it has brand new ones on it at the moment....might have to pull them off the rear as the are actually dans

engine is in and runs. only got the caster rods to wind back into position and tighten all the front suspension back up and it should be good to go for a drive

so i have some pics

the fuel setup is just a walbro gss421 in tank pump. cut the flange and stuff out of a v6 magna and welded that into the top of the tank then made up the pump holder out of modified magna stuff







also put the r31 diff in and centered it, as the guards are a bit non symmetrical. ended up having to offset the diff by 6mm to get it centered between the guards

as you can see its a tight fit so i ended up cutting half the guard lip off for a bit more room, this is the before




then just using the dummy engine to set up the gearbox mounts and crossmember










and i just cut the original 120y mounts out of the tunnel and re jigged them to suit the crossmember i made



















then once that was done the suzi was rolled in and the forged engine pulled out of it so that it can now sit around until another CA is built for it







and bang engine is in the bay




getting the gearbox on wasn't as bad as i thought it would be, it couldn't go in with the engine so the engine had to go in and then be dropped down about 100mm with the cross-member and the gearbox brought up from underneath. engine ended up with the crank pulley sitting on the sway bar and the rocker covers wedging them self against the firewall. but the gearbox went on nice and easy and the everything bolted back up without any headaches

so then i did all the small stuff like fuel lines, radiator hoses, heater hoses...all that not so exciting stuff

speedo cable was one another thing that needed to be changed. standard one wasn't quite long enough. I was pretty sure that i had a 120y cable around somewhere and that id figured out a while ago that it would do the job....but it seems to have gone awol.

local wreckers had a 120y with a good speedo cable in it and it turned out to be the correct length

took a pic of it compared to the standard 1200 cable




then i needed a gear knob, didn't really want one of the normal cheap aftermarket ones that are around and also didn't want to wait for one off ebay. still had some 50mm 7000 series (i think) billet that i had left over from a uni project so i figured that would turn into a nice gear knob, man i love lathing good quality alloy










im pretty happy with how it turned out, especially since the lathe has developed a bit of a vibration and what looks to be a bit of run out on the chuck

also got some pics of how the engine sits

height of the plenum from the top of the guards. measured next to the throttle cable bracket




back of the left hand rocker cover to the main plane of the firewall







did the same thing with the back of the plenum, measured 110mm to the gasket surface on the back of the plenum

and as it now sits all ready to run. just need to do the overflow bottle and rocker cover breathers

looking great, ebay billet knobs are too big and really heavy so much better off having made your own

yeah mines about 40mm diameter i think. and 50mm tall. similar dimensions to the standard a series shifter but a cylinder

weighs more than a plastic one but you get that when its a solid billet i guess

:) looks good nick wish mine would go together so easy

cant say its been that easy. all ive done for the last 2 weeks is either work or working on the car. getting used to getting home around 11pm having tea and going to bed

so i went for a drive in it tonight....and my god is it slow. maybe coz of the rear section of exhaust being 1.75 inch, maybe coz its lower compression than the last CA i had in a 1200

well its not really slow, but definately slower than what the sedan was which i was expecting. but its still not a nice feeling

so next thing to do to the car is a full 3 inch exhaust, and then somehow get it under 91db while still having straight through mufflers

actual bad news though, i should stop putting new bearings in gearboxes. it just doesnt seem to be working for me. the r31 box in the car has all new main bearings, yet whines its head off unless you have the clutch fully engaged
so ive gotta get another one that a mate has and chuck that in and then i guess replace all the smaller bearings in the gearbox and hope that gets rid of the noise

also need to shorten the front control arms as the front of the car is stupidly wide and running around 3 degrees of neg camber. i actually laughed at it when i got out to dads tonight and saw it sitting out the front of the shed. the bottom outside edge of the front tires would have to be around 40-50mm wider than the rear on each side
it does looks stupidly aggressive but i doubt the engineer would approve of it
and as it is at the moment i cant adjust the camber tops out as the tire will then hit the guard. so bottom in is my only real option

so next things to do are:
shorten some control arms
build a 3 inch exhaust
find r31 calipers and jig some form of handbrake (hydraulic handbrake and r32 calipers will happen after engineers)
also need to find some straight roller bearings to replace the tapered rollers that the r31 diff uses as wheel bearings as they have a good couple of mm of movement in them from new which doesnt agree with the r32 calipers

Awesome work Nick Great to see you back in a 1200 especially a wagon.

lol i had same 1.75 inch exhaust.... HUGE improvement when i got rid of that

3 inch over diff and past fuel tank will be tricky! used a 2.5 mandrel system for mine

engineer has asked me to get noise cert under 96dB.... not the 91 you are saying

gearboxes, normally never give much issue, but such a pain when they do