donteventry

Are you sick of not being able to find some nice wheels with the offset you really want? Dont settle for some 4 lug wheels that arent what you want. Get some money together and do a 5 lug conversion, and while your at it do a 300zx brake conversion, so you can stop all that power that your about to give your 240.

Alright heres what I did. Find some s14 SE spindles and hubs. For the rear all youll need is the hub, it bolts right up to the original setup, youll also need some 5 lug rear rotors, I decided not to go cheap and get new pads, and slotted rotors. Now for the front youll need the whole spindle, because the part where the hub goes on is shorter/different on the 4 lug setup than it is on the 5 lug setup. You will also need to locate some 300zx front calipers if your going that route. I suggest tryin real hard to find the 30mm TT aluminium calipers its worth it over the 26mm, or 30mm iron. One place I highly suggest looking for the calipers at is twinturbo.net for this is a 300zx only forum and these guys are constantly selling these calipers. You will also need 300zx front rotors, or just regular 5 lug rotors if you decide to use your stock calipers.

Now the work begins, Ill start at the front, what seemed to be easier for me. First off you need to get a hold of a ball joint remover. I picked one up from a local autozone for a deposit of 15 dollars with a returnable fund. First off remove your front caliper along with the rotor. To remove the rotor a 10mm bolt should fit in the jacking holes, if not an 8mm will do the job. If your planning on keeping the caliper you will not need to disconnect the brake lines, but if you were smart at got some 30mm TT calipers remove the bolt on your caliper but have a cup/oil pan to catch the brake fluid. *Note* for the 300zx caliper youll need either conversion lines or 300zx lines. Make sure you tell your buyin not to cut any of the lines and to include the hard lines with the caliper. Even if you decide to get the conversion lines from a place like www.pdm-racing.com you will still need the hard lines. After that I started off by taking the bolts that hold the spindle to the strut. If you want to take these off quickly, take the top bolt out, and put a similar size chizel in there or a screw driver works. Youll need two people to remove the bottom bolt. First take off the nut off the bottom bolt, and have someone with a hammer to hit out the bottom bolt, while the other guy hold the spindle in place where the top bolt used to be. Once you get your strut free of the spindle youll need the ball joint remover. First take the cotter pin off the nut on the tension rod, and then off the control arm. When your done doing that, put the ball joint remover ABOVE THE BOOT with the slanted side upwards and be very gentle when hammer the remover inwards so you dont ruin the ball joint or else youll be buyin a new tension rod. Do the same with the control arm. After your done taking off the spindle all you do is plop on the 5 lug front spindle, but make sure you have the right side, youll notice that the arm for the tension rod wont line up right if its the wrong side. When you get the spindle on just put the nut back on the control arm and tension rod along with ther cotter pin. Then put your strut back on. Youll need the chizel again to get the strut hole lined up with the spindle holes. After all thats done you can slip on the new rotor and just to temporarily secure the rotor throw two lug nuts on your newly aquired 5 lug hubs. If you chose to keep your stock calipers all you have to do is bolt them back up and your done! If you went ***** out and got some 300zx calipers you will need to remove your stock line from the point it connect to the hardline at the body and attach you 300zx line or your conversion line from pdm-racing.com. After you have your caliper secured and the lines attached your done with the front...for now.

Now onto the rear. Youll start off by removing your whole caliper and your rotor. I believe a 10mm bolt fits in the jackin holes to separate the rotors from the hubs, if that doesnt work an 8mm will do the job. After you get the caliper and rotor off, youll need a 36mm socket to take off the huge nut that hold on your hub. Now youll need to drop the rear control arm to get access to the 4 bolts that hold the hub on. The trick to this is using the right extensions and spinning the axel to get to the bottom bolts and top bolts. Youll need to do the same thing to get the new hub on. After youve got you new hub on its time to put on your new rotor and hook up your caliper. I decided to stick with the stock rear calipers but just clean them up a little and give em new pads. *Make sure you dont have your ebrake engaged because it will make it impossible to get the calipers back on.

