This is one of those jobs that should be simple and routine.

Instead it was one where nothing wanted to come apart, and none of the new parts would fit!

The main problem was the ABS unit being in the way of the new tubular manifold. With the manifold in position it was actually touching the ABS unit, and that doesn’t allow for the extra 40-50mm of space you need to install it with a turbo hanging off the bottom! Most S13s don’t have ABS so this problem is fairly rare.

I was able to move the ABS gear across and back by modifying its bracket, and ended up with a good 15mm or so of clearance between the manifold and the ABS bracket. It will have a heat shield added to protect it from radiated heat.

One part that needs modification in this upgrade (replacing the S13’s original T25G turbo with a T28 from an S14/15) is the turbo’s intake pipe.

The mounting bolts are at a different angle, so if you don’t get the later model intake pipe you have to modify the old one or make a new one.

I made an adaptor plate using a standard 2″ exhaust flange with a couple of M8 bolts welded to the sides at the right angle. It ends up being quite neat and the factory rubber hose connects up as normal.

Other parts needing modification are the turbo’s oil and coolant lines, and the oil drain to the sump.

The T28’s core sits at a different angle to the T25G, so none of the lines will fit directly.

You can rotate the housings to line it up, but in this case they wouldn’t come loose so I had to leave the core at its original angle.

The oil drain needed some modification, but fortunately this car was getting a set of braided turbo lines, which is much easier and nicer than trying to bend the factory steel ones to fit!

The last part of the job was to add an exhaust bracket, since the factory one was missing.

The front pipe (goes from the dump pipe off the turbo to the cat converter) had a bracket on it but it didn’t line up with anything on the car!
I modified it a bit, and made a new plate from the gearbox mount with a small rubber shock mount between the two.

This time it’s a set of GTR Brembo brakes on an S15 Silvia (200SX).

It’s the same story as the handbrake cable adapter plate I’ve made before for S13s (180SX / Silvia) but it turned out that there are some differences in the handbrake cable mount areas on the car.

Fortunately I didn’t just make one from my previous measurements!

This is the adapter plate. The studs on the plate hold the brake lines, and the slotted holes at the bottom of the picture mount on the original studs in the car.

Note the slight bend in the middle, necessary to line it up with the shape of the car chassis.

This is the plate installed:

The brakes were shuddering a bit on this car, so while the rest of the work was being done I sent the brake discs off for machining.

The clutch had started slipping badly in this car, to the point that the engine would drop to idle if the throttle was backed off while moving.

It was behaving weirdly under load though, sometimes gripping ok and sometimes slipping very badly.

On closer inspection, the pivot ball that the clutch lever sits on in the gearbox had broken, so the pivot point could change and not allow the clutch to release properly.

Unfortunately this required the removal of the gearbox, even though the broken part could be seen through the hole for the clutch lever.

The car had an aftermarket performance clutch which, on further inspection, was worn out - which is a possible cause of the broken pivot ball.

The car’s original flywheel and clutch were still available, and turned out to be in excellent condition - so they were installed. An old gearbox input shaft makes an excellent clutch alignment tool

After a good clean up, a new pivot ball, new throw out bearing, and new spigot bush, the clutch was done and the gearbox could be reinstalled.

After a bit of a hassle getting the gearbox back in due mainly to a very close fitting exhaust dump pipe, the car was back up and running, and the new (old) clutch felt much better than the old (new) clutch!

This should have been a simple one, just raising the height on adjustable suspension in an S15 Silvia.

It started off ok, with the adjustment nuts being a bit stiff - but I was able to get enough height on the first three struts.

The fourth one (why is it always the last one??) wouldn’t budge at all, and the lock nut had been broken at some point in the past and was now cable tied on!

I imagine someone broke the lock nut and then use locktite on the main nut to stop it moving - but now it was 100% stuck.

I removed the strut and took it home to have a better go at it. Even after removing the spring and securing the strut in the vice I couldn’t get the nut to move at all. I tried heating it up (not too much - as the strut is full of oil and nitrogen under pressure) but still couldn’t loosen it!

Here’s the offending strut, with the stuck nut in the middle (purple) and the broken lock nut under it:

So, it’s gone back on the car at its original height for now. Given the fairly worn condition of both front struts it’ll be better to replace them than spend more time on trying to free up this one’s adjustment.

The thread on the top nut was also damaged, and a spacer was missing, so someone’s had a good go at butchering it in the past!

This car is being set up for racing use, with most of the interior stripped out, a roll cage, big brakes, and lots of power!

To keep the engine’s oil cool while it’s producing more than double its factory power,  I helped install an oil cooler.

After trying a few possible locations, it was decided to mount it in the traditional position in front of the radiator. This was the best compromise of air flow, mounting strength, and working with the lengths of the pipes in the oil cooler kit.

The air conditioning condenser and plumbing was removed (also the compressor and its bracket) to make space, as well as weight reduction. Unfortunately this meant draining the coolant and taking the radiator out for access!

