Complete build of a 500bhp drift car - want to see it?

[cptsideways]

I've just started the new build of Toyota Soarer just like my old red one

So it's to be a 500bhp stripped out full motorsport spec caged rwd monster Thought you lot might like to see what's involved? if so post up & I'll start a build thread, started this week & should be finshed by Christmas. (or nearly as the case may be)

It's currently looking like this, you'll have to read through to see the rest of it


But it all started back in October 2009 like this


She's being built top do this

Edited by cptsideways on Thursday 25th February 15:29

[cptsideways]

v1paul said:

Sounds awesome! Have you ever done a project this big before?

Yes a couple of times, the red car above I built from a completely stock road car, though over a little more time admitedly! but all the work was done by me. This one is being built from scratch in one go, though the cage work is being farmed out this time round. Its aleady been fitted fitted with the right 1JZ engine & R154 geabox which is a bonus, it just needs a big hoover attached to it

[cptsideways]

Jag-D said:

Declan:

How much did you part with for the old Soarer and what's the lowdown on them?

Less than it costs to build another one !

Cool car, basically a MK3 Supra underneath but quite a few inches longer, with the hairy chest wig spec as standard Amazing bombproof engineering beneath & incredibly well made (they were 50k back in their day) I still can't believe the abuse my old one simply shrugged off over the past 5 years. MK2 Z20's are very rare though, only a few in the UK. I have a spare one if you want one

[cptsideways]

OK here goes right from the start.

Car is to stripped down to the bare bones inside, ready for a cage install, also losing weight along the way. These 20 year old Soarer's are full of amazing superfluos stuff! This car had, electric seats with electric lumbar, bolsters & headrest height, elec windows, mirrors, sunroof, even electronic damper control. Stock weight is 1540kg I got my old car down to 1120kg all caged up.

It'll be single turbo converted, for 500bhp which you'll see over the coming weeks as the build progresses. It's having full suspension work done too & a whole heap of other stuff done too.


Monday is D Day as she arrives in my garage


Gutting the car of everything


Losing weight from the huge doors that weigh 80kg each!


Half the weight they were before


75kg of sound deadening gone


All the glass out, its going Lexan windows


Dashboard out to get the screen out & cage fitted, last time it took me a day to work out how this came out, this time 20 mins


I'm guessing its lost at least 200kg! (not including the glass) going by the weight of the estate car on the way to the dump x 3

So now she's ready for the cage man, I've got a few days spare so will be stripping more weight from the external parts next.

[cptsideways]

Lord Flathead said:

It has to get worse before it can get better.

Any ideas of the costs involved to get that mill up to 500bhp? Ie cost thrown at it after you have sourced the engine, and how available are they and how easy is it to do?

Buy a complete JZZ30 2.5TT Soarer for £300-£1000 & rape it for the engine, thats the easiest option, plenty about as imports. Add £3-4k for the boost package, Turbo, manifold, oil & water lines, downpipes & intakes, intercooler pipes etc, management & mapping. So 4-5k gets you 500bhp on completely stock internals & totally reliable too. Probably one of the best production engines ever made. Most of the parts are off the shelf except some minor exhaust fabrication. This car already has the JZ fitted so thats one less job to do, just the turbo job to do.

Like this

[cptsideways]

Stig said:

Dec - quick off-topic (but related) question, what happened to drift academy?

Had a good couple of days with those lads. Oh, and makes a change from driving Avensis' round Brands doesn't it (which is when I last saw you)

DA died off a couple of years back it was expensive to run & maintain the school cars. Ahh yes Avensiii I had forgotten about them... I'm doing more advanced drift instruction these days a lot of which is in Euroland now. But not a lot on over the winter hence the build project/s

[cptsideways]

Even more stuff coming out now

Front & rear bumpers have been removed & had all the steel crash structure innards removed, along with various trims & I've modified the towing eyes, it had four originally! Plus a whole load more stuff that is'nt required. About 25-30kg each end :wack:

Then refitted the bumpers as they will be going with the car as spares along with an all new kit.

