Almost Done...

Photo courtesy of Takasu-san at NISMO Omori Factory

So I got a call last evening (Friday) from Takasu-san from NISMO Omori Factory. It seems that the used G&Yu NeXT battery that Nakamura at Worx Autoalarm had installed without my permission (and thrown out my trusted Optima Yellow Top - he claimed they were well marketed but not a good battery!) had reached a point where it could not hold a charge. And in fact, attempting to charge it (whether when the car was running or by charger) resulted in a weird chemical burning smell... not good...

Here it is - Model number is NX 115D26L

So I did some research and I think G&Yu (formerly Yuasa) had stopped making this model about 2-3 generations ago. It does appear on Rakuten and Amazon but doesn't look like you can order it anymore.  In any case, looks like it has a capacity of 68Ah (higher than the Yellow Top, as below) but I couldn't find any CCA rating.  Also, I am sure there is a technical reason why this one is no longer made but the Yellow Top still is... and of course being a USED battery, who knows what state the NeXT battery was too when it was installed in my car.

Who da F installs a USED battery in a customer's car??

So, I'll have to buy a new Optima Yellow Top, as I think they are the best out there... Good news is that NISMO agrees and recommends the Optima Yellow Top, so I promptly went online and bought one (model number YT925S-L/YR R 3.7?) from the online dealer I had dealt with before (in order to avoid the NISMO tax, of course...) and had them send the battery directly to NISMO for me.

Here is a closeup of the battery that fits the 33/34 GT-Rs. You can see it has a claimed 660 A Cold Cranking Amps and capacity of 48 Amp hours
From: https://www.soundwavemeiwa.com/SHOP/OPY3704.html

This is the GT-R specific mounting kit they supply.
From: https://www.soundwavemeiwa.com/SHOP/OPY3704.html

Showing this shop is an official Optima dealer, the terminals are pre-polished, compatible with the smaller type battery leads, this is a deep cycle battery, etc.
From: https://www.soundwavemeiwa.com/SHOP/OPY3704.html

Also Takasu-san informed me -  good news - my car is almost done, for real!

The next day (today) being Saturday I decided to drop into NISMO in the afternoon. Yes, NISMO Omori Factory is currently closed to the public due to the coronavirus scare (from March 4 to March 18) but hey this is where being a senior Nissan employee has its advantages...

So as I have written previously, the initial goal of having the car serviced at Nismo Omori Factory was to verify the extent, and then as needed, undo the damage incurred when the car sat outside the Worx Autoalarm garage, exposed to ocean winds, which I suspect then led to rust on parts of the car's undercarriage.

I did take care of the rust that had savagely appeared on the rotors, as I wrote in this post.

And for those suspension parts and links that developed rust, as I wrote recently I simply had those parts removed and replaced.

Then there are some places on the body that simply had to be repaired at a body shop.
For example, here is how their body shop fixed up the sills (the jack up points, having been scratched up in use, had developed some minor rust even before the Worx episode but the amount of rust seemed to increase tenfold afterwards).  My sills weren't bent up like many I've seen, but the outside flanges seemed to be more skewed to the outside than they should be. So now no rust and straight sills!

So you can see how the middle part of the bottom chassis - where the exhaust and driveshaft are - were left alone.
Just dirty, no rust. A future project for me!

So while I left the fixing up and re-protection of the bottom of the car to the pros, if all the rusted parts had to come off anyway, what other parts could come off due to age, not functioning and wear and tear?

 Funny you should ask...

Box of mostly banged up, but still quite usable, NISMO suspension link set parts!
Nothing new bushes and some paint can't fix! Anyone interested?

The hub bearings

Driveshaft boots and steering bushing

Nitrogen accumulator thing for the ATTESSA. After 23 years, pretty much non-functioning apparently...can't wait to take that first corner in the wet and see how much more quickly the front wheels get power!
 (I'd always wondered, why even with Do-Luck's digital G-sensor, response seemed a bit slow...hope this resolves it!).

More Nismo links and body rigidity parts. On the bottom, what remains of my Nismo brake air deflectors (that were attached to the tension rods - these are out of production now, replaced by the 10x more expensive dry carbon ones)

As mentioned last time, the driveshafts had to be either overhauled (front) or replaced (in the rear) with rebuilts
-these are the rears that couldn't be rebuilt at Nismo

The rear suspension member was taken off too and replaced with a new one. 

So, some parts were a simple replacement of the various Nismo parts I had installed long ago. Other parts were OEM parts that had not been changed out since the car left the factory, such as the rear member suspension brace!

Basically - I had the NISMO Omori Factory's Chassis Refresh done - plus a few cool extras.  In my next posts, I will show photos of all the new parts on the car, so you can see the difference, as well as the extras!