Great to see Jeroen Willemsen (aka Kultivate) picking up his personal blog again! :)
He has been posting a few entries for the past days including one posting about Masami Hirosaka parking his RC Levin AE86 sideways:
Damn, that’s tough! :D
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As being an admin of AEU86 I’ve seen a lot of questions, facts and fun stuff about the Toyota AE86 (hachi roku). I also see a lot of questions returning even though we documented it on the FAQ already.
This time we feature the viscous fan of the stock 4AGE!
So what use has a fan for the engine in general? Well, the engine heats up and is cooled through the water system. The water is cooled through the radiator and the radiator only works well when there is enough airflow (moving the heat from the radiator).
Most of the time when a car is driving it will have enough airflow to cool down the radiator, however during city runs and traffic jams the radiator won’t cool down enough. To overcome this problem a fan is mounted to ensure a airflow through the radiator. This can either be a fan driven by the engine (belt or clutch type) or an electrical fan.
The stock 4AGE has got a viscous fan installed on the waterpump. It is driven through the multibelt (crank, alternator and waterpump) and is driven through an internal clutch system. The clutch system consists of a small reservoir containing oil which reacts on heat. If the engine heats up the oil will get thicker and the fan will rotate faster.
4AGE 20v blacktop with viscous fan mounted
The viscous fan of the AE86’s stock engine is driving the fan constantly, so even though you have enough airflow from driving it will also generate extra airflow from its fan. This is not an effective way of using a fan, but back in the early 80s a viscous fan was cheaper than an electrical fan with a thermostat controlling it. The thermostat is able to turn on the fan when it is needed, so 95% of the time it will remain silent! :)
Another reason for switching over to an electrical fan is an engine upgrade: all transverse mounted 4AGE engines (7 rib big and smallport, 4GZE, 20v Silvertop and 20v Blacktop) have a different waterpump. The waterpump of the transverse mounted engine has weaker bearings which will fail after a while when you mount the fan on it. So either you keep the waterpump and have the chance it will fail, you switch over to the old longitudinal mounted 4AGE waterpump or best option is to switch over to an electrical fan!
So upgrading your 25 year old system with an electrical fan is a good upgrade: it will save you fuel (not continuously driven), increase engine power (not driving the fan anymore) and will lighten up the engine (revving becomes a little bit faster).
4AGE RWD/FWD and 4AC waterpump differences
Nowadays you can find electrical fans (and thermostats) plenty in the junkyards! For the thermostat the easiest solution is to buy an AE92 16v 4AGE bigport thermostat: it is external and easier to mount between the waterpump and the radiator. Also the 1988 Camry V6 radiator is a good upgrade of your stock radiator and already includes a big electrical fan!
4AGE AE92 thermostat adaption for AE86
However there are also some doubts upon the numbers of increase of performance: some people even claim 8 HP increase after switching over to an electrical fan. This is very unlikely: 8 HP of airflow is moving more than 10000m3 per hour! Also the viscous fan is driven by a clutch, so it probably won’t rotate too fast at the higher revs as expected unless the engine is overheating! If you get 8 HP increase after removing the viscous fan most probably the clutch system is stuck and the fan rotates at the same speed as your waterpump (or slows down your waterpump)! More likely it will be somewhere around 1 or 2 HP increase. But that’s still an increase of a few percent!
This one already got its viscous fan substituted by a electrical fan:
Images taken from:
[Club4AG]
[ Golberg’s 4age 16v Cooling Guide on RollaClub]
Other resources:
[Camry V6 radiator upgrade]
[Guide how to hook up an electrical fan to the 4AGE]
Thanks to Edgar for correcting me with the word viscous! :)
Even though the HACHiRoCK festival 2008 was only 9 months ago the upcoming HACHiRoCK has already been sold out!
HACHiRoCK festival September 13th 2009
250 entries were allowed to the premises of the HACHiRoCK 2009 edition and they already reached this number of entries! :)
Also several AE86 related companies like Impulse, Run Free and Tech-Arts already confirmed they will be there with exhibitions. Can’t wait till see the pictures of this event on the 14th of September! :)
Maybe a bit of a shameless repost, but I really liked the discovery by Beeoneoneoh of a large Japanese Nissan Bluebird 510 blog.
