hit a few delays... but hopefully will be back to this project soon...

Cliff notes:
New Super Pro bushings front and rear (ordered from J-Auto, who is a GREAT guy to buy from!!!)
New OEM Pillow balls (also ordered from Juan at J-Auto)
J-Auto Trailing arms and toe links
Suspension back on the car with the 4.3 diff installed as well... (hopefully by the end of the weekend)

well, after some delays and life happening...

i didn't originally plan to do this in the build but after checking out the suspension and swapping the '94/'95 subframe that was on my shell into my other FD, I ended up deciding to do new bushings all around, including the pillow balls.

The diff already had super pro bushings, which i only realized after i had ordered my first set from J-Auto (1st set was for my v8 fd). So about 2 wks after that order, I ordered another set of super pro's from Juan, along with his new rear trailing arms and toe links. And from my misreading his website the first time I ordered parts, I ended up with a set of OEM pillow balls w/ new dust covers.

Today I got all the old bushings pressed out and tomorrow I plan to install all the new ones and see about getting the suspension back on the car along with the 4.3 diff installed.

With this out of the way, i can motivate myself to clean and paint my depowered steering rack, re-assemble it and get back to test fitting the engine again, this time with the OEM oil pan.

Side note: I have a Xcessive 20B oil pan on the car right now but with the defined auto motor mounts, the front "hump" of the oil pan rests on the steering rack, raising the front of the engine and made it impossible to get the back of the transmission high enough to bolt in my banzai transmission mount as well as greatly effected the angle of the driveshaft.

sledge hammer?

i would rather try to justify the cost of a dry sump setup... and the metal of the Xcessive pan is pretty steady, i did consider cutting and rewelding it, but just swapping oil pans is considerably less work

doesnt defined auto make a oilpan that clears? or too pricey?

they modify the back of the stock 20B oil pan to clear the FD subframe (and decreasing oil capacity. They do not do any modifications to the front of the oil pan where the sump tube is. and from my previous experiences of doing business with them, I would rather just not deal with them again.

My plan is to leave the stock oil pan unmodified and to cut my subframe and modify it to fit around the 20B pan. really it's just cutting out one section and welding a new cross bar further back... i probably should do this before i re-install the front lower control arms... since i have to swap out subframes anyway...

Either way you do it your gonna have to fabricate. Best to mod the oil pan unless you really know what your doing with the subframe.

Since I moved my engine back 3" I made a custom subframe and oil pan

And if you decide to modify the steering rack mounting in any way make sure you dont have any bump steer with the final product.

i did modify a stock subframe. I simply cut out the rear "cross bar" and replaced it with a smaller bit of square stock. i'll snap some pics while the engine is out for the car to get the bay painted...

so, this past weekend I was able to get the engine test fit again with the modified subframe, depowered steering rack, stock 20B oil pan (with banzai racing oil ban brace), exhaust, trans, and intake setup.

now everything clears a stock hood... without the fancy air box... so i'm running open trumpets and need to figure out filters for them. At this time, the car is stilling with a full drive train except for drive shaft and powerplant frame.

one thing to note are that the header barely touches the subframe so when i pull the engine off and before the car is sent off to get the bay painted, I'll need to do a little massaging of this area. need to just notch it to clear more.

otherwise, i'm happy with the clearance the steering rack has below the engine... and if i wanted about another 1/5'' of clearance from the hood, I could get some 2.4'' tall engine mounts (instead of the 2.6'' I have now) And dropping the engine lower would definitely require me notching for the header on the subframe. I'm also having to look at other options if i want to run a front strut tower bar, the one that came with the car doesn't clear the trumpets.

as before, next steps:

• engine bay painted
• header coated
• massage/notch subframe for header

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-s...121_173226.jpg

11 pics added to the album

You know you can't keep using the id lt1_fd3s once this is done, right? I mean
you will now be 3rtr_fd3s or something.

Or just poor!

Looks like progress, anyway you look at it. DGRR 2016 for it?

I like your scooter. Its a good size for you :rofl:

might have to see about getting my id changed to 20b_fd3s or something after she's done...

looking good will be looking for it :auto::auto:

How's this project coming along?
Will it be making an appearance at DGRR?

Yea Tray....we need an update....anxious to see it with new paint.

it finally ran last night

:biggthumpup:

Nice! Sounds good too! Can't wait to see it.

I cant wait to see it either! I'm guessing it'll be at B3R?

i do hope so!