Ok, its time to re-work the suspension in my Nissan 240SX.

When I first built the car I used a custom assembled suspension system that worked ok, provided me with the added height that I needed, but was too stiff, and seemed to wear out too quickly.



This shows the front dampers, stock tubes top hats and springs/sleeves. The dampers are inverted Bilstiens (40 mm I think) and they are the factory replacement damper for a Mitsubishi 3000GT VR4. The front springs are 300 lb IIRC.

The rears, not pictured are regular Bilstien coilover shocks, the springs are 225 lb. The Dampers were meant for a Z32 Nissan 300ZX twin turbo.

After 2 full events, a bunch of testing, and a couple rally crosses. I have enough data to refine the setup, sort of.

John V, I am hoping you will jump in here and give me a hand sorting this stuff out. You posted in my team thread, but I thought things would be bettered discussed in a stand alone thread.

Here is what I think I know. I stress think, because I am really in the dark.

I have enough height, but could use more travel, although I know I am not using the travel I have properly. I think I need a more non linear dampening profile. Shot in the dark I think I need more rebound dampening, and less high speed bound dampening.

I also think I might need slightly softer springs. The car seems to land well off jumps, I have not had any issues with it kicking or twisting. Just a little bounce off the bigger stuff.

I also think helper springs would be a nice addition, because I have very little droop travel and I can tell that it is easy to get the car light, and traction drops off quickly in those situations.

I also need to work on my alignment settings. Currently it is very conservative. Very little negative camber all around, a bit of toe in on the rear, and near neutral toe on the front.

Beefing up the tubes and ears is something I know needs doing. I also need to rethink the front top mounts. The actual mount plates look like dinner plates. The bearings are all steel and seem fine, but the mount plate is aluminium. Might just make something out of steel, they don't need to be pretty. That's it for now, will think of more I am sure.

---

I Seppanen, Car #240

Ian gotta run for an errand, but I'll be back in a while. I just posted suggestion on Texas 240 boys thread suggesting we drag Martin Walter from Ontario in on the conversation. I built his stuff but he's run it hard, and can relate what has bent, and what has flat failed (like that upper rear loopie arm thing).
I'll be back.

---

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.

Quote
john vanlandingham
Ian gotta run for an errand, but I'll be back in a while. I just posted suggestion on Texas 240 boys thread suggesting we drag Martin Walter from Ontario in on the conversation. I built his stuff but he's run it hard, and can relate what has bent, and what has flat failed (like that upper rear loopie arm thing).
I'll be back.

Thanks in advance for your help.

I have actually talked to Walter before, although its been a while. I ran a few questions by him when I was putting the car together. Bringing him back in would be awesome.

By the loopy thing I am guessing you mean the camber control arm. I can see that failing.

As for the engine suggestions, I already have that mostly hammered out. I will be swapping to a DOHC 2.4 litre from a newer 240SX. I will be swapping cams around a little, increasing compression by a healthy bit, and I will be doing a full standalone ECU.

Currently I have a tired single cam, loosing compression, burning oil, with stock everything except a stupid intake tube. Its a dog.

Back from errand now.
Before we get to suspension I have to ask: what are you planning to do to bop the compression up in the KA24DE? And what are you aiming for in static compression?
I know those heads and with that nice chamber you ought to be able to run over 11:1 on pump gas and depending on intake valve closing ABDC as high as 11.4-11.5. The intake valve are nice and big (36.5mm) so you don't need to worry about getting enough air IN, but to make the thing PULL you gotta squeeze it and make it POP! good.
You have chamber volume in cc? 46cc
Do you have cam data especially intake closing ABDC @ 050?

Just did a quick calculation and zero deck, flat top pistons would give you right at 12.0 with a 1.2mm thick head gasket

Damn that's uh good.

So what about intake closing ABDC @ 050?

---

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.

OK now to suspension.
The rear things have to go. WAAAY too short travel except for smooth tarmac.