Bumpers off, hundreds of wee nuts, screws & clips


Tons of metal work in them there bumpers


Cutting out the towing eyes from the original crash member


Refitted just the towing eye


More of the same at the front end


Anal fact of the day - First use of fibre optics in a car!!!! As fitted to GZ20's & their funky sidemarker light things


It's starting to sit higher on the springs now!


I might be tempted to drive it down to the local weighbridge & see what it now weighs I reckon its easily lost 150-175kg.

[cptsideways]

B'stard Child said:

cptsideways said:

Stock weight is 1540kg I got my old car down to 1120kg all caged up.

See now to me that car was light to start with - My Opel Monza started at 1700 kgs and is now 1400 kgs - however I still have all the glass....... You've got me going down the plastic route now dammit!!!

Great thread - nice inspiration - have you x posted it on RR?

A lot of the weight in these cars is the trim, seats & electronic gadgetry, sound insulation, there is tons of it!! The shells are surprisingly stiff too especially considering their age, but these cars were cutting edge design back in their day, one of these was a 50k car back then It was Toyota's most expensive model, nowadays they're obviously Lexii but the chassis codes are continued even through to the current model SC430.

Considering this car is 21 year old car, everything still worked perfectly, not one bolt had seized in, everything has come undone firt turn. Incredible quality really & just shows how far ahead the Japanese were back then.

[cptsideways]

snotrag said:

How much of an issue is weight on a drift car? Obviously you dont want something too lardy but - tif you think of road cars, evwen comparing cars with similar power to weight and layout - the bigger ones tend to naturally be better suited to it than the smaller ones - all about momentum I guess.

Can you go too light?

Power to weight ratio is definately an advantage & lighter cars seem to be able to corner physically faster, my old Soarer was noticeably quicker through corners especially when it was wet.

Losing 200kg's makes a huge difference to the bhp/ton factor eg 500bhp & 1500kg is 333bhp per ton with 1300 kg its 385bhp/ton & I got my old car down to 1210kg fueled up so 413bhp/ton & thats a HUGE difference. Plus losing weight is always cheaper & more reliable than bhp

I supposed you can go tool light, but its where the weight is & adjusting the spring rates to suit that counts the most so it is'nt a problem.

[cptsideways]

So the car is now ready to be dropped off to Nickson Motorsport for its full rollcage treatment. Todays jobs were remove the old aircon unit, it weighed 8kg! it was already degassed so that was handy & I did some tidying up & gave it a hoover inside. Theres nothing worse than welding & catching light to bits of sound deadening tar when your not looking


Last of the interior bits to go 8kg of aircon unit


All nice & clean for the cage job


Love the back lights on the Soarer


Its still runs & drives as is, the 1JZ sounds lovely,

oh look whats arrived in the bay next door


Two JZ'd Toyota's to play with now, one thats about as lardy & fat as you get, the other stripped & bare to the bone.


I'll be starting on that one soon

Monday the Soarer's off to be caged & I'll be updating as that goes along.



I'm off to the pub

[cptsideways]

Darkslider said:

Interesting stuff, though I'm slightly confused as to your car choice. Seeing as you're spending so much time, effort and money in the build wouldn't it be a lot better to start off with a newer better looking car in the first place? 200SX maybe?

Not questioning your choice but genuinely interested as to why you've picked the car you have?

Simple really, everybody else has a (insert swearword) NISSAN

I'm different, always have been & was brave enough in the first place to experiment with one of these oddball things. With a good basic set up they can be a very competitive car. Plus to my competitors I & my old Soarer have been painfully annoyingly reliable It's never broken a diff, driveshaft, gearbox or engine. I've worn a gearbox out but it had 200k on it before I put 500bhp through it, it didn't break though. I did melt 6 pistons when a fuel pump died (not a Toyota part) it still ran fine though just breathed a bit, I've never blown one up otherwise in 5 years of competitions.

