Nissan Skyline GT-R s and GTR Information

All back at the Long Beach shop. Slightly worse for wear

Brian was having his last Nissan Challenge event of 2024 with Speedventures on December 15th. Since we have a few customers, and friends with cars, we decided to make a day of it. In the end it was five R32 GT-R at the track. Brian, Ernie, Taka, Wakita, and myself. Black, Green, Red, Millennium Jade, and Gunmetal.

A few important things, its better to get out there and drive around, than throw every part you can at a car. Having adjustable suspension, or altered suspension pickup points might be faster, but the reality is you need seat time to get faster. Something the Roadkill guys would say, rather than getting it "right", get it running.

Rather than making excuses, finding all the flaws, use the good to your advantage. The setup on the these old R32's may be all wrong. I know that. I also know that seat time, and a tire makes up for all kinds of things.

Getting some pallet racks setup in the workshop.

Before the event is the preparation. Along with car prep, we of course all have real life. We have the business to do, in addition to that we are opening a second location. Everyone has lives, wives, kids, or something in their life that means we aren't 20 year old kids getting ready for an event. Not everything you want to get done, can get done.

Gran Turismo, practicing for the track. I miss the feedback from the car in real life

1:25.5 at Streets of Willow Springs CCW with a R32 GT-R.

Wakita's car on the dyno. Its painted millennium jade. It was a bit of a rough car and lead a bit of a life before he got it. It has some good parts on it now. Big brakes, dog box, makes 550 hp. He says its on N1 turbos, but that seems a lot of power for some N1's. Next time they are off, I should measure them. In those turbos, just a couple of mm in wheel size is 50 hp difference. I'm not sure what suspension its on, but it was on some Dunlop street tires.

Ernie's Garage Saurus R32 GT-R

Ernie, a good friend, and invaluable help at the shop, in his time off from his real job, was prepping his Garage Saurus car. He had an incident awhile back, and this would be its first outing since then. It will be unbelievable to anyone that knows Ernie, but Greg and myself finally convinced him to go E85. So the old HKS V-Pro came off the car. Many people don't love the Nistune, but I think it has its place. Brian's car, the Nismo, and now Ernie's car was going to be on Nistune.

Shirt matching car. R32 on the Dynapack

So in preparation it needed a few things. Flex sensor, ECU, R35 MAF. Ernie set to getting all those things in place. Once they were in place, we noticed a few things that were off. I wasn't in love with the engine wiring harness in the car. After 30 years, these harness are just old. The connections in the harness, the places they have been tapped into in the past. I had a harness from Wiring Specialties in hand that was going to be for the Nismo, but Ernie ended up installing it. That seemed to help out with a few of the issues we were seeing.

R35 MAF. The inlet tubes are not ideal, but its what we had to work with.

Ernies R32 GT-R. 523 hp 468 lb/ft. I think purple was boost controller off, and green is on at 1.4 kg/cm2.

The Nismo is a little bit of a weird setup. It made 430 horsepower, fuel supply limited more by the fuel pump/stock lines. Stock Nismo turbos. Peak was about 19 psi. Ramp duty cycle down to settle at about 15psi . Stock air box. OS 88 sequential. 4.3 gears. Nismo/Ohlins suspension. Springs are like 8/6. Stock brake size and caliper. Melted the dust seals last time out. Has Carbotech pads. Goodrich lines. Torque Brake Fluid RT700 in it. Has some ducts that I bought off of Yahoo years ago. Has 18 x10.5 + 22 Volk TE37s. Tires are Hoosier Racing Tire R7 in a 275/35/18. Best time was a 1:22.2. Ernie did a 1:21.9. Ernie got third in C1 class behind two R35.

Nismo on the dyno. Gunmetal car, gunmetal shirt. Or Asshole grey to Australians

Filled up with E85. About 80% here in Cali in December. Yes the clock works and it has a bubble in the dash. Impul 913 buckskin steering wheel.

At first trying to bring the boost in slower and ramp it up. I decided I didn't want to do this after thinking overnight about it.

Nistune with a 3 port solenoid actually has pretty good control of boost. You give it a duty cycle and RPM and it works. You can see here I was dipping boost at 5250 rpm.

