The road to competition in my top mount turbo'd s14a

[dandadude]

Hi, I'm Dan, 26 from Newton Abbot down in Devon. Owned my car for over 5 years now so thought might as well show a few people what i've done over that time and my plans for the future!

Sorry in advance this is quite a long post, started typing around 9pm and it's now 1am then had to cut down as post was too long ha ha. Will carry on updating as i get the pics uploaded.

I was lucky enough to have been around jap cars from quite a young age as my dad imported a few whilst running his normal garage, unfortunately before I was old enough to drive he sold the garage and my parents moved away, I started renting and was then pretty skint from 18 onwards, thats a story for another day though. Once I had been in a couple supra's and skyline's especially as a teenager, I was hooked and I was always going to end up with something jap!

So I got to about 21 when insurance was affordable - ish and started looking for something, was torn between glanza's and s body's as they were quite similar in price at the time but as I couldn't skid the glanza and could only afford one, s body it would be! Was looking online for months as you do and along came a nice looking s14a not that far from me, so off I went to look at it. Drove up and met a nice bloke from Burnham on sea only a couple hrs from where I live and I new I was going to buy it after being there for about 2 mins as I could see this car had been well looked after, loads of stamps in the book up to 90k and the guy I bought it off seemed to have kept everything up to scratch and owned it for about 6-7 years.

27-04-13 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr[/URL]

30-04-13 05 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

30-04-13 04 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

Here it is when I got it home, was on 116k if I remember rightly and fairly clean all over. At this point it just had a few bolt on mods and the body work and interior all stock, even came with the original optional extra sony stereo with cd changer in the boot! Mods were:

Blitz Air filter
full custom exhaust with de-cat and hdev manifold
apex coliovers
Competition clutch
lightweight prop
subframe locking collars
18" Dare alloys
Front and rear strut braces
Blitz boost gauge

At this point I was driving the car as my daily doing a 45 mile round trip and was loving it. Started to do a few small things, fitted an aftermarket re-circ valve, fitted a ball and spring dawes device and upped the boost to about 0.8 to 0.9 bar. Was fairly happy with the performance at this point and after meeting a couple of other 200sx owners thought I would have a go at drifting.

ResizedImage_13883415816281 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

ResizedImage_13701978574581 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

These pics are my first ever attempt at drifting at Westonzoyland which is fairly local to me. The car was as above and still with the stock lsd and no lock mods or anything. After a few goes I noticed the diff was unlocking a lot and I was actually struggling to get the hang of it more than I thought. After another event (and driving my mates s13 with a welded diff fitted which felt much better and easier to control) I decided that's what I needed. Managed to get a s13 manual diff and welded that up. Gave me a slightly better ratio as went from a 3.7 to 3.9.

Rich's s13 diff 1 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

Rich's s13 diff welded by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

So I done another few drift days and then added some small rack washers and ground down the lock stops a bit.

IMG00056-20140412-1751 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']

This was now noticeably better and I actually started to enjoy drifting the car. Probably a year later I done a couple more drift days and thought the lock and amount of turns of the wheel were holding me back as I was throwing the steering wheel around like crazy every time I transitioned! So bought a fairly old set (which I am still using now) of modded knuckles, basically stock knuckles that had psm adaptors welded on, got these cleaned up and painted and away I went! Chucked on a nice omp steering wheel and steering was lots nicer

DSC_0004 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']DSC_0004 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr[/URL]

DSC_0006 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']DSC_0006 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr[/URL]

DSC_0008 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']DSC_0008 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr[/URL]

DSC_0009 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr']DSC_0009 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr[/URL]

Post was too long I will add more!

 

[dandadude]

What a difference, anyone who has read this far and is just starting out take note that once you have the basics down upgrading the knuckles is a night and day difference! Much quicker steering and easier to transition as the ackerman change stops the wheels from dragging and slowing you down! This seemed to make the car 'click' for me. Probably one of my fav times owning the car as was still driving it to work and back but as I was only running the hubs on the first of the 2 settings on the hub I could use the stock length rack ends etc and the car was pretty well planted and still usable day to day.

