Chris' R34 GTT Series 2

[hoodedreeper]

On 10/22/2018 at 8:37 AM, ComTruise said:

Looks great man! keen to see the results. One question where did you get the dash LED kit? was it a kit or did you get them separately yourself? keen to know as it looks fantastic.

I purchased them from a friend, but they're pretty shit to be honest. Fuel and Temp bulbs have stopped working,aswell as one in the climate control

[hoodedreeper]

Nothing happens for weeks and all of a sudden everything happens at once lol

The new tyres for the Work wheels arrived and i didn't waste any time getting them mounted and fitted to the car. The front ride height is left untouched from the 17s, the rears were raised 20mm (its still veeeery close to the arch lip)

I think playing it safe with the offset of 30 was a wise decision, it may not be the 'fitment' that kids nowadays wanna see, but i think its perfect

Not long after purchasing the car, i already had a vision of what i'd like the car to look lilke. My very first car/project was a red Nissan Micra K11, one of the things i loved about that was the Nismo livery. That car taught me alot of cars in general especially thinking outside the box when it came to modifying. I knew the livery would work well on the R34 so it had to be done.

A big thank you to Unique Signs & Graphics in Norwich for designing it all from scratch and for fitting it. These were also the guys who designed and fitted the HKS livery on my MX5

I also tried out some coloured smoke grenades, I'll be having another go at night at some point

[Kinkstaah]

Never did I think I'd say this about livery on a skyline, but that looks fantastic!

[hoodedreeper]

No major updates just yet, only more photos 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[hoodedreeper]

A small update to catch up over the past couple of weeks

Took some autumn photos

My Tomei Exhaust elbow arrived from Japan via Nengun. The quality and workmanship on this is incredible!

I found these on Yahoo Auctions and JDMParts Rupewrecht arranged the purchase and delivery. Originally they had a 2-3 week production time as they're made to order. But these were ready to be shipped within a week! 

The quality is very good, the pieces are quite thick so not thin and flimsy like some carbon/FRP parts. They've certainly got some weight to them!

A friend of mine is currently cutting out the engine cover text aswell as the fuse box diagram to help keep them looking 'OEM'. Plus it breaks up all the carbon 

[hoodedreeper]

It was a very nismo christmas this year! Lu spoilt me rotten by buying me a Nismo speedo cluster

 

 

 

 

I also treated myself to some Nismo goodies from Nengun and Yahoo Auctions

 

 

Spent Boxing Day afternoon fitting it all

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Which brings me to my next mini update, engine cover stickers!

 

 

Keeping with the Nismo theme, i purchased an R33 strut brace with brake stopper on eBay. The brace had certainly seen better days so i started to refurb it.

 

 

 

 

And heres the finished item

 

 

 

 

 

Another little change I made was to swap the bulb in the ignition barrel to an amber one, to help match the red/orange illumination in the cabin

 

 

[hoodedreeper]

We headed over to Blickling Hall here in Norfolk, they had an arrangement of lights for the festive period which was a great photo opportunity 





The LED lights had produced an intermittent fault. The first set, the outer tail light ring was missing half of the LEDs and the second set of lights had an issue with the brake light occasionally not working. Driftworks accepted a return and arranged the refund very quickly, I can't fault them for that. The OEM lights were refitted, i think i prefer them lol



Although the interior was clean looking and stock, I felt it needed a lil bit more. I had a Nardi Deep Corn steering wheel stored away from the MX5, Driftworks supplied a HKB boss kit and the Nardi was promptly fitted.





Upon fitting the boss kit and testing it, i noticed something on the floor mat. I had only gone and snapped the locating pin on the clock spring....f**k! I removed the hicas fuse to temporally disable it until i could sort it. I had a couple of options, replace the clock spring and potentially have it happen again or delete the hicas.....which brings me to my next update

Driftworks Hicas Delete



H&S Performance took care of fitting the kit and aligning the car, as always they've done a fantastic job!



Last photo of this update is one i took this evening as the sun was setting, no real reason just a random photo. Its also the first using my new photography watermark teaming up with

Modificata Culture

[PranK]

Looks fantastic!

Gotta admit with you that ride height and fitment is perfect. 