They feature every aspect of the 510 ownership. From the nice and classy lineup pictures:
The men of 510: Nissan Bluebird 510 blog
To the funny bosozoku style pictures:
Funny bosozoku style Bluebird 510
To the cute pictures:
Awwww, how cute: a 510 couple!
I’d say check out their blog:
510????
It was inevitable: one of the Silvias had to feature sooner or later! This week we feature the Nissan Silvia S110, the car that became famous through Kazuyoshi Hoshino during the Super Silhouette Formula till the cars appearance changed to the newer Silvia S12 bodyshape. This car inspired many Silvia S110 owners to convert it into a Grancha style lookalike!
Nissan Silvia S110 Zokusha
This one is a very very accurate copy of that S110:
immitation of Hoshino’s Grancha Silvia Turbo
And this one a bit less accurate:
Less acurate immitation of Hoshino’s Grancha Silvia Turbo
And it is even not the hatchback!
Less acurate immitation of Hoshino’s Grancha Silvia Turbo
And this pimped out shakotan styled Silvia S110 doesn’t look too good either:
shakotan styled Nissan Gazelle S110
But that’s a matter of taste of course… ;)
Factory stock Nissan Gazelle S110
Nissan Silvia history
The predecessor of the Nissan S110 was the ill fated S10: a “traditional” looking sports coupe with a not too hot engine. It was a big failure in Japan and got easily outsold by the Toyota Celica (and the Carina hardtop coupe) and Mazda RX5/RX3. Nissan decided to make the S110 the best car ever! Nissan saw the immense popularity of the rotary Mazdas and thought a rotary engine would be the solution. They forgot that Mazda already had 15 years of experience in rotary engines and Nissan’s attempt was a big failure: it proved to be very unreliable. Nissan decided to release the car with the new Z engine instead to get the production started.
Factory stock Nissan Gazelle S110
The Silvia and Gazelle twins
There are actually two cars with the S110 chassis number: the Gazelle and the Silvia. The Gazelle had a rectangular grille, just as high as the headlights, while the Silvia has a slightly narrowed grille. The Gazelle/Silvia were produced that all Nissan dealerships could carry the S110. The Gazelle was only sold in Japanes and Australia while the Silvia got exported to Europe and the US (as the 200sx).
Nissan Silvia and Gazelle engines
The Z engine featured a 1.8, 2.0 and 2.2 liter displacement. The S110 really got its excitement after the introduction of the FJ20E with its facelifted RS model: the DOHC 4 valve EFI 2 liter engine produced 150HP. It featured a big port with dual valve springs and a wide angle bucket on shim valvetrain (only found on the Nissan S20 engine before) and was essentially a blueprint for the later RB and CA engines!
Factory stock Nissan Gazelle S110
Nissan Silvia and Gazelle interior
The interior was basically an incarnation on the space age designed interior of the Silvia S10. It had a wide console stretching over the transmission tunnel. The material was, like every other late 70s/early 80s car, basic plastic in a two tone scheme.
Rally pedigree
Outside Japan the Nissan Silvia S110 also had a strong rallying following: a UK company called Blydenstein created a homologated version of the DatsunNissan Silvia S110 with a FJ24 engine: basically a FJ20E with increased displacement and a carburetor stuck on it. It dominated the British rally scene in the early 80s till it was outlawed by the Group B regulations.
Nissan 240RS: Nissan Silvia S110 with FJ24
In march 1983 the Silvia S110 got succeeded by the Nissan S12 in Japan. It wasn’t until 1984 that the S12 was available in other countries.
My take on the Nissan Silvia and Gazelle
I understand why the Nissan Silvia/Gazelle S110 is a very popular bosozoku style car: everyone wants to share a bit of that Hoshino spirit! Even though I prefer the later S12 styling more, I think the car itself is a very beautifully styled sports coupe! I would drive one any day! :)
[I posted this article earlier this week on Bosozokustyle.com]
Imagine this: you are the founder of a very big video Magazine about drifting, you created your own drifting challenge, organize several big car shows, know most tuners and drifters in the world, but there is one problem: you can’t drift!
In this video he just smashes the whole rear end of his drift missile Silvia S13 in the sidewall and manages to eat some dust after going too wide in an easy corner.
Ah well, I probably wouldn’t do any better than him in the D1SL (and not even in any other event!) and besides that: I still have the most respect for the man who done it all!