So I started doing a few more events, drove up to pembrey in south wales to the go kart drift track day. Had a few light taps on track to the front end, this led to me replacing a few more parts such as poly bushing the front tension rods, fitting smoked sidelights and replacing the gearbox mount with a db power one - still running all these bits on the car now lol!

10390450_10152432222856460_4687312750536324170_n by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

This picture above is with my mate Rich who I actually met off this forum! His car is all caged up now but unfortunately doesn't get the time to use it quite as much as he would like. I'm hoping to get him back into it again soon though as he's a very good driver

On my drive home I noticed the car was starting to whistle on the motorway and found the standard side mount intercooler was leaking, so I decided I wanted to do a high mount set up to keep it from getting damaged! This took much longer than I expected by the time I cut out all the front panel to fit the intercooler etc. Probably took me a good 2-3 months to get it how I wanted as I kept having to put it back together with a very crude link pipe whilst I was still driving the car steadily every day!

IMG00095-20140830-1220 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG00094-20140830-0957 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG00096-20140906-1120 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG00099-20140906-1611 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

After this I quite soon fitted a japspeed radiator, went to 555 injectors and an hdev 2a mapped ecu. Was pretty impressed with how much more agressive the power came on with the new set up, I was running about 1.1 bar now just to keep it safe as again this was still my daily.

IMG00132-20141231-0902 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG00133-20141231-1201 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0263 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Nismo 555 injectors fitted

14-05-16 1 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Bit more time went on and decided I needed a daily tow truck, I had done my trailer license at a previous job so off I went looking for 4x4's. Found a half decent Nissan Terrano close to home and went for it. Was a bit of come down from driving the 200 every day but if I wanted to do more bigger events it had to be done. First event I trailered my car to was a pembrey weekender, here is a video, great fun, quite tight little track:


I decided when I got back I needed a bit more lock/aggresive steering so made a basic jig and cut and extended my lower arms 25mm, added offset rack spacers to stop any bind and moved the track rod end mounting into the second hole on the knuckles which was for faster turning/more lock.

DSC_0393 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0395 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0402 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0406 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0408 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0415 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0421 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

You can see in this photo I then had to shave down a part of the knuckle if not the track rod end with bind against it! I also had to grind down the inner arch lip to make room for the extra lock available. I also bought some enkei wheels which made the car look much better too!

DSC_0418 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0422 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Me and a few mates then booked up the Anglesey weekender, a good 6-7hr drive up from Devon but worth it for the epic track time!

DSC_0486 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

All was going well until mid morning first day on the small track and I managed to hit the great big tyres placed on the edge of the track 2/3 times, by lunch time the car was looking a bit sorry for itself. Wasn't too impressed by these as it basically ruined my drivers door and both my rear quarters. Other than the superficial damage and melting a spark plug (fuel pump was dieing) the weekend was still awesome!

14976322_936439486462851_7238914347992908616_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

15129405_948493015257498_4718235939172792982_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

15193549_954602774646522_486115057103960060_n by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

 

[dandadude]

DSC_0490 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0491 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Starting to repair the rear quarter:

DSC_0502 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0505 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Sorted myself a new door and did most of the prep work myself then got someone to paint it!

DSC_0518 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0526 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0558 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0563 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0646 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0648 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

DSC_0650 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

After getting the car back together I didn't do much for a couple months as had enough of working on it! Next drifting I did was 1 day of the rockingham matsuri on the sunday. That same weekend driftcup was on and the night battles saturday evening which was good to watch! The sunday was wet but good fun, the infield is quite hard to link in the dry especially with under 300hp so I didn't mind too much.

17218776_1398358366892491_7350917104114919895_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

17310927_1357650014293621_4568848369770808997_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

This photo is with my mate Dave Foot in his stage 3a s14

IMG_20170317_135547 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Watching the night battles etc was cool and seeing the driftcup cars it made me want to get a bit more serious with my car and get it up to spec for some basic competition. Went ahead and bought another shell with a cage in, some people off here will know the car as it was an ex-bdc car with a 1j and rear rad etc, part of the genetic drifter crew. Was pretty much just a rolling chassis when I got it but all I wanted it for was the cage and dash etc really.