[hoodedreeper]

Thanks PranK, it was a 'risk' but i'm glad i played it safe

[hoodedreeper]

Small update

Fitted a tsurikawa and a hannya omamori to the 34

I've finally got fuse box diagram sticker fitted, it finishes off the carbon a treat

While the camera was out I couldnt help but take a few more photos

[UWISSH!]

Wouldn’t that get annoying swinging around n tapping on the glass?

[hoodedreeper]

We went for a drive and it didnt rattle or hit the screen under acceleration

[hoodedreeper]

After reading up on a Speedhunters article by Jordan about his RS4 audio upgrade, I was that impressed I decided to bite the bullet and treat myself to one too.



The DMX7017DAB is a double din mechless unit with a large touch screen display. The minimal buttons along the bottom edge gives it a more modern look without distracting you much.

It has the bells and whistles you expect to find on a modern aftermarket stereo like DAB, Bluetooth, rear USB, steering controls etc. What drew me to this was a couple of things. The first being the integrated dash cam.



With the dash cam plugging into the back of the unit, you can view the Camera aswell as play back recorded footage and photos. The camera has a built in shock sensor, a message promptly appears if the car has been hit in your absence, and you can review the footage straight away.



The second feature that I loved was the ability to mirror what my phone does. For Android an app called Android Auto is required. This allows you to mirror Google Maps/Waze onto the stereo, while still being able to listen to Spotify/Google Music and make/receive phone calls! Very handy for those road trips or convoys to car shows



Another feature the Kenwood unit has is a reverse camera. You can pick up a generic camera off eBay or Amazon for not a lot of money but I didn’t want the extra grief of splicing and hoping the built quality would last. So I went with Kenwoods unit and I’m glad I did. Direct plug and play and all I had to do was splice into the reverse light loom



I finished the install when darkness fell so I’m eager to see the quality in the daylight



The rear speakers have been crackling for awhile so this was one job that needed addressing more than anything. I didn’t know what I was letting myself in for until I was half way through it…



The rear seats, door cards and trim had to be removed before I could touch the parcel shelf. The parcel shelf area was covered in a black dust, thinking it was the parcel shelf material disintegrating, I was wrong.



As you can see, there wasn’t much left of the stock Clarion speakers, no wonder the sound quality was so poor! The new speakers dropped in a treat and I managed to reuse the original fixings. At the point I wished I had bought the wiring adapters but nevermind.





With the rear interior put back together it was time to tackle the front speakers. This was ALOT easier, a few trim clips and screws and access was easy. Luckily the front speakers already had the adapters (weirdly enough) so that was plain sailing.



I did buy some sound deadening pads to put on the inside but space is limited and daylight was becoming less and less. I’ll tackle this at a later date.

The last thing on the list was to install the slim subwoofer. I was hoping it would fit under the seat, but upon removing it I didn’t realise the centre is humped and tapers down. So I decided to put it behind the seat instead.



The wiring is a lot simpler, all of the wires go into a single plug, none of those nasty terminal screws we had ‘back in the day’. The hardest part was routing the live cable through the bulk head (wheel and arch liner off and it’s straight forward from there)

So there we have it, a full multimedia upgrade! I still need to play around with the equaliser, then I’ll get a video sorted

[hoodedreeper]

Not long after I purchased the car I used the Turtle Wax headlight restoration kit. Unfortunately it didnt last long before the lights became cloudy again. I got recommended by a friend of a mobile company who do them for a very reasonable price. So I got the car booked in and well....the photos speak for themselves!







Since the Nismo addiction started I've been on the hunt for an S-Tune boot spoiler. As you can imagine these are rare as rocking horse shit and near on impossible to find. I found a company in Australia who makes a copy but its no longer available.





I did find one on Yahoo Auctions, but it came complete with the spoiler blade and the price landed was £800+ 

I happened to see a post on the Skyline Owners Forum facebook page about someone's own design for some spoiler legs. Messages were sent back and forth for a lil while and I made a purchase.

His friend was developing some covers but there would be a delay due to finishing the mould, getting orders etc. I went with the Carbon Fibre option, who doesn't like carbon?!

These took approx 4 months and they landed on my door today (12th April). The delay was due to the raw and painted versions being made and delivered first before the carbon versions got put into production.

Fitting was quite straight forward as its all been moulded to the underneath of the OEM spoiler,so it fits like a glove. The spoiler bases have adjustment so you can put it where you like (within reason)

[MotHot]

Great looking car.

