Custom 240SX stage rally suspension. Round 2.

Ok John, here are some of the pictures you asked for. Im sure I forgot something, so you I may have to take more.

Here is the clearance I have between the strut body and the tire. We are pretty close here. I think extending the ears on the lower strut mount is a good idea to give a little more, but I think adjusting the back spacing on the wheel is also something to look into. I dont want to lose any negative camber. Might have to cut out the strut top had and move it over. The stock S13 alloys do have a very high offset, but I wont be ditching them quite yet, they have proven to be very stout. I have hit some nasty stuff with the broken suspension, and I have yet to bend a single one (knocks on wood). And they aren't so heavy either.



At full droop.





Room to move towards the center if absolutely needed.



Not much though.



Length for reference.



Houston, we have a problem. Removing the springs = weight reduction?





After climbing my 200 lbs self onto the strut towers and jumping up and down. There are no front springs in the car at all, just dampers. I was able to get the LF to sink a couple inches, and the RF a little less. They didnt go down smoothly either. Every time I would jump, they would clunk down just a little more. Something is very wrong with them.

Quote
Ian S
For the gear ratios, my options are limited. The factory 240SX 4.08 is one of the shortest factory ratios out there. The turbo cars all run a longer 3.91, or 3.69 ratio with an almost identical transmission gearset. I actually have a JDM SR20 trans in the car now.

The R200 is relatively common, but ring gear kits have proved semi hard to find, and I am wary to buy one because there is little to no data on fitment, and they aren't cheap most of the time.

Alternatively, the C200 which came in many of the trucks is more common, and there is rumors that the ring gear kits will fit in the R200, but there is no solid evidence. Some of the trucks came with 4.62 and 4.37 gears which would be worth a shot, but there were so many options, finding the right one has proved difficult. Some of the Xterras came listed with 4.87 gearing, but I think that would be going too far.

Nismo did make a few ring gear kits specifically for the R200. Some of them came in ratios that would be perfect, but they have proved non existant in reality.

I think Im just going to have to find an R or C 200 from the junkyard with the ratio I want and try to make something work. I have both an ABS R200 and a Non ABS R200, so I that is helpful.

Ian,

I have a JDM mystery junkyard diff in my woman's S13. It's a factory LSD (Clutch diff, Hitachi manufacture) with a 4:38:1 R&P. The R&P will not swap between this diff and the U.S. 240 diff. The bolt diameter is different, as is the ID of ring gear. I know this because I tried to swap them (U.S. 4.08:1 is a much better match for an SR20DET).

I suspect the diff originally came from an early S13 with the CA18DET, but I'm not certain of it. The axle splines were different, at least on one side, and we had to get slightly creative. Can't remember exactly how we made it work, but it involved some mixing and matching of factory parts.

If you have an LSD in your car, I might be amenable to a swap, since this ratio kinda sucks for a street driven turbo car.

-Dave

Quote
eyesoreracing
Ian,

I have a JDM mystery junkyard diff in my woman's S13. It's a factory LSD (Clutch diff, Hitachi manufacture) with a 4:38:1 R&P. The R&P will not swap between this diff and the U.S. 240 diff. The bolt diameter is different, as is the ID of ring gear. I know this because I tried to swap them (U.S. 4.08:1 is a much better match for an SR20DET).

I suspect the diff originally came from an early S13 with the CA18DET, but I'm not certain of it. The axle splines were different, at least on one side, and we had to get slightly creative. Can't remember exactly how we made it work, but it involved some mixing and matching of factory parts.

If you have an LSD in your car, I might be amenable to a swap, since this ratio kinda sucks for a street driven turbo car.

-Dave

<Begin excited nerdy SCC fanboi rant>

Holly crap I'm talking to Dave Freaking Coleman. I miss reading your editorials in SCC, but still enjoy the stuff on Moto IQ.

Keep up the good work Sir, I hope some day to run into you at a rally, though I dont know how often you race these days outside of LeMons and whatnot.

Keep on keeping the geek in car geek.

<end rant>

Ok now that that is over, back to business.

I would love to give a clutch LSD with 4.38 gears a go, but sadly I dont think you will want a welded ABS R200, or a pretty abused non ABS R200 that is non LSD.

At the moment I am rather happy with the welded diff. Its not pretty or exciting, but its holding up nicely to the abuse, and in the event of a broken half shaft, I can still limp to service and continue the rally. I fear a CLSD even with heavy preload, wouldnt allow that.

John will just say dont break axles, , but sometimes there is no avoiding it.

Not to mention the cost of shipping 2 diffs from nowhere land to CA would surely be obscene.

In other words, I must respectfully decline.

Its too bad the ring and pinions couldn't be swapped. If it is a clutch type LSD, in an R200 case, I would venture a guess that it came from a Z31 300ZX or skyline. Maybe even S12. AFAIK 4.08 was one of the shortest gear ratios you could get in the S13 or S14. Most of the JDM cars came with 3.9s.

I guess I will have to keep scanning the importers for one of the R32 or R33 diffs with the 4.36 gearing. Or get the part numbers from Martin for the R&P he bought.

Thanks Dave!!!

It's a well-known fact that I appear any time you combine any two of my obsessions. Rally and S13s? Come on, you're lucky I didn't just show up in your garage!

Quote
eyesoreracing
It's a well-known fact that I appear any time you combine any two of my obsessions. Rally and S13s? Come on, you're lucky I didn't just show up in your garage!

Good to know, I will keep that in mind lol. Ever plan to make it up this way again for some stage time?

