Joe's S15 Spec R

[Joe_S15]

Hi Guys, I've been meaning to start one of these for a while now and just haven't got round to it, so here goes!

I've wanted an S15 since i first saw one at Japfest when i was 16, and at the old age of 20 i started looking for one. I knew i wanted one with the full aero kit and after a year of looking, still hadn't found one in good condition with the aero front bumper. I was just about to go down the route of importing one when Mike's popped up for sale on Pistonheads. I loved that most of the stuff that i was planning on purchasing was already on the car, so i gave mike a call the next day and arranged a viewing.

As soon as i pulled up i knew i would be taking the car off his hands. I had already read the build thread on here so i knew what sort of condition the car was in and the work Mike had put in. After a walk around, a quick blast around yeovil (in the passenger seat of course) and a second viewing, i made the deal. Big thanks to Mike for such an easy sale . I had never even sat in an S15 let alone driven one, so it was quite a nervous drive home in the rain!

Heres the spec from when i picked her up:

HSD Coilovers
Apexi Induction
HKS BOV
Autobahn 88 FMIC
Gizzmo IBC
Horsham Developments Manifold
Tomei elbow
THS Front pipe and decat
Blitz nur spec cat back
Rota Grid Drifts 18x8.5(front) 18x9.5 (rear)
Sniper racing carbon exhaust shield
Adjustable rear camber arms
Crystal rear lights
Alpine Double Din
Recaro seats

First time cleaned, not even by myself (shameful i know!)

New plates on

I was really happy with the way the car felt to drive, compared to my previous car (an e36 with a welded diff and cut springs) it was so much nicer!

After a few months it developed a little knock on the front, so bought and fitted some new Driftworks tension arms. Also had the HKS braided brake lines fitted which mike had kindly chucked in with the sale.

Old vs New

The old ones were leaking badly so these felt like an instant improvement.

I left the car alone for a few months as i was happy with the way it looked and drove, but after a while i wanted to make it a bit more 'my own'. So after taking a few weeks to get the balls to hit the checkout button online and hours of time researching offsets (which i will be happy never to do again!) i bought these:

A brand new set of Work Emotion XD9'S in matte bronze! They took a few weeks to come from the states and i did get slightly stung for import tax, but i couldn't be happier with them!

Sizes are 18 x 10 + 38 rears, 18 x 9 +20 fronts

Bit of test fitting

They fitted without hitting the coilover

Then took them to have some rubber put on. My wallet was hurting a bit after the purchase of the wheels so decided to stretch the tyres off of the Rota's onto the new ones, i was pretty happy with the amount of stretch. Also fitted a de-spoilered boot off of a Pewter grey 15.

 

[S15AK]

Nice... thought that was Mikes old car before you said, very nice choice of wheels I always thought the XD9's suited the S15

 

[Joe_S15]

Then decided to go a bit lower all round (quite a bit lower!) and de-wiper the rear window.

The front wheels were rubbing the arches a bit in the corners so decided to call Chazz from arch enemy to come out and roll the fronts.

He had already rolled the rear arches when Mike owned the car so i knew he would do a good job on the front. Gave him a slightly flatter surface to work on this time .

I then sent the boot off for spraying. I knew the colour would be hard to match after reading about the pearl colour on a few of the threads on here, but the painter was confident he could get it pretty close! Whilst the boot was being done i decided to give the headlights a bit of a clean up as they were looking a bit cloudy.

Sanded them down

Got a bit worried at this point but with some g3 and some work with the machine polisher, they came up great

Nice bit of poke on the front too

Ordered a few more bits

The Yashio gear knob turned up without the pink insert in the top, so still waiting for that to arrive before fitting it.

New fuel pump ready for mapping

 

[LeeSpecR]

Lovely car this ,keep up the good work!

 

[Joe_S15]

After going back to the spray shop a few times for colour matching i got the boot back just in time for Japfest! The colour is slightly lighter but its not that noticable when the cars clean so pretty happy with the result . Im all booked in for mapping/fuel pump fitting in the next few weeks too so looking foward to squeezing a bit more power out of her! Also getting the Gizzmo wired up properly as the car is still running on the standard solenoid at the moment.

And heres how the car looks at the moment

 

[Adam L]

Looking good. I'm glad you lowered it, no need for arch gaps

 

[ichigo-300]

Very nice mate,

 

[Simon king]

looks pretty sweet mate think I seen you car at jap fest 1, I have just ordered some XD9's in white just waiting for them to arrive but feels like its taking FOREVER lol

 

[ArTo]

Nasty Ride, Iam a fan of it!

 

[fez06]

Think I'm more a fan with the spoiler on but I love this car soo clean I need to do my arches but scared of the paint cracking

 

[EMAGDNIM]

I like what you've done so far. Perfect offset choice too with those XD9's...

Think I'm more a fan with the spoiler on but I love this car soo clean I need to do my arches but scared of the paint cracking

Same here...

And I'm sure you can find a person who can roll them for you, and do a good job...

 

[Simon king]

I hear arch enemy are good they come to your house and do it, never used them yet but think that's what a few people have use.

 

[Stokes]

Looks good on the XD9's! What size is your front plate?

 

[tet offensive]

His plate looks smaller than my plate and I got stopped by the speed cops and told to get it changed :O.

