I'm starting this off about 10 weeks deep.... so I'll play a little catch up

So back towards the end of August I decided that I'm going to need to get something to keep me out of trouble. No real plans or direction...just something to build. I had a bunch of bullshit parts lying around the shop, and decided to throw them for sale on Craigslist to see what I can come up with. While surfing the 'list, I came across another promising FC....


200k+ miles. straight body complete Roller that was a failed LSx swap. I found it in Delaware. The guy Nate is a super cool dude.... asking $600.



at first check over the car looked awesomely clean and i didnt believe the mileage. I tried to give him $ to hold it, but he wouldnt take it... said I had his word. I told him that I'd feel better knowing he had some $ to bind us and his responce was "My word is my reputation...its all I have, without that I've got Nothing." I was blown away by that since 75% of people who i seem to deal pertaining cars (esp. rx7 ****) are complete scumbags that won't hesistate to take your money and rape you in the ******* without even spitting on it. I forced him to take $100 and told him I'd be back in 2 weeks to collect my new FC.


I sold some ebay turbo to a VW kid, and a Zex 2 bottle nitrous kit to some guy with a SC430 show car from my craigslist add in the meantime for a total of $600... so now this car is solely traded car parts.


September 1st, I grabbed a Roll-Back and headed to Wilmington to get the car...





...******* word...




a lot More catching up and more to come very soon.... off to a car show in a Supercharged G35 I helped my buddy build.

 

I get the car home and tuck it in the garage corner. I didn't really plan on working on it yet. just figured I'd trade some **** that was sitting around for an extra chassis for when I smash my green 7 up.




I got the car up on stands, and really looked at it. There was a ton of half assed rust repair. This was a total bummer. I spent the better half of a week under the car with a wire wheel, and cutoff wheel removing rust. FML



....me being pissed about all this rust.


pulled the subframe to get at everything.



The car was supposed to have a N/A LSD rear too....which ended up being a regular open diff... it was a bummer, but for what it cost me, I wasn't mad.


more catching up to come.

 

Very nice

 

In the meantime, I pulled the dash and carpet out. The carpet was destroyed due to a leaking heater core which I suspect was why there was rust




I sold my Miata (my Daily driver) and decided to drive my ML320... the miata was stupid loud, and i saw some rust showing on that.... time to off it




I got $3500 for it real fast.... and decided to roll that back into my other cars.... now what to do...

Fuggin open engine bay....



I took a trip to JEImportperformance and picked something up....




its on now.

 

I can't wait to see how this goes! I'm planning on doing a 1J after the KA blows up so this'll be interesting.

 

i dont plan on going too ape **** with this car...and its going to be more of a super clean car that gets street drifted and maybe some parking lot events... I'm going to keep it stock twins for the time being...and right around 375-400 whp

I picked up a 97 Supra W58 trans and a bunch of other **** too.

My buddy needed some quick cash and sold me a spare TII diff. I grabbed some axles off a local guy from craigslist. Decided to refinish the rear Subframe while it was out too.


With the rear end ready to go back up in the car, I figured I'd make some Rear Toe Arms.... I have Battle Versions on my Green car, but I couldn't fathom spending that much again.


Turned out pretty gangster... Just have to drill out the subframe tapered holes to accept the giant bolts.

All together...

I spend $40 in drill bits to drill out the tapers... broke on somehow... I have solid mounts in the diff, since they were already in it when I bought it...but I'm keeping the Subframe mounts rubber to use my Camber link from the green car and so its not loud as **** in the car. (i want it to be nice to drive and not too racecar like)

Still more to catch up on.

 

Would you reccomend a T2 rear end with the JZ? I have a welded right now with the KA, and I've always loved a welded but idk how well it'd hold up with a JZ. I plan on keeping mine pretty much stock when I swap it down the road, but I'm just curious.

 

I threw the engine and trans together w/o a clutch to drop it in to build the mounts. I decided to use the oem 1j aluminum brackets that bolt to the engine and go from there...

instagram pic.....



I dropped it in...and found that to get the motor to sit exactly where I wanted to, I heeded to cut away the pinch weld on the firewall... chopped that **** off and here we are...


******* Money.

The car was completely level side to side, and front to back before the motor was set in.. with jack stands, and random **** laying around the garage as shims...we got this.


...decent.




I started on building the mounts... I went with some Poly Inserts in steele sleeves, and some 1.5x.120 DOM tubing for the motor mounts...




