Dirty Thirty - Two

[fricktion]

This is the story of my R32 GTS25. Time to try and keep track of everything that has been done to the car as it is getting way out of hand!

It started off in the hands of Scott (previous owner) as a standard R32 GTS25 with an RB25DE from factory.

He added a few mods, mainly suspension, 5 stud conversion, wheels, GTR Kit, half cage plus much more.

Then I bought it, added new control arms and new wheels but stayed more or less the same car for a couple of years.

After a few stacks id ruined the front bar, new wheels and control arms. Which meant buying them all again. Keeping any real progress on the car at a stand still.

Came to a point with the car that I really wanted to start making more power although wasn't sure on an engine swap as the factory rb25 is so rare and a I didnt want to put it on the same playing field as any old GTST. Eventually decided to keep the RB25DE Head and add an RB30 Block. Essentially it would still appear to be the same motor under the hood. But it didnt take long for me to start dreaming about turbos and then the plan changed involving a low mount turbo set up keeping it relatively inconspicuous.

Going from the naturally aspirated motor to a turbo motor involved a lot more than adding a turbo, it is surprising how different a GTST is to a GTS25. So if I was to go this far, why stop there? I decided I needed a donor car and that way I could swap over front and rear cross members as well in case of any damage to mine and I would have all the necessary parts to convert to turbo. Then the challenge was to find a clean R32 GTST without breaking the bank.

Not long after, I quit my full time job and took what was to be at first, a short unpaid break. Luckily around the same time I found a GTST with low km's and was clean and straight, so I sold my bike and bought the second 32.

The new 32 had recently had an RB30DET conversion although it had thrown a rod and wasn't running. It did have plenty of parts that I could steal though including a Garret GT35, HKS manifold, Cams and much more.

So I pulled the whole thing apart.

Gave this block to my engine builder and he worked out that the cylinders had been over bored which lead to fuel leaking into the crank case and onto bearings, and eventually killed the bearings and ruined a few rods in the process.

So I bought a standard series II RB30 block and gave it to him to start from scratch.

New over sized bore and hone

Decked block

Crank Grind and Crank Colla fitted

Modified Crank Oil Ways

ACL Race Bearings

40. Thou Oversized Forged Pistons

While the new block was in the shop, I pulled the GTS25 apart.

From here I proceeded to make things worse by removing the interior, loom, ecu, steering rack, front crossmember, rear crossmember and all suspension.

Slowly the GTS25 started to go back together using the best parts from both cars and more.

Tein Coilovers

R33 Control Arms

Adjustable Camber Arms

Adjustable Upper Control Arms

Adjustable Castor Arms

Nismo 2 way LSD

Plus a whole lot more

Next the New block had to be prepped to go in. I went to Nissan and ordered genuine gaskets for everything. They are a rip off, probably because its not every day someone wants genuine RB30 gaskets but at least I have the peace of mind now.

Mate at Mercedes cleaned up an N1 GTR Oil pump, rear main, water pump for me. Drilled and tapped tensioner studs in the block then it was all assembled.

The fresh engine was attached to an RB25DET gearbox with a button clutch and short shift kit and ready to drop into the car. Before it went in though I cut holes for cooler piping and intake while I had the space.

Engine and transmission in.

Now waiting for Head Gasket and Head Studs to arrive so fitted up oil cooler, intercooler and power steering coolers. A ton of metal had to be grinded out of the reo to fit but it all bolted up nicely in the end.

New Cometic Metal Head Gasket and ARP Head Studs arrived and the head could finally go on.

RB25DE Head is ported and polished with new cams and cam gears.

Cam gears on and set at zero. Both manifolds were port matched and now ready to bolt on. HKS low mount exhaust manifold needed some modification to bolt up as the taller RB30 block stood in the way.

Cooler piping to go on, 50mm HKS wastegate, Greddy boost controller, vacuum lines.

An RB26DETT Apexi Power FC was installed along with a Greddy Profec B Spec II boost controller. Then the arduous task of installing the new loom which was much bigger than the standard loom!

Port matched intake on, 800cc injectors in and start playing connect the hose.

