Silent Running... or Am I Going to Damage The Engine?

By now, everyone knows that the Tomei Powered EXPREME titanium exhaust which I fitted to my car (after having served as the jig during the design of the EXPREME exhaust) is loud. In fact, for use in Japan, the exhaust is labelled as for off-road use only.  Clearly it does not have the JASMA sticker which would indicate it passes certain criteria to be considered "street legal."

In any case, the loudness does me no favors - if I want to leave my house early, or come home late, it wakes up the neighbors.  Of course I use the Tomei supplied bung, but it still doesn't really quiet it to the level of a regular road car.  And of course, the bung defeats the purpose of a race exhaust, as it means I run around with a half blocked exhaust.

Of course I'd run the car without the bung, and the response is noticeably improved.  It makes the connection between right foot and engine, extremely direct.

So basically, I got tired of the compromise known as the "exhaust bung"

This lead me to some research. I quickly learned that A'PEXi had produced a manual, wire operated "Exhaust Control Valve":

However, not only is there no cool factor, but the prospect of having to drill a hole somewhere, plus the need to always think about whether the valve was fully open or closed, was too much for me. I needed something automatic.

And then I saw an article in GT-R magazine for a product that appeared to be designed for the R35 - the Blitz E-ESC.

Basically, this is a fully programmable, motorized exhaust valve - it combines a motorized version of the A'PEXi valve:

From: http://www.blitz.co.jp/products/exsystem/eesc/e_esc.html

 With a computer brain and a controller:

Normally I might do the install myself, but I figured the scraped knuckles, and time away from family was not worth it.

So off to Be Ambitious, where Ninomiya-san did his usual great job.  I also consulted him for some other work, which will likely end up done and thus posted to this blog.

The view tonight as I picked up the car

There was also something else very weird he was working on....

Ninomiya-san, however, warned me that he thought that this device had the potential to damage the engine, due to back pressure caused by the valve in its closed position.  Further he explained, basically there was no difference in exhaust sound, from about 20% to 100%.  Which meant that any value to this device, would be from 0% to 15%.

However, at 0% the valve is closed, and the only avenue for the exhaust to escape is a small hole:

He felt that running around with the valve in this position, would cause premature wear on the engine, with the increased back pressure. There would be no advance warning either.

So he set up the device so that it would fully open at 1200 rpm. Granted, my idle is about 900-1000 rpm, so this device is closed at 0% only when I am idling, at a stop light. As soon as I step on the gas, the valve opens up to 100%.

I don't have a sound clip yet, but from driving the car home tonight, yes the car is ridiculously quiet at red lights. In fact so quiet if I didn't hear the engine noise I would wonder if the car was on.  I played with the unit a bit, and while 0% is extremely quiet, at 15%, even 20%, the car is quieter than before with the bung inserted. So if 0% puts a stress on the engine, maybe 15-20% is the way to go?

The irony, of course, is that in parking the car, I have to step on the accelerator to get the car to back into my garage.  This raises the RPMs to above 1200, which results in the full roar of the exhaust.  My wife confirmed that, from inside the house, she did not notice any difference as compared to before.

In any case - my plan for the moment is to set the device to open fully at 1200 RPMs (or should it be a higher number?), but also to set the minimum value at 15% or 20%.  What do you guys think - will this result in premature wear to my engine?  Or is this relatively harmless? Maybe there is a way I can program it so it only goes to 10% or less when I need it to....

Let me know your thoughts, please!

Back from Mine's... Fixed and Improved!

So yesterday morning I went down and retrieved my car from Mine's.

The culprit for the smoke that required the visit to Mine's this time around, was this particular hose at the back-side of the engine:

You can see some rust in the crack - from not having a sufficient amount of coolant in the system, apparently

Photo courtesy of Richard (fellow R33 GTR owner from the UK),
whose car suffered the same problem, at about the same time!

I was told this is one of two hoses used to cool the OEM oil-water heat exchanger, located in back above the starter motor, and below the fuel rail and assorted wiring. Nakayama-san replaced both for good measure.

I scoured the web but just could not find a photo that showed clearly where these hoses attach (it really is a huge mess), so instead:

In this excerpt from the repair manual, you can see how those two hoses connect to the oil cooler. however if someone has a better photo and verification, I would be most grateful!

To replace these hoses, they chose to remove the transmission to access the back of the engine.  They then flushed the coolant system, and checked for leaks. So now there shouldn't be any more problems going forward... at least not with these hoses.

