R.Spec's Gt35r Ej25 Supercar Killer

[R.Spec]

Well my 818s finally got here! Ordered it back in May and it was completed August 20th. But I did not have the funds ready for it, so I gave that kit away. My new completion date became November 22nd. Got that paid for and it arrived here at my shop on January 1st! Kinda an epic new years .

Anyhow plans for the car:

• Ej25 Block and Heads
• Forged Mahle 8.5:1 CR 2618 Alloy Pistons
• Forged Manley H Tuff Rods
• BC Titanium Springs and Retainers
• Garrett Gt35R with a tial 0.63 Hotside so that it doesn't hit super hard and break the tires that loose
• Fujitsubo Equal Length Exhaust Header
• Tri-Tip Steak Turboback Custom Exhaust ( lol )
• Stock wrx 5 Speed tranny for now
• Stock 02-03 Ecu running Carberry with antilag tuned by Me
• 18x9.5 Rota Grid wheels in the back with hoosier r6's
• 17x8 Rota Grid wheels in the front with some other tire
• Stoptech Big Brake Kit in the front
• 2 Pot Brakes in the rear
• Momo Carbon Kevlar Acropolis seats with Takata Harnesses

Well the truck showed up and the driver was very friendly, cracking jokes and helping out constantly. We unloaded the 818 and put it in the shop next door on some jack stands. The only thing I noticed so far is that the fiberglass is super thin and cracked right where one of the vents are on the top drivers side of the humped back piece. (lol shoulda just taken a picture) Also the vinyl dash had rips and holes in it

Anyways I unboxed most all the parts, started putting the suspension together. Could barely slide the coil over sleeve over one strut, it ripped off all the paint and I was super mad. I felt like the machining tolerance was off. Then I took inventory of most everything. I feel like I am missing like all of the brake stuff but it said it was in the kit. All i got was the proportioning valve and the lines. AND HOLY CRAP THERE IS A LOT OF ALUMINUM. Anyone have a rivet gun recommendation? How long is the aluminum riveting part going to take me?

Here are some pictures.

10410510_1508819929382010_4278231223730680427_n.jpg

10897044_1508819962715340_652622163983208076_n.jpg

10897085_1508819946048675_7893132697624390358_n.jpg

10898270_1508819972715339_5540934024641220344_n.jpg

10898341_1508819992715337_167442045623893261_n.jpg

20150101_170646.jpg

[Tamra]

On the inventory, did you go box by box and sheet by sheet? Some things are in multiple boxes. We checked line item by line item, and we were only missing one item. FFR shipped it to us asap. They are also pretty good about damaged parts if you contact them.

The brake lines are in a cardboard tube, if that helps.

We got the Harbor Freight air rivet gun and it has worked great for us. We did need a manual one (smaller) for some areas. It wasn't special either, just whatever was on the shelf at Home Depot.

Congrats on picking up your kit!

[R.Spec]

On the inventory, did you go box by box and sheet by sheet? Some things are in multiple boxes. We checked line item by line item, and we were only missing one item. FFR shipped it to us asap. They are also pretty good about damaged parts if you contact them.

The brake lines are in a cardboard tube, if that helps.

We got the Harbor Freight air rivet gun and it has worked great for us. We did need a manual one (smaller) for some areas. It wasn't special either, just whatever was on the shelf at Home Depot.

Congrats on picking up your kit!

I opened up all the boxes out of excitement. But tried not to move anything and I went box by box. Missing a lot it seems like. i will have to go back and check.

[metalmaker12]

Lol, get a rivet gun dude!

[Canadian818]

I taped the corresponding intentory sheets on the outsides of the boxes, and then crossed off items as I went. Then as I progressed I combined boxes and just transferred the sheets. Helped me keep track. Congrats on the delivery!

[Hindsight]

We got the Harbor Freight air rivet gun and it has worked great for us. We did need a manual one (smaller) for some areas. It wasn't special either, just whatever was on the shelf at Home Depot.