After I changed my mind about boost control. I brought it all in, peaking around 4700 rpm, then trailed it off. That put the car at about 430 hp and 430 lb/ft. Peak 19 and dropping to about 15 psi.

On the dyno of course, the Nismo had fuel issues. The fuel system is always an issue on cars. It still has a Nismo fuel pump that went in 10+ years ago. They are rated about 276 l/hr but probably do more than that. I had several other pumps, but I had loaned Wakita my 285 pump (525 l/hr) the day before. Stock fuel lines up to the rail, but the rail is -8 supply and return. Its sorta ready for more line, but the car doesn't have it. Swapped a Walbro 267(450 l/hr) into it, but it was still obvious that the lines were the issue. The car would do 515 hp at 19 psi, but the AFR and fuel pressure were dropping off. Not somewhere fun and safe to be on the road course. Another 80-100 hp would be nice, but again its not always about horsepower. Seat time, tire.

267 Walbro. I would have liked to have another 285 instead, but such is life.

After the dyno, its time to fix and look at some things.

Right side axle inner boot was done. Ernie got it swapped

Hey, look what Ernie found in the hallway. The axle I needed. Thanks Wakita.

Center bearing/boot was looking a bit raggedy , Ernie swapped that too.

Front dust seals were looking a bit rough. Last R's Day seemed to do them in.

Two piece OEM 296 mm front rotors. I think these are Biot

Hoosier R7 transport vehicle - Stagea 260RS

Trying out some Torque RT700 brake fluid.

Torque Brake Fluid RT700 is a compression free, long lasting racing brake fluid with a performance you can feel! With a very high reserve alkalinity rating, our RT700 has superior performance stability with slow degradation of compounds to enhance and extend the performance life of the brake fluid. Simply put, brake later, lap faster, less frequent brake fluid changes, more driving!

Technical Values:

• Extreme Boiling Point (760mmHg):

Dry 683 °F (361.8° C)
Wet 439° F (226.1° C)

Last R's Day, I forgot my Castrol SRF, which I always use on track cars. The fluid was old, and hadn't been bleed in too many years, maybe eight. So I got a super long pedal. Then all we had to put in, was some Motul 600, which just isn't enough fluid for me.

Doing some weird things with NASCAR titanium brake inserts

The magnetic stickers are so old, a few broke.

Nismo with me in it, and 3/4 tank of fuel

Nismo 58.2% on the nose 41.8% on the back

Nismo crossweights, close enough to 50% for today. I could spend more time, but time is something we don't always have.

String alignment on the Nismo

Brian's car on the dyno.

If you don't bleed for a car, did you really work on it?

Shirt match car on the dyno

We fought some boost control issues on Brians car. Which I think we finally worked out to be some ports hooked up wrong. As the car was running at the last Nissan Challenge, with the "new, used stock engine" it was about 330 hp. After some dyno time, plus the Nistune controlling boost, we got it to 450hp and 450 lb/ft at 21 psi peak dropping to about 19 psi.

N1 turbos, boost peak coming in at around 4600 rpm

Picked up about 120 horsepower

Late night prep

Mike brought two of the cars up. Brian trailered his, Ernie trailered his, and Wakita trailered his car

Stagea gets 91, plus some extra E85. Can never have enough at the track

Sunrising while inline at Willow Springs

Moon is setting

Cupholder is cupholding.

Ernie in his R32 GT-R

Leaning a bit

There was a Michael Morris, they checked the wrong box for me. Orange group First session. Ernie was a bit quicker.

Vented. Dig it.

Ernie did a 1:23.1 in the red group. 7th fastest. There was a Steve Ellis, not our Steve Ellis

I thought my number was 909, but that was Michael Morris. I went back to 32

Opps, Brian's car was making a bit of boost. Somehow the duty cycle went to 10%, and it was hitting 32 psi.

Went fractionally faster

Peak of 18.7 psi.

Watching the cars go around the track with a couple of crayon eaters.

Brian out on grid. He struggled with the brakes, and the day was a little rough

Ernie went out and ran a 1:21.9. I knew I had some more in me. So I chased another car, and that was the motivation I needed to drop my time about a second.