Still no car. The wholesaler had a couple of them a week ago. HA! Story of my life! The search continues. I do have a lead on a two of them down in the Chicago, but with my exhaust not here, I don't really have a way to get down there. I really need to though. The money in the account just keeps adding up and its killing me. I hope it doesn't get to the point where I can purchase the motor and the car at the same time. Although, that would be pretty nice ;) The second job is also helping out a little. I also found a good mechanic for my rides. He's been working on quite a few nice drag motors, so he knows his stuff. Since he needs cash bad, I let him install my camber kit that I never got around to on my current car. But I hope I can use him to help me out with swapping the motor in. Hopefully he can do everything, as with two jobs, I don't know where I'm going to find the time.

I also set myself a timetable to have the swap done by the NOPI show. I know I might not have the suspension done by then, but the motor has to be in. I still gotta plan out which parts are going to go on in what order. But I think the motor and exhaust will be done first. Than get the Koyo radiator. Or maybe the roll cage? I dunno, I got to look into how its going to go.

I am excited. The reservoir I was bidding on was being sold by a guy that lives in my town. It turns out he has a 90SE coupe with SR20DET and Inter cooler and Silvia conversion. Its frigging awesome!! He took me for a ride, man my P.O.S. sux compared to it. It made me want this car even more. Also finally had a half a day's rest after working 14hrs days. Feels very nice, but I know tomorrow I will be driving nights, so my sleep will be minimal. But if that's what it takes...

Well, After a little bit of thinking, I might have to get the fast back, as I don't think that I could put 2 tires in the back of the coupe standing up and attached to the rollcage in the back. So unless I have a change of hart, I will be getting a fast back. Although I am happy that I thought of this now and not after I got the car.

I decided to make this into a blog format. Its going to be a lot easier for me to do, as I will try to post a lot of stuff once the I start working on the car. I am still looking around for a chassis for this project, but I expect to have something by the middle June. Once I get it, I'm going to start to put in a lot of hours at work to pay for the swap, not that 60+hour weeks aren't fun, but with this second/better paying job, it will be moving even better than I hoped.

I also thought about the SOHC vs. DOHC thing and I think that it won't be that big of a deal. I was able to easily find a reservoir on ebay for cheap money, so if it goes through, I will have that before I get the car :D. As far as the A/C goes, well that might be a little more pain in the butt to take care of, but I have no A/C now and I don't really miss it, so I don't think I will really care with this car either, especially if its got sunroof. Again, since I don't have the car now I won't really worry about it.

I had a chance to go through quite a few classified adds, online searches, forums, etc to find a decent car. So I might have to go through a buddy of mine, that's got a hookup at a wholesaler, where I could get my hands on one of these puppies. Once I got cash-in-hand, its easy to get what you want. I still am primarily looking for a 91-93 Coupe with sunroof.

I am amazed how hard it is to try to find a coupe. I am pretty sure that is what I want. They are more rare than the fastback. Also I have decided that my budget for the car itself is going to be about $2000, depending on condition and year, but I really don't want to spend more than that. Some side jobs offered some more cash this weekend, so that's always nice. Its pretty amazing how easily people fork over cash. Its like its not that important to them, which is fine with me cuz I need everything I can get my hands on. I already have plans for next Saturday to swap a dash on a civic. Few hours of pain, but for $100 its well worth it.

I found a gray 1989 hatchback for sale. Its a 5speed and not an automatic, so that's always nice. Its got almost 200K miles on it tho, so the condition of the motor is making me worry. Not that I would drive the the tired KA24E anyway. But the suspension would need a lot of replacement. Also since its SOHC it would have some issues with the SR motor. There are basically 3 issues that need to be addressed in the 89-90 240's than 91-94 don't have.

• The power steering reservoir is located on the US passenger side


• The tachometer in the car is calibrated for the SOHC engine and will not work with the SR20DET


• The A/C compressor from the SOHC engine will not bolt up to the SR20DET A/C bracket without a custom adapter

The tach will be non-issue as its easy to replace. But the Power Steering and A/C is what has me thinking about getting a 91-94 model. At the moment I need to replace the catback on my current car, so I might pass on this one and wait for next paycheck to start looking at them again. But its kinda hard to have money just laying there, doing nothing. Oh well, we'll see how it goes. I would also like to have the HUD, and sunroof, so the hunt is continuing.

I finally found the site that had the 240sx rollcages, why I didn't bookmark it before is beyond me. Autopower of course!! DUH! Anyway, it doesn't specify the coupe/fastback option, so I emailed them. hopefully I will know by the weekend. Gotta start looking, and might as well do it while I got the paycheck ;) Oh well, back to work for me. Gotta get more money for this toy. Wow a quick response from Autopower shows that it fits both models. I was hoping they would decide which one I was gonna get for me, but now its my decision. Coupe looks good, but than again the SilEighty would look great too. These decisions are hard. Gotta go sleep on it. The rollbar is about $325 with the shoulder harness bar. Its good enough for me, since I will not be using the rear seats, but there is an option to make it removable along with the cross-brace. The only thing that might go up on the rear is a camera mount, as I'd love to have 1 or 2 cameras in the car recording as I drive.

Today the hunt for the S13 chassis starts. I probably don't want to spend too much money on it, but I don't want one don't rusted either. I want to be able to find one with HUD and sunroof if possible. Still not sure if I want a coupe or fastback. Either one is fine, but I wonder which one would be better to put a cage in...
Something to look into I guess.

I had my eye on the 240sx for a while, but always there seem to be something that got in the way of doing the project. I did almost buy one earlier this year, but the deal fell through. With this project I am planning on doing the following.

• SR20DET Redtop Swap


• Silvia Front end conversion


• FMIC


• CarPc install

I hope to have two of those done before the end of the year. Probably the SR20DET and CarPc will be the main focus, as Silvia conversion is easily available at almost any retailer that imports motors for about 1000USD. The compete swap costs about $2500 plus shipping. I figure that it will need a basic fluids/plugs/clutch replaced. so total would be about 3500 in parts. But we'll see as its gonna come along.