Also the mounting is spasmodic on both those AND the big fat 20mm pin on the lower end of the OEM things. It will save money and headaches to mod the knuckles or upright ONCE so that you can just open a box and bang on the shock on. 2 D shaped ears with a 12mm hole welded on and you can use ordinary Builstein 50mm coilover shocks with the 15mm bearings and the Sooper Bitchin Stainless spacers like these:


Then you can use nice long travel coilovers like these.
Notice the hefty Sooper Bitchin Stainless pin mount tops


To use these you might, probably will want to weld in tower extentions into the shell, but again do it once and be done.

Now if you are a cheap bastid like me you could make your towers with 2 D shaped tops so you can use the spherical bearing top mounts and save buying those stainless pin mounts. Pin is easier, just a disc with a hole.
Bit a plate with a hole topped by 2 D shaped mounts is hardly hard, just takes a few minutes more and you save over $100.

Those shocks---if you order them from a place that evidently knows what you are doing and get them with the 15mm bearings and valved right will take car of the rear, let you use up some travel for grip, and judging from the cars I've driven and ridden in with them, actually be comfortable on stages. Yeah, comfy.

Now fronts: Look arf-fully short. THAT 240 has rather unique "ears up the tube" design which confuses things but lets just say you ought to have at least 200mm travel, maybe 210. The other 240, ya know the boxy 240 has 210mm travel stock, so they get 210, your 240 thing I think its around 160mm with the ears UP for some reason. (Low hood lines) So we're talking +40 to 50mm. And again we gotta valve them right--and spring them with enough spring travel and clear the wheel.

When I did Martin's I sent the things with the ears not welded on, he was doing some deal like some of the Made in China Japanese things where the ears themselves are height adjustable, but now he has the height set so we can ask where he ended up...

So it sounds like to get that thing to work like i know it can work, you either save that stuff for show or asphalt, or sell it to some street boy.
A major reason is also that you nor i have any idea what the actual valving is on the fronts and I'd bet a nickle that they're WAY soft....
Just as an example the valving in the so called "Heavy Duty" Bilsteins for the boxy 240 are so soft that they're about barely half what a 2100 lb MkII Escort would use on gravel, and that's for a car 700 lbs heavier.

A kid Al and I know in SF area was all hot to lower his car and found some Saab 900 new gen (Opel Vectra) struts and was all excited so i gave him the right 1-800 number and said call and get the valving...again about 1/2 what an Escort would use...
Then I organised for him to go for a ride with Al around a 14 mile loop---asphalt with gravel tires and suspension and stock ride height.
The kid was RAVING "I don't beleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeve it!!! YAAAARGH! That thing with a shitty junk yard n.a. motor can be driven WAY FASTER than my turbo car (with 17" wheels and lowered) I CANNOT BELIVE IT!!!
(babble babble.....).

Gotta get the travel and valving and springs right.

Mod the non-wear items (body shell) and make replacement easy.

OK?

---

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.

Quote
john vanlandingham
Back from errand now.
Before we get to suspension I have to ask: what are you planning to do to bop the compression up in the KA24DE? And what are you aiming for in static compression?
I know those heads and with that nice chamber you ought to be able to run over 11:1 on pump gas and depending on intake valve closing ABDC as high as 11.4-11.5. The intake valve are nice and big (36.5mm) so you don't need to worry about getting enough air IN, but to make the thing PULL you gotta squeeze it and make it POP! good.
You have chamber volume in cc? 46cc
Do you have cam data especially intake closing ABDC @ 050?

Just did a quick calculation and zero deck, flat top pistons would give you right at 12.0 with a 1.2mm thick head gasket

Damn that's uh good.

So what about intake closing ABDC @ 050?

For pistons I will be using the pistons out of the current SOHC motor. They came with 2 piston designs, one flat, and one dished a little. So depending on the set, putting the pistons in the DOHC will net me either 10.5:1, or 11:1 compression.

For the cams, I am actually planning to start off with stock cams, sort of. from the factory they use a 232, and 248 duration cam setup, IIRC that is I then E. Plenty of people have had good luck with swapping out the 232 for a second 248.

One of the only benifits of the current KA, is it feels like it makes about the same amount of power from 2000-5000 rpm. I can mash my foot to the floor just about anywhere without it getting too hairy. I would like to retain at least a little bit of that flat power band, increasing things across the board if possible.

