Part 02: Brakes!
 

Step 01 was the engine swap (sr20). Now the car goes, but doesn't exactly stop. I put in new rotors and pads in the front when I did the swap (cheapest I could find @ carquest) to tide me over until I could do my real brake swap.

What's in the works?
5 lug conversion
z brakes all around
z rims and tires.


Parts gathered:

5 lug hubs front and rear. New hubs and wheel bearings. Def. need to be replaced on a 15 year old car.
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_01hubs.JPG

Powerslot rotors front and rear
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_02rotors.JPG

Z32 Rear calipers
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_05rcalipers.JPG

Ferodo DS2500 Front and rear brake pads
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_06ferodo.JPG

G35 Coupe Ebrake lines
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_12ebrake.JPG

An idea of what they'll look like:
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_09rearset.JPG

Z32 NA rims. Street rims. Eventually upgrade to lightweight 17s.
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_10rims.JPG

New 1 1/16th brake master cylinder.
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_15z32mc01.JPG

What else is needed? Front calipers & tires to get the setup in and running. I'm planning on getting longer wheel studs (ARP) and some light weight lugnuts. The rears need new hardware kits already, I'm thinking about going for the whole rebuild and powdercoating deal. That's still up in the air. I've already got the conversion lines to use z32 calipers on a 240sx. Just didn't remember to take pictures of 'em.

I settled on the pads by talking to some friends who know more about this stuff than I do. They really recommended them if I was serious about tracking my car for real. I have z32 uprights as well for the rear, but I'll wait to put those in until I can afford to do my suspension setup.

I really can't wait to get these things on. Even doing some spirited driving on back roads the brakes do not give you confidence. You really gotta give yourself some room, or else you'll put yourself in a tree.

More pix can be found here:

http://www.bumnah.com/brakes

I will keep updating this thread as I progress.

Thanks for looking.

Update time!

Got my calipers in. Bought 'em off of an ebay seller. Aluminum 30 mm. Rebuilt, and painted Hell Yeah I street race! Red.

Z32 Front calipers
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_13calipers01.JPG

The Conversion lines. Picked 'em up from FRSport
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_18brake_lines.JPG

Motul 600 Brake fluid. Get it all at once I say.
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_17motul.JPG


All that's left are the ARP longer wheels studs, new lug nuts, and tires. I'm not sure if I'm going to rebuild my rear calipers or just clean them up. I want to paint the rear a different color than the fronts. I'm thinking lime green or something.

Hopefully in August I'll have my parts together to get this stuff done.

Thanks for looking.

how much has this whole project costed you so far?

I dunno, too much. It's best not to think about things like that. :)

UPDATE TIME!

I've almost gathered up all the parts I need to do the conversion. All I'm waiting on now are tires, and getting the rear calipers powder coated. Caliper hardware has already been ordered, just waiting for it to show up.

Latest pieces of the puzzle are ARP long extended wheel studs, and Gorilla open ended lugnuts.

Information:

If you are doing a 5 lug conversion using Ichiba hubs and would like to go with longer wheel studs, this is the Knurl size. 14.3 knurl for the front hubs, and 13 knurl for the rear hubs. S13 owners for sure, may be different for s14 owners. Read up before you purchase.

Doing the swap was not hard at all; if you haven't installed the hubs yet. There is no way to install these studs with the hubs already installed. I put a nut on the stud I wanted to remove, took my 4 lbs hammer, 3 solid hits later, it was out. Line up your new extended stud, put two thick washers on, then a nut, and hit tighten it up. You can do it by hand, but I'm a girly man so I hit it with my gun (god bless it).

Pix!

ARP Studs
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_19allarpstuds.JPG

Gorilla Open ended lugnuts
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_22gorillanuts.JPG

Tools used (YAY AIR GUN!)
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_23studtools.JPG

Finished product
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_24hubsdone.JPG

Forest of studs
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_26foreststuds.JPG

Front hubs
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_28frontdisplay.JPG

Rear hubs
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_29reardisplay.JPG


So close I can almost taste it!