Ditto on all that. You will want both air and manual (manual for the tight spots, air for everything else). Air does a nicer job on the rivets too.

Buy a package of 10x 1/8" drill bits; they should be short and of high speed steel. Dip the tip of the bit into some oil before each hole. You'll need a regular drill, and an angle drill or angle drill adapter for some tight spots.

[R.Spec]

Ditto on all that. You will want both air and manual (manual for the tight spots, air for everything else). Air does a nicer job on the rivets too.

Buy a package of 10x 1/8" drill bits; they should be short and of high speed steel. Dip the tip of the bit into some oil before each hole. You'll need a regular drill, and an angle drill or angle drill adapter for some tight spots.

Went to harbor freight and got a manual rivet gun cause that is all they had. Couldn't find air. Or maybe i was blind. Either way all the air is in my other shop I also got a little portable blower heater . I get cold easy. I need to go get the 1/8" and 3/16" drill bits of high quality. How prevalent is it that I would get the angle drill?

[Frank818]

• garrett gt35r with a tial 0.63 hotside so that it doesn't hit super hard and break the tires that loose.

gt3582r?

[longislandwrx]

nope no machining issue, shocks are tight. put shock in the freezer for 20, and sleeve in oven at 350 for a 5 minutes and they slide right on. use a glove and work quickly.

I exclusively used a bootleg hand riveter and it was not bad at all.

http://www.amazon.com/TEKTON-6555-Ri...=tectron+rivet

it short cut a few rivets but not bad, I think that has more to do with the rivet quality than the rivet gun.

[Pearldrummer7]

Woohoo! Exciting indeed. I guess you're not where it's THAT snowy (we definitely had snow at New Years.

Get a good rivet gun, make sure you read through all the helpful "don't do this", "do this instead", and "why the hell doesn't this fit/work?" threads on here. Lots of really good stuff.

Best of luck.

[wleehendrick]

I exclusively used a bootleg hand riveter and it was not bad at all.

Agreed... don't feel you have to buy a power riveter. I used a similar Stanley hand riveter (you'll want a manual one anyway to get into tight spaces). It does take a strong squeeze for the 3/16" rivets, but the 1/8" ones are pretty easy for me. Give it a try by hand unless you really like collecting tools. Anyway, congrats on delivery and good luck with the build...

[Hindsight]

How prevalent is it that I would get the angle drill?

Go without until you need it. You'll know.

[Frank818]

I waited for the angle drill and bought it on sale when it came up cuz I knew I needed it for one thing. Turned out I used it at least 15 times now, in a few weeks. And even though it's the small Dewalt one, it's still too big for a few things I wanted to do. But at the cheap price it was well spent.

I agree you should wait until you need it, cuz you may never need it, it's not like a rivet tool that you will need unless you rivet nothing.

[FFRSpec72]

nope no machining issue, shocks are tight. put shock in the freezer for 20, and sleeve in oven at 350 for a 5 minutes and they slide right on. use a glove and work quickly.

I exclusively used a bootleg hand riveter and it was not bad at all.

http://www.amazon.com/TEKTON-6555-Ri...=tectron+rivet

it short cut a few rivets but not bad, I think that has more to do with the rivet quality than the rivet gun.

It's a little rough on the hands in cold weather and tight spaces when using steel shank rivets but gets the job done

[R.Spec]

So this is a picture of everything that came in box 3. And this is the list of what I can't find. Mostly brake stuff.

20150103_173251.jpg

20150103_173255.jpg

[STiPWRD]

A 9.8 compression ratio on the pistons seems high for a turbo car. Are you planning on running low boost? BTW congrats on getting the kit

[R.Spec]

A 9.8 compression ratio on the pistons seems high for a turbo car. Are you planning on running low boost? BTW congrats on getting the kit

We usually build them around 8.3 - 8.5:1 ratio here at the shop. But if I go closed deck motor then I don't see any reason why a higher compression motor won't work. I had a 9.8:1 hybrid ej25/20 motor earlier and it ran great. Assuming I will light the absolute piss off these tires all the time with the 35r, I would like a fair amount of power prior to spool, I don't want peak to burn the tires off. I may just stick with like a 9.0:1 haven't decided yet.

