FMIC Piping

Over the last 2 weeks mark (aka kermit) has been working on my intercooler piping, being an old hand at welding, but eager to explore new horizons in the form of all things automotive, i was eager to see what he could come up with.

Being his second ever FMIC piping job (his own silvia being his first), i really dropped him in the deep end by giving him the RB s13. As you already know there isn't much room left over in the engine bay, so the piping job was going to need to be to-the-millimiter perfect.

We decided to run 2.5 inch stainless steel piping as there just wasn't enough room to run anything bigger! Not only did the piping have to be made with 2mm clearance either side between the radiator and engine, but i also required as much room as possible under the battery to allow room for my oil cooler.

Mark's enthusiasm paid off and he definatly came up with the goods, working countless hours overtime to finish the job. Even calling me over one night to decide how we wanted the top pipe to run, as with the minimal clearance in the engine bay he was afraid that the top 'U' bend might shrink over time meaning the piping may start touching the engine. We had two options, either put a peice of silicon in the middle of the bend so that we can have a little more movement in case it does hit the engine, or run a bracket to the radiator support and adjust the piping in the fututre if it does begin hitting. I opted for the later as it looks much much cooler. and if it does begin to hit we can always chop it and put some silicon in later.

The job took slightly longer than planned but with all things automotive thats to be expected, especially with the standards mark works to! I even remember him refusing to give my car back until HE was happy with it, hahaha!!!

Now i don't want to seem like i'm sucking up to mark too much, but i do believe he deserves the appreciation, i challenge anyone to a place that does higher quality work in perth, especially for the price i was charged. Anyway, i'll let the pics do the rest of the talking!











The car has now been towed to badga's where badga and lance are to wire up the rb20 engine loom to the s13 fusebox loom and get the car running. I'll keep you posted!