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My little War-Wagon


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So here is my little rundown on the daily drive.

The basics:

  • 2004 GU ST-L Wagon
  • ZD30    (270K+ on the dial)
  • 5 speed man.
  • 32.5" Michy boots

The Under-Bonnet Mods:

  • K&N filter
  • Molded Silicon Induction tube (Air-box to Turbo)
  • ProVent 200 Oil catch can
  • Dawes Valve set at 17PSI
  • Bleed Valve mounted in cabin just under handbrake lever
  • 3" Turbo back Exhaust - Stainless muffler, No CAT  (found HERE)
  • EGR blocked
  • Boost & Pyro gauges

Extras:

  • UHF Radio (Uniden POS, Simoco or Icom on way)
  • Factory Steel winch bar
  • RFI CDQ5000 & CDQ2195 antennas plus FM band whip on bar
  • 2x 7" 100W HID spot lights
  • 1x 100W Spot/flood LED light-bar (on top of bar)
  • 2" lift coils
  • 2" lift Dobinson Shocks
  • Return to Center Dampener

Whats on-way or planned mods:

  • 16V 500 Farad capacitor unit (Maxwell) to augment a large, single deep-cycle battery, ON-WAY      ARRIVED
  • Boost controlled VNT actuator (Vacuum + Dawes + Bleed valve going), ON-WAY    ARRIVED
  • Simoco or Icom radios, PLANNED
  • Larger, fan forced intercooler, PLANNED
  • Rebuild of another ZD30 with stronger guts, PLANNED
  • 35" Boots when others are due to be replaced, PLANNED
  • Water-Meth injection, Post Turbo, PLANNED
  • Clean out entire induction system tract, PLANNED
  • ECU mods, way-off planning there
  • Taller 5th gear, POSSIBLE

So, the GU is no virgin, but she hands out a spanking when needed. The beast will happily sit in 5th gear @ 50+Kph and be able to pull all the way to 120Kph. Usable boost is @ 1000RPM, 12PSI @ 1500RPM, full boost (19PSI, I know what I said about the Dawes setting of 17PSI) @ 1750RPM.

I get around 10.5L / 100 and EGT's sit on 190°-210° town driving and 280°-300° on highway @ 100-110Kph. EGT's rise to 480° when pushing up 10% grade with full tanks, tools in back while still holding 100+Kph. 

The Ultra-capacitor will be mounted on passenger side (where second battery normally goes) and be connected to main battery via 2-guage cables with 500A fuse. These suckers can dump Mega-Amps of current in milliseconds (hence fuse). This will enable the vehicle to have instant current with little or no sag while allowing me to swap the cranking battery for a Deep-Cycle battery. 

The biggest Bitch: The crappy diff-gears. I need shorter gears or a taller 5th (considering it too). 35's will help here soon. Make no mistake, this ride is my daily drive where I do a lot of highway work. Very little 4WD action until I get a project car.

 

Edited by Lost-Benji
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Pics?

Yeah, I agree the 5th gear is useless but I wouldn't change the diff ratio for that indeed with 35's you probably going to get the revs just right but it will be a slow going (acceleration). Marks $WD adaptors (Y60 & Y61 5th gear set) make 0.74:1 gear set but OMFG @$1200 it is a bit of joke for 10% step however that would go nicely with 35's perhaps and 4.6:1 diffs with extra reduction gears (Low range 85% gear reduction set) for transfer thrown in for good measure. You can have some fun calculating ==> gear calculator

I'd do it in the flash if the engine in these things was more reliable/dependable.....

Regards

 

Edited by Rumcajs
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I can't really bitch about the rig, sure, a few more cubes of displacement would be nice and I certainly would love to see a Cummins 5.9L in there but for those wanting the TD42... Nope, I have enough torque on boost to have the tyres making plenty of noise on bitchy trying to grip. Hence why I am not too worried about the crowd who scream murder about 35's on a 3L.

I will put some pics up on the weekend when doing some more work on it. 

P.S Diff gears are factory 4.33 which is a little different to what some sites claim of the 4.11's for the 3L manual.
HG43 plated. 

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Well, that's typical Nissan for you, the consensus is that assembly line just fitted what was supplied at the time by the line chasers, there really isn't any sense in it. Some have claimed that if ordered in advance one could specced ratios and types of axles that's why no Y61 is alike. Yours must Series 3 then as well, Nissan has stopped that nonsense from Series 4 (allegedly) e.g. ZD30 auto with 4.3 and TD42Ti and 4.11 for ZD30 manual apparently ...yeah right I so believe that.

4.3 diffs on 35's are actually not bad IMHO so no need to worry with diffs, but how do you go about not being legal? Braking performance will get affected for sure, especially with ZD30 models which have really chit brakes. Perhaps getting TB4.8 L model front brakes (calipers+pads) would improve the situation greatly.

 

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Morning matey, some good points there. The donk is doing around 2750 @ 100 (speedo is 3% under reading currently, double GPS checked) from memory (will have to check today when out-n-about) but hits the 3 grand when on the highway which is not where I want the revs especially when she has enough reserve to either drop the diff's to 4.11's or 3.9's but more so, the 35's.

On the tyre size/legality front: I have spoken with a local engineer who said getting a mod-plate for the bigger boots and associated requirements should not be an issue. 

Braking, well that is a great point, the factory anchors are shit. Then couple with a front-end shimmy (suspect warped rotors), they are on the cards to be swapped out for some increased stopping. 

I guess the whole thing boils down to this, it is the daily drive, not my weekend or project car. At some stage, I will have to look at either getting real serious with a bigger diesel (sorry, the TD42 is not a cost-effective path) or let the pat go and step into what I really desire, dual-cab light truck that has room for me to cover my wants/needs. Pie-in-sky so far. 

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That sucker holds the effective cranking power of a 1000CCA battery yet weights roughly 5 kilos. So I will have it sitting in where most would put a 35 kilo battery on turbo side of donk, will replace the cranking battery with deep-cycle battery. I can now crank the motor with very little Vdroop (voltage stays high rather than dropping low meaning slower and harder starts) while not having the extra weight. 

Jump on Youtube and watch some videos on the Maxwell caps or "Ultracapacitors" 

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