View Single Post
Old Mar 15, 2011 | 01:17 PM
  #4 (permalink)  
Empire's Avatar
Empire
buildin' it
 
Joined: Aug 2006
Posts: 4,565
Likes: 0
Default

take it all apart.
send it to a shop to have them rebuild the engine for you.
if you insist on trying to do the work yourself, then get a FSM. pretty sure there is a link for on in the sticky up top.
You'll need more tools than you have now, so be ready to hit up harbor freight.
Spend the money and the FSM printed and bound. Pretty sure office depot will do it for like 200 bucks.
Keep your greasy fingers off of it. s you learn little tid bits, put some notes down in the book. That way, you have all of the knowledge you will need written down.
From there, send the block off to a shop. Pretty much any machine shop will do. Get it hot tanked and honed.
Send the head off too. If you insist on using a s14 head, then just use the stock cams until it is all together and running. Why make more problems for yourself when it isn't even together yet? send the head off to get it hot tanked and decked. I would suggest having them do a valve job and getting all new everything. But, you can get away with using the same springs and what not. Just replace valve seals. (no choice in that if you get the head hot tanked)
Meanwhile, get your rebuild kit delivered. Don't skimp out on this. Get everything you will need. new seals. new pistons. new everything. I would highly suggest a new oil pump. (from the way your pistons are, I would say that the stock pump isn't keeping up as good as it should be. Most places that sell the kits will be able to help you figure out what you need. Enjuku sells a rebuild kit don't they? Don't just order a ebay kit. most of those people are dumb kids that just throw cheap parts together and if something isn't right, you're fucked.
From there, I would suggest having the machine shop assemble your lower assembly. Maybe even splurge and have them balance the whole thing. its overkill, but hey, why not. Getting pistons on wrist pins and the rings on, and back into the cylinder without screwing up can be a challenge if you don't know what you are doing. If you insist on doing it yourself. Be careful. You need to treat it like you are working with glass. The FSM should walk you through it step by step. Don't cut corners. Don't "think" you know what you are doing. Get it all back together to factory spec. If you are going to use arp studs, then do that when you put the head on. Get it all together. and make sure the oil pump is primed and all of that fun stuff. Assemble the rest of the engine. Get it in the car. Triple check everything. Don't cut corners. Expect there to be problems along the way. Get it in the car and running first with stock stuff before you try to "go fast" get the engine broken in before you do anything. While you are going through the break in process and trouble shooting all of the minor problems along the way. Make sure you have all of the parts you need for boost.
If you are wanting to use the s14 stuff, then make sure you are using things from the 95. that will keep it all obd1. Once it is broken in, swap the cams out for the s13 cams. But use the intake and exhaust cams. The dual exhaust cams don't really do anything and the overlap is terrible, even more so with boost. Then start the process of swapping in your turbo parts. You should have a spare ECU that you had a base tune put on for your parts list that way the car should start and run, maybe not awesome, but it should run. Again, triple check everything before you start it. It is much better to let it sit over night so you can check it again the next day instead of blowing something up because you were too excited to notice that you didn't have an oil line hooked up to your turbo. Once you get all of the little things figured out, then take it straight to get tuned. The base tune is ok, but a real tune is better and could mean the difference between living for a month to living for years. At that point, take it easy on it. Don't start lead footing all over town because you have boost. Make sure things are going to pop off. Work your way into it. That way you can actually enjoy it and not just stress about it falling apart.

On a more personal level, don't just take a parts list and duplicate it. You need to move beyond just having some knowledge to actually having an understanding. If you don't know the difference, then start there. Figure out the difference between knowledge and understanding. Once you know the difference, make sure you have total understanding of what you are about to do before you do it. Being a college kid, you don't seem like you A) have the budget to do this a second time because you screwed it up the first time and B) have the luxury of having your car out of commission for months. Things like your 300zx Maf. Do you understand why you need it? If you do, then you would realize that you don't need to install it right away and that it might be a better idea to put that on the upgrade list after it is all put together. Do you understand why the clearances are the way they are inside an engine? Do you really understand what is happening inside an engine? Do you understand a turbo? If you don't understand all of that, then you need to spend more time researching and learning. As cheezey and cliche and it sounds, the best tool in your toolbox should be your brain. If you understand all of this stuff, then you'll be able to figure it all out by applying your understanding. And at that point, I have total confidence that you'll be able to build something worth talking about. Without that, I totally expect you to have a dozen "what noise is this" Why won't my car start?" "is it bad that my number 3 piston is in my hand?" "I give up, I sold my car, now I drive a single cam, 87 honda" types of threads.

So with all of that, good luck
Reply