Few more goodies to go in, 25% under driven harmonic balancer, Alloy Radiator, Bosch 044 Fuel Pump and she will be ready to fire up.

Pulled it out of the garage, bled the clutch, bled the brakes, did an extremely accurate wheel alignment by eye and she was ready to fire up for her first drive.

Started first go and ran beautifully... Until the oil filter sandwich plate cracked and started pissing oil... So it was back in the garage for now. The sandwich plate wasn't as easy to find as I had hoped so I switched the fitting back to standard and screwed on the standard filter to get it going.

First drive went well, broke in the new motor hard, low revs 100% throttle. Bringing it home I hit a bump hard and all of a sudden it stopped running. Towed it home and ended up here.

Spent a whole day in the driveway testing everything, pulling out spark plugs, testing all sensors yet couldn't even get it to idle. So brought it in, gave it a good wash, parked it in the garage and drove to Melbourne the next morning not to return for 3 months.

[fricktion]

Some things I missed.

Velo's on bride super low rails.

RB26DETT Power FC and Greddy Profec Boost Controller

[fricktion]

Returned from Melbourne 3 months later and had 7 days to play with the car and then hopefully drive it from Sydney to Melbourne at the end of the week.

Worked out straight away that some of the intercooler piping had come loose and it fired up straight away and ran beautifully.

Seemed to be something wrong with the stock blow off valve as it was fluttering very loud. Turns out someone had stuck a beer can under it to block it once upon a time. Took it off and installed a HKS BOV.

Fitted two 10 inch thermos. Struggle to fit them in, had to relocate power steering lines and still only 5mm between them and the P/S Pump.

All ready to go off to the tuner.

The car was tuned for economy driving on the freeway between Sydney and Melbourne, cam gears left at 0 degrees and only running 9psi boost. Just a basic run in tune. Made 220kw.

Unfortunately once the car came off the dyno the gearbox was sounding seriously unhealthy when the clutch was let out, suspected cluster shaft. Drove the car home, back into the garage for another 3 months and booked a last minute flight back to Melbourne.

Have just moved back to Sydney this month to stay. UniGroup suggested upgrading intercooler and piping, plumb back blow off valve and plumb back catch can so the plan is to get it organised plus the gearbox and get it in for a full tune in the next few months.

[blue_vl_t]

ahh, the pain of modifying cars, its all worth it in the end though

Matter of interest, why did you not use the other r32 gtst you bought and save you swapping so much over, or was it not able to be registered?

[fricktion]

Yeah will be worthwhile when its finished, plenty of heartbreak first though

It would have been much saner to start with the black gtst but it had SA rego and needed to be blue slipped to register in NSW. The GTS25 is engineered with the half cage and velo fixed backs, plus it came standard with an RB25 so its much easier to keep it road registered.

I basically have a complete car in spare parts so will probably put the RB25DE in the GTST and put rego on it as a daily. Will be easier to blue slip with that motor than it would be with the 30DET.

[33gts25t]

Nice car man, what noises was the gearbox making? my 33 25det whines with clutch out so suspect either release bearing or counter shaft, i think counter shaft though. Been driving it like that for ages and hasn't seemed to get any worse..

[fricktion]

Its a loud knocking, sounds like shit. thought it was the bottom end again at first then realised it was a gearbox when i put my foot on the clutch.

Does anyone know where to get an rb25 box rebuilt in sydney? or would it be cheaper to just buy another box?

[33gts25t]

Ah i see. I would say cheaper to buy another box but better to rebuild yours. Cause you never know with a replacement one and rebuilt is new haha.

[DJRIFT]

I don't know about Sydney workshops but it costs around 1100-1300 to have a rb25 box rebuilt in Tas. They generally sell for 1500 second hand down here.

[fricktion]

Haven't posted on this thread in a long time but a lot has been happening will post a detailed write up soon

[gtr jet]

Lookin good mate. Is she up and running again?

[fricktion]

Yeah she's up and running again, has had its second tune although still running factory boost until it's done a few more km's, making 225kw on a basic run in tune. Revs out really well and very consistent power all the way through the range. Has had suspension upgraded again and feeling super tight, couldn't be happier with it at the moment!

