Wynona the wagon's resurrection!

[HRH]

So I hit 130 on the freeway on the way home. After I got back, it seems there may still be a vent leak. I noticed some oil on the bolts. And the spare tire. I decided not to follow it up to confirm. I'm done for the day. I'm thinking I may still need to do a catch can.

[DRIVEN]

But only at 130?

[HRH]

Ran out of room, too much traffic. Trying to be safe, sort of. I need to get it out near airway heights where there's a long straight stretch and no one else. Usually about 6am or so is the perfect time. Used to max out the other Maxima heading to work at Cheney Napa every day.

[HRH]

https://www.grannasracing.com/products/ ... -catch-can

I'm thinking this it what I'm going to do. I think I have an extra catch can that just needs a npt thread put in the bottom with a nipple and it should work the same.

[HRH]

So I was all prepared to make a reservoir tank for the diff today. But when I put it up on the rack after work here, I noticed it really wasn't leaking much if at all. I'm thinking it may have been residual from filling it which would be awesome.

I got a Dodge fuel filter because it comes with a bracket for use as a reservoir, but for right now I cleaned it off thoroughly and dried it and will wait until I get home to see if I actually have any more seepage. The top vent was completely dry so it's either residual from the fill plug below it or it's leaking out of the bolt holes because I didn't seal it well. Hopefully I'll have to do nothing and it was just residual!

[HRH]

You know, I love it when I'm wrong. I took the car out for an extended drive after work and there appears to be no fluid collecting on the differential cover now. That's excellent news, considering I hit 6200 RPM in 5th gear at my undisclosed test track. By the numbers, that's 141 mph. Wynona has balls!!

And here is a beauty shot from earlier in the day.

[HRH]

I re-mapped my test track today. It took 2.5 miles approximately to get to 141 mph. Not too bad. I'm thinking the car wouldn't get much past 145, maybe 150, but with the power level now, that's about all the wind I'm able to push. Still, better than the engineers ever thought when building their luxo-cruiser wagon!

[HRH]

I lied. 6200 rpm is 143.5 mph.

[DRIVEN]

Your local District Attorney is going to love this thread.

[HRH]

Ah yes, that would be if it was on public roads. But of course, it's my "Secret Test Track."

[Taterhead]

I don’t think I could pull off what you’ve done (gotta know your limitations) but I’ve always wanted to do a 3.0 twin turbo setup in an ‘83 maxima. I had an ‘83 when I was 16 and still miss it.

I think you’ve done really well with this one

[HRH]

Thanks man! You know, the only reason I can pull this off now is from 15 years of screwing things up, lol. Takes a lot of time and a lot of jumping in and seeing if you can swim. And sometimes you sink, but as long as you crawl to the top with one pinky and throw yourself on the bank of the lake, you'll live to do it again. Hell, it took me 10 years to learn how to properly use my welder. A 3.0 twin turbo would definitely be cool. But inline or V6? Therein lies the question.

The funny part is I still think of all the little things I need to do that I haven't done yet. Hell, I still have a factory stereo in it. And I may leave it, it works crappy but it's so cool with the cassette and fitting the dash, lol. I'm pretty excited it's reliable enough to drive to work, but the anal-retentiveness in me still wants smoother operation down low. Like crawling through a parking lot, it's like an on/off switch with the pedal. The hardbody used to do that today until I fiddled and adjusted everything. Took a long time to get it perfect. The wagon still has about 20 things that need to be done, but it's 98% and fun to drive so meh. I'll get to those other things eventually.

And after seeing all your housework, I'll bet you could do it. You'll just have to shift your focus and spend more money!

[Taterhead]

Specifically a VG30DETT if I had one.

I appreciate the kind words about the house work. We completely remodeled our first house so I learned a lot, really helpful when my father in law has done construction work for 40 years. I told the wifey that when this kitchen’s done I’m going to focus on the 510 until I’m sick of it. We’ll see since the last room to remodel is the master bathroom.

And the money caveat is always a problem

[HRH]

Tomorrow is my dyno appointment. Mohammed and I will be up there early in the am. I need to charge my GoPro, now that I think about it. I'll keep you guys posted!

[HRH]

Big thanks to Chris and Isaac at speedyefi.com!

Alright fellas, here are the pics and video! We screwed around after of course. I do have a noise from the rear end, I suspect the e-brake shoe is having issues on the left rear or I have a caliper sticking. Bascially it's making some noises after burnouts that then go away, no drifting on the freeway. I'm going to yank off the rear brakes and inspect everything later today. Also of note, the air filter is in a terrible location for the turbo. We talked about some ideas for getting the accordian boot out of the picture and running nice curved pipe to a better, less hot location. Also discussed ideas for intercooler improvement. Figure with some basic mods and possible a better turbo I could probably run the stock system and crack 200 at the wheels. Not a big deal at this point. I'm really just happy it runs and I only have a few issues to sort. Also, the torque curve is excellent!

Mohammed has a GPS 0-60 app on his phone and the best we got was 7.8 seconds. Not the fastest, but not slow!











Nevermind Mohammed's finger in this one, lol.

[HRH]

That noise we were having the other day while we were doing burnouts was this. I suspected as much and until I had gotten closer to home and kept hearing a dingle dingle dingle every time I hit a bump, I wasn't sure. This confirms the Dingle Dingle the clip spit out and the parking brake shoe was wearing on the inside fortunately close enough to the rotor hat to not really screw anything up so that's good. I already stopped by Napa and got a spare hardware kit figuring I was going to have to play with it so should be just a matter of replacing the nail and the holder and back in action.!

After I fix that then I'm going to go work on that upper control arm issue with the new heim joints. I really probably didn't need to bring the car on the trailer but I figured if I found something really bad that way I'd be able to call it back home as opposed to having it stuck in the shop and having to take our shuttle rig home.

[HRH]

Getting ready to swap out the heim joints now. I'm also going to swap the spring side to side because I'm a little lower on the drivers side. Offsetting weight in the fuel tank mostly on the right, swapping the springs should be perfect and then it'll be level in the rear.

[HRH]

I wanted to use these slick little rubber dust seals but unfortunately I'd have to take off that amount of material off the ends of the original bushing shell. I was going to try and just fit him in the ears but those things are too beefy they aren't budging and there's another 60,000 worth of room to try and wedge in so it's not going to do it.

I am planning on making fully adjustable upper control arms for this axle semi soon. When I do that I'll account for the extra thickness of the washer with the rubber on it and then install them with the new set of heim joints. The new arms will have adjustable ends on both ends so I'll only have to loosen them and turn the barrel, not pull one end out like I have to do now.

[HRH]

Got the center console installed. Only been waiting 2 years to do that. There seems to be a bracket on the trans tunnel that I don't have to locate the forward holes so I'm going to have to figure that out. And the shifter in reverse hits the edge of the square hole. not enough not to get it in but if I put a shift boot in there it might so not sure what I'm going to do there but at least the center console is finally back in the car.

[HRH]

Changed out the standard transmission fluid for some Redline MT90 (75-90 GL4) today. Muuuch nicer! Actually I couldn't tell much, but it made me feel better.