Gave it a solid bit of use today buzzing around the city doing different chores, visiting friends, buying wine, etc.

There's a nice little on-ramp on the North Western at Te Atatu heading east toward the city, except as far as corners go, it's a bit dodgy because it tightens up 2/3 through, so if you're at the limit already, expect trouble. Today I took a fast approach into it on the brakes in the right lane of the two that last until it tightens up, then turned in and held my line through the right lane passing three vans in the left lane before half way, which allowed me to turn in further and hit the inner barrier apex perfectly across both lanes and exit hard on the gas diagonally out into the fast lane pulling away from on-coming cars before they had a chance. The highlight of all this was the solid IRS cornering across the whole on ramp past all those vans and for the first time ever nailing the line through the whole thing. Nice.








Looking at that, the tightening up is subtle and the initial entry is much tighter, except that I'd softened it with a wide entry angle, and tight hug of the left lane, washing out toward the barrier, before turning across toward the second apex and getting harder on the gas, which is I suppose why it felt so good :-)

Gave it a good wash tonight, too, and then put it back to bed after dipping out on cheap fuel the other night. Disappointing, but shit happens.

Today in the life of the Stagea:

Got it a fresh WOF
Checked maintenance items: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=2693&p=43258#p43258
Straightened and lubricated the gas flap
Cleaned around the seam of the cam cover to find slow oil leak onto exhaust runners
Thrashed engine in attempt to force some oil leak through sustained high RPM/temperature
Found nothing (so far)
Put sixty odd km on it, all up

Not a bad day in the sunshine, all together :-)

Drag racing baseline complete! viewtopic.php?f=3&t=2770&p=43414#p43414

Spare 4wd sump won at auction for peanuts (50 bucks NZ), need to pick it up soon. Here it is in all its filthy glory:



https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 0117293056

Next things is to find one of these. The kiwi one I was going to use has gone AWOL. I've
contacted the engineering firm behind it to see if they'll do it, or not. But if not, nothing
LibreCAD and a bit of time can't fix. And if I do that, I can sell them, too.

Bit of an issue today... went to pick up the car transporter trailer, no worries. Went and raided the hotel for its wheels in preparation for putting some WOFable wheels on it. Headed home. All fine.

Got home, had to back the monster trailer up the shared driveway, and then a couple of attempts to get around the corner into our place, then gave up and backed it up hard on one side in two attempts.

Turned it off. Bubbling sound. Fuck. Key back on. Temp needle pins the hot end. Oh, damn. Open bonnet. Ooops, totally forgot that it has NO FAN. Never did. Picked it up like that and wasn't an issue until today.

Putting it under moderate load at zero road speed just pushed heat into the system much faster than it could get out. It was only like that for a few minutes, and a few litres of bottle water over it and it stopped bubbling, started up fine, idled smooth. No damage done. Phew.

Took it for a shake down to Rob's place and stole his fan from his sweet R33. THANKS ROB!!!! <3. Wow, much noisier, and maybe an unnoticeable amount less power, but much MUCH more airflow, always, and no chance of another cookup even dragging a BMW up a hill at 30kph in 1st gear. I hope.

Tweet: https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 9942732800

Pic:










More info on the Stagea powered journey here: viewtopic.php?p=43443#p43443 and down from there. Though to be fair, this mission is also to pick up the above pictured sump/diff, too. For this. :-)

As per the above linked thread, this thing did the job and did it pretty well!
3500kg+ / 7700lb+ gross on the way home, a few little tail wiggles, a few
iffy cornering moments, a general sense of not being in control, but the
Stagea steamed on without any steam, just unboiled coolant in her veins.
Good thing I borrowed the fan, too! Upon returning to Auckland there were
traffic jams. Several sessions in the final 40km or so. Adele? Who the FUCK
is that? And why was half the country coming to our one proper city to see
her/it? I do not know these answers, nor what it feels like to have female
gender parts attached, but what I do know is, it didn't overheat. It also
sustained 5000 RPM WOT for several minutes up the bombay hills, eventually
creeping up to a wild 5500 RPM still WOT, not bad grossing nearly 4 tonne!

Anyway... last night I degreased the sump significantly with aerosol help.
Today I remembered that I left it outside to dry after hosing it down to rinse
off the degreaser and let the silicone sealants survive another day. And this
is the result I managed to get, after moving it inside:

https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 8379222016







This could quite possibly inspire me to disassemble my RB30E and sell bits of it.

That's an extreme and unlikely statement, I know, but... stranger things have happened. :-p

Got my very own fan, today! :-) Was a bit grubby, so gave it a clean up and this is it:

https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 8653449216







E-fan on the menu with ECU swap, this'll do until then!

Fan returned to owner, new fan installed, and spinning A OK! Job done! Thanks Rob!!! :-)

May score a head for the RB30DET project tomorrow if I pull my finger out tonight and get to bed soon.

Off to the garage to make that happen. XXOO

EDIT, this was tweeted: https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 3322003457

What a mission! But in the end, I triumphed! I now have an R33 VCT RB25DE head!
This was a 200ps engine stock, so let's call it 240ps with 3 litres under it and 500ps
with 15psi stuffed into it. 600 with 20psi :-) That's enough, for me.

Challenges:

Arrived around 2:15pm after ditching work super early with boss's permission only
to find that I didn't seem to have a socket to fit the head bolts. Then I realised they
weren't head bolts, they were giant cap screws! Fail. I didn't own a set of hex drive
sockets. But now I do, 20 bucks from super cheap auto, and the right size was
amongst the modest collection. This cost me around 30 to 45 mins or so, load tools
back into car, drive to shop, buy, drive back, carry tools back inside, etc.

No worries. Got the exhaust manifold off without excess drama. Cut a few hoses
and wires on the intake side, and undid a few brackets etc. Then with that all clear,
I undid the 14 main head cap screws and the head didn't budge at all. I gave it a
mild yank and no movement. Hmmm. Looked around the back of it and found an
m6 10mm head bolt through a tiny tab of alloy into the block! WTF, Nissan, WTF.
Undid this. Exhaust side now lifted a little, but intake side did not budge. Found
another one on the intake side at the back, barely got a socket onto it, but did,
and got that one off, too. Now the back of the head would lift, just, front, no. So
I looked and looked and felt and felt and didn't find anything, the internet and
Rob told me of a third tiny bolt at the front end near tstat and coolant plumbing,
but could I see it? Not for ages. When I eventually spotted it, I could see just half
of the head of it, covered in black oil/dirt, nearly invisible. Mangled the backing
plate for the cam cover to gain access, degreased it, couldn't get a ring on it, only
managed to get my 1/4" "power bar" onto it with the tiny 10mm socket, but could
then only get 1/12th of a turn at a time, having to remove socket from bar, and
rotate 90 degrease before having another go. Wonderful. Thanks Nissan! Note:
Do not try to remove an RB DOHC head with the intake still on, not wise, but yes,
it is actually possible, if you're a glutton for punishment like me.

In any case, I now have a bunch of helpful accessories for the RB30DET project.

Photos in another post later after I take and upload some... all I have now is: https://twitter.com/FredCookeNZ/status/ ... 0616378368