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R31 Skyline, LS1 Swap Project

nathanVY

such boost
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This project has actually been in the works for a while, but didn't want to bore you all with the hideous lack of progress that has been the past year. But now, things are finally moving along - so a little recap: me and my brother in law wanted to start getting into some motorsport, wanted to build something fun but wouldn't be too much of a hit to the pocket if we crashed - what better than the shard collecting nugget that is the R31 skyline.

Donor car

Well, sort of donor car - we picked this up off a very nice bloke in melton, it had smacked into the wall at calder but had many decent parts we wanted for ours - 6 point cams approved roll cage, s13 front end setup, front and rear coil overs, 4:11 spooled diff and more. When I heard about this, I said 'sounds great, let's do it' - the crucial piece of information I didn't is that the wreck had no bloody wheels.

Of course, the experience of getting the thing on and off a trailer (without damaging the sump, gearbox and exhaust that was in it) was very similar to head-butting a cactus 14 times in quick succession.
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Great - so we had the car on the trailer, smooth sailing from here right? Nope. We winched the car onto trailer off jack stands. So getting it off a trailer onto the ground without destroying everything underneath was going to be a task. We did some extremely dodgy things to get the car off the trailer and strip it and would not recommend trying any of the following yourself.First things first, we had a spare diff - easy enough to put in then we'll have at least rear wheels.

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We attached wheels as there was front suspension - but no struts to keep the wheels straight.

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It was then gutted, cage removed and driveline taken out and sold and the shell scrapped.

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Fast forward many months later after acquiring an ls1, t56 and miscellaneous skyline parts and we have our first test fit. This is using a kframe from an R33, engine mounts from a v6 cortina and the stock LS mounts to the block. For next to no work it comes pretty damn close.

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Clearance with stock VY sump
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Next was to test fit the t56, after "massaging" the transmission tunnel a little I did manage to get it in.

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But the little 'ear' that's used to mount the factory commodore hardline was proving to be pain so off that went.

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While I had the trans in place, I was able to check the length of the factory R31 tailshaft and it looks like it'll pretty much fit right up - i'll just have to change the spline over to a t56 style.

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Anyway that's all for now, stay tuned there's a lot more coming!
 

Munz

Right Foot Action
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Wow alot more room in that engine bay than I thought. Gonna be any mods for the LS1?
 

nathanVY

such boost
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Wow alot more room in that engine bay than I thought. Gonna be any mods for the LS1?

At this stage I'm just focusing on getting it bolted in and running BUT I do have a spare turbo... :D
 

Jecs

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ephect

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Stupid, but this made me lol


Nice process mate, like a glove
 
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