Foolin With Azcui's Accord aka the "Storm Trooper"

One of my good friends owns a '96 CD, I've helped him in choices with some of his mods and it has certainly come a long way from stock.

Anyways this is what it looks like now a days, he has a few final exterior touches and then in my opinion I would consider it done exterior wise, he has other things planned for it but you'll only hear about it if I'm involved with any further activities.














So you guys ask "why do I bring this Accord to your attention?" Well he's having idling problems and I stopped him before he invested in a new ICV (Idle Control Valve), I told him I'd swing by and clean out his whole intake assembly and check out his vacuum lines and such.

I pop the hood to find .8L missing and my long lost love for Hondas.

The F22B2 out of a 1996 Honda Accord LX.

This goes without say and should be obvious... But to my shock there aren't any similarities between the VQ30DE which I call my own and the F22B2. Even though I had an idea of what I was gonna do I was slowed down with the vast differences in technologies and philosophies on how the two motors suck in air... After a short fight to work my way to the throttle body, and some WD40, I finally free'd the bastard...

The Throttle Body Assembly out of the F22B2.

[Before I continue, please excuse me for not being consistent in saying ICV or IACV. In my (Nissan) world we refer to it as the IACV (Idle Air Control Valve) and in the Honda world they refer to it as the Idle Control Valve.]

A bit more complicated than mine but there it is, the F22's Throttle Body, TPS (on the left side), Thingamabobber (Map Sensor on top), FICV on the bottom and Throttle Cable on the right

Anyways, after fooling around inside of the engine we finally got to his ICV, cleaned it and did not get lucky, it turns out his ICV is bad and he had to replace it (I've seen quotes for the part north of $200, ouch!!).

Anyways his car is back on the road now, hope to get it in a photoshoot sooner or later.

2010 Import Faceoff: Houston

Well I went to Import Faceoff again, but this time I went to a damn good track in a damn good place, with good 'ol 93 octane also. My pictures aren't the greatest but here's the link to some of them. I tried bracket racing for the first time and lost in the first round but oh well, the GOOD news is that I have a new PB:

60': 2.30
330': 6.37
1/8: 9.74
MPH: 73.9
1000': 12.638
1/4: 15.07
MPH: 91.7

I'm pretty sure I could have gotten into the 14's that day but driver mod needed, either way I'm stoked and I can't wait till I get a chance to return to the track, hopefully to race against my friend Ian's '07 V6 5Speed Mustang which he swears up and down he is faster, and he was at Capitol Raceway the same day I was @ Baytown and he was doing pretty well over there. I would say our head to head competition would come down to drivers and not cars anymore.

Side Project: Engine Bay

Well, I was planning on attending the 6th Cup Cake Meet in Austin, TX, but I can only go out of town so often and also Houston-Nissans has another Meet-n-Greet set up that date so I dropped that idea and decided to roll with Houston-Nissans.

To get prepared for the meet I wanted to clean up the inside of my engine bay, I began with the battery tray because: A. it was already out of my car and B. I thought it was hideous even though no one sees the bottom of it, at least for what little shows of it it won't look like....
....this

After a few layers of BBQ Stove paint... Viola!

Anyways, I'll continue to update this post once I repaint my valve cover probably in a week or so...

RTP Stainless Steel Full Clutch Line Replacement

Well a week ago, I ran into more clutch troubles, I decided to cut my losses and replace the whole clutch line and remove the upper bleeder for the Maxima with the RTP Stainless Steel Full Clutch Line replacement.

The old silly straw line with the upper bleeder still attached (THIS IS NOT FUN TO GET OUT OF THE CAR)

The Stainless steel line is now installed, goes straight from the Master Cylinder to the Slave Cylinder.

I will take more detailed pictures tommorow.

I would write a how to, but it's really not that complicated, it's just unscrewing things and putting them back in....

-Here's a quick writeup- [Edited 3/15/08]

I removed the following:

1. Intake

2. Battery

3. Battery Tray (I left the wire relay box in the car, just pushed it over)

4. The main ground wire to the body and engine

5. The L shaped harness that holds the main ground wire to the engine (for slave cylinder removal)

6. Unplugged the wire harness that's in the far corner behind the driver side strut tower

Then I began unscrewing everything I could associated with the clutch line, sooner or later it became pretty loose then began the really hard part, removing the line out of the master cylinder, believe me this takes time and patience but eventually it will come out. After that, your second big challenge is to thread that sucker out of your car, I ended up bending a few lines so I can get the angle I wanted so I could get that sucker OUT!

Then installing the RTP line is simple, While the slave cylinder was removed from the car, I screwed in the slave end of the line. Then my next nightmare... I had to screw the master in of the line back in..... Ugh. After dealing with CTS (Carpel Tunnel Syndrome), I finally got it screwed it (It needs to be in nice and tight, not crazy tight, but secure because I tried pressurizing the line and it leaked @ the screw, so if that happens crank on it a little more).

