The Beginning

        I bought a 1993 Nissan 240SX Coupe near Oklahoma City in March of 2006 for $2200. It started life as a base model that was 5-Speed, the prior owner had swapped in a HICAS rear sway bar and VLSD as well as some KYB AGXs and SPLParts Tension Control Rods. It had decent interior and a dent in the rocker panel underneath the passenger door, nothing too bad.

         I then began purchasing parts to do a KA-T setup and acquired everything for the setup minus the ROM tune. I had a really nice setup coming along and then realized that my KA was burning a decent amount of oil and compression checked it. Unfortunately the results were not too favorable for adding the turbo items to the KA. I then had the dilemma of whether to rebuild or go to the ever so common SR, with school shortly approaching I couldn't take the risk of rebuilding the KA and then have it blow up while in school leaving me with no transportation. So I looked into some SR motorsets through JHOT Imports. I looked at a few S13 Blacktops and the engines didn't make me feel too comfortable so I bided my time and waited. It payed off because I got to go with a S14 SR for $2200 shipped. I shortly before ordered the Silvia front end from JHOT Imports as well going with a Silvia K's Bumper.

         I had started a collection of parts before the swap began so that everything went super smooth, the only thing that still had me worried about the swap was the wiring for an S13 Chassis -> S14 SR. There weren't any write-ups on the internet so I went through the S14 200SX manual and started to figure out all the wiring and everything that I could de-pin from the main ECU plug because I was sure there were more wires than needed on the S14 ECU plug. After finishing the wiring the swap was completed in 14 days. I personally think this is a freaking awesome amount time considering that I went from running car to running car in 2 weeks while working 40+ hour weeks at Sears. The thing turned over maybe one time after priming the oil system and fired right up and purred so nicely, idle was super smooth and at 800 RPM, I was afraid that I was going to have something wrong in the wiring so I expected to have to troubleshoot some wiring and run the problem down. I then started out breaking the clutch in and the wastegate arm came off and left me with like 2 PSI at 5000 RPM which makes a world of difference from 7 PSI. I then got the HKS EVCIII working and walked the boost up to 8 PSI and was having so much fun. The plugs unfortunately wouldn't support anything above 8 PSI, I replaced the plugs and walked it to 12 PSI and was having a blast, but nothing compares to how it felt at 1 bar. This is when my car finally came alive and I have loved every minute of it.

Posted by CoupedUp 11.21.08 | 10:40