Here are the cracked panels I have recieved and dash.
20150105_153454.jpg

crack.jpg

[nkw8181]

My. 02 I got a rivnut/rivet gun through Grainger and it works great.

http://m.grainger.com/mobile/product...-Riveter-5TUR2

[AZPete]

Have you called Factory Five about your inventory questions and the nicks? Why tell us when FFR the place to go for those questions?

[R.Spec]

Have you called Factory Five about your inventory questions and the nicks? Why tell us when FFR the place to go for those questions?

I called them and Dan said email them with pictures and stuff. He was very helpful. I haven't got around to it yet though, been very busy tuning subarus here at work. Just thought I would share here.

[svanlare]

Congrats on the kit. I love the title of the super car-killer.

I had both missing parts and panel issues and FFR was great about sorting them out quickly without any hassles.

For rivets, I'm using the Harbor freight rivet gun and a hand tool for the tight locations. It is the same tight spaces that I've used the right angle drill. Picked up the same cheap Dewalt one that Frank mentioned at the local hardware store. It was much cheaper than the Dewalt impact drill that I bought That at least has been one of the most used tools on the project so far.

[Hindsight]

What shop do you work at?

[R.Spec]

What shop do you work at?

Horizontal Motorsports I am the engine management tuner, but I also have wrenching experience, and run the phones and scheduling.

[Hindsight]

Wow, Tualatin Sherwood Road. My old stomping grounds. I grew up out there. Got into the tuning business with a buddy in '97-'98 called Matrix Motorsports. We did engine swaps and custom turbo setups on VWs out of a gravel-floored storage facility off of Herman and 108th. I left the business before it got big and moved to the current Macadam location; Now it's called Matrix Integrated.

The internet makes for a small world! Boy, this brings back a lot of memories.... the golden years of my youth!!! Err, I think I'm feeling a mid-life crisis coming on....

Have you always been a Subaru fan or did you work with something else previously?

[R.Spec]

Wow, Tualatin Sherwood Road. My old stomping grounds. I grew up out there. Got into the tuning business with a buddy in '97-'98 called Matrix Motorsports. We did engine swaps and custom turbo setups on VWs out of a gravel-floored storage facility off of Herman and 108th. I left the business before it got big and moved to the current Macadam location; Now it's called Matrix Integrated.

The internet makes for a small world! Boy, this brings back a lot of memories.... the golden years of my youth!!! Err, I think I'm feeling a mid-life crisis coming on....

Have you always been a Subaru fan or did you work with something else previously?

Always Subarus. Not necessarily a fanboy...wait now that i think of it. My cor collection goes. '87 Loyale (sold) , '05 Impreza RS (traded), '03 WRX (sold) ,' 99 Impreza L (daily), '95 Impreza (sold), '2015 818 (project). I would love to get into tuning other cars, evos, hondas, diesel trucks etc. But I have tuned hundreds and hundreds of subarus. mostly stuff between 200-550whp.

hehehe herman road. That is my stomping ground, my self proclaimed "mexico" tuning road.

[Hindsight]

Cool, you should do great on the build! Looking forward to watching it progress.

[Sgt.Gator]

When you get tired of hand riveting someone here pointed me to the Astro Pneumatic PR14 Air Riveter. I love it. I keep looking for stuff to rivet!

What kind of Dyno do you have at HM? I'm -almost- required to use a DynoJet for certification.

[R.Spec]

When you get tired of hand riveting someone here pointed me to the Astro Pneumatic PR14 Air Riveter. I love it. I keep looking for stuff to rivet!

What kind of Dyno do you have at HM? I'm -almost- required to use a DynoJet for certification.