RTP SS line at the master end of things (need to make sure nothing is leaking up here!!)

The SS Line going to the slave cylinder (now you see why I removed that L bracket for the ground wire)
EDIT: The hole in the screw does NOT need to line up with the hose, tighten it down without worrying about the alignment for the hole in the screw.

Do not reinstall the slave cylinder just yet... You can gravity bleed it while it's out of the car!!!

Bleeding The Clutch

If you've removed your slave cylinder and just installed a new clutch line then goto the bottom of this section.

Just google bleeding brakes or clutch, the systems work EXACTLY the same... Except when bleeding the clutch in Nissans w/ a Dual Bleeder system you do the lower bleeder first then the upper bleeder. 

Just from my experience, I have gotten lucky once and successfully bled my clutch using the dual bleeder system, but that was after MANY failures. Do not let the car get you down, if you keep messing up after trying to bleed the upper valve then don't even fool with it, just bleed it the best you can w/ the lower bleeder and if your clutch works, then leave it alone.

Just installed a clutch line? Well use my gravity bleeding trick below.

(The clutch is off of the floor/disengaged during this whole process) If you have removed your slave cylinder then well... Leave it dangling in your car (as low as it can go), then disassemble it by removing the rubber boot over it (be careful, the piston has a spring attached to it, it will fly out at you like an angry ninja!). After the boot removal you'll have hydraulic fluid leaking everywhere, it's cool just leave a tarp, cardboard or w/e below your car and watch it drain away as you refill the master cylinder with hydraulic fluid.

As you let the slave cylinder dangle w/ the boot and piston removed you'll see fluid trickle out of it, keep the master cylinder filled up to max line as you watch fluid drain away (I reused the fluid that drained out, cause at this point in time it was pretty clear and not dark). Eventually it will slow down to a very slow drip and you'll start adding less and less fluid, weird right? Whenever you get bored enough and the drip has slowed down to an almost non existent drip, re assemble the slave cylinder. After re-assembly, re-install it and give your clutch a try, if it works then you're good to go! If not then you should at least have some resistance and you've given yourself a good start to resume bleeding either the regular way or using gravity. No you don't have to take the slave cylinder off of the car again, just open the valve and watch it drip away and continue refilling the master cylinder until the dripping has come to a complete stop. If you haven't had any success gravity bleeding then you can check your lines for leaks and then try it the old fashion way, or just give me a message, I'll talk you through it.

Comments? Complaints? Don't be afraid to leave any, I'm trying to make this blog useful to somebody out there...


[EDIT! 03/08/10]
This did not solve my problem, even though it will prevent any further headaches and I can feel the engagement better. I would say if your Maxima is having any problems with clutch fluid leaking, replace the whole system with this SS steel line AND buy a slave cylinder rebuild kit along with a master rebuilt kit from courtesy nissan (When I originally made this post there was such a thing, I don't know if this still exist today). (The line + Rebuild kit will run you under $50), this will prevent allot of problems in the future and you won't have to remove things over and over like I did. If I would have taken some people's advice from Maxima.org I would not have any clutch hydraulic issues... Well I'm still ignoring some advice, they say that the Clutch Master Cylinder likes to go out after a certain amount of time too... I will just wait until it starts to give me trouble, then I'll attend to it.

Just face it, I have one of the youngest 4th gens out there, and I would say that if you haven't serviced your clutch line then you're lucky, and eventually you will have to get to replacing these parts, not nissan's fault, it's just that time does degrade parts. My car as of last month is now 11 years old, most likely your 4th gen is older than that, you're going to be replacing old parts, that's just true with any car.

Thank goodness this isn't much of a daunting task, if I knew what I was doing I could've had it done in a few hours instead of a long day.

Welcome! First post is a ldoozy..

I decided to start a blog for my daily struggles with learning the delicate ways of modding/tuning an automobile.

I have had the fortune/misfortune to come across many different vehicles, including: 1997 Buick Le Sabre Limited, 2001 Nissan Maxima SE, 2005 Toyota Camry LE, 1998 Chevrolet Camaro V6 5-speed, 2004 Ford Mustang LX, 2007 Chevy HHR LS, 2007 Chrysler PT Cruiser Limited, 2007 Hyundai Sonata SE V6, 2001 BMW 330i (5spd) and then onto what I own now. I currently own a 1999 Nissan Maxima SE-Limited, along with it in my immediate family are the 2008 Honda Accord LX and the 2002 Mitsubishi Diamante LS.

I purchased my Maxima in April of 2009 with around 155,000k miles. I purchased the car with many modifications were already done including the Warpspeed Y-Pipe with a High Flow Catylic Converter, Random Tech Underdrive Pulley, 2003 G35 Coupe 17" Staggered Rims, trunk badges removed, Dropzone springs, RTP Crossdrilled & Slotted rotors, PBR Metal Master pads.