I have no idea where the lobe center is for the stock cams, or the closing point, only duration. I actually had never really worked much with the KA. For 6 or 7 years I owned 95 240SX with an SR20DET. When I built up the rally car, the engine became an after thought, which is why I ended up with the haggared SOHC. I ran out of money and decided it would be better to be out there racing slow, then not at all.

My limited knowledge tells me that drastically increasing duration would create too much overlap, shifting my powerband up. The KA's aren't well known for their ability to rev all that high, so that is something I would like to avoid. Though I may be wrong. I am still refining my knowledge of what effects certain small changes in internal engine dynamics can have.

I may choose to flip flop the Intake cam drive cog, and drill an offset keyway hole to advance the intake timing slightly, but that is mostly pipe dreams at the moment.

For management, I have a standalone Link ECU that I will be using to tune, and I plan to do away with the MAFS and run a MAPS. I have also tossed the idea of individual throttle bodies around, as its something I could custom build using Hyabusa parts without too much wasted money. But again, getting the motor running and tested a little before Sno Drift is the big goal here. Whatever I have time/money for is what will happen.

With that said, I am out to the garage to build support rig so I can pull the engine out of the car. Hope to have it, and the suspension out this weekend.

Quote
john vanlandingham
OK now to suspension.
The rear things have to go. WAAAY too short travel except for smooth tarmac.

Also the mounting is spasmodic on both those AND the big fat 20mm pin on the lower end of the OEM things. It will save money and headaches to mod the knuckles or upright ONCE so that you can just open a box and bang on the shock on. 2 D shaped ears with a 12mm hole welded on and you can use ordinary Builstein 50mm coilover shocks with the 15mm bearings and the Sooper Bitchin Stainless spacers like these:


Then you can use nice long travel coilovers like these.
Notice the hefty Sooper Bitchin Stainless pin mount tops


To use these you might, probably will want to weld in tower extentions into the shell, but again do it once and be done.

Now if you are a cheap bastid like me you could make your towers with 2 D shaped tops so you can use the spherical bearing top mounts and save buying those stainless pin mounts. Pin is easier, just a disc with a hole.
Bit a plate with a hole topped by 2 D shaped mounts is hardly hard, just takes a few minutes more and you save over $100.

Those shocks---if you order them from a place that evidently knows what you are doing and get them with the 15mm bearings and valved right will take car of the rear, let you use up some travel for grip, and judging from the cars I've driven and ridden in with them, actually be comfortable on stages. Yeah, comfy.

Now fronts: Look arf-fully short. THAT 240 has rather unique "ears up the tube" design which confuses things but lets just say you ought to have at least 200mm travel, maybe 210. The other 240, ya know the boxy 240 has 210mm travel stock, so they get 210, your 240 thing I think its around 160mm with the ears UP for some reason. (Low hood lines) So we're talking +40 to 50mm. And again we gotta valve them right--and spring them with enough spring travel and clear the wheel.

When I did Martin's I sent the things with the ears not welded on, he was doing some deal like some of the Made in China Japanese things where the ears themselves are height adjustable, but now he has the height set so we can ask where he ended up...

So it sounds like to get that thing to work like i know it can work, you either save that stuff for show or asphalt, or sell it to some street boy.
A major reason is also that you nor i have any idea what the actual valving is on the fronts and I'd bet a nickle that they're WAY soft....
Just as an example the valving in the so called "Heavy Duty" Bilsteins for the boxy 240 are so soft that they're about barely half what a 2100 lb MkII Escort would use on gravel, and that's for a car 700 lbs heavier.

A kid Al and I know in SF area was all hot to lower his car and found some Saab 900 new gen (Opel Vectra) struts and was all excited so i gave him the right 1-800 number and said call and get the valving...again about 1/2 what an Escort would use...
Then I organised for him to go for a ride with Al around a 14 mile loop---asphalt with gravel tires and suspension and stock ride height.
The kid was RAVING "I don't beleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeve it!!! YAAAARGH! That thing with a shitty junk yard n.a. motor can be driven WAY FASTER than my turbo car (with 17" wheels and lowered) I CANNOT BELIVE IT!!!
(babble babble.....).

Gotta get the travel and valving and springs right.

Mod the non-wear items (body shell) and make replacement easy.

OK?

Thats what I thought.