 

[dandadude]

Stripped it all out to put in mine as the shell had seen quite a lot of use. Then Spent the longest amount of time I have ever spent doing one job on my car, stripping the interior, welding in all the cage plates up to bdc spec, cutting and welding the door bars so they unbolt if I ever have to take the cage out again. Then finally painting and fitting it. I think it paid off though and other than cracking the windscreen and somehow stopped the rev counter from working when removing/re-fitting it is all good.

Here is the other shell/cage:

IMG_20170524_185324 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170620_212949 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Knocking out the sound deadning from mine!

IMG_20170624_133529 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Getting the cage in to check the fit, for probably the 5th or 6th time. Think by the end I could get it in and out in about half hour if everything was loose! Luckily a friend of mine said I could use his workshop and as I am pretty handy with the welder i could crack on and get all that done fairly quickly.

IMG_20170624_181843 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170625_115933 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170626_133926 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170627_134025 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170701_145233 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Starting to tack the door bars in place:

IMG_20170708_125338 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170708_132416 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170708_140912 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Painting it in my back garden!

IMG_20170812_165202 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Post is too long too finish so will update over the next couple days with what I have been doing more recently!

Cheers for taking the time to read, any questions or comments welcome! Over the next few days I will update what i have been up to for the rest of 2017 and this year so far!

Cheers Dan

 

[Jackula]

Very,very well put together build thread so far!
You’ve literally done all the things I want to do to the 33 lol
Love the cage man, massive difference!
Keep the updates coming man,I’ll be following this

 

[dandadude]

Very,very well put together build thread so far!
You’ve literally done all the things I want to do to the 33 lol
Love the cage man, massive difference!
Keep the updates coming man,I’ll be following this

Thanks, ye the cage took soo long to do, won't be doing that job to another car in a hurry ha ha! Ye will update soon.

Saw your is200 thread, good idea having a practice car before going all in with your r33 especially if it's clean. Put some pics up of the skyline in that thread would be cool

 

[Jackula]

Thanks, ye the cage took soo long to do, won't be doing that job to another car in a hurry ha ha! Ye will update soon.

Saw your is200 thread, good idea having a practice car before going all in with your r33 especially if it's clean. Put some pics up of the skyline in that thread would be cool

I bet it did, that’s the route I’m going to have to take one day but for now I’m saving myself and my bank manager a heart attack lol

Cheers man, it’s a good base to start practising and that’s what I intend to do! I will through a few photos of the 33 in later with an IS200 update.
Good luck mate

 

[dandadude]

So ye went to another rockingham infield day a few months later, this time drove up and back in one day which I don't think I will do again as absolutely knackered when I got back. Didn't stay for the whole day as was a bit worried about time getting home as had work the next day, here is a couple pics and a short video, it was very hot and dry and I definitely struggled more than I did the time before when it was wet, you can hear the engine is straining/loaded up pretty hard when i'm transitioning, looking back I should have stuck much more psi in the rear tyres!

IMG_20170828_125047 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Youtube photo 200sx rockingham by Daniel Collins, on Flickr


This was around August last year i think and there was a few things I wanted to change on the car before this year. Firstly I wanted to go to external wastegate as I had been finding even with an uprated actuator the actuator would creep under load and not have the same boost run after run, I wanted to hopefully run a similar size turbo due to the map on the car. I also wanted to sort out an oil cooler as noticed my oil temps were getting quite hot and had to do a few cool down runs between every couple drift laps, lastly i wanted to sort some sort of body kit out ideally a different set of skirts to start as I was not entirely happy with how the car looked.

I then went on the hunt for turbo and manifold options. Managed to find a cast top mount manifold for a good price, it was a log type which I wasn't original looking for but decided to go for it so I wouldn't have to worry about cracking them, i had already welded up my stainless hdev manifold once before! Around the same time I bought a second hand pe1420 turbo off a guy on here. I had checked the specs and from what I could find online etc the turbo could flow just a bit more than a t28r but with just as good if not better spool, i was hoping this combined with the short running manifold would give me a pretty responsive set up.