After all of that work your done your finally done!!! Now you can get some sick wheels with a nice offset thatll really set your car off. Now if you went with the 300zx calipers go test out the stopping response and how you litterally "stop on a dime". Maybe one of the mods will make this a sticky to save us from answer questions like has anyone done a 5 lug conversion, or a 300zx break conversion, so they can just read this and be like oooo I get it now!

donteventry

So what do you guys think?

Bryan

good write up, the first paragraph for the front is a little hard on the eyes but its a good write up, any pics?

donteventry

I will have pics very very soon of the whole install, starting from taking the wheels off to getting the car back on the ground. Do you think you could make it a sticky if i revised it. (It would help greatly if you told me what to revise and what you thought about the write up).

donteventry

thank you s13 240, i will have the pics later this week.

el_g

can anyone explain why?

im just curious because i know a few people with a certain 04+ motorcycle that have had brake fade, and found that replacing with a prior years iron calipers fixed what turned out to be an overheating problem.

donteventry

Well were talkin about cars here, and i suggested the aluninum ones because theyre lighter, and i guess its a little bling factor too. Oh well i love mine, theyve saved my *** a good amount of times so im happy, but hey guys the cars for sale lemme know if you want to buy it.

ZenkiOwns

I have the ability to get everything from the struts down off of a Z32 for a very low price(Including ABS sensor). My question is; can I use the parts off of a not turbo 300zx to do the 5 lug/brake conversion on my s14?

CowboyTurbo

yes, not positive about the front hubs, but everything else works. If you decide to install the rear brakes too though things get a bit more complicated.

ZenkiOwns

kk. I''ll post letting you guys know how it goes. Most likely will do a write up if it goes well.

donteventry

The front hubs offa the 300zx do not work at all, they are a completely different setup. I tried z32 rears and the inside of the hub didnt match up with the rear axle...not sure if they were non turbo or twin turbo. Might wanna check that out.

ZenkiOwns

hmm.....guess I'll scrap that idea and just start saving up.

CowboyTurbo

Hey, this is the only 5 lug hub swap write-up that I've seen that says you have to change the S14 spindles when doing the swap. (I'm talking about zenki S14 only.) Can anybody else verify that it is needed? I was under the impression that you can just put the new hubs back on the original spindle... the FSM makes no mention of replacing the spindles when putting the hub back on either. Also, when ordering lines for the front 300zx calipers, you have to order special conversion lines? I'm getting kind of confused with that part of the write-up.

donteventry

If your gettin the Z calipers from a private seller, tell them to not remove or touch the hard lines...tell them to just take the lines off from the chasis and send everything. However that might not be easy for them and they either A. might just cut the lines not caring, or B. Contact you and tell you that they can not separate the lines from the body and other way besides cutting them. That is all fine...all you really need from the calipers are the HARDLINES. Then youll need to get conversion lines from a place like www.projectsilvia.com . They sell exactly what you need and they are a direct bolt up from the Z caliper hardlines to the hardlines on the body. This is what i went with and highly recommend them. They are SS braided...which is top of the line quality and never gave me any trouble. When installing the front calipers make sure to have the bleeding nipple ON TOP so you can properly bleed the brakes. I made the mistake of putting the bleeders on the bottom and not knowing bled the lines countless times...so ya...make sure the nipples are on top and bolt the lines up and enjoy the new brakes! **I highly recommend the 300zx master brake cylinder. I forgot which one works best, but i think the write up on zilvia.net has the part numbers or at least the name of the MC that works best. If anyone else has questions on this install i will be glad to help them. Email me at brunswick240@gmail.com with any other questions, as i do not check the forums that much any longer.

CowboyTurbo

yeah I still have a few questions about it, I'll e-mail you soon (tonight or tommorrow)~ thanx.