Thus, the engine did not have to be removed, which means I was not tempted to open the wallet and install those optional goodies I was hinting at.  Perhaps next time!

Although, from my research on this, I am now not sure why this piece is still there.  That is, on a road only car, this oil cooler mechanism is obviously enough to keep the oil temperatures in check; but you need an external one if you run your car on a track, however once you install that optional external oil cooler, not sure why this needs to remain. In fact wouldn't it work backwards and heat up the coolant?  Someone said that this could be to warm up the oil as the coolant warms up faster, but that doesn't really make sense as oil should be designed to lubricate at even colder temps. So I wonder if this should be removed in the future (one less thing to go wrong), or kept as a back up just in case?  And, I wonder if these 4 hoses (shown in the diagram) are available in silicon?

In any case, Nakayama-san inspected the engine and confirmed that the engine suffered no problems from the incident. So that is a relief.

As for the catalytic converter, they weren't kidding when they told me it was "dead." Check this out!

Looks like the honeycomb has degraded quite badly

Other side... when I held this up to the light, could barely see ANY light coming through!

So I suspect that this degraded and clogged up catalytic converter was doing me no favors.  I asked why OEM catalytic converters last for the life of the car, while this one only lasted for about 8 years. The answer is, of course, the more free flow nature of these aftermarket ones, plus the additional power of the tuned up engine.

In any case, I've now got the HKS catalyzer installed, and the first thing I noticed wasn't just that everything smelled nicer (or more precisely, no smell at all...) but that the engine seemed more eager and responsive.

If I recall correctly, this is how the engine was back when I had it installed - very revvy, like a motorcycle engine, and extremely responsive (the engine was put in about one year after the Apexi catalyzer was installed so presumably it was still working well then).  Boost comes on much quicker and the turbos make that funny whooshing sound much more clearly and frequently now.

And this is still with the bung installed on the Tomei exhaust...I'm now tempted to run the car without the bung and with a de-cat, just to unleash its full potential!

In any case, this incident has been a wake up call, so I think I will be having more work done on the car very soon. Stay tuned!

Update #2 from Mine's...

So got an update from Mine's earlier today. Turns out, the problem was not one burst hose but two! Not sure exactly which hoses (they were behind the engine), but likely due to normal wear and tear? Or is something else to blame? I'll find out when I pick up the car hopefully later this week.

I had also mentioned when I dropped the car off, to Nakayama-san, that my car's exhaust stunk.  In fact it was overpoweringly bad. Mine's is reporting that this is because the catalytic converter (Apex'i Super Catalyzer) is dead.  I suspected this, in fact, and was thinking about getting another one to replace it.

from Apex'i website - http://www.apexi.co.jp/products/exhaust/cata.html

The Apex'i replaced the OEM one that was on the car when I bought it. This was a couple of years even before I had the Mine's engine put it, circa early 2006.

At the time, in my research I found that the Apex'i was the best catalytic converter because it had the lowest cell per square inch (cpsi) of only 130 cpsi - most other catalytic converters were in the 200 range (OEM is 400) and therefore more constrictive.

However, I always believed that catalytic converters pretty much lasted the entire life of the car, although now I suspect that is only true if your car is not highly tuned.

But a relief the smell wasn't necessarily caused by the engine. I've asked Mine's to go ahead and install a new catalytic converter - they've recommended an R33 GT-R specific one by HKS, which happens to be the one I was looking at anyway. Hopefully they will have photos of the old one for me to see how badly it had degraded.

The HKS one has 150 psi so a slight increase, however their website claims that their catalyzers have "high purification performance" - so something to look forward to, if true.  And if for some reason the HKS fails or dies in the future, at least its replacement cost is not as much as the Apex'i.

From: http://car.indac.jp/product_shousai.asp?hin=10123126012

In any case, as Mine's has the car for a few more days,  I've decided to ask them to do a full check of the car, in order to see if there are any other parts that could be suspect.  I'll post what (if anything) they find.  Hopefully this whole incident was just a wake up call for me to pay more attention to my car!

Stay tuned...

Flash Back Post - Aluminum Pedals

Since I haven't heard anything from Mine's since my last post, I've been trying to clean up parts of this blog.  For example, I updated my Spec List page and realized that I had made some mods, and even took photos, but had forgotten to post when I did those mods!

So, time to post and get those photos up. First up - aluminum pedals.  This I did back in April, 2010!