Here’s the oil cooler installed between the intercooler and radiator:

The oil cooler kit also came with a filter relocator, which makes changing the oil filter much easier - much appreciated by anyone who has changed the oil filter on a Silvia (or pretty much any modern car). The relocator also has fittings for oil temp and pressure gauges.

A larger aftermarket aluminium sump was also installed. It holds more oil than the standard one and has hinged baffles inside to keep the oil near the oil pump pickup during hard cornering. There was a bit of a snag with the sump install because the drain plug thread was found to be damaged.

I re-tapped the thread to a larger size and replaced the factory drain plug with an off the shelf tapered plug, which should work well and be harder to damage in future.

The next job was to swap the ECU. The car was running an older Microtech ECU which worked ok but is a bit limited in the accuracy of its tuning and tends to be affected badly by changing weather conditions, etc.

The replacement ECU is an Apexi PowerFC D-Jetro - which used a MAP (Manifold Absolute Pressure) sensor like the Microtech, rather than the factory MAF (Mass Air Flow) sensor. A MAF sensed ECU is superior in a few ways, but since the car was already set up for MAP sensor the D-Jetro version of the PowerFC was an easier option.

Swapping it over required removing the Microtech wiring loom, which had been spliced into the factory engine loom, tidying up some other wiring (fuel pump control, etc) and plugging the PowerFC into the original ECU plug.

Since MAP sensed ECUs also need an air temp sensor, this had to be added into the wiring. The PowerFC’s air temp sensor has a different thread to the Microtech one, so the fitting in the intake pipe needed to be modified.

One of the PowerFC’s nice features is a readout from the engine’s knock sensor. This can be a very handy thing to have, as it can tell you if the engine is pinging (detonating) under certain conditions. It’s not foolproof, but it’s generally worth keeping en eye on, and never worth ignoring!

When the ECU was installed we found that the knock sensor wasn’t working. Upon closer inspection I found that the plug had fallen off the sensor, and was missing the small wire clip that holds it on. Not having a clip on hand, I found a paper clip and made a new one!

A minute or so with some needle nose pliers and it looks just like a real one

The knock sensor plug went back on and the ECU started giving the knock readout as it should!

The last job to do was to bleed the brakes because they were feeling very spongy after being upgraded to some very nice four piston AP racing calipers. Bleeding the brakes is pretty simple, as long as you have two people - but these calipers have two bleed nipples each! So, each caliper has to be bled twice, but once that was done the pedal felt nice and solid.

The owner of this Silvia wanted better brake performance for track days and supersprints.

He bought a set of Project Mu HC+ pads, ProConcept two piece slotted front rotors, and RDA standard replacement rear rotors.

All these parts are a fairly straightforward bolt on job, except that the two piece rotors’ alloy hat is larger in diameter than the standard ones and will foul on most brake pads without modification.

I trimmed down the brake pad backing plates with an angle grinder, and it all went together nicely.

After that it was just a matter of changing the brake fluid and bleeding any air out of the system- ready for the track!

S15 Silvias (200SX) come with a six speed gearbox, which is very nice to drive with - but is not as strong as the previous model’s five speed.

In racing use with engine performance modifications the six speed is prone to breakage, so sometimes it’s best to change to a five speed box for reliability.

The gearbox, clutch, flywheel, tailshaft, gearbox mount, gearbox bolts, and even the exhaust bracket are different - but they can all be sourced from the previous model Silvias.

In this case we also installed a twin plate clutch, and the new gearbox has been rebuilt and strengthened.

Many Japanese import cars are hard to find with a manual gearbox, so often it’s best to buy an automatic car and convert it to manual.

This one is an S13 Silvia with a CA18DET engine.

The auto to manual swap is fairly straightforward as long as you have all the bits and everything comes apart easily.

Of course this time things didn’t want to come apart easily, and some of the parts were missing!

The conversion requires the removal of the automatic’s pilot bushing from the engine’s crankshaft, and its replacement with the manual version.

No matter what I tried, even using a newly purchased tool for the job, the pilot bushing wouldn’t come out of the crank.

In the end I had to weld a plate onto it to allow the puller tool to get a better grip!

Eventually it was all done, the car now manual, and there was a big pile of leftover bits!

It is often possible to use aftermarket adjustable camber tops on factory suspension with minor modifications.

In this case, to fit them on S15 Silvia (200SX) struts, it was necessary to make a longer spacer between the strut and the camber top to give it enough clearance to prevent anything rubbing.

The tubular nut also needed to be machined down a bit to maintain enough thread depth to keep its original strength.

After that, they bolt straight on and give the standard suspension adjustable camber - as well as lowering the ride height by about 10mm.

This one was pretty quick, just swapping a noisy and leaky power steering pump for a good one.

It was making some pretty bad noises, easily mistaken for serious engine trouble!

Swapping the power steering pump is fairly straight forward, apart from the ridiculously tight banjo bolt holding the pressure hose on.

It’s also a good idea to flush out the old fluid and refill the system with fresh stuff.