Sr20 Conversion To Ke55 Plus Rebuild Plus Pimpage

[JDM55]

step one! again another set of (corona xt130 front struts) were bought,

they cost me 120 from a wreakers , bit of a rip off in my opinion , tho i did get the complete strut with disk ,

spring ,caliper etc etc ,the hole strut assembly was what i got,

 

so after striping the strut down to the bare thing ,

the first job is to remove the spring cup,

I'm taking the cup off so i can fitt a coil over threaded sleeve.

 

so get ya self some of these bad boys ,the xt130 corona strut:::::

 

 

 

i set them up in a vice and used a grinder with a cut off disk to first hack the cups off....

 

 

 

then with a grinder ,i grinded down the left over cup metal and the weld that held it on there, till it was nearly all gone

 

 

 

 

 

then further sanding the left over right down ,trying to keep the round shape of the tube,and keeping it level with the rest of the tube.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

so thats the first thing i done with these struts, cut off the cups and grinded and sanded the left over down level...

 

 

 

 

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Edited March 24, 2012 by JDM55

[JDM55]

step 2!!!!

 

 

 

next thing as to see if i can indeed use coil overs with these struts and with the wheels i have,

there was a big concern the large nuts that the spring rest on would be far to close to the tyre,due to my offset

 

 

 

so i was right in thinking that ,can clearly see if the thread tube was welded too low down the tube i would run into trouble with

those nuts hitting the tyre.

 

after alot of mesuring and working things out , i gladly found a good position for the threaded tube,

where i ended up was a place that would give me a small amount of lowering to start with ,but with a few inches nearly of adjustment,

ie dump it ,lol

 

 

 

so now that i had the position worked out i could go ahead and weld the threaded tube inplace

so the next things i done was to prep the strut as if i was going to paint it, the whole thing was sanded with 180# and red scotch brite ,

the struts ended up mostly bare metal but smooth,

 

 

here ive got the struts all cleaned up and ready to be welded, marked the position of the threaded tube and i just used tape to hold them in place

so i could get a few tack welds on them

 

 

 

and heres the struts with a few tack welds on the threaded tubes, also i used a bunch of masking tape on the axle to protect it from damage while

I'm throwing the thing about the place...

 

[JDM55]

then after some further setting the strut up in the vice it got a heavy weld all the way around the bottom part,

( please excuse speeling mistakes of word that don't make sence its 3 in the morning and I'm exhausted from working since 8 this

morning on the car @!!)

 

 

 

 

both struts finished welds

 

 

 

 

since i had sanded the hole strut before hand it was nearly ready to paint, just had to scuff off the welds and the threaded part

[JDM55]

next step was to paint the strut black and clear over the hols thing

 

got some etch primer on the struts ,ready to be painteded black

 

 

after the black was done i removed the masking from around the thread...

and cleared the entire struts

[JDM55]

so 2 coats of black unmasked the threaded tube and put one coat of clear over the whole lot,

reason i done this was ive heard alot of storys about the threads rusting up rather quick,

so hopefuly the clear will hold that off for a while,only thing i see wrong with doing that,

is maybe the nuts wont go on because of to much product,???

 

 

 

so starting to lay out the parts!!! now can start seeing where the money side comes into this conversion,

 

cusco i think it was a te37 model, that was about $$$$ 200.00 i think ,tho not part of the conversion

 

the springs and threaded tube and spanners etc was $$$ 300.00

 

koni adjustable gas inserts were $$$$ 550.00

 

 

 

 

the xt130 hubs , with new bearings bearings were about $$$ 60.00

 

 

 

these are toyota ae86 power steering arms , these are getting hard to get ,took me a while to find a good deal on these,

 

they cost $$$$ 85.00

 

 

 

these are the T3 camber plates , i painted them silver and blue to suit the car a bit better,they were gold and red ?? wierd ass colours but yeah ,

they cost $$$$ 180.00

 

 

 

these are the disks I'm running, there from a peugeot 604 , these ones are vent and slotted,there chunky as ,

these need to have 2 things done to them ,first the mounting holes need to be slightly reemed out by about 1.5 mm,tho the

centre of the xt130 hubs fit the disk perfectly,the second thing is the outer diameter of the disk is too large

and needs to be machined down a bit , can't quite remember how much it was ,12 mm??? it wasnt much tho, reason they

need to be machined down is the hilux caliper wont clear properly,, the machining cost 25 dollars so not a big drama.

