Skyline RB26 engine build

After nearly a year under shrink wrap on an engine stand it's finally back on track! Found a bit of time recently to order up some stuff and do some work on it.

Found a bit of time yesterday so fitted the valves and springs and cams. Some pics of why the head needs a clearance machining for 10.8 mm lift cams (they are 280 degree duration, maybe a bit mild, but we'll see), and some of the porting. Head should be ready to fit to the block soon. New turbos have arrived, just awaiting some fittings and gaskets and I can port the exhaust manifolds and do a dummy build of the exhaust side.

IrfanView HTML-Thumbnails

Sample pic below

Mild

Would love to see some pics of exhaust porting with manifold. Have no idea how its done.

And some other basic terms of whats going on for us mere learners.

Running stock Ni-Resist cast iron manifolds for crack resistance and longevity. They aren't a good match for the head ports, especially when the head is worked on and the ports opened up, so they need scribing to match the gaskets and grinding out. The manifolds to turbo are an appalling fit, some say to keep power down, but I can't see that myself. That area of the manifolds will need a lot of fettling with a die grinder, but the flow improves dramatically. I'll try and get all the build photos together at some time, from new bits in boxes to a finished engine. At the moment they are scattered over my ftp site and a couple or three web sites. Will take some pics of the assembled bottom end tonight, the sump should be on later.

If you are interested there's quite a few pics at ftp://ftp.chriswilson.tv/Skyline_Stuff

If only I had the cash I would love to do an RB26 conversion on my S14a.

10.8mm lift and 280 duration what brand are the cams Chris and how high you planning to rev it?

Tomei. It'll be safe to 8750 I guess, Probably keeping it to 8500 though. Stronger valve springs would allow more, but the wear accelerates dramatically with revs. It's all steel bottom end, so it *SHOULD* be OK to 9000, but there's little point.

Bottom end pics:

http://www.chriswilson.tv/RB26_Skyline_Race_Engine_Pics/bottom/rb26.html

Sump is the cast 4WD one with the front diff casing machined off and the drive shaft inner bearing housings cut off, and the holes welded up. Sump depth extended with a welded in well, and extra baffling fitted. Not as good as a dry sump set up, of course, but should be adequate for the limited grip this type of saloon car can give.

Crank is Farndon steel product, rods are Tomei forged, Block is a new N1 heavy duty block. Pistons are Tomei forged with an oil cooled gallery under the crown, like the stock 2JZ-GTE and RB26DETT cast ones. The whole assembly is balanced as individual items. The crank drilled and dowelled so the similarly drilled flywheel can't be put on out of balance index. The oil filter take off and all oil galleries are radiused and ported where access allows.

Example pic below:

Thanks for the progress updates Chris, very interesting

Which turbo's have you gone for?

A pair of genuine Garrett (what else after all the *hit I see with el cheapo stuff every week? ) 2860 -10 on ported stock Ni-Resist cast iron manifolds. I actually bought them *CHEAPER* from an official UK Garrett agent than the the US based super special offer from the US.... List prices are out the window at the moment, people want stock sold, not sat around

A pair of genuine Garrett (what else after all the *hit I see with el cheapo stuff every week? ) 2860 -10 on ported stock Ni-Resist cast iron manifolds. I actually bought them *CHEAPER* from an official UK Garrett agent than the the US based super special offer from the US.... List prices are out the window at the moment, people want stock sold, not sat around

Nice. 700-ish crank?

580 / 600 will be fine Built this for reliability, although the internals are good for a lot more. It's going on a proper engine dyno, so I'll have real world honest figures to quote.

Just finished the head drain. RB engines have poor oil return from the head to the sump, so I have designed and made a head drain to externally drain this area. Should I dry sump it a scavenge section can use the adaptor instead of a pipe and gravity. The same set up is on my 4-AGE engine, and I know that works well. Just making an adaptor to remove all the oil to water cooling stuff from the oil filter area. Simple mod that could be applied to a 2JZ I believe.

580 / 600 will be fine Built this for reliability, although the internals are good for a lot more. It's going on a proper engine dyno, so I'll have real world honest figures to quote.

PICS AND VIDEO PLEASE!!!!1!! \o/

Just finished the head drain. RB engines have poor oil return from the head to the sump, so I have designed and made a head drain to externally drain this area. Should I dry sump it a scavenge section can use the adaptor instead of a pipe and gravity. The same set up is on my 4-AGE engine, and I know that works well. Just making an adaptor to remove all the oil to water cooling stuff from the oil filter area. Simple mod that could be applied to a 2JZ I believe.

