RYU's "properly molested" NSX build thread

[MotorMouth93]

The number of reputable machinists I've tried to use who still can't manage to do passable work has been absolutely unbelievable. Out of the 4 different guys I've used for block work over the past couple years, only one of them has actually done a good job on the first try.

HQ seems to have a good reputation for C motor builds though so I imagine your luck will be better.

 

[Midnight_Raven]

That airbox plenum looks amazing Ryu. Nice job. I had an idea for a plenum if I ever went to ITBs. I was thinking the scoop area for the passenger side gets no love and was thinking this configuration would allow for the utilization of both scoops. Probably easier said than done though lol. Love what you did though looks so clean.

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[RYU]

That airbox plenum looks amazing Ryu. Nice job. I had an idea for a plenum if I ever went to ITBs. I was thinking the scoop area for the passenger side gets no love and was thinking this configuration would allow for the utilization of both scoops. Probably easier said than done though lol. Love what you did though looks so clean.

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I don't see why that wouldn't work! I have my oil cooler on that side but more cool air the better for ITBs

 

[RYU]

Engine Build Goodies

Got some pretty pictures from HQ Engineering today. I'll share some.

Comptech ported heads. Damage courtesy of @docjohn getting a little too overly excited lol. Cams went to @Honcho.

After Repair. Who wants to guess the size of those intake valves? yikes...

WPC'd Toda oil pump gear and housing

I think I shared photos of the piston and LSD before. If you don't recall just think 95mm bore, stroker crank, stock rods, custom cams we're testing, WPC'd pretty much everything (wrist pins, cams, bearings, etc...) all wrapped in a pretty 3.6L bow.

 

[docjohn]

Nice and shiny...btw those heads got me from WGI to home in Vigor mode...:biggrin:

 

[Honcho]

[MENTION=20915]RYU[/MENTION] I'm so happy to see these legendary heads coming back to life. [MENTION=4282]docjohn[/MENTION] has breathed new life into two NSXs!

Are those 37mm intake valves?

They look closer together than my 36mm here:

 

[MotorMouth93]

Did they have to replace the seats or did the stock seats have enough meat on them?

Also why is there leftover RTV on the block girdle? That's an O ring seal!

 

[Big McLargeHuge]

Those are some Top Fuel dragster valves right there :semi-twins:

 

[RYU]

Those are some Top Fuel dragster valves right there :semi-twins:

In other words this will be a sub 300wHP motor that only gets 8mpg haha

 

[Big McLargeHuge]

In other words this will be a sub 300wHP motor that only gets 8mpg haha

LOL the most glorious 8MPG ever though, but much more reliable than a TF motor . I'm assuming you're not too worried about MPG for this build.

I mostly lurk here but love the airbox/ITB setup and the driving vids, both aesthetically and engineering-wise. All you ITB people are giving me dangerous inspiration. I wish there were people more local to me that are doing this sort of thing rather than halfway or more across the country.

 

[RYU]

No groundbreaking updates but now that we're heading into the holiday break I should be able to get to some things. The 6spd has been cracked open. The synchros have seen better days but the gears look good. Now it's a waiting game for the parts order to come in. The Wavetrac seems to slide in nicely but we won't know until we get all the parts like the shims, bearings, synchros, etc...

I believe we have everything we need for the motor to go in. So the current critical path item on the project plan is the tranny.

I don't have any pictures because everything is being done out of my hands.

I believe we ought to have everything installed by end of the year? MAYBE

 

[Valhalla]

Best of luck on the transmission rebuild. Anxious to see what the new LSD does.

 

[Honcho]

I believe we ought to have everything installed by end of the year? MAYBE

Welcome to my world.

Honda Japan was out of the 5-speed 2nd gear dual cone set- had to grab it from ATR. I'm glad the 6-speed parts are still in stock.

 

[RYU]

Welcome to my world.

Honda Japan was out of the 5-speed 2nd gear dual cone set- had to grab it from ATR. I'm glad the 6-speed parts are still in stock.

So far I just need to find 3 parts out of 2 dozen. Let's see how this search will go!

 

[RYU]

Best of luck on the transmission rebuild. Anxious to see what the new LSD does.

Same same. I've researched the Wavetrac quite a lot. It seems to be not as good in terms of the upper echelons of high performance compared to the disc type OS Giken (ex. like the OSG is infinitely adjustable) but it ought to be a heck of a lot more street friendly with a more gradual engagement and not make the noises when turning in a parking lot. We will see. What is surprisingly to me is that the OEM LSD is a disc type isn't as good since it's also a disc type, not helical like the Wavetrac. Perhaps the OEM LSD just gets overwhelmed by the new sticky tires we're all using these days .