so puegeot 604 disk ,machined down, and mount holes reemed out slightly, total cost $$$$$ 325.00

 

 

 

 

also for the spring tops, these are machined alloy with a needle bearing in the top to suit the t3 camber tops,

price $$$$$$ 60.00

 

 

[JDM55]

so alot of parts !!!! and thats not all theres more, calipers ,brake pads, bolts ,just for a pair of struts, any way on with the build,

 

so struts striped sanded ,threads welded on and now painted ready to go

 

 

 

inserts fitted to the struts, and the spring nuts fitted, they actualy fitted realy well over the cleared thread,

 

 

 

coil springs fitted and t3 camber plates sitting on top, they look pretty cool :)

 

 

both fitted to the car

 

 

camber plates bolted in, happy with the colours i went with, these plates were well worth the money spent, great quaility ,and most inportantley have

totaly removed my camber problem with the xt130 struts, now have the adjustability that i need :)

 

 

 

now the first drama of fitting all this stuff,

the dust plates wouldnt fitt,

reason they wouldnt go on is using the ae86 arms ,they sitt slightly inward,as compared to the xt130 arms,

this makes the dust cover hit the edge of the lower arm

so i could bolt it on but it wasnt moving to well,

 

to work this out it took me most of the day ,i started by bashing the shit out of cover where it was hitting , this just gave me a few mm clearance,which i thought was ok ,

but what happened later on is when i went to put the disk and hub on the disk was hard up against the bash out portion of the cover and wouldnt turn :bash: :bash: :bash:

 

a very long story short , i ended up cutting a slot in the cover ,then bashed it all flat again, this let the edge of the lower arm come thru the plate

slightly , got there in the end! dam thing , any way onto the next part

 

 

 

assemblying the peugeot disk to xt130 hub ,after the small modds it bolts right on nice

 

these wiegh a fair bit ,but are frigen chunky !!

 

 

 

here can see the slot i made in both dust covers, i could have just not used it ,ive seen alot of these done with out them,

how ever i needed the cover to keep it road worthy apparently , dam vic roads and there nazi laws

 

 

another modd that needed to be done to the dust covers was to trim the opening for the caliper,

these calipers are frigen huge so need to cut out the opening to suit, easy job just snip snip :)

 

[JDM55]

and these are the hilux caliper, there a 4 pot set up, very heavy tho ,but should have good stopping power,

 

i painted them a while ago,but i do need to rekit them with new seals ,they been sitting around for a few years

and no doubt a few years before i got hold of them , but for the mean time i just want to get them set up and see if i can get

them working with my brake system,

 

 

 

 

 

got the caliper bolted on ,jesus its big, comparing it to the mx62 one is like lol

 

 

can see how chunky !! i like it, how ever i couldnt fit the brake pads, since the pistons were to far out,

 

 

 

 

i figured out a little custom tool to help press the pistons in,

just a piece of threaded rod,2 nuts ,2 washers ,and 2 small pieces of pipe

 

 

 

i put the magic tool inbetween the 2 pistons and winded the nuts towards the pistons ,this forced the small pipes hard against the pistons

and pushed them in :)

 

 

fitted the pads ,and the brake hoses, i was very lucky there,

the brake hoses were set up for the mx62 caliper,

the guy that made the line said if i wanted to use the hilux later on i would need to make up new steel lines ,between the caliper and the hose,

but ... the hose fitted the caliper and was long enuf just to reach the strut bracket , so that was a bit of luck , by now

you guys would know how found i am of making steel lines with flares 0.o

 

 

 

on this side you can see the charcoal canister that i sneaky mounted under the wheel arch ,

but there you go , full custom!!!

