I had a real “Frank” in Old School weekend. I got so much done. I don’t know how it happened. Here’s a recap starting with the pic above. The weather was finally nice, so I rolled the car out of the garage to have more room to work. My goals were passenger air bag removal, wiring harness relocation, wiring my gauges, and anything else that came up. (To defend my honor, there is a jack under the car in this pic hence the height.)

My first project was mounting my Earl’s oil filter relocation bracket. I am paranoid about having my filter (or cooler that matter) down low in an area that could get hit by random road debris or a good tap of a tire. What I ended up with was this. The hole below it was from cutting out the old battery tray a few years ago.

Next up was removing the dash to get at the air bag. No pics of that fun because my camera battery was dead. So, I put it on the charger and worked on the dash. It was much easier than I expected.

You can see I managed to get the airbag out before my camera finished charging. I also removed all the associated wiring and its control unit that is under the rear seat.

I then got diverted on a side mission: removing the interior A/C core. I had taken out the A/C components in the engine bay long ago and have no plans of putting any of it back. It was time to finish the job. This is in mini-write-up format for those looking to do the same thing. You need to keep the housing that the A/C heat exchanger(?) sits in since it connects your blower motor to your duct work.

Undo like three bolts and an electrical plug, then the housing comes right out of the dash area.

There are a few phillips head screws that hold the two halves together. There are also some stick on foam sealant strips that seal between the housings. As you separate the housings, cut this stuff nicely so it will go back together and still make a seal. With the halves separated, you are looking at the exchanger thing…covered in 15 years of junk.

It slides right out. Below it, there is a white foam piece that it sat in. I used a flat bladed screwdriver and scrapped it out. This is the finished product.

On the right half above, you can see the a little black wire with a probe on the end of it. This was mounted on the condenser before. I was unsure of its function in the grand scheme of the heating/cooling system, so I kept it. To do this, I RTV’d it to the side of the opening so the probe end was still in the path of the air flow.

Moving on, it was time to tackle the wiring harness relocation. Doing a full wiring tuck would be my preference, but I don’t have the time to dedicate to something of that magnitude right now. Need to keep moving forward. I opted to run the harness over the strut tower in the engine bay then back through the firewall.

Again, mini-write-up style. I undid the pertinent connectors and managed to pull the harness through the firewall. In the pic below, the connectors at the right are from the steering column; on the left are connectors from the drivers kick panel area behind the fusebox; and the long skinny black wire runs in the engine bay down to the power steering pressure sensor. It all needs to come out.

Photo break.

Back to work, I pulled the harness into the engine bay from the hole it passes through at the front of the car (can be seen in pic above), and then ran it over the strut tower like so:

In the driver side firewall corner, there is a triangle shaped hole. This has to be slightly enlarged to fit the massive square connector and the wiring harness. This is my winning shape after a little trimming with the cutting wheel.

I doctored up the hole with some black spray paint to seal the exposed metal, and then lined the “sharp” edge with some random hose I had. Finished product.

Before and after comparison: The before was from when I originally put the engine in almost three years ago. I thought I was so slick in the way I had it routed. Sigh.

If you are low, running big tires, or both; you really need to do this. Don’t let a chopped wiring harness ruin your track day or leave you stranded on a cruise.

Closing shot.

For anyone at a loss on how to disassemble their throttle body, I put together a “how to” when took mine apart. This was for a stock S14 DOHC KA throttle body, but the steps should more or less apply to any throttle body of similar design – Q45, Z32, SR, SOHC KA, RB, etc.

I was surprised as the process turned out to be much easier than expected. It just required a little organization and attention. You can see the finished product above. The throttle body was disassembled, then the housing was bead blasted and powder coated with high gloss clear. The pulleys were covered in wet black.

The full write-ups can be found on ziliva.net and ka-t.org (click on either site for hyperlinks to the write ups). If you are not a member of either, then now would be a good time to join.

Update. Up to date. Bunch of small stuff going on. The engine bay looked all awesome – as shown in the above pic – after powder coating the pipes and installing the DEI Titanium turbo blanket/wrap…but, it was not to last. I prepped it for start up, started it, and my same mystery condition resurfaced. The car was going lean at idle. As it warmed up, the idle would creep toward 17 AFR on my AEM UEGO and eventually go to high to even read. Awesome.

Prior to starting it, I had boost leak tested it, and sealed up what I found. That obviously didn’t work. Brainstorming other possibilities, I became suspect of the PCV ports in the intake manifold which I had put rubber vacuum caps on ~2 years ago when I originally took it apart. At the time, I didn’t think it was the best way but figured it would “work”. For my piece of mind (and hopefully to solve the problem), I am sealing the ports more permanently. Now, the once pretty bay, is looking like this:

The original rubber PCV caps were looking a bit haggard, like this:

In their defense, they have what appears to be a silicone liner which seemed to be intact after slicing one open. So, maybe they were okay? Oh well, piece of mind, right? I plugged the holes with steel allen headed plugs after removing the stock ports. More on that in another post as I really got carried away with the intake manifold.