Hey Bumnah, how did you get the ebrake to work on the rear? Is the G35 ebrake all you really need???

i haven't done the install on the vehicle yet.

you'll need the ebrake cable (stock one is too short)
the actual ebrake assembly itself
rotors for z32 that have the drum hat built in.
and brakes shoes.

here's a picture of the ebrake assembly

http://www.bumnah.com/swap/026ebrake03.jpg

http://www.bumnah.com/swap/025ebrake01.jpg

hey man, how did you get your lug bolts on?? just hammered them in there? i need to know hpw to get those in..

You need a lug nut, a deep impact socket and an impact gun. Hammers are ok to an extent, but safe way to do it is lug nut, deep impact, and impact gun.

i used my airgun to pull them in. it make life much easier.

basically i put a nut on the end of the stud i wanted to remove. giving me a nice surface to hammer nad not mushroom any studs i wanted to remove.

i then hammered the old studs out (3 good hits each basically)

to put in the new studs. i put in 2 thick washers, and a nut. hand tightened it down till it sat nice and even. i then hit it up with air gun until i pulled it all the way through. 1 hour job max and then gathering up tool doing it, and clean up. the gun made it a lot easier. pulling the studs in by hand would've doubled my time easy.

if you're doing extended studs on hubs still on the car, you'll need to remove the hubs to have enough space. there isn't enough space behind the hubs to slide in your new studs.


here is a good write up one of our members; positron:
http://www.club240.com/forums/showthread.php?t=39057

Score. Way out of my budjet, but its one of those.. "i would like to do down the roadsometime, but will never get around to it because im a cheapass." sorta things.

what's out of your budget? the brakes or the extended wheel studs?

upgrading to oem 4 piston calipers up front and dual in the rear, is almost a no brainer. why would you not want them?

you can also keep it simple by doing just the front and redrilling to the 4 lug pattern. find the proper se rims and you can get them on for less than $500.

That's not too bad, i drive the car everyday, so i don't need a track car, but there is no such thing as TOO good of brakes.

I just need to get my rb in..

Update time!

Alright it's been a while since I addressed this brake swap.

So I've finally gathered up alllll the parts.

I've gotten new rear calipers that are already rebuilt and powder coated red to match my fronts. They haven't arrived yet, but when they do, you can be assured I will photograph 'em :). Last big purchase for the swap were tires. I planned on getting Azenis which I did.

The tires are gong to be mounted on z32 NA rims i bought over a year ago. The rims are pretty beat up, but they'll work for now. I wanted to upgrade to something after market, but these will have to do now. Eventually I hope to have FN01R's 17x7.5f and 17x8.5r for the streets (te37s for the track). FN01R's could've been a reality sooner than later, but driving the car for fun this past weekend, it was apparent the brakes couldn't wait any longer. I went with my original game plan.


Now I just have to put all of this together. I'm hoping to have a friend help me and take pictures of the whole process. Hopefully I will it done in October, and hopefully hit up atleast one track event this November. If all goes well I should have some coilovers on the car in the middle of winter. I really would love to do a full suspension tear down, but it will have to wait until the winter of 08. I want to track the car in 08 as much as I can, and just enjoy the fruits of my labor. I need a break from this money pit.


Anyways, enough talk. Pix:


Falken Azenis Tires
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_30_tires.JPG

Rear tires
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_31_225tires.JPG

Front Tires
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/TN_32_215tires.JPG

Good Greif Bumnah, you are the man. Good Work man, good work.

i'm glad someone realizes my greatness. :D

Niceness! I've seen first hand how good those tires are! :smilie_thumbsup:

yeah. i've used them before on my civic. this will be my 3rd set purchased; first for the 240.

Sexy tires man, i assume it doesnt snow where you live.

oh no, it snows, you can assume i've got a DD with 4x4. i've worked since i was 17 to get a project car, a dd and a place to work on my project car. i finally got all the pieces together last year when i picked up my 240 :)

"Hell Yeah I Street Race" Red pWns!!!!

Yeah Im ****ed once the snow comes....
FR and snow on Dry tires dosent mix too cute.

So I finally started on my 5 lug swap.

Today I did the following:

Got the car on 4 jackstands
Took off front brake calipers & rotors
Disconnected the brake lines
Took off the front hubs
Disconnected the rear brake lines
Took off my stock brake master cylinder.

I only spent 3 hours or so on it today. And half of that was leaving to go to sears/lowes to locate a 30 mm socket. I didn't work too hard or fast. The front took no time at all to take apart.