Once I got the manifold through i realised it was a T3 and the pe1420 turbo was T2, luckily I don't mind a bit of fabrication, I spend quite a bit of time at work welding shock mounts and rear chassis on landy's and 4x4's etc so decided after checking clearance from clocking the turbo that cutting off the old flange and welding on a T3 flange would be the best option. I wanted to weld up the wastegate actuator at the same time too.

Here I've marked up the flange and also decided to chop the actuator arm off whilst i'm at it as I was worried it would be close to the rocker cover.

IMG_20170810_170804 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Here it is ater the grinder met the turbo and then the new T3 mild steel flange

IMG_20170810_172457 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170810_172505 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Tacking the flange on using the manifold to hold it in place

IMG_20170810_183318 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170810_183340 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Then welded it and quickly peened it as cast can crack very easy, I got the correct amount of heat and cool down time and luckily it was all ok no cracks

IMG_20170816_134328 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170816_134335 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170816_135418 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170816_135428 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

 

[GlenF95]

Looks sweet so far, will have to have a word with you about steering lock when I see you. Look forward to more updates to see how its getting on now

 

[dandadude]

Looks sweet so far, will have to have a word with you about steering lock when I see you. Look forward to more updates to see how its getting on now

Cheers mate, was good to chat to you on facebook, send me a message any time I will help out as much as I can


Here's a pic of the old manifold/turbo removed and then the broken or knackered studs replaced where needed:

IMG_20170907_184823 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Manifold and external gate fitted:

IMG_20170908_184044 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

My HEL oil cooler turned up with an extra length of hose incase I changed where I mount it in the future:

IMG_20170909_094556 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Mocking up and clocking the intake housing, it is a very tight fit with the bend that comes past the p/s reservoir! New Oil lines showed here too.

IMG_20170909_115859 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170909_115859 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

At the same time decided to ditch the abs pump and replace with copper brake pipe, easy job to be fair, I had been driving it with the fuse pulled for about a year now anyway so was good to free up the extra space especially as i was going to need to modify the exhaust downpipe for the top mount.

IMG_20170909_152200 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170910_171403 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

So here was the stock elbow, cut the flange off and flipped it. I then made the downpipe with what I had hanging around, some 70mm tube.

IMG_20170914_133225 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170914_134025 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170920_131722 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170920_131734 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170921_131815 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

I was in a bit of a rush as wanted to take a friend out in the car who was coming back from Australia for a couple weeks and I hadn't seen him for about 6 years! I do remake the lower half of the downpipe in the future but will come to that in a bit.

 

[dandadude]

So had to cut and spin the screamer pipe as it wouldn't fit, started out like this, my stock t28 is in the background.

IMG_20170922_185513 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170922_185945 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20170926_183138 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Then had a go with a mates TIG, had only done a small amount before but came out ok, I am mainly a MIG man though.

IMG_20170926_184127 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

And this is how it all looked after getting it back together for the first time, oil cooler wasn't fitted yet:

IMG_20170926_190121 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

So managed to get it all up and running and checked for any leaks etc, first time I drove it up the road I was surprised how punchy the boost was and how loud the screamer is! All you can hear when you come on boost. I loved it though, and managed to take my mate out before he went back to Aus!

At this point i still had the 0.8bar external wastegate spring with the dawes valve fitted to up the boost to just over a bar. I drove around a small amount and done a local drift day, Westonzoyland, which I hadn't been back to for about 2/3 years since I started drifting. Here's a little on board video from my mate Ryan's car drifting with me:


I was finding the boost wasn't quite holding as strong as i was hoping until it was loaded up, swapped the wastegate spring from the 0.8bar it came with to an uprated 1bar then upped it to 1.1bar with the dawes valve. Now it was boosting how I wanted! Power felt good, came on boost and held it there with only a slight fluctuation as the vvt kicked in but that is as expected. Either way the car pulls well considering it's probably only around 280/290hp.