See, this is what happens when you let some nerdy kid with a welder get over zealous about what he knows about suspension.

I had a feeling when I started the whole suspension buildup that I had like a 1 it 10 chance of getting things right. I figured, hey, I will learn something, and I will end up with a set of spares that will at least get me through an event. Which they still will. With a the fronts rebuilt, they are great on asphault, they just dont like all the bumps and jumps. I know they are too soft, I figured they would need rebuilding sooner rather then later, and I could just re valve them at that time.

I think you are right on ditching them, I kind of saw it as a lost cause after all the damage they sustained at RMN. I have already done a bunch of searching regarding replacements. I came across a few different options, one of which was actually a link to this forum.

I remember when I was emailing back and forth with Martin, he mention that you build his coilovers, but for some reason I never took the time to actually dig into having you build a matching set for me. The farthest I got was looking at a few pictures of JVAB stuff here and there and thinking to myself, man that stuff looks bitchin.

So my options stand as

Try again, with your help at building coils sort of from scratch
Bite the bullet and stop trying to know everything, and let you build me a set that is proven
Spend a bunch of money on DMS
Or be like every other cheapo rally nerd and buy HotBits.

Option number 2 is looking awfully sunny.

Option number 1 would be cool, but I have enough paska to deal with trying to get a motor put together before January.

Ok, now I am really going out to the garage to work on stuff.

Thanks for all your help John, its interesting how many people will toss out ideas, or random thoughts attempting to be helpful, but its rare than anyone is willing to go out of their way the way you already have.

One last thing.

I do think modifying the body to except easy changeover of parts is a good idea, and I also have no issue modifying the rear strut towers or uprights. If I did the towers, it would give me a good excuse to make some of the changes to the cage I have planned for sometime somewhere.

Quote
Ian S

Quote
john vanlandingham
Back from errand now.
Before we get to suspension I have to ask: what are you planning to do to bop the compression up in the KA24DE? And what are you aiming for in static compression?
I know those heads and with that nice chamber you ought to be able to run over 11:1 on pump gas and depending on intake valve closing ABDC as high as 11.4-11.5. The intake valve are nice and big (36.5mm) so you don't need to worry about getting enough air IN, but to make the thing PULL you gotta squeeze it and make it POP! good.
You have chamber volume in cc? 46cc
Do you have cam data especially intake closing ABDC @ 050?

Just did a quick calculation and zero deck, flat top pistons would give you right at 12.0 with a 1.2mm thick head gasket

Damn that's uh good.

So what about intake closing ABDC @ 050?

For pistons I will be using the pistons out of the current SOHC motor. They came with 2 piston designs, one flat, and one dished a little. So depending on the set, putting the pistons in the DOHC will net me either 10.5:1, or 11:1 compression.

For the cams, I am actually planning to start off with stock cams, sort of. from the factory they use a 232, and 248 duration cam setup, IIRC that is I then E. Plenty of people have had good luck with swapping out the 232 for a second 248.

One of the only benifits of the current KA, is it feels like it makes about the same amount of power from 2000-5000 rpm. I can mash my foot to the floor just about anywhere without it getting too hairy. I would like to retain at least a little bit of that flat power band, increasing things across the board if possible.

I have no idea where the lobe center is for the stock cams, or the closing point, only duration. I actually had never really worked much with the KA. For 6 or 7 years I owned 95 240SX with an SR20DET. When I built up the rally car, the engine became an after thought, which is why I ended up with the haggared SOHC. I ran out of money and decided it would be better to be out there racing slow, then not at all.

My limited knowledge tells me that drastically increasing duration would create too much overlap, shifting my powerband up. The KA's aren't well known for their ability to rev all that high, so that is something I would like to avoid. Though I may be wrong. I am still refining my knowledge of what effects certain small changes in internal engine dynamics can have.

I may choose to flip flop the Intake cam drive cog, and drill an offset keyway hole to advance the intake timing slightly, but that is mostly pipe dreams at the moment.

For management, I have a standalone Link ECU that I will be using to tune, and I plan to do away with the MAFS and run a MAPS. I have also tossed the idea of individual throttle bodies around, as its something I could custom build using Hyabusa parts without too much wasted money. But again, getting the motor running and tested a little before Sno Drift is the big goal here. Whatever I have time/money for is what will happen.