I was up in college (@ KSU) playing football when during spring football I incurred a serious knee injury which prevented me from being able to drive a manual for while.

In June, I flew home and finally saw it...

I purchased the car with:

Manual 5 Speed

Auto Climate Control

No ABS

No stereo and speakers

Ceased AC Compressor

The aforementioned mods

All for $2600 + Kansas Tax/Registration = $2940.77

First thing is first a good washing and waxing, I used the pictured products, some no name (Blue Coral?) car wash soap, Meguiar's Cleaner Wax and Black Magic Tire Shine.

After a wash it was to the shop... (this was before I got adventurous with the tools in my garage), to my surprise there was more wrong with the car than I thought, there was a leak in the Power Steering Pump (again before I really learned about this car, it was probably a bad seal which could have been a $5 fix instead of $350), along with three oil leaks which were leaking a good amount.... Anyways left the shop poorer but safer (With the pump leaking, it leaked directly onto the rubber axle seals which are rubber, and rubber+oil = fail). Then returning home I installed the stereo. The rear deck has 6.5 Infinity References, the front panel has Clarion 6.5s all connected to a Pioneer DEH-P6800.

then onto it's first photoshoot with my friend's fancy DSLR camera and his 1995 Saab 9000 Aero.

The duct tape was on there because there is a little white grommet ( part 26110J) that belongs behind the bumper lights missing, for a little less than $3 I got that taken care of along with ordering black bumper lights.... which had a slight flaw in them... the screw out of my oem bumper lights did not fit the ebay black ones... oh well... 30 mins w/ a drill solved that then...

So that was my official first visual mod to my car.

After driving it back and forth to Kansas, I came back home for the Fourth of July and of course more photos.... Red, White & Blue Photoshoot.

Before leaving town again I had a very interesting turn of events....

I installed my new Kenwood DPX-503

The next night the hose leading to the slave cylinder decided to leak, and my car was dead on it's feet, so while attempting to fix it, during the day while I was out collecting parts...

Someone decided to back into my car and not leave any info. Enough of that, I don't like talking about it.

In September Import Faceoff made it's way to Kansas City Missouri, which is around 1 hour and 30 minutes (of my driving) from Manhattan, KS, it was there where I had the opportunity to partake in my first real "Drag Race". No pics of the slips but the best out of 4 runs that day was:

'60 foot time: 2.490

1/8 Mile ET: 10.032

1/8 Mile MPH: 71.89

1/4 Mile ET: 15.416

1/4 Mile MPH: 92.41

Density Altitude: 1810

Track Name: KCIR

Anyways still up in Kansas I decided to clean my maf to help fix the stuttering while accelerating @ low rpm problem, but while taking it apart, I failed and broke my MAF-> Cone Filter piece, after some duct tape and eBay shopping, I came across a used Bomz Short Ram Air intake for $20.

It sounds much better than my previous generic K&N cone because of it's a JWT Pop Filter knockoff, I doubt I'll gain any HP w/ that sound but hey, atleast it makes me think I'm faster, and that's what counts right?

Around November, 4 months after purchasing those GOD AWFUL Goodyear Eagle LS-2s (Just look @ my '60 foot from KCIR, those tires weren't hookin up to save my life), the Eagle's just about had it (w/ 5000 miles on em, not Goodyear's fault, mine) w/ 2-3/10s remaining I purchased some used Bridgestone RE960 Pole Positions. Immediately after leaving the shop the belt broke on my passenger side tire, to my luck the tire did have a sidewall gaurantee so I returned it, only to learn that they only had a Bridgestone S-02 in stock, so I took it and went on my merry way. After driving on these for awhile I've gotten the feel for em, the RE960 is better in rain over all, but the S-02 grips so well when it's dry outside that I will always get summer tires from now on (I plan on purchasing Michelin Pilot Sport PS2's later this month).

So in early November it was time for an oil change, I decided to go w/ Amsoil XL Synthetic w/ a Wix filter. I went to 10w-30 because of the oil leaks, and whaddya know? Less oil is leaking, but as for the oil, so far so good, I still maintained my mpg, since I got it part of a group deal (cheaper than going to the website) I see no drawbacks and I will continue to use Amsoil.

During thanksgiving break I decided to do Digital's Cefiro Clone mod but with the 95/96 Headlights (they came w/ the car) and 95/96 corners. This is the link to the thread on maxima.org.

Then I (Well not me, my friend Andrew w/ the Saab) snapped some more photos of the car.

And well after all of that, here you are now, the beginning of my blog.

Welcome, and I hope to provide you with as much useful information as possible, I plan on making how-to's and reviews and try to entertain you with videos and other media as well.