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Absolutely. Nice shots! Also, maybe I'm confused here but I thought heating metal expanded it and cooling it made it contract? Maybe that's why the bolt was so tight?
EDIT: I think you meant the dampener, if so then disregard lol
The photography in this thread is background worthy. Nice build.
Thanks. Just trying to do it right the first time.
Originally Posted by DumpdEJ6
Absolutely. Nice shots! Also, maybe I'm confused here but I thought heating metal expanded it and cooling it made it contract? Maybe that's why the bolt was so tight?
EDIT: I think you meant the dampener, if so then disregard lol
Correct. I put the damper in a 170° oven for an hour. I didn't want to get it too hot though and destroy it. It was probably about 100° when I took it out.
I'd really like to find a source for liquid nitrogen for when I need to assemble parts with interference fitment. Heat one part and freeze the other.
Originally Posted by CandyRedRC46
I'm glad I stumbled upon this thread. Very well put together and refreshing.
Pulled out the built head that was in the car, and installed the stock head I had. So I'm pretty much running a stock GSR now.
Took most of the day to finish, fired up the first time. Always good when that happens. I had an extra set of ARP studs, so I used those to bolt the head on.
When I bought the car, the owned told me it had Supertech valve train and S2 cam gears. I was glad to actually see them when I pulled the head, and that I wasn't taken for a ride. I'll post pics after I clean the head up, I'ts an oily mess right now.
I won't lie. I kinda want to turbo the stock engine now...
Spent today working on the interior, installing my radar detector and moving the radio.
Played around for a while with where I wanted to install my Valentine 1 radar detector, wanted something clean and out of the way. Anyone who doesn't know about the V1, it has two sensors, one that reads forward, and the other reads rearwards, so you have to place the unit with a clear view in both directions. Finally decided to place it above the rear view mirror. Install went easy enough, and there's only a small piece of wiring showing (that I don't see from the driver seat). Used a 90° bracket and velcro to mount the unit on, then I sandwiched the bracket between my rear view mirror and the Broadway mirror I have. This detector has the ability to use a "conceal" display so cars behind you can't see the radar lights (sometimes people will follow you because you have a radar and they don't). I installed the conceal display in front of the gauge cluster so it's easy to look at.
I also changed around the radio, installing it lower in the dash. I'm not a big fan of seeing the radio out of the corner of my eye, especially at night. It also just makes things look less cluttered and cleaner. I had a block off plate, so that replaced where the radio was, and I put a cubby under the new radio location. Install wasn't that bad since I had some radio install parts that helped to align the head unit where it should be. Still took a while to get it right. The cubby didn't have mounting holes where I needed, so I used some Gorilla tape to keep it from sagging and falling out. Actually works really well. lol
Radar above the mirror, conceal display behind the steering wheel, and the radio relocated. I think it all came out really clean.
Went and drove the car this morning and had a 1,800 RPM idle after it warmed up. Uh-ho. At first, I thought the head gasket I just installed failed on me, maybe there was air in the cooling system. Went and bled the system again and had bubbles pouring from the bleed port. The car had been idling for a good twenty minutes, and I started to check if there was anything else going on. First thing I did was check the radiator hoses. The top was hot, and the bottom was cold. Figured the thermostat was stuck closed. Changed it out, filled with water, bled the system, let idle until the fan cycled 4 times, checked the top and bottom hose and all was good. Glad I don't have to pull the head again.
Now I'm wondering how long the thermostat was stuck. Never had that problem before I swapped in the stock head. Maybe that's why a small coolant hose burst a few months ago.
While I was bleeding the system I found an injector was leaking. I went ahead and replaced o-rings on all the injectors and fixed the leak.
Went and installed my sub today. I tried to put it under the seat a while back and it didn't fit. This spot is actually really good because the firewall has a large piece of sound deadening in the foot well. Put the floor mat over it and it disappeared. A hidden system is a good system. This little sub does a great job of filling in the lows, music sounds awesome now.
Yes. My car is filthy. I need to give it a good once over, again.
Is your interior otherwise gutted or was your carpet so roached that it warranted removal?
I took the carpet out and pressure washed it. It was growing stuff. It's chillin in the garage at the moment. Need to find the leaks before it goes back in. I'm pretty sure the windshield seal needs replacing, and the rear hatch is leaking.
I actually put the rear plastics back in yesterday. I haven't put the rear seat in yet because of the fuel rail leak, in case I needed to unhook the fuel pump again and relieve pressure.