With the intake off, I figured it was time to finally install some parts I had been collecting, upgrade some others, and just spend a lot of money in general. What was a simple plan quickly snowballed. Firstly, an oil cooler setup – Skullworks oil housing adapter, Earl’s -10AN Ano-tuff fittings, Earl’s Pro-lite hose, Earl’s billet oil filter block:

Some things that I have been collecting – TurboXS Knocklite, YASHIO Factory Okachan Water Temperature Gauge with Parts Shop Max hose adapter, and STRi Auto Timer – will be going on:

I am really stoked to get the Yashio Fatory gauge hooked up. That is one piece of JDM goodness that I have been wanting for years! I also picked up some general maintenance items that I hadn’t changed yet – (left to right) distributor cap and rotor, tap and plugs for the PCV ports, O2 sensor, coolant temperature sensor, and intake manifold gaskets:

I bought a new “S14 Aluminum Radiator” off eBay. Can you spot the not? Yep, surprise! It’s for an S13. Damn it. It turns out they don’t actually make an S14 KA application, and the supplier gave them the wrong application information. The seller gave me a partial refund which made it stupid cheap. I will make some brackets, and it will work.

Finally got around to installing my Z32 brakes with a 1″ master cylinder. 26mm’s not 30mm’s. Stock rears. Hawk HPS pads and new stock rotors all around. Cleaned, painted, and rebuilt the calipers. I’ll be powder coating them gold (I think).

Rotor size comparison. Nothing new but impressive difference. Minty Fresh is looking so cute.

1″ BMC with lines re-routed.

Finally, Greg and I installed 15mm wheel spacers and Peak Performance extended studs which have the wheels fitting like this:

That’s all for now!!!!

This will be the point most people will give up on me and my build, but I would like to assure you to hang in there and all will be right someday.

My brother and I have been tossing around plans on what we should do to get my car to drift status by the first KCDA event. First, we considered rebuilding the SR. Assuming all it needed were rings that would be a fast fix, but it would have been half-assed. We don’t do things half way here at the Brickhouse camp so that was out. Then came the back up plan. I am so, so sorry everyone…

The suggestion was made to use the SOHC that came out of my other car. GRRRR. I was very reluctant to say the least…at first. Then, I started thinking, “Yes, I am moving backwards in the engine department, but if I can drive Minty Fresh, I can get the drifting experience I lack entirely.” So which way is backward and which is forward? I would say it is a wash. I am just excited to drive my car hard and push myself on the track.

The SR build will continue behind the scenes for a while as I collect parts and get machine work done. I just hope my SOHC can make it that long…good thing I have two!!!

If it’s metal and will fit in your home oven, we can probably coat it. Need some ideas? Here is a short list of pieces that are excellent candidates for powder coating: valve covers, intercooler piping, wheels, suspension arms, reservoirs, manifolds, etc. Get creative and we’ll let you know if it’s possible. Send your inquiries to brickhouseproducts@gmail.com.

Enough jibber-jabber, here are some pictures of our work in a before and after format. All pieces were media blasted and cleaned prior to coating.

1) RevHard manifold.
Before, high temp spray paint flaking badly:

During, freshly blasted:

After, coated in high temp black:

2) S13 SR Fuel Rail.
Before/During, blasting away grit and grime:

After, coated in “wet” black:

3) S13 Power Steering Reservoir.
Before, standard tarnish and grime:

After, coated in the same “wet” black as the fuel rail:

4) Hulk Smash Intake Piping.
Before, raw finish with a bit of surface rust:

After, again “wet” black:

More examples/projects are in the works. Let us know what we can do you! brickhouseproducts@gmail.com

As I was looking through my pics, I found some pictures from our trip to Chicago a few years ago. While we were there, we visited AMS and Touge Factory. I thought it would be fun to share.

At the time, AMS was just getting into the KA with turbo240.com. I picked up some parts, and then we took some pics of the cars in their lot. You can see the old AMS drag car above. You can tell these are from a few years ago (spring 2007) based on the cars, and AMS was still in their old shop. Anyway, more pics and more cars…

So cute on pizza cutters.

This yellow Evo looked pretty insane. Never saw what came of it. It looked to be a high budget build. And, what are the odds that that white Evo is Martin’s personal car that just won the Castrol Top Car Challenge?!?! Not like white Evo’s are rare but cool thought nonetheless.

Galant VR-4, baby…and the rest of the 4G63 line-up.

Clean Kouki S14 out front. Which is a nice segue to our Touge Factory adventure…

This car had it all – wheel fitment, stance, Brides, clean kit and paint. Remember this was early 2007; VS-KF’s hadn’t blown up yet. We didn’t really appreciate the amazingness before us at the time. Also, check out all the kits on the shelves. Origin/Version Select warehouse. On to the other cars parked in the warehouse. Touge Factory wasn’t a “shop” at the time. These were just employees’ and friends’ cars parked in the warehouse for storage and a place to work.

This S13 was pretty legit too. It was getting some wiring done at the time. I think it was sold or for sale recently.

This hatch used to be S15 fronted but was being converted back so he could go lower. Now, that’s the right way of thinking. And yes, those are real deal Karotype mats. Again, before they be came the JDM tyte object of the week.