From a distance, the OEM pedals sure look boring and ugly:

But look closely... the "R" on the clutch and brake pedals

To be honest, I was hesitant to do this mod.

First, note how Nissan has actually inscribed the "R" on the pedals themselves. GT-R specific? Probably! But old and getting worn...

Second, aluminum isn't going to be very useful if the soles of my shoes are wet from rain.  Then, I realized that since I almost never drive in the rain, this should not be an issue.

Out of excuses, I went ahead and ordered a set from Nissan. Note in the photo below there are three "bush" - but if I recall correctly, only two were actually needed (I can't recall where I got the part number list.  Unfortunately, I also don't remember which one bush I didn't use, but as they are cheap parts, I would go ahead and order all 3 if you are going to do this mod, unless you have access to a proper parts list).

These began appearing on the later model BNR34s

No instructions were included, but this can't be that hard. The foot rest was a simple bolt off and bolt on affair.

Next up was the gas pedal. Note the difficult part here was, getting that clip undone that holds the top part of the pedal. A small standard screwdriver is handy here.

holding the pedal upside down (narrow end on top)

The aluminum pedal - I can't recall exactly, but I seem to remember that you had to be careful to force the bottom piece (onto which the metal pedal arm hooks into) in. The top piece is self explanatory.

I don't know what that piece on the right is?? I think it wasn't needed.

Turned out that the brake and clutch pedal were the most difficult to get on. I ended up using a hair dryer to soften up the rubber, and then quickly stretch the rubber part on the back side of the pedal around the metal pedal arm portions.

Here is the aluminum pedal installed, from the back.

And finally, the end result:

Looks good! Yes, I lost the "R" factor, as these same pedals are now found throughout various Nissan vehicles. Still, I can't complain as they look good and I GUESS the small rubber sections on the left and right of the brake and clutch pedals act as anti-slip mechanisms for wet shoes.

Also, yes I have seen Nismo branded aluminum pedals, but was never sure if they were fake or not. So I stayed away from those, even though I'm pretty sure Nismo did at one time have such parts available.

In any case, this was one more small thing I did to help "modernize" the car - heck if Nissan installed these on the later model BNR34s, then of course they would have put these on the R33 GT-R had these parts been available back then, right?

Update #1 from Mine's....

So I finally got a call from Mine's Takayanagi-san to update me on my car.

Here is what he told me that they've found so far:

Apparently, they found most of the water in the cooling system, gone! So they suspect a broken hose somewhere.   No visible damage anywhere, so likely they will have to lift up the car and/or remove the engine to be sure.

Luckily, I only drove for about 10 minutes once I saw the smoke so there is unlikely to be any damage due to overheating, however Nakayama-san will be inspecting the head of the engine to make sure there is no damage. (keeping fingers crossed, that sounds expensive!!!)

If the leak was from a hose somewhere, it would have happened very rapidly, as I don't recall seeing a puddle of coolant in my garage area.  So it would have happened that day when I drove to Yokosuka.

Additionally, they found that the water that remained, was rusty. This is probably my fault, I can't recall the last time I had the coolant changed - I thought it was a couple of years ago - and I've never had any cooling issues.  Takayanagi-san doesn't believe I need a new radiator, but it (and the whole system) will simply need to be flushed out thoroughly.

By the way,  I've circled where I saw the smoke/steam coming from:

In any case,  I will let them first diagnose exactly where the leak is coming from, but assuming that it is a hose that gave way,  I think I will have to replace some of those hoses back there with something stronger.  Steel braided looks nice, but my understanding is that silicon hoses are just as strong and reliable (so long as you use the proper clamps) and steel braided's drawback is that the braiding prevent you from finding the source of a leak quickly.  People's thoughts on this? If I do silicon, what color? Blue or black? (note I already have the Samco set for the radiator, in blue).

Stay tuned....

Back To Where It All Began...

So this past Sunday afternoon, I was driving around Yokosuka (where the US Naval Base is), when all of a sudden I heard something weird: like a fluid hitting something hot, repeatedly. It sounded like this: "pshh pshh pshh pshh."

I first thought something had gotten caught in one of the brake calipers, but then I began to see some white smoke. Still the optimist, I kept going, and headed onto the expressway.

However, entering a toll booth, it just seemed like there was a BIT too much smoke. Also, the idle speed was too high - like at about 2000 rpms. Did not sound normal at all.  So I finally pulled over, popped the hood, and tried to locate the source of the smoke.