EDIT: I'm back to the OEM LSD in my Type R 5spd. Been on it the last 3-4yrs since [MENTION=32684]Silent[/MENTION]nsx has my built 5spd with OSG LSD. Being on the stock 5spd LSD.. kind of sucks.

 

[RYU]

I can share a few photos. I'm changing ALL the wear parts on this transmission. Bearings, shims, synchros, et al. I believe I have sourced all the parts today. Thanks to the NSX Mafia! The only delay may come from ordering the preload differential shims. We won't know the thickness needed until all the parts are in for reassembly. Something I considered but decided against, is to not WPC coat the gears. I won't be putting down a lot of HP/TQ so hopefully it will not be necessary. Many critical items on my 3.6L has already been WPC'd however. In retrospect, should have DLC coated a few items but oh well.

Here is the Wavetrac LSD mated to the 4.23 Ring NSX-R Ring gear. Notice the missing 12-point bolt. I had to ask... that's actually an oiling port that's suppose to be open. Odd and interesting...

So far everything checked out on the trans. PHEW!!! Only the synchros look badly worn and some gears shows sign of wear to be replaced. It was clear that this was previously opened whereby the rebuilder used too much Hondabond. There were pieces of it all over. This is also why i'm changing all the wear parts.

I'm really excited for this tranny. In my part of the world, the 4.23 NSX-R Spec 5-speed has been pretty awesome except my cruising gear is a bit too short and the stock LSD is super MEH. The 6 speed 4.23 ought to have the perfect gearset i'm looking for. 1-4 will be just a hair shorter than my R 5spd, but I gain a very usuable 5th & 6th overdrive. Not to mention a street friendly, but track capable LSD (in theory!)

 

[Track Addict]

The 6 speed is a huge upgrade that I’m sure you’ll love. I don’t get as great cruising RPMs because of the 4.40 OSG. Makes me wonder about the RFY 4.7 and Comptech 5.1!

Build is looking awesome. Can’t wait to compare 3.6s and ITBs


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[RYU]

Well Thanksgiving was great but not so great for car project progress. Looks like I won't be making my end of year deadline. Pretty annoyed about that but it comes with the territory with pioneering parts like these. SIGH..................

The critical path now is the 6spd full rebuild. Despite parts being relatively easy to hunt down (Thank you NSX Mafia!) and meticilous measuring, the Wavetrac LSD is not cooperating. Basically it's lot allowing the case to fully seat/close by about 2.xx millimeters. We think something is off with the conical carrier bearings or the race that it seats onto. Before we could dig into it further my friend had to leave for 2 weeks to visit his folks. Whatever buffer I had in my timeline is now gone and i'm behind.

I had wasted dead time during the long holiday weekend that I tackled a long standing back burner project. Rebuilding a set of Brembo calipers. These pistons were so siezed I had to basically pry them out! It was ridiculous...

To add to the delay... So I ordered a new HKS A/F Knock Amp. It's basically their knock detection amplifier and build in wideband. I've had the 1st generation, single wideband unit with the old NTK wideband sensor. For this new motor build I wanted the newer unit with the upgraded electronics and dual Bosch wideband sensors for both front and rear cylinder banks. Despite ordering it in August with a 90day expected delivery, I was informed it's been pushed back to Feb 2022 at the earliest. Probably chip shortage, etc as the likely cause. I found a used one on eBay. I'll be swapping out to new dual Bosch widebands O2 sensors which is taking some leadtime to deliver as well. Apparently the ones HKS uses are stock units for a upstream O2 sensor on a Volvo. I don't think Version 2 is going to be any better at detecting knock as it's using the stock knock sensors, but perhaps the knock detection logic will be better? Not sure yet.........

Old one...

New one...

 

[FSFNSX]

Who did you end up ordering your pistons and seals from for your brembo calipers? I ordered a aftermarket set of seals for mine and I’m not super happy with the fitment.
Did you end up buying a used color knock amp version 3 or version 2?
I have pretty much the same setup as you for my car Vpro with Camp2, knock amp 2, EVC. All the OG HKS gear. I’m looking for forward to finally getting to use it once I get my motor back and car put together.

