[crepemachine]

Hi guys, thought I'd do a*write up of my grenade seeing as I've been finishing off a few jobs on the old girl... I've been crook for about a year and haven't*been able to drive. I'm just starting to get a bit more active, tinkering with a few things.

It's a 2000 GU 3.0L DI.*Most of the stuff on it was there when I bought it, I've mostly done minor mods since.

2" lift - some cheapo brand couldn't afford better & needed to be done
Standard rims, standard size Maxxis 980 A/T - very happy with this tyre.
GQ manual hubs.
Rallye 2000 driving lights,*one spot one spread.
Piranha dual battery system.
Boost and EGT gauges.
NADS + voltage modifier.
3" exhaust from turbo.
Nissan snorkel.
TJM bulbar.
Uniden UHF, GME antenna.
Rear door shelf.
2nd glove box in dash.
Kenwood DPX-U5140BT head unit.
Engel 57L fridge/freezer combi.

A few pics of us out and about:

Found a very boggy patch of ground. Sank right into it, was quite an ordeal getting out.

Out with the old. After she went bang...

In with the new.

Slotted right in like it was made to fit!

 

[crepemachine]

Continued…

Pics of 2nd glove box:
Cutting out the hole.

Small hole for the hinge pins to slot into.

I had some vinyl in there but after a few hot days it started coming loose so I ripped it out. Looks a bit messy atm. Not sure how I'm going to finish it off yet but otherwise I'm very happy with the room I've got in there. Probably going to fit it out with controls for future mods, switches and fuses etc.

My wife wasn't super keen on the lock not being in the middle. Was a bit limited due to the construction of the cover, but I don't mind it off centre.

Rear door shelf. It's a sheet of MDF wrapped in stainless steel which was just laying around.

Interior pic. Still pretty clean. I wasn't keen on the UHF position when I bought it, I was always planning on moving it. After a few years of use it's actually grown on me... It's out of the way until I need it(you'll notice the clip to the right of the gear stick), and I've often got family sitting in the back so it's in a central location for anyone to use it.

Not your usual gauge mount but I'm pretty keen on the look.

I've got a wishlist of things I wanna do, who doesn't?! I've been on and off work because of my health for a few years so not much can happen until I'm back on my feet. But I'm always tinkering!

 

[festy]

Your glovebox mod looks great. What sort of lock did you use?

 

[crepemachine]

Your glovebox mod looks great. What sort of lock did you use?

Thanks! I tried a few different approaches over about a year. Ended up ripping this lock out of a filing cabinet I wasn't using. Had to modify the catch side a bit but otherwise it went straight in. And I think it looks pretty clean.

 

[arron95]

i like where you mounted your gauges, they aren't really in a blind spot, I bought a pillar pod set up and im not too much of a fan of it.

 

[crepemachine]

i like where you mounted your gauges, they aren't really in a blind spot, I bought a pillar pod set up and im not too much of a fan of it.

Yeah I'm very happy with them. The mounts just came with the cheap gauges I bought and couldn't afford pillar pods at the time. After having them though, I would definitely choose these over the pillar.

 

[crepemachine]

Holed a piston a few months ago. As I pulled it all apart I found a lot of problems with the ebay exchange motor that had been swapped into it a few years prior. A lot of shortcuts and cheap parts. The pistons had marks on them where they had been smacking the valves...

So I'm doing a full rebuild. Will be posting updates here but will probably be a relatively slow process, don't have heaps of time to head out to the shed.

The first thing I did was build a waste oil burner in the shed so that I can stay warm while working on the motor. Works a treat.

 

[crepemachine]

Managed to get the journal bearings for the balancer shaft replaced. Was a bit of a challenge, just took it slow.

I made a tool to get the job done using some threaded rod and a few nuts and washers. Had to make the washers as I couldn't find a washer off the shelf which was exactly the size I needed.

Using this I could make sure they went in square and aligned to the oil passages.

 

[crepemachine]

After the bearings were in I installed the crankshaft and lower block/bearing cradle. After measuring, re-measuring, and re-measuring all the tolerances.

I looked over the picture of where to put the bead of liquid gasket a few dozen times too. Didn't want to get that wrong. Ended up with a nice even bead squeezed out around the whole thing. Looks like it's sealed to me!

 

[crepemachine]

Got the pistons ready for installation. Paired the pistons to cylinders, measured ring gaps, installed rings and conrods to pistons. Ran out of time so putting them in will have to wait a few days.

Was very happy with the ring gaps, they were exactly the same across all cylinders on the larger end of spec. Was nervous about having to grind them, but no need.

