Yeah, it's made so all the bracing fits. I would have been just as happy with less "detail" and mandrel bends but the fabricator is known for his skill at pie-cuts and wanted to show off a bit.

He is also considering copying mine but with mandrel bends if anyone local wants a duplicate. It's not cheap but it will be comparable in price with a FM or BEGI exhaust even WITH the v-bands.

Mine? I am sure he lost money on. Way too much labor that I didn't pay for... lol.

 

I was about to say, that many pie cuts probably took 2 days to weld

 

70 welds...

 

Spend no time on it, run as is, it will get filthified anyway.

Looks good.

 

It looks a lot better in person even than in pictures. One thing that blew my mind was the part that went alongside the differential and connected to the muffler. I can't imagine how it could be any smoother with such a big muffler.



And with that, I'm done showing off. My exhaust at least

 

Finished installing Poly bushings and zerks. Now I just need to fit them on the car.

 

Put some new coilovers on the rear. Any idea what these are and if they are any good?


lol!

(XIDA 800/500)
I hope to have the fronts installed in the next couple days.

 

looks like raceland to me



Ultimos?

 

Hit some major snags today guys. Sorry about the wall of text. If I knew how the day was going to go I should have taken pictures just to document this **** show.

For sticking with it, here is a pic of my exhaust hooked up to the motor:



A couple people here know that I was having some problems with a leaking coolant re-route. The motor was pulled and I removed it and chased the threads and prepped it to be reinstalled. Just last Friday I was able to pull the motor out and put the re-route block back on.

While the motor was out on Friday I started cleaning up the engine bay so I wouldn't have to install the motor in a engine bay covered in crap. While I was doing this, my friend (the owner of the shop I am doing this work in) says, if you have a leak, why not fix it while the engine is out of the car?

Just to catch up, I had been having some problems with my oil return line leaking because I didn't know how to properly tap a pipe thread fitting... Anyhow.

So after hemming and hawing over it for twenty minutes or so, the decision was made to pull the oil pan and weld the fitting so I don't have that problem anymore. Unfortunately Mike (shop owner) was not able to be there on Saturday so the work had to be done today. On Saturday I picked up these:


A set of Tire Rack C3s used with 225/45-15 RS3s that have a good bit of life left on them. Used, in fair condition for a fair price.

Back to the story. So we weren't able to start working on the motor today until about 1pm. I had the motor apart from the trans and the flywheel off the motor by 1:50pm or so. I will skip some details and say that with a small amount of work with a tig welder we were able to fix the oil return problem. It's not as pretty as I'd like but we were strapped for time.

Where the problem was found, was the clutch. I have some bad driving habits and my ceramic sprung 949 sport clutch was very close to the rivets, so we need to replace the clutch.

Where this becomes an issue is I need this car together and RUNNING by March 8th because the car is going to the Indy dyno day, which I already paid a lot of money for.
I was hoping to have the motor at least sitting in the car by the end of the day today. By 6pm (had to leave because got called into work) the oil pan was done but now I am waiting on clutch before I can move any further.

Time is slipping away on me...

 

Overnight is your friend. Get it running Wed night.

Sorry man

 

Can't. Shop is only open till 8pm if I am lucky. Going to try to set my work hours to be there by 4pm at the latest every day.

Shopping clutch choices as we speak. I liked my sprung ceramic supermiata but I may go with a different option.

Thoughts? Torque is less than 250lbs at the moment. Are there any bedding incompatibilities that I need to know about like there are with brakes?

EDIT to add: Looks like the supermiata clutches are all out of stock so I am stuck having to buy a whole new system not just friction material.

Leaning towards FM Stage 1. My turbo setup isn't going to support over 300wtq until next year sometime. Solid choice in the interim? (FM Stage 1 ordered)

 

I ordered the FM stage one. Don't forget to adjust it accordingly. You should come to the GPS tracktime event April 4th at Autobahn in Joliet. I just realized I need to hurry up and finish my car and start driving it to break in the clutch before then.

 

I've had my FM stage one for 4 years. I like it. Recommended.

 

Clutch arrived yesterday, but I wasn't able to get it onto the car in the time available. I did get the pressure plate on and torqued properly.



Also here is a picture of my new 15x9 wheels with RS3 225/45-15's. The original wheels are stock 16x6.5 with 205/45-16 BFG Comp-2 tires.

 

can't go wrong with FM1, and I take it you got those TR's we discussed

 

Correct. We will see how it works out. I would have had to buy new front tires anyhow as they were nearly bald and I can always sell the wheels when my 6uls arrive. We will see how I feel in May or so

Next step is install the clutch and get the motor and trans back in the car. I hope to have the engine ready for install tonight.

 

Quick update, no pics (yet). Clutch is installed and transmission is bolted to motor. Tonight I will be fixing a couple wiring things that are ticking me off (just ugly) and cleaning the engine bay best I can with a spray bottle of simple green and some brushes. Motor should be installed tomorrow.

 

Sweet! You'll be shattering transmission gears this week!

 

Good news...

Motor is in and runs. I couldn't run it for more than a couple seconds though because we had no coolant in the motor. It turns out that when we relocated the turbo oil return line we placed it in a spot that conflicts with the steering rack. I need to replace the straight fitting on the oil pan side with a 45 degree fitting, and that wasn't available on short notice. I am picking up the fitting today which means I can hopefully put on the air conditioning compressor and power steering pump as well as install and fill the radiator.

I also managed to pull the wires out of the coolant sensor plug so I need to find another. I have one on order from partsgroup. Hopefully it will be in by this weekend, otherwise I MAY have an injector harness spare somewhere.


Pictures (and first start video) coming when I have time.

 

Nice!

I like how your tires rotate to give visual confirmation of the engine turning!