[White GTS-T]

This is so awesome, nice work. Please keep us updated.

[fricktion]

Ok so the gearbox came back out and was sent away to The Gearbox Factory who pulled it all apart and turned out its in immaculate condition. Came back home and realised it was the flywheel that had come loose so the bolts were locktited in and it all went back together. Good to know the gearbox is schmick though!

While the car was up in the air the Tein HR's came out some brand new HSD MonoPro Coilovers went in. Also Adjustable Lower Control Arms were installed front and back to widen the track.

Then the car got seriously low!

[fricktion]

Before getting back on the road some more parts came in including a forward facing intake manifold. It's a Plazmaman copy so I can keep my portmatched runners, only a cheapy but the welds all looked good and headed down to Pirtek to fill it with vacuum fittings. Genuine Nissan gaskets all round and kept the stock throttle body.

The old catch can had to go, Unigroup recommended a sealed can rather than venting it, so picked up a custom can to go behind the strut tower. Baffled and no vent. Rawbrokerage do press in fittings for the valve covers so that I could make up some braided line with speedflow fittings.

The old cooler piping had some serious bottlenecks so started again from scratch getting rid of all the mild steel stuff and going aluminium. Ordered in a bigger 600x300 aluminium intercooler and a Tial 50mm plumb back blow off valve.

[fricktion]

Moved the battery into the boot to make way for intercooler piping, made up a dodgy panel for switches and with a ton of messy wiring the car was loaded onto a tilt tray and taken down to Road & Race Performance who got the wheels pointing in the right direction. After a few days there we were back on another truck out to Unigroup to have the new aluminium cooler piping fabricated. Piping is 2.5" from turbo to TB with the BOV on the hot side to keep things tidy.

[fricktion]

Brought the ride height back up a long way and widened the track of the front wheels, still needed to go back in for a final alignment once it was running.

Spent a long couple of weeks at Unigroup, the washers which go on the crank pulley behind the harmonic balancer were missing so it all had to come back off, thankfully it made it through its run in on the dyno the first time without the belt slipping off!! It was all sorted out though and had another run on the dyno and tune although still only on wastegate pressure.

In the meantime I got the front bar ready to fit over the cooler, sanded down and painted.

[fricktion]

Made up a proper panel to fit in the centre console. Colorbond flashing cut to size and sprayed in KH2 the same colour as the car, switches for fuel pump, thermo fans and demisters. Greddy Boost controller mounted in the ash tray and push button start in the cigaretter lighter although I have wired it up so it can be easily changed to start on the key as its easier haha. Got the Power FC hand controller on velcro so it can be mounted on the dash or taken off easily. My parking lights have been constantly on since moving the battery to the boot so really good to have the isolator in the dash!! Will need to work out whats going on the the parkers soon though

[MickoLis]

Nice read

[fricktion]

Okay so about 150km's later after the car came back from Unigroup everything was good, car was smooth and fast until that gearbox noise started coming back. Put the car on yet another flatbed and towed it up to Hornsby Diff & Gearbox who luckily could fit it in before christmas. Sure enough the flywheel bolts had come loose again so we swapped them with some ARP items. All of the gearbox crossmember and tailshaft threads were super dodgy so spent the time filling and re-tapping them all as well.

Once she was back on the road it was back to Road and Race Performance for a final wheel alignment. Adjusted ride height again and got her sitting pretty. Handling beautifully now car feels like its on rails!

Now there is about 700km's on the new engine and all has been pretty smooth other than the problems with the flywheel. Went for a cruisy drive up the blue mountains last weekend and coming past Penrith on the way home noticed the oil pressure drop so pulled over and then started getting some tappet noise. Checked oil, it was full so started her back up and zero oil pressure and some loud tappet noise. The oil in the car has been changed 3 times already so doubt it could be a blocked pick up, assuming a problem with the oil pump until we can pull it apart and have a look. So called in another flatbed which picked us up at almost midnight on a Sunday and got her back home safely.

Currently running an N1 oil pump not sure whether to upgrade gears or whether to go for a new pump will have to do some more research. Could be a good excuse for a gated sump at the same time who knows