At this point I was still running the 3.9 s13 diff i welded ages ago and the s14 shafts the car came with. A couple other guys were talking about changing to skyline set ups with a 4.1 as they were running around 350hp plus and they had both either broken or had a shaft become slack/noisy. I am not expecting to run that power for a while but did fancy having the gears closer together. Searched around for a bit and ended up buying a 4.3 ratio auto skyline diff, then bought some matching 5x1 shafts and solid front diff bushes from JDM garage. Sold my old diff/shaft set up to a mate with a r32 4 door who's welds had broke up inside his diff.

Drove the car with the new diff, was like I had gained 25/30hp. Car had instant power, would probably only top out around 135/140mph now but never going to get to that on track so who cares! If i'm honest after going in my mates who have the 4.1 manual I would say mine is actually a little too high ratio but for the power that I have it works well so will be keeping it how it is for the moment.
Around the same time I also poly bushed the rear subframe and lower arms. Used some bushes and some superpro ones. Started doing this on my drive in the snow! You can see the skyline diff in these pics and my hardrace toe and camber arms.

IMG_20180317_165744 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180304_154853 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180304_163529 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180315_223441 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180304_150614 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180317_124344 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180317_124412 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Whilst I was under the car decided this was a good time to upgrade the rest of the exhaust, the previous owner had a custom exhaust made but was only in 2 1/4" system which was fine when it was running lower boost on the stock ecu but I thought it could do with being able to breath a bit better now. Bought a used hks backbox off a mate, 3" resonator and some 3" tube and went about pulling the exhaust off and working out where i wanted the v bands. Didn't take me too long, probably a week of evenings and then tacking it at home and welding it fully at work on my lunch breaks.

Here is the old non mandrel bent powerflow or similar generic exhaust:

IMG_20171125_160738 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

New one with v-bands:

IMG_20171121_132719 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171124_131350 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171125_154945 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180319_181504 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180319_181411 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

 

[Bu11et]

Loving the way this is going mate!! What are your plans re competition? Driftcup next year?

 

[dandadude]

Loving the way this is going mate!! What are your plans re competition? Driftcup next year?

Thanks, I am just getting to that ha ha. Still catching up but ye driftcup is the aim

I then decided I really wanted some different skirts as the look of the car has never quite been how I wanted since I've owned it. Found some red genuine chargespeed skirts that seemed ok. Rubbed them down and gave them a spray myself. Did use a gun but I am no sprayer so used solvent basecoat and lacquer. I was happy enough with the results other than a bloody fly walking all over one skirt and getting stuck in it lol.

IMG_20171208_132232 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171209_160157 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171209_162235 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171209_180844 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171209_180853 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Got them on, had my 3 spokes on for the first pic as was getting my enkei's painted as a mate scraped up one of my rear wheels when he bumped into me at a smeatharpe practice day:

IMG_20171221_130045 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Wheels painted and tyres re-fitted:

IMG_20180106_100441 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180109_131604 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180109_133022 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180110_135041 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180114_131533 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180114_131554 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180204_165908 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Got it aligned at my work, pulled the spats off and sold them as I was looking at other rear bumpers too!

IMG_20180324_121339 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

A picture of my cracked windscreen but also shows the dash I fitted from the other shell I bought.

IMG_20180402_132241 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Fitted a rear jacking bar as now the exhaust is bigger and closer to the diff which made it awkward to get a jack under it:

IMG_20180502_184458 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

This brings me up to about Feb/March time this year. More to come though!

 

[dandadude]

You can see in the last pic where I had been laying our new block paving in the drive, still had the edges to cut which is an absolute pain and pretty messy cutting every individual block with a disc cutter!

Anyways back on topic, I had tried to get a driftcup round by round ticket and/or a full season ticket at the start of the year with no luck, they literally sell out in a couple seconds as there are only very few available.

I then put my name forward onto the reserve list as soon as I could hoping to hear back at some point, I messaged the organiser throughout the year and he told me after the first 2 rounds I was close to getting a spot as people move up to bdc and others don't come back etc etc. I decided to book a rockingham outer paddock practice day as never done one and this would be where the next round would be held, I had only previously done the infield.

