I thought it was time to make a build thread apart from my other thread that was originally a question! Here is what I got so far for those who didn't hear. I bought a 1985 Nissan Maxima for 1000, Totaled it, While searching for a car for parts I came across a 1986 Nissan Maxima, I asked the guy if he would be interested in selling it and he gave it to me for free.

I have some big plans for this car. Nothing is going to happen overnight as this is my daily driver until I can afford to purchase another pickup truck.

So far this car has been though a lot. It has a new gas tank, new fuel lines, new injectors, new intake, new radiator, a fire, a new harness, and probably plenty more that I can't think of at this moment.

Some of the ideas I have...

It is gonna be a daily driver / show killer / grocery getter. I plan on keeping this car the rest of my life and nothing will change that.

Whats happened so far!

Replaced the entire fuel system
Replaced the wiring harness
Removed EGR, AIV, IAC, Vacuum Chamber
Rigged a short ram intake for the moment until I can purchase the right parts
Installed a CD player
Replaced Speakers
Replaced Clutch Slave & Master
Replaced Brake Master
Cleaned it
Detailed It

Top Priorities

Timing Belt
Plugs / Wires / Cap / Rotor
Accessory Belts
Oil Change
Fuel Filter Change
Brake Flush
Clutch Flush
Coolant Flush

In the future

Engine Work

Ported and Polished heads, intakes.
Custom CAI
Nitrous System
Maybe a new cam profile if my wallet will agree with it.
Custom Tune
Custom Short Throw
Custom Exhaust - Header Back
Everything is either painted or powdercoated
Full wire tuck & battery relocation
Custom Harness Inside and out! To clean things up and for piece of mind

Interior Work

Completely new interior, Black Leather Seats, Black Carpet, Grey Suede Accents
Custom Entertainment System, CarPC, Flip Down monitor, touchscreen in dash, in car wifi, speaker system
Custom Gauge Clusters
Alarm with Remote Start
LED's

Exterior Work

Royal Candy Blue paint
Black Accents
Tinted Windows
Custom Projector headlights and fogs
Custom LED Tail Lights
LED's Again

Suspension

Custom Air Bag Suspension
All Suspension pieces replaced
upgraded sway bars
All brake components replaced
Almost everything painted or powder coated
Gold Rims


Possible Rendering of what it may look like in the future. ( I am working on a better one )

 

I got to drive the car around today! It drove great! I even smoked a 5.4l F150

 

Nice Mod list...for cams that aren't too expensive check with Zcar.com....

 

I do not have any recent updates because right now this is my only running and driving vehicle at the moment. I am working on getting a secondary running vehicle as a daily driver. I have my eye on a nice ford ranger at the local buy here pay here. I found a place where I can get some wire for cheap.

I though that I might add that I am going to be getting rid of a lot of the fancy stuff that is more of a annoyance than it is helpful. And it will definitely clean up the wiring harness and trouble shooting problems in the future a little bit easier. I have been making a small list of some of the stuff that will be taken out.


Talking Lady & all associated wires <-- Me and my girlfriend hate her.
Factory Alarm & all associated wires
Headlight sensor & all associated wires
Cruise Control & all associated wires and hardware
All the relays that aren't needed anymore to control all that crap
The electronic shock absorbers & all the associated hardware and wires

I do have some other things that I would like to remove but I am not quite sure.

Door lock timer?
Windshield washer timer?

I will be adding more as I get more of the car taken apart.

All the hots and grounds are gonna be based off of two custom distribution centers under the dash. One will be a switched hot and one will be a constant hot. I will utilize the stock fuse block but everything will be custom to those distro blocks.

Everything will be separate from one another. I.E. The left head lamp would be separate from the right one. It would make it easier to hide all the wires and make the engine bay look really clean. Also the other perk to this it makes it a little easier troubleshooting. I wanna try and keep it simple and wire everything with connectors with molex connectors for easy disconnects

I plan on doing a complete wire tuck. I plan on the only wires you see are the spark plug wires.

I can't wait to get into this thing and really get it going. The big bulk of this project is the wiring. But I have never seen wiring as bad as a 80's nissan. Honda's are pretty bad but not this bad.

 

Not another "what I'm going to do" thread...

Basically you're telling us your dreams. I've already completed several of them and it's taken me several years, large amounts of time, thought, and a ton of luck to get where I am, and I've always chose to keep it a secret until the car is finished. I'm talking about small percentage of what you have listed there (and some things you don't) and haven't had time to even consider doing most of that. You want to rebuild the car as your own? Do it, and then show us..

Good luck

 

A wire tuck on a maxima. Heard of others trying but can't recall any success. For all that you listed you must be a electrician by profession. I've never heard of anyone listing let alone wanting to breakdown the wiring harness the way you plan. Got to be a passion.

 

Thanks but I already completed a lot of stuff on my "dreams list" for this car. I already have another motor that I have already started to port and polish the heads on it, I already purchased a wet nitrous kit, I have started to re design / re engineer the wiring harness, I have started to pick up parts here and there. This thread isn't another, What I am going to do thread, its more of this is the plan and this is how far I have gotten so far. I usually keep my projects secrets, like all you guys don't know about the drift ranger project I have going on at the same time. I just thought it would be nice to put a build thread up because I kept putting updates on a question I built. And if you drove by my house you would know that the maxima project is no secret being that there is at least two 2nd generation maximas in my yard.

 

A lot of people try but their cars always end up in a giant hunk of melted plastic and metal because the fed up somewhere. I am not an electrician although I do have my MECP Certification. I have done enough motor swaps, wire tucks on civics ect, and custom audio video installations to know what I am doing.

 

Thats kool. Not many people with the know how to accomplish such a task.