Started cleaning the head today and found that someone has done some minor porting.
Intake
Exhaust
Not sure if it's a good or bad thing. Looks like they tried to blend the ports before the seats, and knife edge and open the dividers. It doesn't look like they touched the radius, so it shouldn't be that big of a deal. I was thinking about cleaning the casting marks before I found this, now I might just go in and polish the exhaust a bit. I'm going to try and pull the valves this week, get a better look and clean the valves as much as I can.
Looking into buying a Moroso oil pan. Not going with the aluminum one as people have said it leaks. So I've been looking at their 4 qt and 5.5 qt units. Both are baffled units to help keep the pickup wet.
I plan to eventually install an oil cooler and oil filter relocation kit. If I'm already running lines for the cooler, I might as well make oil changes easier on myself. With all the oil plumbing and the cooler it self there will be between a quart or two of oil in the lines.
I know the 4 qt pan will be enough, but does it make sense to use the 5.5 qt pan to have an extra 1.5 qts of clean oil circulating around? With the oil cooler and 5.5 pan, there could be 7 qts of oil in use. Thoughts? The car is destined to be driven on the race track once the engine is in and tuned.
Should I add a bump out and baffles to a stock pan instead?
Took the race head to the machine shop. Talked about goals, the port job that was done, polishing the exhaust. I'm luck to have a great shop to work with. Asked them to be easy on my wallet. They're going to do their thing and make sure everything is good, and then give the head a resurface so it can be bolted down.
Moving forward. Going to be picking up a s300 unit in a few weeks, and I'm trying to source injectors (still not sure on what size to go with). Plan is to learn to tune on the stock engine running E85 before I install the race engine. This way I'll have a base tune and an idea of what I need to do.
Took the race head to the machine shop. Talked about goals, the port job that was done, polishing the exhaust. I'm luck to have a great shop to work with. Asked them to be easy on my wallet. They're going to do their thing and make sure everything is good, and then give the head a resurface so it can be bolted down.
Moving forward. Going to be picking up a s300 unit in a few weeks, and I'm trying to source injectors (still not sure on what size to go with). Plan is to learn to tune on the stock engine running E85 before I install the race engine. This way I'll have a base tune and an idea of what I need to do.
What are your plans?
Are you lapping the valves yourself? Are you going to do any reshaping or polishing?
There's a DSM YouTube channel I've been watching where the guy redoes is whole head. Pretty interesting stuff. Glyptal coating, casting flaw removal, blending, polishing, channeling, lapping, measuring, etc. the channel is: Jafromobile
I want to just clean everything first, get rid of the grime.
Plan to gasket match the intake ports and blend into the throat, maybe hit around the valve guide just a hair. Trying to speed-up airflow before the valves.
I have a new set of bronze valve guides here that will be installed, and will get a valve job at the same time.
Going to open the combustion chamber a hair, and get rid of the rough spots from the factory machining. Should let the engine breath a bit easier. I'll see if I can get a good polish also, to keep the chamber clean. I wasn't going to do this, but I'm trying to lower the compression some since this head has been decked (a couple times) already. Was doing the math and I was getting 13.8:1. Aiming for closer to 13:1 to have a larger margin for error when tuning.
Exhaust will be gasket matched, and polished a bit to increase flow. Won't take too much off the walls so there's a low pressure area after the valves, should help to get exhaust gas out of the cylinders.
This is all theory right now, not sure how much I'm going to do.
After watching the jaframobile videos I wished I had done some polishing. I paid a machinist to do head work on my project car and it cost a pretty penny. Now I'm considering buying a replacement engine for my daily just to mess with it while I wear out the 200k+ mile stock engine.
I'm looking forward to seeing some shiny parts pictures.
Exhaust ports, second pass with 180 grit buffing wheel. Gasket match exhaust gasket, opened a little around the valve guide and then blended everything. Last pass will be with 280 grit.
De-shrouding the valves. This is after the 180 grit buffing wheel. Going to have to cc the chambers before I go much farther. Machine shop told me to come use their's. Stoked!
Intake cleaned up. Didn't really do much here, ground some casting marks and a quick blend with 180 grit. Might make one more pass (with 180 grit) and call it good,. Already close to the intake gasket size so I won't bother matching it.
03-28-2017, 05:10 AM
Re: From the Ground Up. Build Thread.
