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Spec R on the way!

John-

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"Got job I got mine?" Think it was yours that I won!
225/40 fronts on 8.5 x 18
255/35 rears on 9.5 x 18
 

John-

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Small update as nothing's happened for a while.
I was bored of my quiet exhaust and while I was at GDUK picked up a straight through exhaust, because why not, unfortunately it didn't fit as the s14 it came off must have had a custom down pipe. Anyway I took it too EMP performance in St.Albans to get it fixed, and bumped into fruit booters old car!

Got the exhaust on an it is more than a little mental, probably won't be on for long, but it did put a smile on my face going through tunnels!
 

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Finally got the alignment done today! To be fair, my eye alignment was pretty good. My camber is pretty severe, but I am getting arms soon to fix that.



A picture of the underside, why not.



Also did an oil service.
 

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Update!


Finally got around to getting some alignment arms, went for bushed ones as this isn't a dedicated track car.
got them fitted without hassle, trying to match my original alignment so I could make it as safely as possible to get it redone.



Called a few garages for pricing for a four wheel alignment, and most places were charging £20 per adjustment per corner!!
Considering i'd just fitted a whole set of adjustable arms I was looking at a hefty bill, and I also needed two rear tyres replaced!


Decided mainstream tyre places are all crooks and gave Garage-D a call as they aren't too far from me, was pleasantly surprised.
To have two tyres swapped and balanced, fitting the front tension rods (Coudln't get the old ones off, didn't have a breaker bar and I'm a weakling) and the tracking done was significantly cheaper than just an alignment at everywhere else I asked.



Guys down there were really friendly and most importantly, the car feels even more amazing to drive than it did before! More traction and better feel!



That's the settings now, I would have liked a bit less rear camber, but there isn't any room, might have to pull the arches a bit, or go for a skinnier tyre.


The next update should be brakes, did a track day the other day at Snetterton and my brakes faded after the third corner.
 
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quite a lot of camber on the rear! not sure Julian knows alignments. what size tyre do you run at the moment?
 

John-

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Mentioned that in the post! That's as low as it would go without contacting the arch.
Rears are 255/35.
 

John-

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Haven't updated this in a while!

Done a few things since. In the summer I uprated the brakes to r33 gts-t items, considered the Brembo option, but the price difference for what was different didn't really seem worth it.
Took me a day a half to do all four corners at a casual pace.

Pictures!

When I picked them up they were thickly painted with blue paint and looked quite rough, so I stripped it all back and started again.



Stripped them all back and then sprayed them black!


Fitting the rears took the longest because the job was far more involved. Glad I'd borrowed some hub pullers from work or else the hubs would have been right bastards to get off!




R33 GTS-T rears waiting to go on



Handbrake mechanism on, the dust plates were a bit worn and rusty so, I cleaned them up and Hammerited them.



Then callipers and disc's.



Finished fronts!



Size difference between 15 rears and GTS-T rears.
 
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Going to do this mod on mine when it arrives.... How much did it cost to do all four corners? Did you use braided lines?


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John-

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The entire setup cost me £300!
Used the braided lines I bought for my stock setup, they fit fine!
They were HEL ones from camskill.
 
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Bargain!! Have you noticed if the rear has changed the wheel offset? I've read somewhere the hubs sit further in/out so will change how your wheels fit


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John-

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Yeah, got them for a good price!
I didn't notice any significant offset change, my wheels were pretty flush to the arches before, and they didn't rub afterwards!
 

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Update:


MOT the other day... passed, easily, the guy commented on how clean it was!


Anyway, updates that I never got around to putting up:


My original cast manifold managed to split, I think this was due to there being no flexi section in my exhaust system. However it could have been there since import, I only saw it because I took off my manifold heat shield to tidy it up a little.


While I had the manifold off, thought I may as well upgrade everything; stainless manifold, elbow and more importantly a flexi downpipe!


setup out!

This wasn't as much of a pig as I had thought, but I had a lot of different spanners and socket sets.



New turbo elbow and manifold, I had to slightly twist the turbo so that it didn't foul on the manifold.



And back on...



About a month later I took the manifold back off because I didn't like how the stainless went after it had been heated. Then I sprayed it black with high temperature paint.



I didn't have anything to do for a while after that, so I decided to do something with my rear lights, I considered aftermarket rears, but none of the ones I found really stood out.
So I decided to tint just the orange sections, and it came out well!
Masked

Sprayed




Bad photo of the finished result



Then I got these!

Apex adjustable ARB's


stock vs uprated


There is a LOT more weight in the uprated ones, standards are hollow, Apex ARB's are thicker and solid.





Well worthwhile upgrade really smoothed out the ride in corners, I have the rears on the softest setting and the fronts in the middle.


That's it for the moment, here's a couple of pictures of how she stands.

 
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where abouts did you manifold split? I have no flexi in mine and recently upgraded to 3" all the way so expecting it to fail soon, also what SS manifold did you get? have you noticed a significant power gain? with my 3" system the turbo spools a lot faster and more violent even on a standard map.
 

John-

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Thanks Johnnybravo!
My manifold split on the runner closest to the firewall, nearer the turbo, just split the whole way around!
I got a japspeed one, after reading numerous posts on here, seems like no matter how much you spend, it'll probably crack! I plan on waiting to see if it cracks, hopefully not now with the flexi section, then reinforcing it if it does.
I did notice that it spooled faster and feels like boost comes on harder, but that's probably because it was leaking before... Another thing is the exhaust note sounds nicer with the new manifold.
 
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