 

[RYU]

Who did you end up ordering your pistons and seals from for your brembo calipers? I ordered a aftermarket set of seals for mine and I’m not super happy with the fitment.
Did you end up buying a used color knock amp version 3 or version 2?
I have pretty much the same setup as you for my car Vpro with Camp2, knock amp 2, EVC. All the OG HKS gear. I’m looking for forward to finally getting to use it once I get my motor back and car put together.

I ordered my Brembo rebuild stuff from David Zeckhausen david(at)zeckhausen.com <david(at)zeckhausen.com> He's been pretty awesome. Really spent the time to teach how to properly measure stuff, etc.

</david(at)zeckhausen.com>I was in the process of ordering the latest version (V3?) I'm not sure if I ended up buying the V2 or V3. Whatever version I got ought to work with my V-Pro though. What's the difference between the V2 vs V3 knock amp?

That's pretty cool you have all the HKS tuning stuff. It wasn't my intent to be such an HKS fanboi but my good friend is an ex-HKS employee so you know what they say... go with what your tuner knows. He's given me so many random internal documents/memos explaining random shit that was distributed to his USA dealer network back in the day.

 

[FSFNSX]

Thanks for the insight on the brakes, I will get in touch with David for my brembo’s.

On the knock amp I know the 3 is black with a color screen vs the 2 black with backlit screen and 1 is the silver backlit version.

All my previous cars FD3S, S2000, and S13 have all had a Vpro as my old tuner specialized in it back in the day. I just happened to get a great deal on a FXMD turbo kit with all the HKS gear with from an old member here called VegasNSX I believe.

Do you happen to have a copy of the Vpro US software? I the Japanese cracked software currently.

 

[RYU]

ahhhh... I have the one with the Rotary Volume knob so perhaps I have V2. I didn't even notice that nuance AT ALL. haha

You bought Brian's old stuff. He's a good guy. He's been MIA for years but still pops up every now and again. His car is (was?) a beast!

No, unfortunately the problem with HKS Powerwriter for my car is that it's married to my ECU. So I don't have any copy of it to distribute and if I sold my car the laptop will have to go with it. I didn't even know there was a "US" version of the software but mine is all in English.. albeit it's broken english in some menus.

 

[RYU]

The cool part about using this new HKS Knock Amp is, because it has the ability to monitor O2 Wideband signal from both front and rear cylinder banks, the V-Pro ECU will allow me to tune each bank independently and also perform any kind of Air Fuel and Timing compensation on each bank independently. With the new motor, the injector layout, and the odd exhaust design, the rumor is the rear bank runs a tad bit lean. I'll find out soon enough! i'm pretty excited about this new added granularity in the tuning.

 

[FSFNSX]

Nice I did not realize the new version was able to do both banks.
Brian hooked me up indeed. I will have to add a to my post showing all the parts he sent me.

 

[RYU]

Spent a few hours this wknd tearing apart all the wiring in the firewall. I've always been zen about wiring as I'm so afraid of engine fires but I had legacy wiring still in the car from my Zeitronix setup which I gutted out. I also had to undo probably 100 zip ties, shorten wires, repin wires, etc. I remember promising @jwmelvin my Zietronix setup several years ago (i'm sorry man!!! I barely just got around to removing everything lol. I'm sure you've moved on since them. My apologies).

Pulled out the HKS AF Knock Amp V1. Not sure if I want to sell this. They're so hard to come by and I might need it as a backup in the future. It's probably worth it to me to keep than the little money I can get for it. That's a new Wideband O2 sensor as well.

This the replacement - AF Knock Amp V2. Everything is used except the 2 front/rear bank O2 widebands. My friend found some in his stash and he found the matching insulated HKS wire harness. Score! These things are like trying to find a Sega Genesis for sale. I'm very excited about the prospect of being able to fine tune each bank independently, especially due to the weird transverse layout of the NSX. I fully expect maybe a tiny itty bitty incremental gain in power but if I can gain efficiency and smoothness, i'll be happy. The peace of mind knowing it's tuned to that granular level is also pretty cool.

Here are the two new Bosch sensors. The prior version used a NTK sensor.

@nsxmugen also sent me a new recalibrated torque sensor for the S2000 EPS steering rack. After several thousand miles of abuse I found some areas in the mounting bracket that can be improved. He and I are working on potential solutions for this. I think this might only apply to the aggressive driver. Will keep this post updated of changes on that front. Removing the Steering rack is such a pain! Every year I tell myself to get a lift, but every year I put up with the grunts and groans of being in awkward positions in, around, and under the car. It's the carguy's yoga program.

Also, will be posting one of my Recaro Pole Positions for sale. See the classifieds.