With that said, I am out to the garage to build support rig so I can pull the engine out of the car. Hope to have it, and the suspension out this weekend.

OK this intake closing ABDC things is not just a worry for rad cams. Some of the OEM emissions cams for those boxy 240s close intake 55 degrees after BDC and the point is you don't make compression till you close the HOLE.

And agreed we want to use the big engine to have a broad good powerband, and that's a function of duration and lobe centers.. What we want is "reasonable" lift and relatively "mild" event timing but a lot of area under the curve..
Just as an example my lil' ol' V4 Saab uses cams with about 308 duration IN and 312 duration EX measured like the Euros traditionally have @ 010". That'd be somewhere around 280 duration the 'Merikanski way.
That sounds like it'd be rad but with 10.7 to 11.3 comp the thing pulls like a truck and putters around in rush hour traffic no problem (that motor runs 2 x 45 DCOEs with 38mm venturis and I've used the same set up on motors from 1730cc to 1815 to 1883 to the current 1965cc). A bigger motor would tolerate something like that even more.

The BIG LIMITATION aside from money (!!!) is the gaps in the gearset...
I say like this FIRST!!!
Q: is what fuel? A: Pump gas

Boom that determines how crazy we can think of compression.

Next,
Q: what gear set? A: that determines how rad or up the rev range we can shift power

You want pump gas,and that thing has box ratios like:
1st 3.321
2nd 1.902
3rd 1.308
4th 1.000
5th .759
So you don't want a "peaky" powerband.

And if we make it pop real good then it'll PULL the gaps fine.

I wonder what the ratio in the JDM diffs for the SR20DET cars is?
I think they are shorter than the US spec 4.08.
Do you know? They might 4.37 and that would be worthwhile to find out, cause I've seen those for $225 and 4.37 is insta-torque at every rpm , 7% more. It about makes up for the taller gravel tires which gear you up maybe 8%.

By the way there seems to be a discrepancy between the comp I come up with from the data I looked at and "what everybody says".
Intraweb forums are usually wrong.
But we should look into this..

As for standard cams 240ish duration is REAL short, and I would be chewing my fingernails like Olive Oyl to be running over 11 with such short duration cams--detonation dontcha know. The big enemy.

More later, wifey and the girls just came in.

---

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.

Quote
Ian S

Thanks for all your help John, its interesting how many people will toss out ideas, or random thoughts attempting to be helpful, but its rare than anyone is willing to go out of their way the way you already have.

Remember that I spent my late teens to late 20s in that Socialist Paradise a little to the West of where your ancestors left from. And i worked together with a lot of your cousins and uncles. And every one was Red. THEY pointed out how EVERYTHING we do we do in cooperation with dozens, hundreds even thousands of others, that is the way modern societies work.
The moto-cross tracks I raced on -dozens and dozens and dozen (maybe 75 different tracks) were ALL on land donated by the cities or towns or "komun" they were in. They were made with volunteer labor, donating their time so some schmuck kid could train and train and train....
Other club members gave their time to teach me how gearboxes work, how diesels work, how to weld, how to prioritize, how to look at power relationships, media representations, "what everybody says", how to think, and how to become not a big hero but at least good enough racer to make a modest living..
I am forever indebted to them. So forever, I pay those guys back. pass on the knowledge but mainly the most useful thing, the 'approach" to the problem: Serious prioritizing. (Like what things gives the most back in terms of dollar spent to laugh return---which is close to results, but laughs are far more important.)
So you have a 240, it aint a boxy 240 but I know it ain't BAD, and simply not being bad is pretty damn good. You are descended from a crazy tough tribe of loonies, you genetically cannot be a total 'runkare'.
If i help you, you'll ahve more fun and if you have more fun you'll stay in the sport. If you have lots of fun for reasonable expenditure, maybe MORE 240 guys both roundish like yours or boxy like Ian Toppings or Alperti Kunkanen will be encouraged and build cars..

And one day we'll maybe have something like F-cup here.
That's the goal.

---

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.

john, any chance you got my pms recently?

