blownb310

Inner right frame rail shown. Actually, it wasn't that difficult to extract the old radiator support. I drilled out the spot welds and peeled it out of there.


The above pic speaks for itself.


Inner left hand frame rail shown.


Outer left hand. Now I realize that I need more than just the lower radiator support. The part it attaches to is NLA from Nissan, so I had to fabricate one.





I made it out of 1/8" thick plate [it is much stronger than the original.]







The engine crossmember is bolted in securely again, and now I don't have to worry about jacking the car up with a floor jack any more. Or that the engine will fall out.

Now to install the Mishimoto radiator, which is all this job started out as - a simple radiator upgrade! My how things can get out of hand when working on an old northeastern car.

__________________
'91 SE-R [MF class rallycross car and
SR mpg record holder @ 76.90]

blownb310

After all these years I have never had a header on either of my SE-R's. They are so cheap now [China] that I bought one for $89 [+$45 shipping] on ebay. I knew going in that these look good but would have some quality issues. I accepted that risk and got one. I am impessed with the fit regarding how tightly it tucks up under the oil pan. That's very imprtant to me for rallycross.


The first problem I had is that the three bolt flange between the upper and lower sections was very badly warped, presumably from the heat of welding when built. So even with a copper collector gasket fully torqued, there was an open gap on one side. It was that bad!


I ended up using a belt sander and an angle grinder to fix it. Both upper and lower flanges were off so much that I had to first grind them down with a disc grinder. Then I could use the bech top belt sander to get them flat. Luckily the larger top flange that goes to the cylinder head was fine. It was nice working on this while the lower radiator support was out.




The only other complaint I had with the header is that one of the primary collector ports was quite a bit off center, as seen in this picture.


This is the other side of that same port. You can see that the exhaust gasses would have met a sharp edge from the flange/pipe mismatch. I ground a 45 deg. chamfer into the edge for a smoother transition with a die grinder to blend it all in. In all I spent about 3 hours of labor to make this header right.

blownb310

I've always wanted a skid plate on the SE-R but was never able to make one......until today. The reasons?

1. I couldn't figure out a way to bend the large piece of 1/4" thick 6061 aluminum I had laying around.

2. There was nothing to mount the front of the skid plate to, because of the rotted lower radiator support.

Now with the new lower radiator support, I only had one hurdle left.

This is what I came up with.



I used the weight of the car on a lift to apply the pressure I needed.



However it just sprang back when released. So I used an acetylene torch to heat the bend area and it slowly sank more and more. I let it cool with the weight on it. It worked.

Benito Malito

Wow you've been putting in a lot of work. The car is more together than mine at this point. Great mods and repairs.

I'm faced with a big dilemma about selling mine and moving to the Midwest. The rust.... I wonder if I'll ever be able to find a nice SE-R again.

__________________
1993 TJ4 NX2000
2004 Forester XT SGM

llaprad1

Great update!

I'm still working on getting a tow dolly. I didn't get to one event on 2012. (won't pass emissions anymore)

__________________
**************************************************
Louis - 1993 Nissan Sentra SE-R
Rallycross Machine!
**************************************************

blownb310

Thanks Guys!


I finished up the skid plate. The piece of aluminum I had was not wide enough to cover the full width of the undercarriage. That's fine because it's the oil pan that is most vulnerable on this car. The transaxle side has quite a bit of clearance.


There was now a second reason to have this skid plate as the drain plug for the Mishimoto radiator hangs down below the lower radiator support [the stock radiator doesn't do this] and is vulnerable to being ripped off if the car bottomed out badly enough.


I fabricated and welded on tabs to mount it. [Front]


Rear


Counter sunk all of the holes and used flat head allen screws.






It hugs the original crossmember very nicely.

I welcome any comments. Do the open mounting tabs look strong enough or do you think I should gusset them for more strength?

blownb310

I built a light bar to mount four Hella lights. Center two are Hella 4000 Compacts and the outer two are [$70 WalMart] plastic Hella 500's. I always wanted a quad setup like this and it is awesome at night. It took some time to get all four lamps aimed just to my liking.



You can't tell from this pic [as the car's too close to the door] but on the open road the light path is very wide and uniform.

My standard 80 amp alternator can handle it just fine, but it is very old so I will be installing a fresh 100 amp B15 unit this week.

blownb310

Here are a couple pics from yesterday's A.M.E.C. ice road races in Wells, NY.





The tires on the drive wheels are studded Nokian Hakapelliittaa 7's with two older Hakka 2's on the rear. Finished first in the 2WD class.

llaprad1

Ice racing, HELL YES!

---

As for the skid plate, I think it looks amazing. Your tabs should be plenty beefy unless you plan on catching a lot of air.

thewizard

Looking good!
When are you gonna cage this thing Mike?
I d like to come out for some of those AMEC events but the car is not running and I am too lazy to work on it in the cold...

Do people tractionize the Blizzaks?

blownb310

Thanks Ozgur. I have no plans of caging this car as it's not exactly rust free lol. Some Canadian clubs tractionize Blizzaks but we don't allow it. It severly shortens the life of the tire and makes them worthless for the street any more. This year we brought back the street stud class, but mandate the Hakka 7 as the spec tire for the drive wheels. You can run whatever else you want on the back. I am using some older studded Hakka 2's.

blownb310

Although I've ice raced and rallycrossed this car, I've never tsd rallied it...... until last night that is. That's why I've recently been upgrading the car with lights, a skid plate, digital odometer for the navigator, map light, pass seat & seat belts, etc.

The 2013 Winter Challenge Rally is held out of Barre, VT. It was comprised of 3 sections for a total of 240 miles. The route went as far east as Littleton, NH, as far north as St. Johnsbury, VT, as far west as Waterbury, VT, and reaching as far south as White River Jct, VT.


My navigater, Steve with our time card at a time control checkpoint. This was our 5th Winter Challenge rally as a team but our first without 4WD. [I usually use my turbo 4WD wagon for this]. With this year's road conditions, [plowed, hard packed snow] we definitely did not need the extra drive wheels and my lightweight rallycross SE-R was a blast.


We took a more laid back approach this year and put fun in front of sweating the details of time calculations and trying to 'win'. We skipped the 1st leg of the rally [daylight section] and went for the traditional night sections from 6:00pm to 1:00am. We ran in the 'A' class and were first car on the road again this year. The SE-R performed flawlessly on my studded 175/70R14 Hakka 2's. It eagerly ate up the brisk and slippery sections of the rally without putting a foot wrong. This rally's got all of the best features, narrow, twisty snow covered roads, blind crests, and no traffic. Even though we arrived to about every checkpoint a bit early, we still finished 15th out of 30. These are some of the best roads I have ever been on. Good times for sure!


Chris Regan's BMW 325iX at a pause in the action. This was at about 12:30 am, during the final leg of the rally.

Thanks again to my navigater on his excellent navigational work, and of course to John Buffum and the checkpoint workers and volunteers who make it all possible. Yup, looking forward to next year as well.

thewizard

Looks like I ll be riding shotgun in Gus' new car at Empire State Performance Rally. We would like to see you out there Mr. Kamm!

blownb310

That's great news Ozgur! I will try to get out there to see you guys. The entry list looks awesome - like 50 cars!