The trans mount was staright forward..... I literally bolted a plate to the rubber w58 mount.... some 3/16 angle to the chassis...got the engine and trans dead square and built in between.

...came up with this contraption



with the engine and trans mounted up, I spaced down the front sway bar 3/4 of an inch by making boxes out of 3/4 x 1/8 flat stock and longer sway bar bracket bolts... theres about 1/4 inch between the power steering rack and the rear sump 1jz oil pan all the way around it. It seems kind of tight for the heater core hoses, but not impossible....so I'm not worried at this point. Its in there and looks like it might clear a NA hood without mods..... at worst, trimming the webbing... I want to run a D-MAX style scoop anyway so **** it.

TIME FOR WIRING... this is literally my favorite part... its what I do at work all day and is mindless to me...

Re located the battery to the cubby behind the passenger seat. Routed the cable through the chassis, and wire harness hole in the firewall... used Copper eyelets, met up the the alternator, and swung around the front to where the battery was originally located. Done.

I spend 12 beers and 3 hours making a speadsheet of what 1jz wires go to what S5 FC wires on the front chassis harness.

-I removed FEM-01 and FEM-02 connectors from the S5 RX7 engine harness.... you literally need them for the wiper motor and temp gauge.... There were the 2 black/white and 2 black/yellow on the FEM plugs that were 12volts at key on and start... hooked them to what i needed to for the 1JZ to run (black and orange and black and red on the 1j)

-Ran the tach off the 1J ignitor to the "test" tach wire where the trailing coils used to be....

-wired the Battery voltage, and sensing wires of the alternator and spliced them to the alternator light wiring that goes to the relay at the main RX7 "CPU" fuse box.

-extened the wire to the oil pressure sending unit

-re worked the stock rx7 starter wiring to work on the 1j

BOOM... one hungover saturday and the car is completely wired.

The biggest ***** was extending all the ECU wiring plugs the 18inches to get them inside the car to the stock FC ECU location.

Still... more to catch up on...

 

honestly.... nope.


I have a welded NA in my green car...and that ****** makes 402 tq..... I just did it because it wanted to have a LSD for street driving.

 

Measured for the Driveshaft.... This is the one thing that I won't build. Im getting that built and balanced by a local shop with all new flanges, joints and yokes....


I decided to start plumbing.....

Time For a Radiator. I'm not cheap, but if I can save some $$ by finding something mass produced for less than some one-off ****, them hell yeah I'm all about it... plus if I smash it up, it'd be nice to be able to buy a radiator off the shelf. So, I went on Mishimoto's web site since they have all their dimensions listed... for all ground clearance purposes, I wanted it to be less than 18 inches...and needed to be less than 27 inches wide to fit in the frame rails once you hack all that slanted RX7 radiator **** out.

95+ DC integra radiator..... perfect dimensions... bought one. The only issue is that the coolant cap is about 1.5 inches below the highest point of the 1jz coolant neck... this could lead to hot-spots, air pockets, cavitation and overheating.... Est No bueno.

Jegs to the rescue...


This will go right off the upper rad pipe of the 1j.... then from this to the upper inlet of the Radiator. I've decided to have the Radiator Modded by eliminating the Rad Cap on it... and by Moving the upper inlet more to the center instead of the passenger side. Also... upping it from 1.25 inch diameter to the 1.5 of the 1jz and JEGS filler neck.

also, since the 1jz was a clutch fan, I am wiring in a Bosch 90*c coolant temp switch to run the electric fan... this is the same style that BMW and Mercedes used in the 90's ...its will be its own circuit so that at 90*c, this switch grounds the relay and turns on the fan. I will also have a switch inside the car that is also a ground, so I can bypass the switch and have the fan run whenever I want to, or if the thermo-switch fails, i can manually turn on the fans. This bung will be welded into the upper tank of the radiator where the old inlet was.


I swooped a big *** cheap bar/plate intercooler and mounted it.... It literally bolted right up to the bumper mount bracket.





....AAAANDDD.... this is where I'm at.... engine in and wired up.... rad and intercooler mounted.... diff in, driveshaft on order.... in the next few weeks, I'm going to be pulling the engine back out and painting the engine bay. I want this car to be super clean and pretty much exactly what I deem to be a propper car.


Work in progress.... gonna be fun... lots more to come

 

I went to the shop with the sole purpose of just dropping off some material and grabbing some paint for my Bike at home ... I took a minute just to look at the car, and some things happened.

I had some extra Roll Cage scraps lying around and was feeling it.