Already a lot of personal touches.

 

Keep it up!

[hoodedreeper]

Hanami is one of THE most beautiful things on this planet, and I'm extremely envious and jealous of the Japanese and this beautiful season.  With my social media exploding with various images of this iconic scenery, I knew I had to try and replicate it as best as i could.

In the UK its a relatively small window when the blossom is in full bloom and how long it lasts for (also adding a lack of spare time to get such photos) makes a good challenge. I spent a couple of weeks driving round the city trying to find the perfect backdrop, this was harder than I thought.

I finally found somewhere good enough and I did my best with what I had

I've been going to a car show called Modified Nationals for the past 11 years. This year it moved date and location which ended up being scorching hot and a far better surrounding, win win!

Myself and a couple of others have started our own Cars & Coffee meets and today (28th April) was the first meet of the year. The weather just about stayed dry for the majority of the morning, I was met with a couple of more R34s

Seeing this V-Spec 2 Nur roll in made me go complete fan boy. You just dont get to see this car out in the 'wild' very often.

The full album can be seen here > https://www.flickr.com/photos/93923515@N07/albums/72157708154531655

[hoodedreeper]

I've been looking at replacement seats for a couple of months but have always been undecided on which ones. Last week we took a visit to GSM Performance to consult with the sales team on various seats and to try them. 

Being a 'bigger build' comfort was top priority, and trying the seats out before commiting was a major advantage. It was a tough decision as there were so many nice seats,but in the end I went for the Recaro. 

I managed to source some R34 GTR Bride rails that had been modified to fit the GTT. Upon ftting I noticed the Recaro seat mounts were alot wider than the rail. Several hours of swearing later, I had some brackets made up and everything bolted together.

I'm unsure if the GTR seat rail is different height wise, but the seats do slope down which has changed the driving position abit

One feature I really like is the reclining lever that's neatly camouflaged into the harness cut outs. 

The suede centres make the seats pop alot more than the all leather equivalent 

Its abit snug inside, the side bolster does currently touch the doorcard. I'm hoping I can modify the mounts I made to bring it over abit.

[PranK]

Damn! Those seats look amazing!

[hoodedreeper]

After 24hrs the seats had marked the doorcards quite badly, so I had to sort them out ASAP. I removed the doorcard to have a look, hoping I could modify and retrim the arm rest. But upon a closer look the whole door card would need re-doing and I didn't really fancy all that work. So I adapted the rail mounts instead.

I started with the driver side by drilling another hole next to the first one, the seat was still hard pushed against the doorcard. To explain it briefly it required alot more moving over than I first thought. The bracket on the rails was fouling the bottom of the seat so those had to be cut off. The belt buckles were too short to be bolted to the rear inner rail mounting hole so additional brackets had to be made. Then it was a headache trying to hold the seat up to get said bolts in while holding the seat up to line it all up while making sure the belt buckle didnt fall down.

*sigh* 

But I finally got it all sorted and theres still room between the seat and the centre console.

With the seats in I have to admit it was abit of a struggle getting out without brushing against the steering wheel. I decided to go with a quick release steering wheel, but it had to be a slim version. A friend had a Vac Motorsport race quick release for sale which would do the job nicely. The centre of the quick release boss looked too small for a horn button, so he included some Fast and Furious-esque NOS buttons to use as horn buttons.

The Nardi deep corn wheel has served me well in pretty much all of my cars, but it was time for it to retire in favour of a smaller, more modern equivalent. I decided on the Sparco L360 in leather, mainly for its 330mm size and it's flat bottom. 

Of course,this wasn't going to be an easy job, not with my current luck lol

I wanted to mount the horn bracket inbetween the HKB boss and the first half of the quick release. This was to make the wiring neater and hidden. The first half uses a Nardi bolt pattern (whats the problem with that you ask?)

Well...the horn button bracket uses a Momo bolt pattern. Even redrilling the bracket would make it lean over to one side and not be central. So the only way was to mount it between the second half and the steering wheel. Luckily theres a gap between the two brackets, the wires were heat shrunk and taped to neaten it all up.

Once it was all mounted together, I lined up the supplied horn button from Sparco and it fits Just my luck lol

[hoodedreeper]

Today marks 1 year since I purchased the car, time flies when you're having fun 'ey! I've made some before and after photos