It seemed to be coming from the back of the engine area, on the side opposite of the turbos, down near or on the firewall.  And of course everything was too hot back there to touch, and further, it was getting dark... quickly. In any case, having spent a good amount of money on the engine, I wasn't going to press on and risk damage.

So I called roadside service (JAF - Japan Automobile Federation) and they dispatched a flatbed to pick me up.  JAF is great - only 3000 yen per year, and they offer numerous services. When they tow or  haul/flatbed your car, they do so anywhere within 15km for free!  In any case, the operator (who didn't know much about cars) was going to send over the first available tow truck... but then this flatbed showed up.  

The JAF driver told me, as soon as they heard "Skyline GT-R" over the radio all the local drivers knew it had to be a flatbed. So this driver who was nearby volunteered to come over.  It turns out that there are two types of flatbed - the ones that extend the entire platform to the ground, and those that slant.  Obviously, your car has to be drivable to use the slant one (they can winch it up, but because my car is so low, that would be tricky).

View from the driver's seat as I drive up the ramp

I wasn't about to wait for a "true" flatbed type truck to show up (another 2 hours). So I started the car up, expecting the worst... but it sounded fine, in fact sounded nice and warmed up??!!  Even the highway safety officer (not a policeman but one of the guys who, although they wear police-like uniforms, actually work for the private expressway operator) who showed up in one of these:

commented on how good the car sounded, asking me "hey is this a Nismo tuned engine?" When I told him it was a Mine's engine, he got excited and asked me more questions, even though I was busy at the time listening to the JAF driver as he directed me to drive up the ramp slowly, one meter at a time as he used wooden blocks to make sure my car's front lip spoiler didn't scrape!   Sheesh.

Mine's is also in Yokosuka, and was the closest tuning shop (I had called ahead to request they stay open late for me).  So once the car was safely strapped down, off we went. We arrived exactly 15.1 km later:

Arrival at Mine's.

Takayanagi-san (aka "Elvis") met us at the door, and directed the driver to pull into the backside.  As he was directing the JAF driver, Nakayama-san, the man who actually built the engine in my car, greeted me looking a bit worried and tired (he was there late as he is currently building another RB26 for another customer - you can barely see the gunmetal BNR32 in the photo below, to the left):

Nakayama-san moves to open the garage door for my car

Interestingly, he told me that customers with RB26 GT-Rs were keeping Mine's busier than R35 GT-R owners... that plus those overseas trips he has been taking leaves him tired!

Takayanagi-san pulls my car into the garage of one of the world's most awesome GT-R shops.

On the left, the Mine's R34 GT-R. On the right, a Stagea RS260! 3 world class RBs lined up?

Once again, the car sounded great upon unloading. Nakayama-san DID agree with me that the exhaust smelled worse than it should (a long standing problem which I've been neglecting a while) so he promised to do a thorough whole car inspection for me.

Two GT-R Legends? (only in my mind, LOL)

So now, all I have to do is wait to find out what they diagnose is the problem with my car. Going back to the beginning of this blog, Mine's did the new engine install back in late summer of 2007, so it's been just about 7 years.  During that time, I've had a leaking water line, and then a few months later, had the turbo oil lines break, (twice!) spewing hot oil all over the place - the smoke this time was not black, was coming from the other side/rear of the engine, and there was no oil residue so I'm optimistic that it doesn't involve these oil lines.

This time, I'm hoping that it's nothing serious, in which case, I will ask that expendable items in the engine bay be upgraded to the extent possible.  IF the engine has to come out, however, then maybe it's time for a few "optional extras" to be installed??  Any suggestions?

Stay tuned!

How the R33 GT-R Improved Upon the R32 GT-R (Part 2 - Engine, ATTESA ETS-PRO, and Super HICAS)

Continuing from the previous post - (How the R33 GT-R Improved Upon the R32 GT-R (Part 1 - Aerodynamics and the High Traction Layout), the following items seem more mundane and evolutionary, versus revolutionary.

Also, these are areas that have been widely discussed in the English press and so the big improvements may not be new to you - however, I still discovered items of interest, as described below.

First, however, this video - this was a promotional VHS video sent to Nissan dealerships upon the launch of the R33 GT-R, to be shown to prospective customers - it's Nissan's explanation as to how the R33 had improved on the R32 (yes it's all in Japanese, but the visuals... and engine noise... and the amazing acrobatics while being driven hard at Nurburgring (at about 8:50 onwards) are worth it!):

Not surprisingly, the video describes or mentions, in addition to the items in this post, most of the items I wrote about, not just in the previous post but also much of what appeared in the design trivia posts (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3).