We rent out PRE and English's Dyno a lot. I would like to get my own dynojet here in the future. But gotta put my funds toward the 818 first. I do a lot of road tuning as well.

Cleco pins, how important are they. And where can I get them? Would it be bad to just start riveting on the firewall like the book recommends?

[Tamra]

They make sure your panels stay lined up while you are riveting. The cleco's will make your life much easier, guaranteed.

[xxguitarist]

pliers: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
1/8" cleco (get 20-30): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
3/16" cleco (don't need 25): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[R.Spec]

They make sure your panels stay lined up while you are riveting. The cleco's will make your life much easier, guaranteed.

Do standard clamps and what not not work good enough? I would think you need two clamps, once you get the first rivet in then the only one clamp. Ehh screw it, I will get some clecos. More money gone. Haha

[Hindsight]

If you are going to put your panel in place ONCE, then drill one hole and immediately rivet it, you can get away without clecos. Otherwise, in addition to what Tamra said, they keep the hole alignment correct. If you don't use them, as you drill down the panels, slight shifting in the panel will cause the previous holes to get out of alignment. You'll then have a bunch of holes that don't line up and have to re-drill.

It's hard to put rivets in a perfect line with perfect spacing using the above one-shot way. There are other problems: You have to silicone the panel into place and quickly put all the rivets in before it hardens, do-overs are harder (when you realize that due to poor instructions, you didn't realize one panel had to go on before another and you already glued/riveted it in place), you have to paint before drilling, etc.

The most popular method seems to be to use a marker to mark the frame position on the panels, then mark holes on the panel using a ruler while the panel is your workbench. Drill holes in the panel on the bench, then transfer to the car. Using the panel holes, drill into the frame at each hole, and adding a cleco into each hole or every other. You can leave like that until all panels in the area are in place and you know you did it right, then one at a time or all at once you remove them then debur and paint if you want, then apply silicone and rivet into final place. This is what I did and it worked well. Least fun part of the build though.....

Standard clamps won't work for this. It's more about keeping the hole in the panel and the hole in the frame lined up EXACTLY. Clamps will still allow for misalignment especially when the frame isn't perfectly flat and you are having to slightly flex the metal.

These are what I got:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0084QK1U6/...332200_TE_item
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00AFL7QU6/...332200_TE_item
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008PEN67C/...332200_TE_item

Also, stop tracking money.

[AZPete]

X2 on Clecos needed. But, about 25 have served me well on two builds because when I need more I use the #8 self-tapping screws FFR used to hold the panels.

[nkw8181]

I got 100 1/8 clicos and ran out lol. But I put alot of the car together temporarily and then took back apart.

[longislandwrx]

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

25 is enough if you are not mocking everything up at once.

50 lets you attack multiple panels at once.

I have 75 which is plenty, although one day I hope to build a Zodiac so i'll probably need more.

[Frank818]

If you are going to put your panel in place ONCE

When is that going to happen.

[Frank818]

I have 7 clecos (free left-overs from my mech) and was able to work out everything so far, including the under seat panel. 25 is certainly a no-headache number.

[theburner9]

With how easy the rivets are to drill out, I just popped one in every so often and drilled them out to remove and mark the panel, put them back on and drill the panel and frame at the same time. I couldn't be bothered to wait for the clecos to arrive. Also, I've done all my riveting by hand. The front firewall took a total of about 1.5 hours to drill, rivet and seal.

[R.Spec]

With how easy the rivets are to drill out, I just popped one in every so often and drilled them out to remove and mark the panel, put them back on and drill the panel and frame at the same time. I couldn't be bothered to wait for the clecos to arrive. Also, I've done all my riveting by hand. The front firewall took a total of about 1.5 hours to drill, rivet and seal.

Eee that makes me excited, I am thinking about painting the front firewall black. Should I paint it before I put the panels on or after?

[Hindsight]

People do both. Have to do a lot of masking if you do it after and harder to get as nice a finish and as good a coverage that way.