 

too mant wires too hide!

 

Good luck kid, keep us posted wit pics...love those years, my boy has one turbo'd...

 

That is hawt

 

Thats what I'v always thought, but if hes got it already planned out then kudos to him.

 

You know I'm not a fan of body kits at all but I gotta say that looks GOOD!

 

I'm not a big fan of body kits but I have to say that looks GOOD!

 

Sorry for double post. Stupid app is acting up.

 

Thanks! Its not just a wire tuck, The entire harness is just getting rebuilt the right way. Its way too messy and dangerous with all of the splices for hots and grounds and even signal wires they have. That's one of the reasons that my cars harness caught fire... There is a 22 awg wire that is spliced into at least a 16 awg hot wire! thats a big no no.

 

yea...quick too

 

That thing is sick mang. I would do a turbo but I am trying to keep my costs down on this project

 

I think the only real expensive stuff would be the turbo, stand alone and probably the down pipe. The rest like manifolds and ideas on how to run stuff can be obtained from a z31.

 

very true but I want to put my turbo money to my other project. The less money I spend on this project the bigger of a turbo I can put on the other project

And For an update!

I got pulled over in Montgomery NJ because apparently you are not supposed to be driving with historic tags anyday of the week but sunday in their town and I did not have my insurance card with me, the car is insured, and they impounded my max. Of course the impound lot is closed today, so I have to pay three day storage fee of 25 a day. plus a 115 towing fee. plus a 190 dollar ticket, plus another 75 dollar ticket. So things will be set back a little bit.

 

Wow! That sucks *****. Man I hope you make thru alright in all of that. Hopefully they don't try to tag u with some other type of bs when u go to get it.

 

That's a pretty nice looking and running 2nd Gen.....Well executed body and stance.....seem to be puttin down plenty of power but nothing insane....I'd assume 320-370 whp.....

 

Got the car back today, So far it cost me $212 not including the tickets! They left my hazards on so now I have to go reset everything in my radio!

 

Man its like they did this to u on purpose.

 

It feels like that but the towing company was just doing their job. It was my fault that I didn't have my insurance card on me. I did not get too angry with the people that had the keys to my car.

 

Thats true. They could make you jump thru all types of hoops b4 they give you back your keys.

 

very true, I paid my bill showed them proof of insurance they threw a jump on it for me and I was on my way in about a half hour

Soon I will be back at my job making money so I can go out and buy another daily driver for the upcoming winter so I can start to tear into the max starting with the wiring.

 

Well good thing they didn't try to stop you on the way home to do it all over again. That would suck!

 

yea I had my card with me so if they did stop me they couldn't do anything

 

I would've shown them the ticket I already got. Lol

 

Lol I probably would of mentioned it. I am almost done pulling the rest of the parts out of the old max before it goes to the junk yard. I hate to see it go there but its not getting any biters on craigslist. I'll put the load of scrap I have in my truck and back yard in the car to make the trip worth while. Then its back to organizing everything in my workshop and rebuilding my tool collection after a break in last year left me with nothing.

 

The old grey parts maxima is going to be going to the scrap yard either this week or next week, Just have to pull the vin plates off and fill it with scrap I have. It should bring a decent check seeing how I have the car, treadmill, two lawn mower motors 2 generators with seized motors, a subframe and parts from a sunfire, spare rims, extra rims from the max fence poles and what ever else I might find in my yard! I hate to see it go but I need to make room for another project. If it wasn't such an eyesore I would keep it and use it for mock up purposes. Other than that I am probably gonna get off for the night because I have to get up early to finish mowing my lawn.

 

I got the old grey maxima to the scrap yard only got 200 for the car, not that bad not having a motor or trans in it. I didn't take the generators either. I cried a little bit when they took it off my trailer because they just grabbed it with the claw and it got all chewed up. I worked on my buddies 200sx, got my shop cleaned up and reorganized from the dismantle. I should be starting a new job this week so it would be income. Later this week I am gonna be finishing up on the one cyl head, porting and polishing the exhaust and intake ports. Gotta get new dremel because mine took a crap being 3 years old and being used almost everyday. I'm surprised it lasted this long. I'll be cleaning out the max tomorrow giving it a nice detail that it deserves so I'll have some better pictures for you guys. Also probably going to a car show tomorrow so I'll have pics of that too

 

I got the old grey maxima to the scrap yard only got 200 for the car, not that bad not having a motor or trans in it. I didn't take the generators either. I cried a little bit when they took it off my trailer because they just grabbed it with the claw and it got all chewed up. I worked on my buddies 200sx, got my shop cleaned up and reorganized from the dismantle. I should be starting a new job this week so it would be income. Later this week I am gonna be finishing up on the one cyl head, porting and polishing the exhaust and intake ports. Gotta get new dremel because mine took a crap being 3 years old and being used almost everyday. I'm surprised it lasted this long. I'll be cleaning out the max tomorrow giving it a nice detail that it deserves so I'll have some better pictures for you guys. Also probably going to a car show tomorrow so I'll have pics of that too

 

back with an update. Not much of one but still an update. I got all the parts organized after the dismantle of the old engine. I unbolted the transmission, and the rest of the motor from the subframe. I have started to put together a shopping list of things I need to pick up to start assembling the motor. I have to pick up a new dremel and come nice carbide bits so I can finish porting and polishing the heads.

I also fixed some tiny little things the the hood alignment, fender alignment, door alignment, trunk alignment, the sunroof motor and the driver side window switches.

I'll take and put up some more pictures either tomorrow or the next day

These are the pics from the ride up to the year end nissan meet. Photo cred to victor pham

 

 

 

Nice!

 

Looooooook what I got todayyyyy