It’s been done pretty well, and drives nicely - except that it has a bit of a rough spot in the tune just above idle, which makes it hard to drive in slow traffic.

The engine runs a MAP (Manifold Absolute Pressure) sensor rather than a MAF (Mass Air Flow) sensor, and the chip in the ECU is an off the shelf one for a commodore (to match the aftermarket cam)

What this means is that any difference in the exhaust or intake plumbing vs the original commodore setup will have an effect on the tune.

Remapping the ECU on a dyno would be the best way to fix it, but since it’s only slightly out I decided to try an interceptor type tuning device on it.

This one is a Field SFC, which just takes the signal from the MAP sensor and adjusts it according to user settings for different rpm ranges.

It’s not the most accurate way to tune an engine, but it does let you adjust things in real time very easily.

The rough spot was able to be ironed out quite well with a few minutes playing around with the SFC, and it then functions as a handy LED tacho (since the car’s original tacho doesn’t work very well with the V8)

On inspection, the computer’s power supply was too hot to touch, and definitely the source of the smell!

The fan had just stopped working - and obviously there’s no thermal shutdown in the power supply…

The old fan was a 140mm unit, but I have temporarily fitted a 120mm fan I had sitting around to keep it running until I can find a proper replacement.

The moral of the story is that it’s worth paying a bit more for a good quality power supply!

Last time I fired them up I noticed one of them wasn’t working properly, and something was rattling around inside! It turned out to be one of the mirrors that moves the laser beam around. They are just glued onto plastic hubs on the motor shafts, so fixing it was just a case of cleaning it up and gluing it back on.

Note the missing mirror on the middle / rear motor:

The problem was that the car didn’t have the usual hole in the bottom of the gearbox to allow the flywheel to be locked in place to undo the bolt.

I ended up putting it back together with the old timing belt temporarily until I could have another go at it in the workshop.

After trying a much larger rattle gun and various other methods, I made up a steel bar to lock the crank pulley against the chassis, and with a 2 metre extension on a breaker bar I was able to undo it!

The rest of the job was much easier

I’ve been pretty busy, but mainly doing boring stuff that’s not much fun to write about.

This project has been a bit more interesting though - making some custom furniture for an office. The main part is a large work table, which will seat six people with computers. The idea was that the frame won’t really be visible once it has the top on it - so the legs had to be as close to the middle as possible.

Because of the large overhangs the frame had to be very rigid, so it’s mainly constructed from 100mm square steel tube.

The bench top will screw on from underneath, through the 50×50mm horizontal bars.

Here’s the frame sitting in its final location - now it’s just waiting for the top to be made

Access to the head bolts on the 4M40 turbo diesel is easier than on many engines because the camshaft is not in the way. Half of the bolts are actually external to the cam cover!

Unfortunately in the Delica the engine sits mostly under the dashboard, which greatly limits access from above - and the intercooler is also mounted on top of the engine.

It’s made from 1.6mm aluminium sheet, and attaches to the existing partition and a headlight bolt. There is also a hole for the air filter mounting, replacing the original bracket.

Here’s a photo from a nice angle. The Silvia on the left is waiting for an engine and a few other jobs, and will hopefully be on the road soon!

The batteries (4 x 6v) were completely dead, so I replaced them with a couple of normal car batteries. It won’t give as long a run time as the original setup, but I only need to use it occasionally.

There were some wiring issues to correct, and I still need to fix a broken hydraulic fitting, but it’s working - and proved to be quite useful for carrying things like gearboxes around

It’s not a fun job due to the lack of space and the amount of parts in the way due to the mid engine layout, but I managed to swap the gearbox without pulling the engine out - which saves a bit of work by not having to disconnect all the wiring, drain the coolant, etc.

Some of the plumbing had to be removed to get access to various bolts, and the engine had to be dropped down on an angle to let the gearbox clear the chassis.

Once it’s out the space doesn’t look so small - but there are a lot of annoying hoses in the way from above!

The old gearbox appears to have an internal problem - most likely a bent selector fork. Note the leaves sitting on it - from inside the engine bay!

The main things added were power steering, some serious chassis braces, and a new ignition system that should work better at high boost levels.

I also removed the air conditioning to save some weight, made up an intake heat shield, installed a larger swaybar, race seat, fixed up the two stage boost controller, and sorted out a few cosmetic items.

This is what the engine bay looks like after painting the cam cover, installing the new ignition system, power steering, and the intake heat shield:

Underneath the car there’s a new swaybar, a diff brace, and this rather massive chassis “butterfly brace”

It bolts on over the original chassis rails, then the “wings” link the two. It looks pretty impressive, and being all stainless steel it won’t rust!

The only issue is that it reduces ground clearance a bit, especially in the middle where the brace has to clear the exhaust.