collets removed the spring and cap will come out as the valve tool is released and the valve can be pulled out with the plunger keep all of the valves/springs/caps/collets/spring seating washers from each port in one bag labelled with the number of that port, i normally write the numbers next to one or two of the ports too as you can see in some pics...just to make sure they go back in the same place here is one of the exhaust valves as it came out when the valve and spring/cap is removed you can see the valve seal these can be removed *carefully* with a pair of pliers...must be careful not to score the wall of the head l when everything is removed you can give all the parts a clean with fuel inc the parts of the exhaust ports that you cant get to with the valve in place....i wouldnt clean around the valve seat/valve sealing surface with anything other than cutting paste but you can clean the backs of the valves with a dremmel type wire brush end on a slow setting with any dirt/grit out of the way the valves can be recut to cut the valves you apply three small dabs of corse paste onto the sealing surface at the back of the valve, you then insert it with the plunger and rotate the plunger like you are making fire on one of those discovery channels lol (you will need to then repeat with fine paste at least two more times or until you are satisfied that the paste is being pushed out of the sides of the valve in a uniform manner indicating that the valve seat has been matched) you also need to lift up every few seconds and rotate the valve about 90 degrees before placing back down to make more "fire" you can feel after only a few moments of rotation that the paste has been pushed out so you wipe up and repeat a couple more times with fine paste.....some valves/heads will need more cutting than others but in this game less is more.....if you remove lots of material you will at least affect the height of the shim (we will come to those later) you can get marks on the valve mating surface but some of these will not come out no matter how much fire you make

all coming together now!, the piston rings have already been cut to spec and they have been fitted to the rods already too so its just a case of taking them with their piston and oiling them up to help slide them in to the cylinder before we fitted the rod/piston we placed duck tape on the studs to prevent assembly marks to the crank journal bolt up the rod to the crank to the correct torque and repeat 6 times fit the splashplates, oil pickup, oil pump and the flywheel side crank cover before fitting the sump heat the timing pulley up in a saucepan of water before fitting to help it go on and make sure the washers are round the right way!, round one to block, then timing pulley with groove to block, then curved washer with the bowl facing away from the engine before fitting the pulley pump and timing pulley fitted bottom end rebuild complete the head is now back on the agenda for the next stage