Show me an RB engine thats realible at 500bhp that does'nt cost 5 times a JZ build, or a Nissan driveshaft that does'nt break, or Nissan SR20 that does'nt break rockers, or an SR20 gearbox that does'nt self destruct 3rd gear. You can throw money at a Nissan to fix it, but I can't break a Toyota in the first place.


It's also quite a cool old skool car, everyone always asks "what the hell is it" Oh & my sponsors love it.

Edited by cptsideways on Saturday 7th November 18:07

[cptsideways]

How would I go about getting in there then....

Edited by cptsideways on Saturday 7th November 18:08

[cptsideways]

Lord Flathead said:

Great stuff thanks. Preferred places to shop and specifically what parts are needed, if that's not divulging any secret builds?

Mr Universal Turbo's for a Garret GT3076r turbo about £1100, external wastegate & various flange fittings, so about £1600 all in.
XS Power manifold £200 (bargain)and good too
HEL Performance for the oil & water lines plus fittings £200-250
Supra 550 injectors £150 ish ebay
Downpipe 3" SS tubing & bends about £200 ebay & some fabrication
You'll need a decent clutch from about £600 from Driftworks up to £1500 for a twin plate from HKS, OS Giken etc

Thats most of the mechanical bits, then its management, I'd go emanage as its simple & diyable about £400 but lots of others to choose from, then mapping about £3-400.

[cptsideways]

1JZ-GTE has 280bhp as standard with its twin turbo configuration, the later single turbo VVTI engines were the same bhp but had a lot more torque lower down and slightly faster spool rates, though these are rather rare.

[cptsideways]

B'stard Child said:

cptsideways said:

1JZ-GTE has 280bhp as standard with its twin turbo configuration, the later single turbo VVTI engines were the same bhp but had a lot more torque lower down and slightly faster spool rates, though these are rather rare.

hmmmmmmm nice

Are you DIYing the plastic windows or going to a company that does them? I ask seeing as it's going to get done on the Monza over the winter

I'll be doing them, its pretty straight forward to do if a bit fiddly, hardest part is getting to look factory neat & not wobbly. Obviously a rare car like this you can't buy them off the shelf. I'll show you how in the thread when we get there.

[cptsideways]

VxDuncan said:

What's the lightgrey/white beast in the background? Some kind of Camary?

It's a JZX81, a Toyota Cresta

Which will soon end up a bit like Bobon's old one

[cptsideways]

OK the car arrived back from Nickson Motorsport yesterday & he has done a mega job. I asked for the latest spec door bars, Nascar style. a lot of MSA series are going this way, more room if it does goes wrong & safer all round. It does mean you have to cut the door innards out but I'm fitting lexan windows so not a problem.

Here it is all done & primered


Some of the neatness & attention detail involved in this job & Nicks work in general


Base plates & gusseting all made to measure


The Nascar stylie doorbors & look at the room you have




Awesome work, on schedule too & I for one sure can recomend Nick's work, so much so I delivered my JZX81 to him for the full treatment

[cptsideways]

Yes the other cage pics are from during the cage build & yes it does show perfect cage joins, that was the idea of the pics!

[cptsideways]

Been doing wiring & interior jobs this week. Dashboard trimmed to fit the cage, FIA kill switch & battery cables fitted, dash mount pod & wiring loom made up, plus extra switches for future ancillaries fitted.


Kill switch & looms made up, will fitted away neatly behind the panel when it goes back together



Dash temporarily fitted, with dash pod unit. All off to be flocked by stiggy in a the next week

Edited by cptsideways on Monday 30th November 18:50

[cptsideways]

Another update, fabbed up the polycarbonate windows all round over the last couple of days

Here's how: Cardboard templates made up as original windows with trims are smaller, so using a template you can make to the aperture size. Just flex the cardboard around the edges & trim to fit. Easier said than done....



Door windows are removeable on this one


Interior all painted silver