Brandon's CA18DET powered "Panda" S12

[tooley]

Good work so far man! How you getting on with the wiring ? I'm doing the same bit now need to get the dash to wire up to the ecu

[Brandon G]

The wiring is coming along nicely, I couldn't tell you that much about it as I had another member on here (Prolowtone) do most of it, so he'll probably chime in with the details. When we fired it up, we were having issues with our switched relays so we'll be needing new relays.

We haven't hooked up the dash wiring yet. I haven't actually looked into it a whole lot yet. I was reading somewhere about doing an S14 cluster conversion so I'll be checking up on that pretty soon.

[Prolowtone]

Wiring so far was pretty easy once it was together, just been trying to get together to work on it. I bought relays with dual outputs and didnt realize till we put a battery in the car the the relay has one out put on till the switched wire gets power when the keys hit the on position where it sends power to only the second output. Noticed this due to the the ecu not turning off with the keys out . Simple fix tho.. I had the dash info saved somewhere but cant remember what i did with it lol.

Nothing like making a swapped car run with the fuel pump in a pickle jar 

[remi_uNderdog]

great work man. nice to see it started. Always wanted a CA. AND crazy you were given tho car... great job saving and bringing it back.

[Prolowtone]

Well i was asked to update the build since i pretty much have all the pictures.

We have been having trouble trying to make our schedules align, or this would have been done pretty quickly. its been awhile since we really did much to the car other then fill the trans fluid as it is pretty close to being road worthy. need new brakes, maybe some bushings, FMIC setup installed, then put the interior and exterior back together.



Fuse block for the relays. also makes it easy to install other aftermarket parts to a power supply. 


I Cleaned out the dash... found a body just like in my black car




vids:
installed the freshly refurbished fuel tank and the new walbro pump. shaking cleared up after the air was out of the fuel system
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152012656878993&comment_id=30828187

Testing the dash wiring before soldering it all together
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152012634838993&set=vb.700258992&type=3&permPage=1

Brandon got home to find the wiring all soldered. next day i sleeved it all with scraps that were left from the s13 in attempt to make it look a bit cleaner. he is one happy guy
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152012680958993&set=vb.700258992&type=3&permPage=1

[sideways_s12]

I love the way the ca sounds lol this gives me more motivation to get mine done! I'm so close. What turbo are you running and it sounds like open dump do you have an exhaust on yet?

[XortioN]

Nice progress! I hope I get my swap running

[sideways_s12]

can you post an up close pic of the fuel line the feed and return to the rail please

[Prolowtone]

grab one tomorrow with brandon, what do you need to know?

[cellblockd]

Ah god what is it with dead mice in these cars..lol same shit when I got mine..

[Brandon G]

No exhaust yet, it's just open downpipe for the moment. I'll be getting my friend to make one once I come up with a resonator and muffler of choice.

I believe it's just the stock T25 as it has an A/R80 marking on the compressor housing, but I'm not sure if it's a G model or not. I'm not sure what the difference was between the two. The engine came out of a insurance write-off parts car so I have no idea what's been done to the motor, could be built for all I know (I doubt it though, I'm not THAT lucky) Basically, I just bought it because it ran in the parts car and didn't seem to have any problems. It wasn't pissing out any oil so I figured there was no need to tear into it. It has an Impul tuned ECU so I'm assuming it's stock internals. I haven't been able to find any specs about it yet, but it probably just removes boost/fuel cut and speed cut.

[sideways_s12]

grab one tomorrow with brandon, what do you need to know?

Nevermind I figured it out thanks

[Brandon G]

Wow, I totally forgot I had a build thread on here.


I'm not sure where to begin, a lot has happened in 2 years. I bought 4 more cars and so the S12 sort of got pushed on the backburner so progress is slow. I managed to befriend one of the managers at my local junkyard and as a result he gave me some pretty sick hook-ups on parts (but more on that later)



As far as the S12 is concerned:

I finally worked out a front mount intercooler setup that wouldn't interfere with the headlight motors. It's 22" from tank to tank and I mounted it down in front of my 21" Mishimoto tri core rad so the inlet/outlet pipes basically hug my radiator (without interfering with airflow too much) with a half an inch of clearance on either side between the radiator. It's a bit close for my liking so I'm probably going to put some sort of rubber sleeves on either side of the IC piping to dampen any contact that might occur.