How about a quick look at the showroom?

Kazuya “Chunky” Bai’s kit, like actually off his car in Japan.

Peep the wares. They had a bunch of cool stuff and a bunch of cool dudes working there. I got my Stance coilover rebuilt while we waited, and we picked up a few more odds and ends.

That’s it for now. I went back to Touge Factory earlier this year and snapped few pics. I’ll post those…eventually. Haha.

With the car painted and the weather cold, it was time to reassemble the interior with some of the bits and pieces I had accumulated. This was February-ish 2009. A good job to do in a cold garage. Anyway, you can see it was an absolute mess. I put the S14 driver seat in my S13 but had something to replace it.

Knock Bride Low Max with real Bride LH rails.

Installing the hub. A bit more of a pain than I expected but not much to it. ArmorAll’ed and vacuumed. A vast improvement.

HKB hub, NRG ver. 2.5 Quick Release, Nardi Classic, Parts Shop Max Drift Knob, Nismo Shift Knob, ATI gauge pod, STRi Oil Pressure Gauge, and my little buddy, Hello Kitty.

Cool shot.

Hello Kitty. Meow.

Door panels and rear interior has also been put in. More goodies have been and will be installed.

I mocked up the intercooler and got it fitted in the core support area. However, I managed to take some absolute crap quality pictures of most of what was involved in getting it to fit. So instead, let’s look at the piping fabrication. The pic above was our starting point.

The intercooler fitted in place. There are two brackets on the bottom and two bolts that mount it to the core support at the top. It just required a bit of trimming here and there, but the radiator and headlights mount just like oem. You can see the area that was trimmed for the 90 degree couplers.

Hot side. 2.5″ piping.

Cold side mocked in place. Again, 2.5″ piping.

Intake pipe with recirculation inlet.

Overall. The hot side routes down and then up so its not really visible. The BOV mounts on the hotside and dumps directly into the intake. Due to the upward angle of the throttle body, the cold pipe routes down and then up around the radiator hose. Now, moving onto the exhaust side.

Wastegate and its cute little dumptube. 1.5″ piping. Moving on to the downpipe.

The downpipe with extra length for a cat-delete. It had to be welded as it sits under the car. Without a lift, it is kind of “stuck” in the car due to its length. Haha.

A quick coat of heat-temp black. Wideband bung and support bracket welded in place. The support bracket was modified from the oem bracket and mounts to a rubber bushing on the transmission crossmember.

And the best part of all, the clearance! Here it is mounted in place. You can barely see it! 3″ downpipe tucked in the frame rail. It doesn’t get any better than that!

More updates coming! Interior, electronics, brakes, etc.

So, I have been doing a piss poor job of keeping up with the site. I worked on the garage the other day – here’s a quick before and after (B&A, duh). As you can see above, the garage was an unorganized shithole. Greg has a knack for never picking up a tool or piece of trash during a project. Add to that another car and all my random crap, and that’s the mess you get. I had some parts to put on my car so a clean-up was a must.

Out with all the crap.

Couple shots of the cars…

Much better.

Bye bye, cars.

Paint! Well, almost all there. Fresh out of the garage.

A couple more. This was the most sunlight I saw it in before storing it for the winter. 90% of the body was painted; then winter hit, and it quickly became to cold to paint. The remaining parts were put on hold until spring. Talk about anticipation!

Spring finally came and so did the sun! Here are a few shots of trying to catch the light. It was a really clear early spring day. That is when the above pictures were taken – early spring 2009. Hey, wait a second, we are now in 2009! Yay! I am getting closer to bringing Hulk Smash to current status.

You can see I spent some time reassembling a few things and making it road worthy…well…drivable. It is sad to say that at this point the front and rear bumper covers, door handles, and gas door had not been painted yet. I put the front and rear bumper covers on it to make it driveable and take up less storage space. Obviously, the rear quarter glass is still out, and less obviously, there is a good amount of weatherstripping that still needs to be put back on.

As a nice Christmas surprise, Greg painted my wheels white as I had been wanting to do them. This was the first time with them on the car after getting the tires mounted. Yes, he used the most absolutely cocaine white he could find. It is white white and bright bright.

The final product! Ignoring the ride height and the missing front lip, the exterior is complete…for now…well, we’ll just say it matches how it sits now. I foresee some color changes coming in the future but more on that when it happens.

Now to address the color, I knew I wanted green – not forest green, blue green, neon green – just green green. I think I succeeded. Its pretty dark but its not foresty or blue-ish. It is a pretty true green. I am happy with it as it really comes alive in the sun. There is a lot of gold pearl in it so it has kind of a gold tinge to it when it catches the light. In all honesty, I haven’t spent enough time with it clean and in the sunlight to be able to fully appreciate it. For a cold 100% garage paintjob, it turned out great! I couldn’t be happier.

The color choice also helped give it its name – Hulk Smash. Obviously, it is green but The Hulk was also insanely muscle bound. I am not saying I have the most crazy KA ever, but it is no slouch and a far cry from the cheapo t25 setups. Look for updates on the car’s “muscle” in the near future. Also, hands down, The Hulk was and has always been my favorite super hero (if you can call him that).