Checked the car over and changed the intake pipe between the filter and turbo and also the top radiator hose, I had also fitted the oil cooler already by now, didn't want it somewhere it was going to get hit but also wanted it in as best air flow as possible! I decided to cut up the passenger front inner wing area and slotted it down through, it has decent air flow here but would need quite a big hit to do any damage so happy with that for the minute!

IMG_20180417_134858 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20171218_132533 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

I managed to book the outer paddock day the same time as my mates stag do in oxford but luckily his do was on the Saturday and Sunday and the drifting was the Monday, asked him and he said i could leave the car on the trailer at his then go from oxford to rockingham after our night out! As it's a couple hrs closer than coming from Devon it all worked out ok.

IMG_20180507_081007 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

So got there on the bank holiday Monday, was on my own and didn't know anyone, was pretty chilled day but was going out mainly doing single runs. In the afternoon I managed to get some decent twinning with a nice bloke called Axel, who drives a lush rb s14 and is on the Driven oils stand, he is chasing me in the video below. I was happy with my car now, too. Drove well, super happy with the polybushed rear end, top mount set up and now the cooler oil temps!

IMG_20180507_104612 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

31956620_2015999928727377_87325008774299648_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

31961406_2016004088726961_5825697943851630592_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

31598583_435414900215192_2413386357490581504_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Really like this picture above, the sideskirts definitely look better than the stock touring ones imo. Sorry for the camera being a bit low, first time I had stuck it on my helmet but you get the idea!


As you can hear I definitely know when the car is hitting full boost as the screamer is loud! I love it though.

 

[Bu11et]

Looks ace mate! Im hoping to do Driftcup next year so hopefully will see you about, maybe even a battle or 2

 

[dandadude]

Looks ace mate! Im hoping to do Driftcup next year so hopefully will see you about, maybe even a battle or 2

Thanks, i am pretty happy with the set up now! Ye driftcup are a good crowd, if you see me at any drift days just literally come say hello! Just seen your build thread too, you have a lot of seat time under your belt and as you had a go at driftcup a few years ago you should do well! Good commitment to that s13 as well lol.

I forgot to mention but somewhere around the end of last year i also swapped the offset rack spacers for an actual modified front subframe, the offset rack spacers seemed to twist the rack a bit, you could see it when doing side to side with the wheel/tyre if you have the front lifted off the ground. For the money though the spacers are a good bang for buck mod and I didn't have any problems with them coming loose or anything like some others.

I also replaced the engine mounts with a pair of cusco poly bushed ones. A warning to anyone who buys these, they are very stiff, great that the engine hardly moves and driveline movement is helped too but the dash does try to nearly jump out the car every time you start it

Back to drifting, I was lucky enough to the be offered a place at round 3 of driftcup at rockingham. This was good timing as my mate was back from Australia so he came up for the journey too. Got there the night before and met a few people for a burger at spoons, got to track and unloaded the car, had the briefing etc. Only problem was the track layout was different to the one I done the month before and I only had 3 hrs to get it right! I tried my best to learn it but by the time I came to qualifying I still didn't have the entry to the first corner nailed.

First qualifying run thought to myself I have to go for it! I went in too hot just washed out wide and spun, ahhhh no! I was now really nervous for my second run, couldn't spin again so went in a bit more tentative but this meant I was shallow to the first two clips which was the main scoring criteria. Ended up in 40th out of however many so that was the end of my day. Did stay and watch for a bit and was great to see the battles in person.

Here is a video of my qualifying run:


Got back from rd3 a bit annoyed at myself for firstly letting my nerves get to me and secondly not being able to learn the track in the practice time. I also had my eyes opened to just how good the level of driving! I was pleased I went and most of the people I met were friendly and helpful. I was keen to have another go.

Got offered a rd4 place so jumped at the chance! This time it was at Teesside Autodrome a track I had never been to. Luckily I didn't do any damage to the car at rd3 so just had to change tyres, do a general check over and standard oil/filter change that I do every couple drift days to keep the old sr going! I have been driving the car with the same engine/gearbox as when i bought it so a bit of preventative maintenance seems to be going a long way.

