One thing that I know for sure about show cars is that they are scary clean. Like, super scary do-you-even-drive-it-anywhere clean.
Because I want my 240SX to be a show car, she too will one day be meticulously clean. I hope.
I also know that it will be a long, long, long road to get her to that point; so I’d better start now.
My Summer Project
Aside from hopes and dreams to get her front end conversion paid for and hopefully finished this summer, I want to work on cleaning her up.
While I don’t plan on fully starting until the weather is cleaner, I may go ahead and figure out what I’ll need to help me embark on my ambitious cleaning goal: To get her engine bay as squeaky clean as possible — hopefully up to show car standards.
Hello, 2011 summer project -- Operation Clean Engine Bay?
Trust me, this is going to be quite the project.
Dirty, dirty, dirty…
She’s got a lot of dirt and grease in plenty of little nooks and crannies under her hood. Sadly, the engine swap timeline and time of year didn’t really lend itself to taking the time to pressure wash the empty engine bay. And since I neither have a pressure washer nor want to run the risk of damaging her engine, I’ll be doing it all by hand.
I see some long summer days spent under the hood of my 240SX polishing away… Haha.
It’ll be worth it in the end, I’m sure. I also hope to buy her a few shiny parts to work on getting her ready to be a show car. She’ll always be a car I enjoy driving, I just want a pretty car too. (My Miata is cute, yes, but her paint is in awful shape. She’s also my race car, and scratches, dings and dents aren’t things I want to worry about with her.)
Rewarding Work
It is, of course, my hope that this project turns out to be rewarding.
We do have an odd coolant leak that we need to figure out yet, since we can’t seem to tell where it’s leaking. Or why.
What is sad is that I’d like to take her to one of the bigger meets that takes place in Seattle… But I’m not sure if I’ll ever feel comfortable driving her that far. 
Hopefully the coolant leak gets solved and after that, perhaps, I’ll feel okay driving her further than I am now. Then we can plan on her first car show, probably either late this year (if there is one for us to go to) or next year sometime. And hopefully after her front end conversion.
Whatever the case may be with all of that, I am determined to have a squeaky clean engine bay by fall!!
hi Meg,
been following you on twitter and seeing how your rps13 project is going. i too have an rps13 and i wanted to get your opinion on something. ive got the sr20det with the s15 spec r turbo, nismo 555cc injectors, tomei turbo dump pipe, titek down pipe, and rsr exhaust. im looking into getting tomei poncams, the expreme exhaust manifold, and the greddy intake plenum. ive got enough money saved up for the manifold or the poncams. which would you get? im looking to get the most horsepower for the money. thanks for your help.
Hey Reo,
I think your choice comes down to how much work you’d want to do — An exhaust manifold is less invasive and easier to install (to me anyhow!) than new camshafts, so take that into consideration. Personally, I might go for the manifold first and fully open up the exhaust system. (Then again, I’m assuming you want to do both eventually, so I’d just pick one first and plan for the other!) In the end, the better the engine can remove waste gases the more efficient it can be.
Thanks for following and reading.