I went out with a flashlight and crawled under the old stock car that hasn't moved in a while. This Ring and pinion fits in an ABS housing, which should suite you well.

Part number 38100-05MB0
"Gear Set-Final" is the description.

Then I wrote "2000 frontier, front"
and "4.625"

Tell me what you find out.

-Martin.

Hej poiki, check this out; whole axle for as low as $175 and not too far:
Year
Part
Model Description Miles from you Part
Grade Stock# US
Price Dealer Info Dist
mile
2001
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Xterra 103,000 A 207157 $175 Shipman Auto Parts, Inc. USA-MN(Brainerd) E-mail 1-800-892-4779 86 miles
2003
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Frontier IN TRUCK 189,000 D08187 $200 Kadinger Salvage, Inc. - GoldSeal, ARAPro USA-WI(Downing) Request_Quote 1-800-503-8895 Request_Insurance_Quote
109 miles
2001
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Frontier ASSY,FRNT,4.636,ALSO UNDER 440 88,984 A J315 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2003
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Frontier ASSY,FRNT,4.636,ALSO UNDER 440 5,366 A F304 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2004
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Frontier ASSY,FRNT,4.636,ALSO UNDER 440 97,264 A M0064 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2000
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Xterra ASSY,LESS AXLES,SE,4.63 20,981 A D210 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2000
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Xterra ASSY,FRNT,4.63,ALSO UNDER 440 59,924 A E173 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2000
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Xterra ASSY,FRNT,4.63,ALSO UNDER 440 88,687 A F222 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2001
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Xterra ASSY,FRNT,4.63,ALSO UNDER 440 80,504 A H143 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118
2001
Front Axle Assy.
Nissan Xterra ASSY,FRNT,4.63,ALSO UNDER 440 87,000 A H363 $200 Pam's Auto - ARAPro USA-MN(St-Cloud) Request_Quote 1-800-560-7336 Request_Insurance_Quote
118

A bunch in one place. Skip 1st and have fun!

---

John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
CALL +1 206 431-9696
Remember! Pacific Standard Time
is 3 hours behind Eastern Standard Time.

looks like i know where i am going on my next day off.

pulled the internals out of the sohc. now i just need to get my dohc motorset up here from the cities.

thanks guys.

John, any other pictures or measurements you need to get the ball rolling?

While browsing for a spare transmission, I found a 180SX diff with supposidly stock 4.36 gears. So they do exist. Apparently it came from an early model CA18 180SX. It was an open diff though, and the kid wants a boat load for it. Maybe Dave is onto something

SOHC engine is all tore up. Hope to have my DOHC delivered next week and I can get the block and head off to the machine shop for cleaning, honing, and pressure checking.

What are everyone's opinions on bearings. I have a bunch of choices. ACL, Clevite.....

I always hear people talking about these big bearing manufacturers, but what about OE Nissan. The ones I pulled out took a hell of a lot of abuse, and they didn't look all that bad.

Then there are rings. So many choices.

Bump

Any word on some of the stuff you were getting put together?

Any more measurements you need?

I need to know how much I will be needing to bump up my strut towers in the rear, and I dont know if we discussed what we are going to do about top mounts. Since I will be making the towers, I can do just about anything, what would you suggest?

keep me posted.

See this thread, page 10 for what i did in the rears.


http://www.rallyanarchy.com/phorum/read.php?5,38131,48930#msg-48930

I can verify the 2.5" if needed, but what I did was cut the top off, figure out the bottom mount, then mount the things up to figure our where the top needed to be re-located to.

-Martin.

http://ruggedrocksoffroad.com/5143-front-r200a-ring-and-pinion-gears-nissan-frontier-1997-2004-v6-by-nismo-p-5660.html?osCsid=dlm4gi2v25u9gvijsh8n9k08g5

Well now that looks entertaining for gearing.

I really need to bug yukon to see if they would entertain the idea of doing a run of R160/R180/R200 R&Ps.

---

Quote

This isn't floor mat anarchy

Additional OEM transmission gear ratio info can be found in this thread.

http://www.nissanroadracing.com/showthread.php?t=3257&page=2

All KA's SOHC and DOHC
1st = 3.321
2nd= 1.902
3rd = 1.308
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.759 (Over Drive)


All S13 SR20DET's
1st = 3.321
2nd= 1.902
3rd = 1.308
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.759 (Over Drive)


All S14 SR20DET's
1st = 3.321
2nd= 1.902
3rd = 1.308
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.838 (Over Drive)


All JDM CA18DET's
1st = 3.321
2nd= 1.902
3rd = 1.308
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.838 (Over Drive)


All Euro CA18DET's
1st = 3.592
2nd= 2.057
3rd = 1.361
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.821 (Over Drive)


KA24 4WD Trucks (Hardbody's/Frontiers)
1st = 3.985
2nd = 2.246
3rd = 1.415
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.821 (Over Drive)

KA24 2WD Trucks (Hardbody's/Frontiers) - 1997
1st = 3.985
2nd = 2.246
3rd = 1.415
4th = 1.000 (Direct Drive)
5th = 0.838 (Over Drive)

Russell, Welcome aboard!!!!!

When are you building that rally car you always wantd?

Quote
phlat65
Russell, Welcome aboard!!!!!

When are you building that rally car you always wantd?

What rally car does he wanna build?

---

John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
CALL +1 206 431-9696
Remember! Pacific Standard Time
is 3 hours behind Eastern Standard Time.