Quote
john vanlandingham


OK this intake closing ABDC things is not just a worry for rad cams. Some of the OEM emissions cams for those boxy 240s close intake 55 degrees after BDC and the point is you don't make compression till you close the HOLE.

And agreed we want to use the big engine to have a broad good powerband, and that's a function of duration and lobe centers.. What we want is "reasonable" lift and relatively "mild" event timing but a lot of area under the curve..
Just as an example my lil' ol' V4 Saab uses cams with about 308 duration IN and 312 duration EX measured like the Euros traditionally have @ 010". That'd be somewhere around 280 duration the 'Merikanski way.
That sounds like it'd be rad but with 10.7 to 11.3 comp the thing pulls like a truck and putters around in rush hour traffic no problem (that motor runs 2 x 45 DCOEs with 38mm venturis and I've used the same set up on motors from 1730cc to 1815 to 1883 to the current 1965cc). A bigger motor would tolerate something like that even more.

The BIG LIMITATION aside from money (!!!) is the gaps in the gearset...
I say like this FIRST!!!
Q: is what fuel? A: Pump gas

Boom that determines how crazy we can think of compression.

Next,
Q: what gear set? A: that determines how rad or up the rev range we can shift power

You want pump gas,and that thing has box ratios like:
1st 3.321
2nd 1.902
3rd 1.308
4th 1.000
5th .759
So you don't want a "peaky" powerband.

And if we make it pop real good then it'll PULL the gaps fine.

I wonder what the ratio in the JDM diffs for the SR20DET cars is?
I think they are shorter than the US spec 4.08.
Do you know? They might 4.37 and that would be worthwhile to find out, cause I've seen those for $225 and 4.37 is insta-torque at every rpm , 7% more. It about makes up for the taller gravel tires which gear you up maybe 8%.

By the way there seems to be a discrepancy between the comp I come up with from the data I looked at and "what everybody says".
Intraweb forums are usually wrong.
But we should look into this..

As for standard cams 240ish duration is REAL short, and I would be chewing my fingernails like Olive Oyl to be running over 11 with such short duration cams--detonation dontcha know. The big enemy.

More later, wifey and the girls just came in.

Ok, looks like I need to re research my cam options. Maybe I can find something worth giving a shot.

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.

As for the static compression numbers, they could, and very likely are wrong, but its a close guess. I need to go back through all my info anyway so I can determine what piston rings and bearings I need to order, and I also need to decide if its worth it to do anything with the pistons, or maybe even upgrade them. I have thought about teflon coating the sides and bottoms, and ceramic coating the tops. Really though, Im trying not to build too high strung of an engine, I would like it to last.

But I digress. Back to suspension. For a baseline PM a price for a set of replacement coils, and what they will include, and what I will need to change/modify on my car to make them fit.

Thanks again.

Quote
john vanlandingham
Remember that I spent my late teens to late 20s in that Socialist Paradise a little to the West of where your ancestors left from. And i worked together with a lot of your cousins and uncles. And every one was Red. THEY pointed out how EVERYTHING we do we do in cooperation with dozens, hundreds even thousands of others, that is the way modern societies work.
The moto-cross tracks I raced on -dozens and dozens and dozen (maybe 75 different tracks) were ALL on land donated by the cities or towns or "komun" they were in. They were made with volunteer labor, donating their time so some schmuck kid could train and train and train....
Other club members gave their time to teach me how gearboxes work, how diesels work, how to weld, how to prioritize, how to look at power relationships, media representations, "what everybody says", how to think, and how to become not a big hero but at least good enough racer to make a modest living..
I am forever indebted to them. So forever, I pay those guys back. pass on the knowledge but mainly the most useful thing, the 'approach" to the problem: Serious prioritizing. (Like what things gives the most back in terms of dollar spent to laugh return---which is close to results, but laughs are far more important.)
So you have a 240, it aint a boxy 240 but I know it ain't BAD, and simply not being bad is pretty damn good. You are descended from a crazy tough tribe of loonies, you genetically cannot be a total 'runkare'.
If i help you, you'll ahve more fun and if you have more fun you'll stay in the sport. If you have lots of fun for reasonable expenditure, maybe MORE 240 guys both roundish like yours or boxy like Ian Toppings or Alperti Kunkanen will be encouraged and build cars..