I got my hands on a Z31 turbo VLSD with axle shafts and driveshaft, all for only $20 (thanks to my junkyard connection)

Jonathan worked out the tach conversion and soldered in some capacitors so I can retain the use of the stock cluster.

We were having issues with the rear factory harness (the section that handles the fuel pump, level sender etc) being all rotted out due to moisture exposure. So we wired in a Walbro 255 on a separate relay and switch which has since fixed the problem.

Bolted up the transmission crossmember using a stock S13 one that came on my CA trans.


Unfortunately I now have some wiring gremlims to work out with the car due to it sitting so long. Rats got into the bay and started wreaking havoc on the already-not-finished wiring harness.



Remember that junkyard I mentioned earlier? They had a nack for buying more desireable cars. And whenever something cool came in, the manager gave me first dibs at the good stuff.

Here are some of the cooler, more expensive things that I found and bought:


R32 Skyline 4 door sedan with an RB20DE and 5 spd trans (no pics)


S13 240sx BN Sport sideskirts (no pics)


Complete running 2JZ-GTE swap out of a JDM Aristo



Wrecked 2002 Subaru WRX
Tomei ExpremeTi titanium catback exhaust


BC Racing type BR coilovers with Cusco front camber plates



Wrecked 2004 Subaru WRX STI:
STI front seats and Brembo calipers


STI rear interior



Full set of 18x9.5 SSR Professor SP3's (4th not pictured)




And last but not least, one of these...



Post Merge
You Americans should get a kick out of this:






Yup, that's an R33 Skyline. I find it kind of funny that it made its way into the junkyard of all places. Regardless, I just had to have it. Less than 2 hours after it rolled into the yard, it was mine.


Bringing her home:



So the story behind this poor R33 goes something like this. The previous owner was some punk kid who decided take it out on a public road one rainy night with no driver's license... and no insurance... Ended up drifting it into a tree, and then it somehow ended up at my junkyard which is where I came along and scooped it up.


Some of the goodies the car came with:

-Rays Gram Lights 57DR
-JIC Magic coilovers
-HKS front mount intercooler kit
-HKS EVC
-HKS SSQ3 BOV
-Apexi FC Standalone & FC Commander
-Koyo triple core aluminum radiator
-Sparco bucket seats
-Sparco 4 point harnesses
-Blitz turbo timer
-Cusco catch can
-Yashio Factory water temp monitor
-RS*R catback exhaust, custom test pipe and screamer pipe
-Clarion double din head unit with GPS/Satellite radio etc
-Nismo GTR rear wing


The damage isn't too bad, passenger side quarter is smashed in and the lower control arm is bent. Subframe doesn't appear to have shifted any and there isn't a terrible amount of damage to the unibody. I'm torn between parting it or fixing it and keeping it. I've always wanted to put an RB in my S13, but at the same time I wanted an R33 for my first car and I never got to live that dream haha.

If I do end up keeping it, I'll probably end up swapping out to an S14 rear subframe and deleteing the HICAS...probably why the kid crashed it in the first place... Heh.

[Prolowtone]

Im still tracking that s14 and r33 stuff up here but they go pretty fast. Next time im home hopefully ill have the time to run over the wiring again with you, this being home once a year thing sucks.

[Brandon G]

Im still tracking that s14 and r33 stuff up here but they go pretty fast. Next time im home hopefully ill have the time to run over the wiring again with you, this being home once a year thing sucks.

Don't worry about it too much, I have most of everything I need now. Picked up an OEM GTR front bumper, Nismo control arms and a new axle shaft. All I'm missing now is an S14 subframe. I have a lead on a few, just trying to work out having someone pick it up for me.

[deco]

God I wish I lived in Canada.... I could handle driving a r33..... or 34, or any other cool 15 year old cars you all get.