Made a Bash Bar since I'm ditching the stock core support.



Also, while I was in there, I decided to mount the Radiator so it wasn't propped up by stands anymore. I made some tabs for the lower Rad that bolt to the Stock oil cooler mounts... I think Im going to end up welding them instead though.... last thing I need is some bolts coming loose and my radiator like falling out or something. Plus since I cut that slanted rad mount sheet metal out, its not like its ever going to have a stock Brotary in it again....

Theres some shots of how much room is left.... there should be plenty to mount 2 12inch slim fans




I got a few messages asking about under the car clearance.... so I snapped a shot... nothing hangs down at all. the exhaust will probably be the lowest point of the car... Dumping this thing on the ground wouldn't be a problem





My Girl texted me and asked what I was doing today.... my responce was "car ****"... she was like "can't wait till you're done building this" ..... my responce.

... conversation ended...

 

Liking this alot, I was thinking of going this route in the future

 

sick man, i cant wait to see more.

 

like

 

A few things have happened in the past couple of weeks....


I've orded all of the stuff to do the Intercooler Pipes and the Coolant pipes... I'll be Tackling that next... meanwhile in PA...



The Drive shaft is gorgeous. It fits ******* awesome, and all the parts of it are brand new. The shop I used really did some awesome work here.

I'm really gunning to make 375+ on stock Twins before I go big(ish) single, so I needed to let them breathe...


I welded up this 3inch Downpipe.... Turned out pretty good.


VHT header painted and Heat Wrapped... and installed.




My Girl decided to buy me an early Xmas present even though all i wanted was more dome...


Vosstoen 5.5.2. 18x10 +17


There was a spurt of like 3 days where it was almost 70 out, so I decided to paint some stuff...


Bash bar painted.

I didnt want plain wheels on this car, so I hit them up too.

They turned out nice as hell IMO.


I was bored and felt like I was leaving the Green car out of things, so I put some tires on a pair and put them on her....



....yeah and then a got carried away with it... I had an extra s&w pre bent cage that was sitting around the shop for the past 3 years.... so I decided to hack it up and make some ****.



Bumper on vs. Bumper Off...



I have a ton more **** to do.... Christmas Bonus Check from work was 99% dumped into the 1jz car lol.

 

lmfao.

I really wish I was as mechanically savvy as you. Such a dope build.

 

**** yes, my buddy Scott Pham is going the same in his and it's the craziest swap ever... you guys ate going to have something unreal on your hands when you can drive it...

super jealous of your build quality

 

This build is awesome!

What are the chances of you passing that S5 to 1J wire list spreadsheet to others that are considering this swap in their "spare" shells? PM me.

 

well that escalated quickly

 

Its been cold... I've been Lazy....

Got all the intercooler and intake piping fitted. Now I just need to send it off to get it welded up.




Scott made me this pretty guy....




Then This guy came in the mail.... so I had to put it on.





Heres a shot with the Corksport Exhaust... The tip is too generic for me, So I got a piece of 4inch raw stainless pipe and I'm having my Friend at AAM competition do me up a Pie Cut TIG'd 45* Dolphin tip on it.






I have a set of BC Racing BR coilovers on order (they're backordered for 2-3weeks). I am having second thoughts about putting them on the 1J car though. I am debating whether or not I should take the Baller Stance GR3+ Pro's off the Green car and put them on, and just use the BC's on my Green car. That way I can cut the inner fenders out of it since I don't need to worry about mounting the external reservoirs anymore. Aaaand when I smash the green car up bad this year, I won't feel bad if I break a BC vs one of those Stances. Ah, dilemmas.

 

oh, and then this ******* nightmare shows up in the shop. Haha... its getting a 6.0 LQ4 with LS2 heads and intake on it....

 

Did some work.


had a buddy from work weld up the Water neck, and the intercooler pipes. I'm still waiting for the cold side to be done.


sitting pretty.

AEM gauges... wideband and boost. Check.



Bought some more ****... I've come to know the FedEx residential, FedEx ground, and UPS dudes pretty well.


I bought a pair of these...

And a pair of those......

Modded the GF some... 5 days after the fact... Threw some D's on that bitch.

 

Lol @ the last pic.
Nice build

 

**** yeah! I haven't seen this thread in forever. This takes a lot of the guesswork out for me when I go 1j. I'm assuming you used the rear sump MKIII Supra motor in order to clear the steering rack?

#lastpicforrealz #jelly