Z31 N/A RB project

[five&dime]

I will stack all our mulch bags on the front crossmember. 

[siteunseen]

That car would undercut sod! 

[five&dime]

It will be lower when it's all said and done

 

If it were a 600+ hp turbo time attack wide body...

 

[five&dime]

I've spent hours researching tires and running tire calculator numbers to figure out the ideal tire for my application and finally made that difficult choice. It was down to about 10 including several track only tires but I spoke with some people with real street experience who say the only issue with that is excessive gravel, noise and stiff sidewall. That led me to extreme high performance summer, narrowing it down to about 5-6. In the end, I focused on the tried and true Bridgestone Potenza RE71R which seems to be the absolute best R street compound affordable tire you can get. A close runner up was always the Dunlop Direzza ZII. It came close to the grip of the RE71R but it also far exceeded the tread life as well as lowering road noise. Then rumors circulated of it's replacement, the ZIII as a direct challenger to the RE71R. They were just released and were only $10 more so I went ahead and ordered 2 225/50/16's to test fit on the Watanabe 18x8/8.5. They claim equal or better performance to the Bridgestone with almost double the tread life and less road noise/harshness. They look almost identical as well. Coming from BMW for the last 10 years, I welcome the cheap prices of a 16" tire! 

The car looks great with the drop! Off tomorrow for rear cage! That will be exciting. 

 

Edited March 18, 2018 by five&dime

[five&dime]

RS Watanabe 16x8 0/ 8.5 -6

 

[five&dime]

Getting there on fitment. Still plenty of adjustments need to be made. Ideally, I want to tuck a tad bit of tire under the fender. 

 

[Patcon]

It's gonna have to be awful stiff not to rub the tire. Doesn't look like they would be easy to roll either because of the way the fender is made. Might look sharp if some all metal flairs could be made that basically shift the wide flat wheel arch out an 1" or so. Some one good with an english wheel could probably roll them out...

[five&dime]

Evening, Charles. Yeah, I will be running coilovers with 9k/7k springs so it will be pretty stiff. Most likely just a bit softer than my previous BMW wagon. But I am building this car more for performance than comfort. No A/C etc. I adjusted the camber pretty aggressively and I do believe I can get them to fit but I am definitely considering dropping down to a 205/55 or 50 tire. That's why I only bought 2. I only want to run about -2 rear camber but -2.5 would be as extreme as I would like. The fenders look pretty easy to roll and are very similar to my BMW wagon which didn't have any fitment issues once I really massaged them. 

Here is how it sits with some negative camber and without any fender rolling. I've got a roller in my garage so I will work on that next. 

[Patcon]

2 hours ago, five&dime said:

Evening, Charles. Yeah, I will be running coilovers with 9k/7k springs so it will be pretty stiff. Most likely just a bit softer than my previous BMW wagon. But I am building this car more for performance than comfort. No A/C etc. I adjusted the camber pretty aggressively and I do believe I can get them to fit but I am definitely considering dropping down to a 205/55 or 50 tire. That's why I only bought 2. I only want to run about -2 rear camber but -2.5 would be as extreme as I would like. The fenders look pretty easy to roll and are very similar to my BMW wagon which didn't have any fitment issues once I really massaged them. 

Here is how it sits with some negative camber and without any fender rolling. I've got a roller in my garage so I will work on that next. 

 

I thought you might be running pretty aggressive rates based on the other aspects of the build. I also considered increased camber to get inside but I really don't like that solution for a number of reasons. Having the roller around definitely helps...

[five&dime]

Yay!! 205/55 fits! I rolled the fenders and was able to set the camber much less aggressive. Tried to eye the toe close to 0 as well. Very happy with how this looks.

 

[five&dime]

Picked up my S13 Fortune Auto coilovers. Looking forward to getting these in. My best friend is towing the car back to his place soon to weld in the Response Type S13 front conversion kit and he will also notch out the rear frame rails. We decided to see how low the car could go with the current wheel/tire combo and it can go really low. The upper arm hit the frame rail before the tire made any contact. Bump steer spacers also arrived from Japan. 

Note the notches in the S13 front kit. It's really cool because you can adjust camber at the bottom and/or top which means I can bring the track width in our out to suit wheel/tire fitment. It also allows you to rotate the upper camber mount and use it for caster adjustment if you desired. Just offers up a lot of adjustability overall.

I also ran into a couple of roadblocks but working through it. First off the Z32 calipers don't even come close to fitting behind these Watanabe's. Even the stock front calipers rubbed a tad which could easily be fixed but I found some floating 2 pot slim calipers from Wilwood which will work once I have brackets made. Next off, the S13 rear coilovers upper hats were too large for the Z31 towers so my friend modified them a tad. But then the angle still isn't right using the S14 subframe with the Z31 chassis so my friend is trying to come up with a spherical bearing for the upper hats of the rear coilovers which would allow articulation and correct the angle issue. Worst case, I will sell the S13 coilovers and buy Z31's from Powertrix and modify the bottom rear mounts to fit the subframe. 

The machinist got the old valve seats and guides out and put the Tomei beryllium copper seats and supertech guides in. Next is port and polish then combustion chamber reshaping, unshrouding of the valves. 

Lastly, my little helper

 

 

Edited May 5, 2018 by five&dime

[Diseazd]

Careful what you start Brandon......