Project: Slideways z26

[Barry]

Background:
I used to drift a 240sx for the past year and a half. Super fun and I learned a ton in a short time. I decided to sell the car to get money for a motorcycle, but never ended up getting a motorcycle. The drifting bug has bit me again.

While this was going on I bought a e36 bimmer and have been using it as a daily driver. Great car, really happy with it. Kinda down on power and only has a LSD, no welded diff. Plus 245 rear tires are a no go for low power drifting. Needless to say the bimmer only fills my sideways craving when its raining outside.

So that leaves me with a perfectly running 3500 5-speed beretta in my back yard. Its time to put the beretta on the priority list and I am going to RWD swap it, my way. Im not a fan of the frame drop turds that I see occasionally. I want rear irs rwd unibody action.


Plan:
The plan is as follows

1994 z26
Keep 3500, flip intakes, modify timing cover, relocate P/S pump
Camaro t-5 trans. Either a 2.8/3.1 dual pocket bellhousing or a 4th gen 3.8 trans
Custom driveshaft
s14 rear subframe, diff, arms, knuckles, ebrake, EVERYTHING.
s13 Coilovers
Bmw steering rack
Nbody front knuckles, flipped left to right right to left (to put steering arm up front, to use bimmer rack)
fbody front brakes
Fake axles to hold front wheel bearings together
Fuel cell in trunk.
Bride knockoff seat, gforce harness, some kind of steering wheel.
If money allows I will build a cage. I need it to drift A class and tandem. It will also help strengthen the car because im sure this 190xxx mile chassis will be flexxing quite a bit.

Thats the majority of the big parts. Im sure most of it will change as I go along.

So far I have:
s14 ebrake handle, cables, calipers, rotors, hubs, knuckles, arms, subframe, diff, axles, driveshaft.
s13 coilovers fronts need rebuild, rears are good.
3500 beretta

I got lucky and got a rear out of a SE s14 which has 5x114.3 pattern. So with the Nbody front stuff I will be able to have matching wheels some day (pointless for a drift car)

So far I have 120 bucks into the project

First step is removing my old axle and mounting the subframe. Not gonna be a easy task, but even more difficult is building shock towers for the coilovers, because we dont have reinforced shock towers.

Keep in mind, this is a track/thrashing car only. Dont expect pretty welds and fancy paint.

[Barry]

Heres a picture of my grandmoms leaf blower. She has a heated garage so I am working there this winter. I dropped the car and the parts off tonight. No pics of coilovers at this moment

[SuzukiGhostRider]

I hope you're not talking about destroying the car in your avatar?

[berettaboi]

DO IT! cool stuff man. yeah i suppose you'll be making the car unibody much stronger by adding a cage/framing on the interior. i know your 3500 is in good shape, but to make it easy, you should just go for a camaro 3800 and 5spd (are these trannies hard to find? and are they decent quality?), maybe adapt the superchacha from the grand prix etc... or turbo, for some more 'i hate tires, burn em' power.

[speedy]

soo... when can i come down and get my seats... i wish i had a heated garage... and a big enough one to actually work in, lol.

[woody90gtz]

This will be interesting! In for pics.

[Kris GTwhat?]

If anyone doesn't love this project, well they can go to hell! Lol.

Can't wait for more updates!

[scd88ga]

I have a pair or 2 of the bare aluminum N-body front knuckles from a 01 GA if you're interested! Oh, I can include them with the wheel bearings, but I can't guarantee the condition of those. If you wants CV axle ends to hack up with the nut and washer, I can do that too! LMK

[3X00-Modified]

I hope you're not talking about destroying the car in your avatar?

There is quite a bit of rocker rust on that car IIRC, so its not a perfect shell, he will have to do many mods to keep it running let alone move to RWD so I wouldn't say it's destroying. He either does this or it gets sold off to someone who beats it into the ground or it rots away... Which do you think is better.

And that's a shitty leaf blower... its friken electric...

[weba]

Properly built rollcage will support the whole body enought to handle all this. I'm meaning one that is piped to all suspension support points.

We do have one guy here in Finland who is currently building Beretta to cheap budjet drift car, basically swapping mechanical parts from RWD volvos, that are dime in a dozen here.
I would had done RWD conversion years ago if there would be way to road drive it, laws here dont allow this type of stuff..... But I have it all planned if it's made possible some day. Not enought tracks\track events to build track-only car.

[Barry]

Jon is right. The car looks great still but rust is taking over and it has a few issues that I'm tired of fixing, so I would rather just make it a track car and have fun with it. I have had this car since I was 15 (I'm 20 now) and just cant get rid of it. Too many good times through highschool and my first 2 years of college.

Plus I like driving something different. Rolling up to the track in my s13 along with 65 other 240's and a few corollas and rx7's is not cool.

[wicked-irocz]

I've always thought about doing it the same way, except mounting a 9" (which my buddies and I throw away on a regular basis) in back using the regular axle mounts and coil-overs recesed into the trunk floor (like they setup back halved cars).

Shouldnt be too bad of a job depending on rear axle assembly width.

[Barry]

Brakes are being held till next week for Shane. All other parts are forsale. Good wheel bearings, ABS wiring, Hollow z51, FE3 bar, gas adjust shocks, springs, axle, etc.

Tomorrow I will take the 240 stuff apart to make it lighter so I can get under the car with it and see what kind of mounting modifications I need to do.

[Barry]

Heres my 240 after backing it into a wall at ~45mpg then it pulled the front end in too. Minor damage

[Wanako]

f*cking DO EET!!