Engine:
Basically the same, except boost was raised in response to Nissan test drivers who wanted more torque and response.  This resulted in 1.5 kgm more torque (to 37.5kgm) and more horsepower, although due to the gentleman’s agreement, power continued to be listed as “280ps.” Engine management (and thus response) was improved as the engine ECU was changed from 8 bits to 16 bits for more detailed engine control, response and reliability.

Side note: Something that Nissan did not publish, however, is the claim that the standard R33 GT-R RB26 blocks are actually more rigid than the R32 ones, due to slight changes in the block design (i.e. improving the ribs in the block). [Note: Even though this is published in my sources, I have never heard this claim before. I would take with a grain of salt.]

Drivetrain: ATTESA ETS-PRO

With the BNR32, in addition to high speed corners being tricky as the car generated lots of understeer, there were also times where traction was not satisfactory.  So the goal with the BCNR33 was to have it behave exactly as you wanted it to.

Yes, everyone knows by now that the R33 GT-R V-Spec model came with the electronically controlled Active LSD, while the standard BCNR33 did not. This leads many to believe that the standard R33 GT-R uses the same ATTESA system as the R32 GT-R… which is true for the hardware, but NOT the software.

Hiroki Sasaki, in charge of ATTESA-ETS in Nissan’s Chassis department, explains that the problem with the R32 was that it understeered badly, it simply would not turn.  They researched the issues, and ended up changing (the software on) how the torque split is done.   As a result, the R33's handling is more precise. The R33's ATTESA ECU is able to take into account more road and speed conditions, using higher capacity (higher limits) sensors, to better tune the car's response in light of the driving conditions and compatibility with the tires.

For the ETS-PRO, they initially borrowed the Active LSD that was already being used in the standard (2wd) R33 in a quest to maximize real wheel traction. However, initial testing did not go well, so the engineers spent a lot of time experimenting.  They finally got it to work well, but this also was due to improving body rigidity and tire performance, finally better.

Here are a few photos of the active rear diff - note that it has the finned cover, which the standard differential does not.

From: http://www.eonet.ne.jp/~t-e-s/bcnr33lsd.html

The end result is, ETS functions in both R33 GT-Rs to make the car much more FR-like than the R32.  And, with the ETS-PRO, the active LSD allowed Nissan engineers to say the the V-spec is “the GT-R we really wanted to build, with superlative performance.”

Brakes: all cars, both V-Spec and Standard trim, came with the Brembo brakes that made their debut on the R32 GT-R V-Spec models. I occasionally hear about the odd R33 GT-R that doesn't have Brembos on it... unfortunately, those were stripped of the Brembos before being sold to the unsuspecting new owner.

Super HICAS:  The R33 adopted the electrically driven Super HICAS versus the R32’s more primitive Super HICAS which was hydraulically driven, heavier, not as precise and did not utilize a yaw sensor. See my technical note about this from an earlier post.  HICAS appears to be a touchy subject - many people claim that "HICAS kicked in" to explain why they lost control of their GT-R.  I believe this is the result of people not understanding how HICAS works, and not understanding what else could cause handling issues - HICAS is an easy culprit to blame, especially given the number of hydraulic HICAS equipped R32s, the fact that many tuners sell lock out bars, and the apparent complexity of the mechanism itself.  I'm doing research on this issue, and I hope to be doing a future post on this topic, soon.

Putting it All Together:  Along with a more responsive intercooler, all of the changes mentioned above and from the previous post resulted in a car that Nissan engineers claimed was more responsive and faster than the R32 GT-R, as demonstrated by the significantly faster performance at Nurburgring (in Japan, the advertising copy was “Romance of minus 21 seconds”).

Here is the "romance of minus 21 seconds" commercial:

Hiroyoshi Kato, Nissan's main test driver, explained that (due to all the technical improvements, especially the ones mentioned on this page) "the R33's performance completely surpasses the R32s... the first we went to Nur (with the R32), the Nissan team was completely intimidated with how Porsche was testing, but by the time we had the R33, in our hearts we believed we could kick Porsche's ass." (Quote from "Nissan Skyline GT-R R33/R34, Neko Mook 1377")

By the way - here is Nissan's official profile (in English) of Kato-san: Nissan Legends - The Man Who Found His Calling -Hiroyoshi Kato.

Next - time for some mods for my car (finally)!