My mate Dave with the green s14 a few posts up also got a place and this would be his first go. We booked in for the practice day on the saturday to try and get the track somewhat dialed. Drove up friday which took us about 8 hrs with traffic, stops for food/fuel. Stayed over nearby ready for an early start saturday. Got there and had our briefing etc and it was a very chilled atmosphere, you would have no idea there was going to be a comp the next day, everyone was taking there time and enjoying it.

Weather was hot, i don't currently have a fan cowling due to my high mount intercooler set up which meant I moved the rad back closer to the engine etc. I wired in an electric fan on a switch before I left so when i'm sat in the que and after I finished a run I could flick it on, never really had any overheating problems since I fitted the oil cooler but did notice that with the lack of run off after doing 2/3 laps in a row at rd3 of rockingham the temps did go up a little, it was a very hot day and it was pretty dry/dusty at rockingham so probably just me being picky but I would rather be safe than sorry. The extra fan worked spot on, temps kept fine throughout the weekend at Teesside.

All was going well for me and Dave until after lunch on the saturday practice, Dave went out on some fresh part worns and he did say to me before we left "keep a bit of distance". I forgot that the second we got on the start line and followed him in pretty hot into the first corner, for anyone that doesn't know it's a big cambered corner that you enter about 70/80mph, I threw the car in about a car length behind him and halfway around the corner Dave spun, we were cracking on at a decent pace in 3rd gear still so as much as I tried to avoid him with his car staring at me nose on I hit him with my passenger rear quarter. Was a bit of a bang, looked over and gave him the thumbs up hoping he was all ok and other than lots of fibreglass and bits of Daves bodywork I thought all was good, that was until I looked into my passenger mirror and could see my rear wheel was poking the wrong direction, ahhhh not good!

Back in the pits and after both having a few mins to take in what we had just done we cracked on, Dave bent his bonnet straight and fixed up as much of his body work as he could, no mechanical damage for him though. I then set to work looking at my rear wheel, I could see straight away the rear traction arm was bent and after looking a bit harder the actual hub itself was bent in at the toe arm mount, luckily someone in the pits had a spare arm and using the adjustment on my hardrace toe and camber arms I got the wheel looking as straight as I could. It also dented the quarter in front of the wheel but left it until the end of the day to push it out incase something similar happened again.

Before:

2018-08-10_07-34-43 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

After:

2018-08-10_07-35-47 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

And Dave's car after he straightened it out best he could, he also is the best bumper cable tie repair man in the business

2018-08-10_07-37-05 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Couple runs later and the cars are still going, think I had dirt dropped a bit as the side of the car is covered in dust ha ha:

2018-08-10_07-38-18 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

So we went out for the last couple hours and to be honest the car felt it had a bit of a wobble when first initiating but actually felt better than I thought so I was happy enough. Dave said his was ok other than a slight rattle that was his air filter bracket had broken from our collision. Done a few more runs and called it a day. Went back to the hotel and sat in the swimming pool to chill out and mull over the days events!

So onto Sunday, had another briefing, practised for a few hrs which honestly didn't feel like long. Me and Dave were in the que for one last run but they turned everyone around about 11:55 ready to set everything up for qualifying so back we went ready to que up for our qualifying runs!

Here is a video of my 2nd qualifying run which managed to get me the last qualifier in 32nd place:


Unfortunately my mate Dave got 34th spot but for his first comp he done bloody well! The level of driving again was super high. I was now soo excited that I had qualified, went to que back up for our runs which seemed like ages, I was also a bit nervous but also felt I had nothing to loose as I was battling no.1 qualifier Danny Whyman who is currently 3rd in the championship so expected him to show me how it was done (he did!).

Done my best chasing but his car pulls very well and I let off for probably have a second as I initiated and that was it, Danny was gone, tried to catch him but there was over a car lengths gap, I then kept to the qualifying line as best I could to score as high as I could. We went back to the start line for me to lead this time, I pinned it as fast as I could, threw the car in and halfway through the first corner I felt a decent bump, he was on my door! As we slowed down for the second corner he bumped me a few more times, I was absolutely loving it and even though he obviously had the win I was just happy to have had an awesome battle and was super pumped at the end of it.