 

[pegliobaglio]

Love this man looks sweet!
Exact size xd9's I have just bought what size tyres are you running buddy?
Car is looking awesome man

 

[teejay43]

what sort of power did you get after the remap?just like to know as mine is a similar spec and was wondering what I would get when it goes to Greg/protuner on the 23rd next fri. nice wheels by the way where did you get them from:thumbs:

 

[Joe_S15]

Thanks for the comments guys

Simon king

looks pretty sweet mate think I seen you car at jap fest 1, I have just ordered some XD9's in white just waiting for them to arrive but feels like its taking FOREVER lol​

Thanks mate, yeh i know the feeling, felt like ages before mine turned up! Even though it was only a week lol.

fez06

Think I'm more a fan with the spoiler on but I love this car soo clean I need to do my arches but scared of the paint cracking​

Thats why i kept the other boot with the aero spoiler just incase i fancy i change. I had the same worry mate, i used arch enemy in the end, they came out to my work and did it for a pretty reasonable price. He warned me that Japanese paint was quite thin and brittle (especially white!) but mine seemed to be ok.

Stokes

Looks good on the XD9's! What size is your front plate?​

Thanks mate, the front is 12" by 3".

tet offensive

His plate looks smaller than my plate and I got stopped by the speed cops and told to get it changed :O.​

Haha, i have also had this problem! Ive been stopped twice for it now, first time i was given a 60 quid fine . The other time was last week but they let me off as i had the legal plate in the boot with some sticky tape on the back, ready to slap on haha.

pegliobaglio

Joe's S15 Spec R
Love this man looks sweet!
Exact size xd9's I have just bought what size tyres are you running buddy?
Car is looking awesome man​

Cheers mate . Nice choice haha, The fronts are 215/40/18 and rears are 225/40/18. Had Falkens on before but these are achilles and have to say these are so much nicer to drive on!

teejay43

what sort of power did you get after the remap?just like to know as mine is a similar spec and was wondering what I would get when it goes to Greg/protuner on the 23rd next fri. nice wheels by the way where did you get them from:thumbs:​

All i can tell you mate is that it feels a lot quicker and much more responsive! They did a live map on mine and haven't yet had the chance to get it on the rollers. Only had it mapped to 1 bar but has made such a difference. Il book it in for a dyno run soon and let you know what shes running. Bought the wheels from Vivid Racing in the America as they seemed to be the best price i could find mate, just have to remember about the import tax on top though!

 

[Joe_S15]

Time for an update.

Probably the biggest change since my last update is having the car mapped with the walbro pump and EBC. After a chat with the mechanic i took the car to FCM motorsport in bristol and left it with them for a week whilst i was on holiday. The mechanic 'John' seem'd very knowledgeable and would recommend them to anyone looking to have work done. When i went to pick the car up he explained that when they pressure tested the system, they found the majority of the connections on the intercooler pipework were blowing and letting pressure escape with anything over 0.3 bar. So presuming this has been like this for a while, i haven't actually even been running standard boost pressure! They replaced all the jubilee clips on the pipework and the vacuum pipes to the boost controller solenoid, as apparently the previous ones were causing boost fluctuation.

Once they sorted out these little snags they soldered in the nistune board and did a live map out on the road. The car is now mapped to 1 bar of boost with two settings on the Gizzmo (one for higher boost and one for standard). The car feels a lot quicker than it did before and pulls a lot harder, all in all i'm very happy with the results! Just need to put her on the rollers now and see what she makes. The guys at FCM also strongly advised me to uprate brakes as mine are still standard, they just fade away really quickly if you use them hard a few times, said they nearly ran out of road a few times when mapping which is worrying ha!

EBC connected up:

Also had a bit of a knocking noise on the front end so decided to polybush the front arms. (Made a bit of a mess on the driveway in the process...)

The knocking noise is still there at low speeds so i'm thinking either the steering arms or top mounts need some attention. Plan to get this sorted asap as its the sort of thing that really bugs me!

Then all of a sudden on my way home from work on a narrow road A GIANT WHEEL EATING KERB jumped out in front on my car as a bus was coming the other way, and i decided to scrape both left hand side wheels on it.... Don't think i've ever been so angry in my entire life! After a week of being annoyed every time i looked at the car i decided to get all 4 powder coated by a friend who works for a refurbishment company. Didn't want to stray too far from the original colour but enough to make them unique. In the end i went for a matte Ferrari bronze which is a limited edition edition colour to the alloys on a specific model of the 430. You cant really tell from the pics but in the dark they look like a dark gun metal, then when the lights on them they look bronze!

First undercoat

Finished with final coat

Wasn't sure at first but now i prefer this colour to the original

Whilst the wheels were off being painted i decided to relocate the wiring loom in the front wheel arch. After lowering the car a while back i had noticed the wheel rubbing the arch liner slightly in the corners and over bumps, so thought id do it before the wheel wore through the liner and onto the loom!

Nicely out of the way now

Since we lowered the car the handling on the rear end had felt pretty poo, so bought some rear toe arms from japspeed and then had the car all set up to the spec i wanted on the lasers. Handles 10 times better now, not really surprising tbh as when i loosened off the standard arms to fit the new ones the rear wheels sprang out an inch or two, must have had some crazy toe angles on the rear before!

Also had my birthday last week so the Gf treated me to a new suede Nardi wheel and HKB boss kit too . Bit of jimmy up air freshener love too :ghey:

And thats about it up to date, next plan is to sort out the noise from the front end and uprate the brakes, either by doing EBC Grooved discs with yellow stuff pads or saving for a big brake kit, but we'll see what happens!

 

[EMAGDNIM]

Ah if you do buy a BBK kit, what are you currently eying? Have you thought about buying GTR/Evo Brembos?

 

[FaberNZ.blaaack-S15]

so so nice man