 

hopefully every thing will work as it should,i did find a small drip of fliud from one of the calipers,

but i suspected that would be the case,would have been all dyed up and probably cracked when i winded the pistons in,

not to worry i have a seal kit for them ,which ill do later,

 

 

 

 

but for now there pretty much done,

so again the parts on the conversion and set up ::::

 

 

XT130 STRUT

XT130 HUB

HSD COIL OVER KIT

CUSTOM SPRING TOP WITH BEARING

KONI SHORT SHOCK GAS INSERT

LN106 HILUX CALIPER

PEUGEOT 604 FRONT BRAKE DISK

T3 CAMBER PLATES

BEARINGS

BRAKE LINES

[JDM55]

so back on the ground , and this is where its sitting at the moment,will go lower after engineering,

 

 

 

 

 

also i have finished all the vacumm lines, there was alot of them ! going al over the show, but got them all sorted and

thats pretty much the engine bay completed!!! :dance:

 

still have a few thngs to wire up here and there, the set up is fairly completed now ,which is good ,frees up my time to move on to other things needed

, i noticed after all the vacumm lines were fitted up ,i asume i done them right , was going off a diagram in a manual so they should be all right

but i notice how much the idle has improved and starting up seems alot easyier too ,

all the emmissions parts are in place and next i need to build the exhaust system! yip going to try build the exhaust my self,

don't feel like giving some one 1500 cash for welding some pipe , so going to give it a go, hell ive done everything else my self,

can't see why i can't .

 

got rid of that camber problem of the xt130 struts

 

[kickn5k]

For some reason I don't think you'll have any issues pulling it mate. They're huge!!

[JDM55]

For some reason I don't think you'll have any issues pulling it mate. They're huge!!

 

 

haha yeah they are ,hopefully they do the job, but I'm happy now the camber problem has been solved and having adjustable stuff means i can set it up how i need to , but yeah man these calipers are big ass ʞ©$ɟ lol , can't wait to see how they pull the car up

[JDM55]

so heres the engine bay fairly well completed!!! just a few things to wire up ,but the general set up and parts are there,

what you guys think??? i think it looks tops , ive put ALOT of hard work into getting it to this stage,as you can tell if you have read thru my blogg,

 

[BUZ440]

Looks awesome ryan, that feeling of getting close and wanting to cruise and hit boost is a rewarding feeling, and knowing what parts are their and putting them in yourself you know she will hold up and know what needs to be fixed (when needed)

 

I have the same front end setup apart from the tops, but run the 180sx booster amd master

 

Top work mate

[oh what a nissan feeling!]

yep, some seriously tidy work there mate, I have seen very few rolla that even come close. :y:

[JDM55]

cheers guys, much appreciated :)

feel like ive come along way in the last 3 months with it,think it was just be fore christmas that had the block fitted into the engine bay and now everything is attached and hooked up,

and its looking great, a few of my mates think I'm mental doing all this ,but hey its the way i wanted to go with it ,and i think its realy paying off now all the extra work.

 

still a way to go yet before she hits the road, but feel like ive reached the peak and now its all down hill from here,

 

apart from the usual stuff being done ,i hope some one gets something out of these 37 pages of me rambling on haha,

tryed to make things easy to understand for people that are maybe starting out and just learning the ins and outs of how cars work,

i know ive learnt a huge deal taking on the task bymyself, but like you said nisrola,when you know exactly whats been done and going on its much easyier to work on

the car if a problem does arise,

i think just keeping things as clean as possible also helps to spot if theres any leaks or things not going right,

mind you , i have the thing of if you rebuild or change or paint one thing nice ,then you have to do the rest nice as well or it wont look rite,lol

 

my main goals from here are to build the entire exhaust system myself of corse,then move onto some serious wiring ,

ive got alarms and a gps tracker and head unit all to be wired in,then theres the final tyding of the igntion wires ,

and a huge amount of dash board wires and gauge wires all to be done yet so i can see several weeks worth of making looms and running hundreds of metres of cable lol

then from there start finishing off the interior, seats ,carpet, dash board any trims that are left over,

 

also have the rear suspention set up to do ,

 

so heeeaaapppsss to keep me busy as few a good few months yet,

 

main goal is to get it done by september, I'm hoping to drive up to sydney and enter in the toyota fest show there, just for something differnt,

never realy had a nice car to put in a show before so be new thing for me ,and just be great to see what other peoples have done to theres as well,

some times I'm working in the week end and ill look out the window and its an awesum nice day, mannnn i wish i could just jump in the car and go cruise

and enjoy it, and then i would also wonder i must be the only mental that works on there car all weekend and devotes mental number of hours into building

so be nice to see other peoples hard efforts as well! pics can only show so much , seeing things in real life is much better :)

[dreamin]

Hats off to you mate, a ʞ©$ɟin top effort. I'll definately be reading back through your thread for info when i get back onto my car.

Well done dude