Emulsion VM

Vol 3

CA18det Build Progress

This year has been pretty rough so far all things considered, however this CA18 build goes on! This page will update as I make more progress towards finalizing the swap into my s13, and I plan continue adding additional updates post-swap for anything interesting directly relating to this engine swap, and if you are reading this- Thank you for following with me on this journey!

Here's from back in January (2025), sitting on the stand with the oem harness still attatched.. Although I could have at this point just done a basic check, swap hoses out, and extend the harness to call it a day, this was the point where I had to decide exactly how far I wanted to go with this engine.

I knew for certain that I wanted at the very least for this thing to sound good, which requires ditching the oem log style manifold for a tubular one! Not for any power gains as the factory one does just fine, but a mani like this is one of the best things you can do to an engine like this to really change its note.

While I waited on a good time to start the dissasembly and was buying up parts, went ahead and mocked up the new manifold on the stock T25 Turbo so it looked pretty in the shop and gave me some motivation.

Here I finally start the tear down! both manifolds off, and timing cover off giving a first glance into the timing setup on one of these. The belt seemed like it was still fine, but I was betting on that being around 30 year old now and worth replacing. The timing gears are a little rusted over from sitting so I decided to give them a clean.

Entire front cover now off and getting a good look at the timing belt tensioner and idler pulleys, which do rotate, but with it at this stage I felt why risk a failure here that could be catastrophic and just buy new some ones.

Once the head was off I could get a good look at the cylinder walls... could be worse, but from sitting for so long there was some concerning rust pitting beginning to eat away, so this needed a good hone to get all cleaned up.

Wasn't too thrilled with the verical lines seen here, but they cleaned up nicely.

Annnd Heres the head, actually in really good shape!

Took some time to clean up the harmonic balancer, I will be reusing this, although I would like to find a good replacement in the future.

All of the fluids drained, pistons out, started cleaning the deck surface while I waited on the head to be worked on at the machine shop for a basic once over.

Started getting all of that rust off these cam gears.

And all clean and painted!

Pistons cleaned up and prepped with new rings and bearings!

Nothing flashy but figured a factory ECU from a ps13 silvia/rs13 180sx would be more than enough to break in the motor with and keep me from doing anything too crazy in the short term while I deal with any potential issues post-swap.

Cylinder head is back from the machine shop! all clean and checked out good! just decked it a little to get it flat.

Because I will be running oem rods and pistons for now, a T28 off an S14 silvia seems like the upgrade to go with in the event I overboost on a larger setup or get a little too excited adjusting a boost controller- this one has a little more play than I'd like, but its going to go in for now and pray its not in dire need of a rebuild.

Pistons are back in! Like mentioned before- new rings, and rod bearings are in, which is much more love than what I put into my KA.

Always neat seeing the SR sitting next to it while the CA is under the knife.

Cylinder Head is back on! started prepping the top covers for paint, shot primer on the left one here. We have a few other projects happening at the same time at the shop, the 65 Falcon on the lift with its engine out for an overhaul and the 70 Charger for a few maintenance jobs.

Little Ceasars and Taco bell are the diet of the proletariet.

Fuel Injectors out, these I am looking to have tested and cleaned out to prevent any issues on first start since they have been sitting for a long time.

Intake manifold on, regasketed a lot of this, and began working on replacing and researching where all of the coolant and vacuum lines go. This engine is a JDM 8 Port CA18det, which means it has the butterfly valves in the intake runners controlled by a vacuum canister which was thankfully included when I picked this thing up. so that got all new hoses, praying that works...

