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Rocker Problems and Header modification

Monday, January 25th, 2010

After the transmission mount was made and the engine assembly was in its final position we could attempt to mount the headers. On the passenger side the header was making contact with the fire wall, requiring us to cut and re-route one of the runners. On the drivers side a runner was interfering with the steering shaft going into the rack. The driver side was less invasive and a lot less tricky to reposition and weld back into place. The passenger side on the other hand was a real pain. Clearance was a major issue and the angle of the bends allowed us only one route through two of the other runners. Multiple segments were made with compound bends and very little room was left for welding. One of the hardest fabrication projects I have had for sure. It is certainly easier to make it all from scratch than to rework an existing piece.

The rocker set up in this project should have been straight forward. However with conflicting strories from two different manufacturers on how the pieces interact with each other has left us frustrated and unable to progress. We have a set of after market heads and we were upgrading the rockers to allow for a higher rpm range as well as strength. Upon installing the rockers though we found them to interfere with the head. Not only did they not have adequate clearance of the head but they also interfered with the installation of the valve covers. Against the recommendation of the rocker company to “grind” the head and/or valve covers we tested and shimmed and retested. We even tested them side by side with the stock rockers and installed them in a stock head. It was all in vain, they were not going to work. After a few heated conversations and multiple digital photo’s, we have sent the rockers back and are patiently waiting on the correct assembly.

Maybe we can get some of the body panels installed now? Mounting the radiator and front remote mount reservoirs would be nice too! Oh, and the lexan windows, drive-shaft, fuel system, seats, headlights, tail lights, bumpers, wiring harness, guages, ugh…There is a lot to do. It is coming together though, excruciatingly slow, but coming together none the less.

25.01.2010 Batlground Drift 350z, Batlground Shop Cars No Comments

Batlground: LS6 350Z “little by little”

Thursday, January 21st, 2010

We had a few short hours to get some work done on the 350Z last nite. We needed to get the transmission mount fabricated in order to mount the headers. The headers need to be “adjusted” to clear the steering shaft and fire wall. Up to this point we have had the motor semi bolted down with the transmission  just propped up with a piece of steel strapping and a couple pieces of wood. After making sure we had gotten the tail shaft centered in the tunnel we had to measure the angle between tail shaft and differential receiver. This is hugely important because you want the drive shaft to be as close to level as possible. If you have too severe an angle this puts undo tension and stress on the yoke and causes excessive wear or even failure.

For the transmission mount I took some steel 1″x2″ rectangle stock and cut it to length (using the stock trans. mounting holes). I drilled the mounting bolt holes through both sides of the steel stock and on the bottom side I drilled it out to accept the head of the mounting bolt. After mounting that bracket I used a jack to get the transmission in place. Using some simple 4″x4″ angle iron, I cut to length (using the mounting holes on the transmission), and bolted it into place.  From here all I had to do was tack weld it into place, remove the now whole bracket, and TIG weld everything together. The end product is a very simple, very strong, solid transmission mount. Now I can start on modifying and mounting the headers!

21.01.2010 Batlground Drift, Batlground Drift 350z, Batlground Fabrication, Batlground Racing, Chevrolet, Nissan No Comments

Batlground: LS6 350Z "little by little"

Thursday, January 21st, 2010

We had a few short hours to get some work done on the 350Z last nite. We needed to get the transmission mount fabricated in order to mount the headers. The headers need to be “adjusted” to clear the steering shaft and fire wall. Up to this point we have had the motor semi bolted down with the transmission  just propped up with a piece of steel strapping and a couple pieces of wood. After making sure we had gotten the tail shaft centered in the tunnel we had to measure the angle between tail shaft and differential receiver. This is hugely important because you want the drive shaft to be as close to level as possible. If you have too severe an angle this puts undo tension and stress on the yoke and causes excessive wear or even failure. 



For the transmission mount I took some steel 1″x2″ rectangle stock and cut it to length (using the stock trans. mounting holes). I drilled the mounting bolt holes through both sides of the steel stock and on the bottom side I drilled it out to accept the head of the mounting bolt. After mounting that bracket I used a jack to get the transmission in place. Using some simple 4″x4″ angle iron, I cut to length (using the mounting holes on the transmission), and bolted it into place.  From here all I had to do was tack weld it into place, remove the now whole bracket, and TIG weld everything together. The end product is a very simple, very strong, solid transmission mount. Now I can start on modifying and mounting the headers!


21.01.2010 Batlground Drift, Batlground Drift 350z, Batlground Fabrication, Batlground Racing No Comments

LS6 350Z Suspension,Brakes, and Fuel Cell

Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009

Small things make the world of difference as the car is coming together. We were able to get some more of the crucial parts of the car installed. The goal at this point is to have the car together by Dec. One major goal is to get the car off of jack stands and mobile. In order to do that we had to get the suspension and brakes installed so we could put some wheels back on.  We were fortunate enough to get some real high quality pieces.



 Giant 14″ Stoptech brakes in the front and 11″ out back will pull your eyeballs right out when applying pressure to the pedal. Keeping everything glued to the track is Moton remote reservoir coilovers. We mounted the rear reservoir up under the body, in front of the frame rail. This should insure we keep the important stuff safe in case we have a repeat of the infamous “Bill Sherman incident“.  Just in case you missed it or forgot, we didn’t. ;-) We did not mount the front reservoirs  just yet because we honestly don’t know where we are going to put them.  Finally, we  installed adjustable front upper control arms and rear lower control arms to complete our installation before mounting up some rollers.



A couple less major goals were accomplished too. We have removed the stock fuel tank, in its place we are running a 10 gallon Aeromotive cell. We will run a Walboro 255lph external pump mounted in the trunk area. The shifter was custom made and we kept it as simple and comfortable as possible. The E brake handle was modified and extended to utilize the Project µ rear pads. You can also see the custom tranny tunnel we made for clearance of the shifter linkage. The project is certainly starting to look like a car now.

03.11.2009 Batlground Drift, Batlground Drift 350z, Batlground Fabrication, Batlground Tech Articles and How To's No Comments

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