Dala's 100NX

[Tuppurainen]

Dala, you got very nice Nissan But I have to ask: How old this car is? From 90's? I like its curves I know, I know, my english sucks, but you maybe understood that

[Mystic]

Strut tower brace maybe?

[Dala]

Dala, you got very nice Nissan But I have to ask: How old this car is? From 90's? I like its curves I know, I know, my english sucks, but you maybe understood that

Thanks man! Yep, it's from the 90's, 1991 to be more correct.

Strut tower brace maybe?

Spot on! I put a few more hours into it today, still need to make some additional bracing.

[Dala]

The USDM B13 ECU came in the mail! I immediately dropped it off at dad's work, where they soldered a 40pin connector onto it, and moved the CJ1 surface resistor to CJ2 position, so it can accept a daughterboard. Oh, and the circuit board was re-clearcoated aswell, to avoid corrosion in the future.


Everything installed. Datalogging wires, USB cable, RJ45 breakout cable and finally, the PWM Boost controller signal (blue)


Now we're ready for some serious boost

[Tuppurainen]

Very interesting... Must follow

[Dala]

I just did some late night ebay shopping. I've been reading up on more advanced tuning theories, and wanted to expand my ability to monitor the engine. Here's what I chose:


You might be asking yourself, Dala, why do you need that?

Let me explain. I want to get back my gas mileage. To do that, I need to run a leaner cruise, and with more timing. These two things can be very dangerous, and you need to keep your EGT's(Exhaust gas temperatures) in check.

I've tried to cruise in 15.5 AFR area, but I wan't to try to aim for >16.0! To do this, I need to increase the timing. To safely increase timing, I need to monitor my EGT's.

I plan to measure individual exhaust runners, aswell as the turbo temp.

"Many people think that the leaner you go, the higher the EGT gets. This is also incorrect. Peak EGT occurs at stoichiometry- about 15 to 1 for our purposes. If you go richer than 15 to 1, EGT will drop and if you go leaner than 15 to 1 EGT will ALSO drop. It is VERY important to know which side of peak EGT you are on before making adjustments."
"You will also begin damage O2 and WO2 sensors at about 1650F (900C) and therefore should use this value as the upper limit when dealing with a street car with O2 and or WO2 sensors."

Stay tuned

[Dala]

Couldn't wait for parts, so I drilled and tapped the GTIR exhaust manifold for the sensors. Worth noticing is to place the sensors 40mm (1½") from the head, and in my case I needed an 8,5mm drillbit + 1/8 NPT tap.

[Dala]

Time to update this;

I noticed that the exhaust ports don't line up so good. There are differences between DET and VE, so to solve this, simply enlarge the four bolt holes in the middle, and push it upwards when installing. Use the VET gasket to guide you on how much to enlarge the holes:


I am planning to test running anti lag. I don't want to ruin my expensive cat, so I made a decat from the old one.


Then I welded it to the downpipe. When it's time to emission test, the whole turbo system gets removed anyway, so it makes sense to weld it, and have no chance of getting an exhaust leak. I messed up abit, and used non high temp heat paint, let's see how long that stays on...


Anti lag enabled This wont be run daily, but I want to try it


I also configured the boost-by-gear table. The idea is to run 0.5 bar boost in first and second gear, and 0.7 bar in third,fourth and fifth. A 0-10% duty cycle doesn't affect the wastegate. You can calculate the needed duty cycle, with a simple formula, 0.7/0.5=1,4 = 40% duty cycle. I put it at 46%, lets see how much boost that creates


I also finished the strutbar, but forgot to take a picture of it. Startup next week when the EGT sensors get here

[Juucso]

Well this is cool project!
You really seem to know what you are doing!

[Dala]

This was a busy weekend. I made the final push to get it driveable again.

Exhaust gasket material. Made one gasket for the downpipe (hadn't been running any gasket, developed a small leak), and one gasket for the warm charge air that connects to the turbocharger.


Installed the exhaust temp sensors


Here's the chinese K-type thermocouple reader.


Here it is in action. Can't complain, it was so cheap! Let's hope it lasts!


Got some switches in the mail, these will be mounted later on for quick enabling of certain functions


Testrun! The weather has been unusually warm! I took the opportunity to do some road testing, but due to the 98E5 fuel, the car feels sluggish. Timing has been removed, and it doesn't feel as peppy as before. I'll try to empty the tank asap, and get you a video

[Dala]

Great day today. Started some road tuning with a mate, and immediately blew a coupler from the cold charge air pipe. After fixing the leak, we went on with tuning the electronic boost controller.


Short summary, I love it! spool up is greatly improved, due to the initial bleed off until 1500mbar stock wastegate pressure is reached. When you get to higher gears, boos pressure is increased. I settled at 1700mbar manifold pressure for now.

I also tested the anti lag. Here's a video:

Mild settings, so no fireballs But it builds boost just fine! I am almost scared to manouver this car now, it's fast (and fwd, so more spooky than rwd)

I love it.

[Mystic]

NICE! I fixed link to video for you.

[Dala]

Thanks!
I need to winterize this car. Badly.

After driving it this week, the weather got colder and alot of snow/ice showed up. Now there is zero traction with my unstudded winter tyres. I parked the car at the garage, and it will stay there until I get it ready for winter.

I did have time to boost it to 1800mbar manifold pressure, and it was superb Recirculated the BOV, so there's no more PSSSSSSSSSHT noise when changing gears. I like it better that way

Now on the to-do list:

-Refresh undearcoating. Salty roads are death
-Buy engine block heater (car is german import, so no stock block heater)
-Buy cab heater+outlet+wiring
-Get a set of studded tyres
-Buy a remote unlocking kit (my doorlocks froze, and are almost worn out)

Updates will slow down now, will post pics when I install parts.

[Dala]

Happy new year! 2015 will be an interesting year for sure!

Picked up some Ground Zero 50W-RMS speakers. I've been running speakerless doors, so this will be a long awaited upgrade.

Let's tear up the doors!


Speakers didn't fit (too wide), so I had to fabricate some wooden spacers. I also installed an actuator to the locking mechanism, since I plan to install a remote locking kit asap. I had an actuator left over from a previous install, so I figured I'd throw it in while I'm there.


Finished everything up by coating the insides of the door with oil, should keep the rust at bay

[Dala]

I have craved an engine heater for a long time, and now they were -10% off at the local carpartstore. Let's get one!

I went with a Defa kit. Total for these was 124€, and on the other side of town a similar kit was priced at 220€!


This is how it all connects.


To install it, you need to knock out a freeze plug from the engine block. The particular one is located next to the alternator. I practiced removing freeze plugs from the old SR20DE block, and got kinda good after doing 4 of them. Then I moved on to the SR20VE-T... Ofcourse it didn't want to come out, so a 10min job turned into a 2h job...


Here's how it looks when installed. This particular kit mounts on the front of the engine, with only a rubber o-ring. The OEM spot for engine block heaters is on the back side of the engine, in a threaded hole. This kit is 10x easier to install,but more likely to develop a leak.


Better overview on placement. Notice the scorched downpipe elbow, 650*C paint is not enough


I mounted the electrical outlet above the RH side intercooler pipe. I want it to be easy to remove when summer comes, for a small weight reduction.


Took it for a spin, but having unstudded tires feels like living on the edge. The micra got new 13" snow tires, so the old 14" I had on it previously might aswell be put to use on the NX. Having moderately used studded tires is alot better than good conditioned friction tires IMO.