The rear's will take more time, since I plan to take the whole upright off and swap everything over, then install everything. I'm planning on having the whole rear torn apart on tuesday evening.

So far so good. Sorta upset because i'm borrowing a massive snap on slide hammer from a buddy to help convince a stuck hub to come out, but the front two came off easy. I hope I get to use my sweet slide hammer. :(


Pix:

Front all torn apart. Should I keep the dust shield or no?
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/34_IMG_8515.JPG

Car on all fours. Sweetness.
http://www.bumnah.com/garage/IMG_8512.JPG

Man you got a sweet setup to work on your car at!:ylsuper:

ITS FLYING! HAHA oh man i gotta get new calipers pads and rotors now that i think about it... i should get on that.. haha good thread man hope it comes out great!

Made some more progress. I got the front brakes all taken care of. Easy as pie; IF I didn't screw one of my calipers up. I wasn't paying attention and I stripped the hole where the hydraulic lines goes into the back of the caliper. Spent a few days trying to get it repaired. I luckily found another re manufactured caliper at advance auto. At first they sent me an Iron one, but second time around I ordered up the proper one. I took it, and painted it red to match my other 3 and knocked it out. I was pissed that I made such an amateur mistake.

I also sourced up a HICAS front steering rack. This is my 3rd attempt at locating one. 3rd times a charm, because this bad boy is 2.6 turns lock to lock. I've got my old rack all unbolted and ready to come out, just need a second hand to help wiggle it out. Wiggle the new sweetness in and the front is pretty much wrapped up. I also installed the 1 1/16 master cylinder. Plug and play, 5 min job.

I need new parking brake cables, because the G35 coupe cables DEF. DO NOT WORK. Those should be in tomorrow. I won't have time until Friday afternoon to hit up the install. I've got the whole parking brake deal figured out and swapping it all in should be pretty straight forward. With any luck I'm hoping to have it running by Sunday. I'm dieing to drive this thing!

Pix:

The brakes in all their glory!
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/38_IMG_8529.JPG

HICAS Hotness
http://www.bumnah.com/brakes/40_IMG_8537.JPG

More pix @ www.bumnah.com/brakes

Man, thats a pretty intense photograph.

Something about the way you took this pic screams HOTNESS! Lookin good so far bro!

Very nice setup!:thumb:

So. I'm finally done. Been done for about 2 weeks. I've been fighting 2 pain in the ass issues.

Issue #1:
Leaking power steering fluid near the pump. Solution, get new crush washers and tighten it down extremely tight. It seems to have worked. I believe I was just a hair too loose and it would leak. Glad it's finally fixed.

Issue #2:
Spongy brake pedal. Trapped air in the lines obviously. After hours of bleeding the problem was found, and I feel silly for not even noticing. The front passenger side caliper was the front driver side caliper. The bleeder screw was on the bottom, instead of the top. Air was trapped in that caliper. So I unbolted it, and mount it right side up to bleed it. Once bled I remounted the caliper, and everything is good. I still have the slightest bit of air left, but I'm not stressing it. I opened the bleeder screw so often in the last week, I was afraid I may strip one. Either way the brakes are on and working with a rock solid pedal feel. I'll bleed the rest of the system out later.


Final thoughts: The brakes look great! The car looks great, the z rims look awesome on the s13. Sits off road right now since I still have stock suspension. I don't care, the car grips much better and stops much better. I'm very happy with them, and I've only bedded the pads in. Hopefully I can get on the brakes some tomorrow. Today was just fixing minor issues and alignment. The people who mounted the tires didn't do a good job so I got some shaking in the steering wheel when I got above 60 mph. I had them re balance the tires, and the problem seems to have gone away. I got an alignment since my toe was off the wall with the steering rack swap. Alignment is within' spec now, but the steering wheel is not sitting straight. I'm going to go back tomorrow and ask for my money back or they do the job properly.

I was so fed up with the brakes I took it to a shop, and they showed me the caliper issue. Those were the only competent people I've met. The people I had mount the balance couldn't do it right the first time, so I had to go back. Then the people couldn't center the steering wheel at the alignment place. Just annoying. It's the first time in 10 years I've take a project car in for some work, and I'm greeted with the incompetence of the modern mechanic.

yeah thats about how it is..the first (and only) time i ever took mine in it came out with more problems then it had