Any pics of this head drain setup yet?

PICS AND VIDEO PLEASE!!!!1!! \o/

 

 

 

Any pics of this head drain setup yet?

Can I wait for it to cool down....?

Any pics of this head drain setup yet?

What advantages would this yield on a 2JZ?

 

What advantages would this yield on a 2JZ?

I was talking of a means of tidying up the oil filter area and removing the oil to water heat exchanger. the 2JZ head drains superbly, it has a huge drain area.

http://www.chriswilson.tv/RB26_Skyline_Race_Engine_Pics/drain/rb26.html

Pics of the oil drain. When I fit it properly I'll freeze the fitting with liquid CO2 and heat the head. It'll then be a slip in fit that becomes interference when the temps stabilise. A bit of Loctite and it should be fine, but I will also drill and tap for 2 small button head bolts to make sure it can't get pulled round when tightening the fitting on the hose to the sump.

http://www.chriswilson.tv/RB26_Skyline_Race_Engine_Pics/drain/rb26.html

 

Pics of the oil drain. When I fit it properly I'll freeze the fitting with liquid CO2 and heat the head. It'll then be a slip in fit that becomes interference when the temps stabilise. A bit of Loctite and it should be fine, but I will also drill and tap for 2 small button head bolts to make sure it can't get pulled round when tightening the fitting on the hose to the sump.

 

http://www.chriswilson.tv/RB26_Skyline_Race_Engine_Pics/drain/DSC05935.JPG

That looks well made, nice welds Chris

Got some more done last night and today

http://www.gatesgarth.com/RB26_in_build/rb26.html

Sample pic

Chris how do the JZ & RB engines compare to each other?

Chris how do the JZ & RB engines compare to each other?

RB26 is more compact, less industrial in its casting and forging sizing, lighter and has individual throttle bodies per cylinder. It has a full main bearing support girdle to triangulate the main caps. It looks an older design, and is.

I don't like the woeful head drain back passages to the sump. I don't like the cam and crank triggering being done via the cam belt and a combined optical sensor. It's inaccurate and prone to drift with cam belt stretch. I do like the fact they stayed with twin turbos when a bigger single would have been cheaper, but more laggy.

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The Toyota 2JZ is, in my opinion, of better build quality, it is also very heavy and almost overkill in strength, even the cams are huge It is more modern though, and looks like more modern design practices have been used in its inception.

I don't like the oil pump, with very marginal drain back. I do like the OTT head oil drain back though. The sequential system showed Mazda that it could not only work, but work very relaibly, with far less solenoids, and far less rubber pipework

Got some more done on the Skyline engine. The turbos are here and I have ported some stock manifolds to remove what is generally thought to be an inbuilt power limiter that shrouds the outlet of the 2 manifolds restricting flow. having spent a fortune on a turbo manifold for the Zeus 4A-GE engine project I couldn't afford to have anything too dramatic in the way of manifolding on the Skyline, and the stock Ni-Resist cast iron manifolds (same material as the MKIV stock TT manifold) are bullet proof. Similarly I am sticking with the stock dump pipes form the turbo. Most after market fabricated stainless ones are, to my eye, of no obvious flow advantage, and most just happen to decide bosses for Nissan's strong support bracketry from the turbo elbows down to the block are two machining processes too many.

An hour in the bead blaster after porting the manifolds to match the head ports and the turbos had rather `orrible looking things virtually as new. I am now doing a final assembly of the turbos to the engine. One snag is that some of the oil feed pipework to the front turbo fouls the, (different to a GTR), GTS-t left hand engine mount. I will have to make up this pipe in Aeroquip, rather than the steel hard pipe Nissan use, to re route it around the 2 wheel drive GTS-t engine mounting.

You can see how poor the stock manifolds are as a match to the turbos by the carbon on the stock one in the photo below.

More pics are at http://www.gatesgarth.com/RB26 Race Engine5/manifolds.html

http://www.gatesgarth.com/RB26 Race Engine5/DSC06215.JPG

Blimey, nice work

The 1/8 BSPP threaded holes near the collectors of the manifolds are for EGT probes, BTW.

Chris that's looking very good indeed, if by any chance u get stuck ( i wish) and need any help in running it in/testing u can fit it into my r33 gtr lol!