Accessories on, most of the hoses are all routed, primered both of the top valve covers (mistakenly different primer so this was redone)

At this point I released a video on the YT channel giving an update on how this CA is coming along, not quite as in depth but shows some more of the process. You can watch it here if interested

New timing belt tensioner and idler pulley arrived from Lithuania! It was at this point I realized the cams were way off the TDC timing marks I thought they were at, after some tinkering with it branson helped me get the timing all set and I don't think the valves were damaged from this. Also note: the head is now torqued down with ARP Head Studs, which are known to have a weird issues with the front stud above the water pump extending further than the rest. I installed them as normal with no extra washer or cutting any material off as it seems no one on facebook or the forums can decide what the right way of dealing with this is.

My paint for the valve covers finally came in, so time to take the front cover off to begin prep work and reprimer the top covers to be ready for paint.

Attempting to do a lace paint job, it came out alright.

Final form of the Front timing cover.

Finished valve covers.

The paint I wound up using was some silver metal flake, then a can of Honda Jazz Ice Blue, and laced with some GM blue metallic from the parts store, topped with a bunch of 2k clear.

Turbo Lines came in, mounted those up and torqued down the manifold with fresh gaskets. A little nervous with how the oil feed line fit, hoping it isn't too squished against the block to cause issues.

New Clutch is in! Spec Stage 2+, advertised to be more streetable than the normal stage 2, but will have to see once it's in the car how it compares to my factory one.

Ran the vacuum line for the wastegate similar to how branson's SR is set up.

Mounted up the Head drains, just need to mock it up with the pan and get the bungs welded to it! Also rebuilt my fuel injectors and went ahead and put the rail in, crossing fingers they all work. Was about to put the valve cover gaskets on to finish up the top of the motor but turns out the ones supplied in the cometic kit were totally wrong! So got some ordered off Rockauto and will get those buttoned up next time I'm out there.

While I wait on parts and recoup funds from this all of this mess, trying to get some rest before the next wave of classes begin right as I want to throw this engine in ٭(•﹏•)٭

As I was deciding where to put the bungs to weld in for my head drain kit, I found that the pre-made AN lines were far too short to go past the transmission brackets, so after consulting the facebook group I decided to remove one, however people typically install these on the hot side because "the rotation of the crank" Instead I found it much easier to just put them on the cold side so that if I ever need to remove them in the future while its in the car its not a major pain in the ass. Also this keeps the hot side from being more cluttered than it already is.

I cut my pan! the christmas tree drill bits worked great, pushing the largest one all the way through gave me the exact clearance I needed!

view from inside with bungs in place.

Ty was insistent on letting him weld these little guys in, I was far too nervous to do it myself with this being a fairly important piece. Thank you.

Rode with Branson in his new corolla! (to pick up the pan), took both of the corollas to get some food just after this :)

Only got around to noticing this now but my engine came with an oil filer sandwich plate, looked into the logo "LaMco" and seems to be company who made some sought after guages for subarus (and other models) back in the 90s, really carbon dates this thing. As much as I'd like to keep a fun piece of history on here like this, I can only assume the threads for the sensor ports are in bspt rather than the npt thread used by the sensors I already own.. So I will be swapping my oil filter relocation kit off my KA to the CA during the swap and putting this thing on a shelf.

Picked up this honda Cr-v recently which made parts hauling significantly easier, tragically my datsun was crashed into while it was parked outside so this will be the new daily anyhow..

Only things left are my wiring harness (which FINALLY shipped and should be here soon), my transmission seals and gaskets (shipping out today) for swapping my bell housing, and some little stuff that I will itemize in my parts list. Although I have a single cam KA maf which i was told works, being too nervous I ordered an oem CA18det maf to ideally create less issues to deal with on startup.

Head drains test fitted. The one on the left it an exact fit haha.

Oil pan cleaned up, slathered some Honda Bond on it to hopefully create a good seal, and hooked up the head drains with some teflon tape, I kindof hate AN Lines because I've never had any that are flawless.. Hoping these dont leak.

Anddd there it is! Long block mostly complete, need to grab some hose for the turbo oil return but otherwise its mostly there! Going to try and start pulling the KA24de out this weekend and start work on getting everything ready to be swapped in!/p>