Here's the footage, check out my drivers side wing mirror when i'm leading, you can see Danny is on me!


So after that battle I had a few more battle scars, some paint removed from my wheel and a dent on the drivers rear quarter, more things to repair over the next few months!

IMG_20180716_154022 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180716_153821 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

 

[Bu11et]

Thanks, i am pretty happy with the set up now! Ye driftcup are a good crowd, if you see me at any drift days just literally come say hello! Just seen your build thread too, you have a lot of seat time under your belt and as you had a go at driftcup a few years ago you should do well! Good commitment to that s13 as well lol.

We'll see man, things have changed a lot since 2014 haha! and I also haven't drifted in over a year and the car is a completely different animal!


Loving the updates though dude, keep up with it!

 

[dandadude]

We'll see man, things have changed a lot since 2014 haha! and I also haven't drifted in over a year and the car is a completely different animal!


Loving the updates though dude, keep up with it!

Thanks mate, be cool to see yours at some practice days when it's done, I have subscribed to your youtube channel. Don't worry about it being a year it will all come back to you in no time once your back in the car

Update: I left the car strapped down on the trailer after driftcup round 4 as I was taking it to our local Dakota drag and drift day, it's only about 45mins away and i've been there loads of times. I pushed out as much of the rear quarters as I could with a rubber mallet before the weekend but otherwise car was still the same as Teesside and the rear knuckle still bent lol.

Track is always the same, cones spaced out on a pretty rough concrete surface but it's fast enough to get 3rd gear in a few places and there is no major obstacles to damage the car, winner! This is good though as we are allowed out 4 at a time which means we can get a bit of twinning practice in.

Short video following my mate Dave and our other mate in his e36

2018-08-23_10-49-05 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

37843728_1429729550460643_865915838379589632_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

37815648_1429756283791303_3123008009551216640_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

37845975_1429755727124692_5175370136378408960_o by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Think i've got a few more video's but haven't really had time to look through all my footage.

 

[dandadude]

Now I had a bit of time on my hands first things first was to swap out my bent rear knuckle with my spare ones. I had spent my lunch times burning out the stock bushes and then fitted more poly bushes. Bolted them onto the car and also swapped out the bush from the bent traction arm into the one that was now on the car.

You can see how the toe arm mount is bent in this pic below especially if you look at the angle of the stock bush/mount against the angle of the arm, I'm quite amazed it bent the hub and then the toe arm seems to be in perfectly ok condition and didn't bend at all?!

IMG_20180904_193005 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180904_203013 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180906_133154 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180906_134039 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Looks a bit better:

IMG_20180911_151410 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Finally got the ms-style rear bumper sprayed and fitted too:

IMG_20180922_111858 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180823_214858_494 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

You can see I've started to repair the driver side rear quarter from my collision with Danny, think I am probably going to go for over-fenders very soon as the passenger side arch near the side skirt is going to be hard to pull out enough to get a decent shape.

 

[dandadude]

Have been busy over the past few weeks, bought myself another truck, a Toyota Landcruiser Amazon. Should be good for the long distance towing next year especially if I do a full season of driftcup which I am hoping for! Done my first bit of towing with it by delivering the spare shell I had to it's new owner. Truck pulls like a train so had no problems there.

IMG_20181014_120633 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Decided I wanted to make a more substantial bumper bar so if I do take a hit it will bend the bar before doing too much damage to the body. Started off by cutting the bottom of the rear quarters off and tacking in new plates to keep the strength in the panel and give me a solid backing when I fit the over fenders in the future.

IMG_20180823_174633 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180824_172453 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180824_174319 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180828_135732 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180928_120337 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180928_120610 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180928_131254 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

All tacked in:

IMG_20180928_152901 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180928_152922 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

All sealed up:

IMG_20180928_154938 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180929_110947 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

IMG_20180929_115856 by Daniel Collins, on Flickr

Next I will be starting to make and bend the new tube frame to support the bumper and hopefully save the rear end if I take a shunt.