Building a SCCA Autox car (ST class)
 

So now that I have FINALLY saved up enough money to buy a house (18 months and 18 grand later) I can finally start putting money back into the car :) If anyone remembers I said a long time ago I had decided to build a autox car to SCCA's ST class. I hate it when most people are "followers" and and just run all the same car in one class (which for ST is the 89-91 Civic Si) so I wanted to show people that there is a car out there that can beat it, and after much research I decided to do the 240sx was the car to do it with. After I bought the car and started doing some more research I found out that a guy named Jason Rhodes has already build an awesome ST classed '93 240sx and beat every civic Si out there and won nationals back in 2005 (so this isn't exactly uncharted waters).

My goal is to do a "budget build" spending less than 9k (including the price of the car) with this 1995 240sx SE.

If you are curious as to Autox ST class rules (or any other class rules) here is a link to the rules book (St class starts on page 68 of the book):

http://cms.scca.com/documents/Solo_R...Solo_Rules.pdf

While I don't have the budget he does (he put 14k into his $4k car) I'd like to build something close to the competitive level of his, and do the divisional events in San Diego, CA and and Farmington, NM. I don't think I will have the free time or the funds to do the national championship in Nebraska :(

Here is the earliest pic I have of the car, I bought it for $3,600 with some slight front end damage. had to hammer out the passenger side front corner a bit, and replace the passenger side fender, headlight, and front bumper. I also put on a stock spoiler (I prefer the stock look on most if not all cars, just lower it and call it good ;) )

Unfortunately this is the earliest pic I have of the car:

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As you can see in that pic the first thing I bought were some Drag Dr-17 wheels (they weigh 17.0 lbs each, and were simply what I could afford at the time, I'd REALLY like to get some Kosei T1 KS's, only 14.1lbs each!)wrapped in 225/45-17 Dunlop Z1 Star Spec tires (if you want the best performance tire, Dunlop Star Specs or Kumho XS's are the tires to get)

Since I can't stand a 3-color car (car is maroon, replacement carts were green, spoiler was white) the first thing I did after wheels and tires was paint. I choose "smoked Metallic Grey" for the color and I am very happy with it :). Also the car even came with some no name coilovers so that is what is on there now.

Pics:

http://http://i483.photobucket.com/a...6/100_0211.jpg

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The car also has an intake I built myself along with a lightweight racing battery:

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I had to paint the engine bay and trunk myself, which was A LOT of work, here are the after pics:(I know the trunk looks kinda bad, but its just the shadows, it looks a lot better in person)

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I just installed a stock VLSD (per ST class rules) so I am anxious to see how it performs at the next event July 26th & 27th.

I hope to make this a build thread and show my progress over the next year or so on building a great dedicated autox car.

PS - I don't think we have a "member's rides" sections, or I just fail and couldn't find it. So Mods if this is in the wrong place feel free to move it.

Technically you might not be legit but who is gonna know. did you get a 240sx vlsd, or a J30, or 300z VLSD It states in the rule s that you cannot change the gear diff ratio. If you use the 300z, or J30 diff you will get a slightly different ratio than the 240sx diff.

If you ask me I would of gone with an after market helical with the stock gear ratio.Such as the OBX helical, or s15 helical. Better for autox grip.

i would look into a extruded, honed, and ported stock manifold for your next modification. It's stock it can be modified.

also a set of s13 240/248 cams to kick some but with the s14 motor.

with modification.. they will not even be looked at untill you start to kick ass on a normal bases...... and dude auto-x doesnt require tons of cash.. at the end of the day. driver skill is what wins.

Ya I went with a stock 240sx vlsd, SCCA ST class only allows a vlsd from the factory that was offered in the car so that was the only one I was allowed to use in this class.

A honed and ported intake manifold is definitely on my list ;) and I picked up a set of 240/248 cams last week ;)

Yes I realize this, but as I said I want to start doing some divisional events and I have seen some winning cars there taken apart and THOROUGHLY inspected, and there's no reason to cheat anyway.

I agree driver skill is definitely the biggest factor (and tires the second biggest) but I have never been to nationals, and I talked to the guys that have been there and they said it is very hard to beat the guys with all the money that spend $2k on exhaust and $1.5k on headers and $3k on shocks etc, and obviously I'm sure their drivers have some talent too. I didn't mention before that I have been autox'n for 2 years now (started with a '98 civic) and I placed 3rd in my class (4th overall all out of about 80+ cars) last year with the 240sx so I least know my way around the track ;)

yea i remember we spoke about that the last time.... but in my region which is big.... not everyone is spending big money and they are winning.

i was not saying cheat.. stay in the guide lines because often once you are found to be a cheater as you know.. you will be banned for the most part and word gets around.. others will probably treat you like ****.

Ya that is true, if you are caught cheating you pretty much carry a mark for life.

Well I had a spare valve cover and painted it today (black/silver, I'll post pics later) and order a muffler today. After seeing that regular aftermarket exhausts weight 30-35lbs, and a titanium one (12-13lbs) cost $1,000+, I decided I'm going to remove my stock exhaust (~40lbs), and weld a small muffler to a flange and bolt it right to my cat and weld on a hanger for it somewhere(whole exhaust should then weight ~7lbs). Rules state that as long as the cat remains within 6in of stock location and exhaust terminates behind the driver it is legal.

PS - Is the "show and shine" section really correct for this thread? Wouldn't the general section or autox section be better?

i think the 30-35lbs of the stock exhaust is for the entire set up, starting from the manifold ending at the tail pipe. the manifold and catalytic converter are what make up most of the weight. from that cat to the muffler, 30-35lbs just seams too much to me.

but then again i am stronger than the average guy, so that could explain why things don't seem that heavy to me when i'm taking them off. :)

show in shine is for builds which this is. besides stats show that the Show and shine section has more traffic so people will see your work and progress more.

the name may throw you off.

ah ok, ya it does a bit, but no worries

Hahaha, well go He-man!

40lbs for the stock cat-back exhaust seems to heavy to me too, but that is the number so other people gave me. I'll weight it when I pull it off this week and let you know how much it weighs.

Ok, it took a lot of taping off and filing, but here is the new valve cover, I'm pretty happy with the results :)

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SCCA is a blast no matter which class your in!! I'm stuck in Street Modified because of the engine swap, so I get to run again AWD Subaru cars with drivers with some mad skills, so yeah I finished next to last in my class but I did have a blast. I'll keep watching the build and see how you do on your first event at least. Again, good luck.

Ya a lot of people complain about the engine swap = SM class, but that's the way the cookie crumbles ;)

Also I as stated above I have been doing events in this car for almost year now, but am just now getting the money to mod it, hence the build thread. I'll let you know how the next event turns out this weekend and try to get some some action shots and maybe even a video if I can.

Which reminds me, can anyone recommend a good camera mount? Never looked into one before, so are they pretty universal or do I need to find one specific to my camera?

i asked about a mount a while back but cheaped out and got something that i didn't like afterwords. the panavise 809 is what was recommend for an in cab camera.

Know of anything that mounts to the front bumper? I thought having a video from that perspective might be cool and a great learning tool.