And one day we'll maybe have something like F-cup here.
That's the goal.

Paying things forward is what makes the world really work, and for that I thank you. There are so many people these days who are only out to make things work for themselves, they forget where they got their start. I hope to pass all the things I have and will learn doing this on to the next generation. I have already started working on the guys that crew for me. I think there is a good chance at least one of them will be as addicted to this as I am within the next few years.

2011 was a testing year for me and the car. I learned so much, and I plan to apply that knowledge to next season. I am committed not only to improving my stage times, but also expanding the scope of rally as a whole. There is a huge wealth of competitors and spectators involved with 240SXs and other Nissan's in different forms of motor sports. My goal is to try and attract a few of those guys. The Subaru and much of the Mitsu markets are tapped out. And I think there may be more Ford people coming out to see the Fiesta. I can only hope that other manufacturers might take note. AWD may be fast on dirt, but 2WD is cheaper, more fun, and at the moment more competitive.

Max Attack is a great start, hopefully we can expand it. If we can draw enough people into Max Attack we can increase the exposure, which would make it more realistic for sponsors of the series, which would mean a possible increase in payouts, and or an expansion of events.

But again, I digress.

Ian, shoot me your
puhelinnumero
I gotta swap a brake master on wifey car and I am semi-delirious from this flu which liquefied my brains but we can talk.

---

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.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/2011 10:29PM by john vanlandingham.

Hi Guys,

I just found this talk of 'round' 240's ;-) I just put some info in teh otehr thread, but this one makes more sense.

John's suspension work. I played around a lot at the front, with height, mounts etc. to get travel.. it's all about travel. I have 210mm travel inserts now, but I'm still not using it effectively as I could... I'll be playing more over the next few weeks leading up to Tall Pines, where I'd liek to haveit right on the money.
John hates my adjustable ears, but they give me so much more options when trying to get things right. When I finally do get them right yes I could switch to static ears, but right now I still like having them adjustable. Note: there's lots of room below the ears for a longer strut tube

I run the 40mm invetred inserts, next ones I buy will be 50mm... I've bent a ton of inserts over the last 5 or 6 years. I think 50's would stand up to teh beating I'm laying on them.. also I added alot of strengthening to my car so it's f'ing heavy. Right around 3000lbs without crew.

At the rear I modified the cast steel upright to take the stock bilstien bottom mount. I raised teh top mounts such that the suspension was at full droop and the axle wasn't quite touching the subframe. I think it was pretty much 2". I run 14" 175lbs springs + a 5" or 6" spring.. I've played with 180lbs to 400lbs, and find I like 300lb best.

Search these forums, you'll find pictures of most of my setup... usually when it's wrecked ;-)

I wouldn't spend the time/money building a NA KA24DE when you can pick up a SR20DET so cheap these days. I've run the same engine for 5 or 6 years... about 30 events, including Targa Newfoundland. All i've changed is the turbo once, teh plugs once, and the oil every event or so...

-Martin.

Quote
MRWmotorsports

I wouldn't spend the time/money building a NA KA24DE when you can pick up a SR20DET so cheap these days. I've run the same engine for 5 or 6 years... about 30 events, including Targa Newfoundland. All i've changed is the turbo once, teh plugs once, and the oil every event or so...

-Martin.

I think the KA can have its benefits. A turbo SR just isn't an option for me right now. First off, I just dont have the cash to dump into that at the moment. Around these parts, even a rough SR will still run me $3000 or more, plus intercooler, fuel pump, and other supporting mods. Its just not in the budget. If that weren't enough, I cant wont run G5 at the moment. I am no longer a novice, but I am still provisional so I am limited to G2 OL or P. That being said, I dont know if G5 would be a logical step for me. Max Attack is taking off here in the US, and G2 has become fiercely competitive. I know G5 cars compete in Max Attack too, but personally I dont think they should, or there should be different standings. G2 is the class of the privateer, and there are just so many more entries to compete against. I see myself having a lot more fun getting out and trying to catch the Zedril's or them crazy Himes boys.

If I do decide to up to group 5, I would rather go the displacement route. I can imagine a VH48 powered 240SX would be an absolute hoot.

In other news, the motor is out.





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/2011 11:37PM by Ian S.