 

[crepemachine]

Finally got the pistons installed. A long string of work & health kept me out of the shed for a good few weeks.

I put them in a few weeks ago and took a few measurements. They were 0.0065" taller than I would've liked. They were technically within spec but only just. I decided to get the conrods taken down cause why not while I'm here. I'd rather be in the middle of spec rather than on the end of it, so they're bang on now.

I've got a coating on the pistons and the head so I took that into consideration, but the coating is only 0.0004" so that didn't have much of an influence.

 

[crepemachine]

Today saw the rear main seal installed along with the rear plate. It was a bit of a pain having to take it off the stand to get that done.

Next up was the front plate and timing gear. I was nervous about putting this stuff on, but looking through the book a few times and taking it slow it was quite an easy job. Little bit of jiggling saw the gears slip into place quite nicely.

I checked the backlash on the gears before the teardown and all was good. I'll give them another check before I cover them up to be sure.

 

[crepemachine]

Got the gear case and cylinder head on today. I used ARP studs for the head. I received a set of bolts from the rebuilt kit as well as from the guys who worked on my head, so I've got two sets of head bolts I don't know what to do with now...

Finished up with the timing chain. I used new chain guides and tensioner for that. I've got a pic here of the old guides and they have more wear than I thought they would, with maybe 100,000kms after the reco motor went in. I'm thinking the guy who built the old motor used old parts to save some cost. It's probably the same reason my old pistons had impressions from hitting the valves. Maybe someone had tried turning the key after having the timing set wrong and sent their motor to this guy. He's gone reused the pistons. Not sure but I'm glad it's all getting replaced.

 

[crepemachine]

Was a bit of a doofus and put the rear plate on before the sump. So had to get it off the stand again to take care of the hidden bolts at the back of the sump...

Been bolting on as much as I can when I've got the time.

Test fit the turbo today. Wanted to confirm where I'm going to run the lines for water cooling.

Also needed to check the clearance against the aftermarket alternator I have installed. Not sure where it came from as I wasn't the one who bought it, but the terminal is in a slightly different location to standard. It barely fit against the standard turbo inlet so I was concerned I'd need to purchase an OE alternator to have it all fit.

It ended up being too close. It all fit, but the turbo inlet was in contact with the terminal. I decided to bend the terminal back to give it more clearance. Bit of a hack, but it'll still do the job.

 

[geeyoutoo]

Just for a reference what is the make and type of alternator, the inlet was designed to miss the std alternator.

 

[crepemachine]

Just for a reference what is the make and type of alternator, the inlet was designed to miss the std alternator.

I couldn't find a label or stamp on it anywhere so I don't have any make or model info unfortunately. I know it was purchased from Sprint Auto Parts, but my brother bought it and handed it over, so don't even have an invoice to check.

It does have 120A output rather than the standard 100A, so that may have something to do with the terminal being in a different location. I did a quick search and it looks like listings for 120A versions have the terminal set back slightly.

 

[AndrieK]

That turbo is a beautiful piece of engineering. I wish I had one.

 

[crepemachine]

That turbo is a beautiful piece of engineering. I wish I had one.

It's hard to stop looking at it and leave the shed... I've got a gearbox rebuild to do and a few other mods before I'll even see it spinning, it's torture.

 

[Squalo]

Very enjoyable read, thanks for sharing.

 

[crepemachine]

Worked on the cooling lines for the turbo today.

Threaded a couple of -06 fittings to the turbo. Was debating whether to tap the turbo vs tapping into a plate bolted onto the turbo. Thought I'd go with tapping the turbo and if I couldn't get a good thread on it, or snapped a tap I could go with plan b. Went well though and I'm glad it worked out this way as there isn't heaps of room back there when using these fittings.

Nice blurry shot of the lines attached.

Bit hard to get a shot of this. It looks pretty tight, but there's quite a bit of wiggle room in there. I'm thinking I'll sleeve this section of line too, because it runs quite close to the exhaust manifold and to reduce wear against other components. I'll secure it to the heater lines here to reduce vibrations.

Need to trim the small heat shield a bit before the final fitting too.

The line comes straight over to the gear case. I tapped a -06 fitting into the location where the standard line returns. I might secure it up this end too, to reduce vibrations. Just a bit worried about it flopping around and rubbing against something. I'll see how this routing goes for a while. I can modify it if I see any issues but am limited by the minimum bend radius of the braided hose. I could add some more fittings to get tighter turns but then securing those fittings becomes another hurdle. We'll see how it goes.

I was one fitting short. Just need another 90° bend to connect up to the feed port in the oil cooler.