[MOC][WIP] Nissan 180SX Type X

[MinusAndy]

And a bitch to build on a purely mechanical level!

[Gray Gear]

3 hours ago, MinusAndy said:

I think hicas actually steers in different directions to the front wheels depending how fast you’re going? Ie low speed it’s in opposition for tighter turning and agility and when you’re going fast it switches to making it crab slightly.

Exactly. This is the HICAS system at hight speeds on a R32 Skyline:

Since this is supposed to be a drift car (and most drifters hate the HICAS system) I just want to keep the slight crab steering mode that can be turned off for drifting and on if you do decide to do some Highspeed driving on the Wangan 

[syclone]

Glad to have contributed with a tiny idea that made a bigger challenge of a build  Seems to have been executed very smoothly from the video, hopefully the gearbox lever won't present any major problems, though I doubt there's anything out of the scope of your genius)))

[Gray Gear]

Hi everybody, its been a while.

Here's my progress:

Mostly Bodywork progress, but some panels are not yet fixed in place. I think I finally managed to get a good line over the rear wheels by slightly tilting the wheel arch outwards.

 

This is my current version of the taillights, but I am not really satisfied. The shape is kind of hard to do with these 2 circles, and I don't really like the small radar dishes sticking out. 

 

Biggest change on the inside is the reworked 4 wheel steering. The wheels now turn in the opposite direction, because while the slight crab steering I had before was fun to make, it wasn't fun to play with. A decreased turning radius is much more fun!

I'll update you soon with an LDCad picture of the insides 

 

 

 

[Touc4nx]

looks good, I'm just not convinced by the angle in the front… it seems really high.
But otherwise the bodywork is super smooth. Congrats on making it without any holes !

[syclone]

The rear wheelarch definitely looks good! May the lights look better if the dish were the other way around? Or part nº2654 maybe? Another option could be a continuous light bar on the rear without the round lenses:

[Gray Gear]

I spent the last 2 hours making these LDCad Models, I hope it was worth it! I will try to explain how the 4 wheel steering system and Transmission work. Here we go!

First of all this is the front steering. The tan pins are fixed to the cassis, so the direction of the gear rack is getting reversed by the gray levers. This was necessary due to the placement of the eingine's crankshaft.

 

This is the complete 4 wheel steering setup. Main feature here is that the 4 wheel steering can be switched off by moving the red and yellow assembly 1 stud forwards, like this:

The yellow axle is now disengaged from the front steering, and is getting locked in place by the black pin in the middle.

 

Now to the Transmission:

Brown: 1st+2nd gear. Orange: 3rd+4th gear. Pink: 5th+6th gear. 

Gray: Drive axle to the engine.

 

To move the transmission's clutch rings there have to be some shifting liks that connect the shift lever to the transmission. The purple piece is what I call my "Safeshift System". It can slide left&right on the black axle, following the movements of the shift lever. It's purpose is to lock the gears that are not in use in place.

 

The two links left and right were easy, like this:

 

But there was no space left for the middle link, because of the yellow 4 wheel steering axle. So I had to get creative:

If I can't go under the shift lever, I'll just go above! 

 

This is the entire setup, Transmission and 4 wheel steering system. It is all very cramped in the 7 studs wide center tunnel, but everything works very smooth.

 

I hope this wasn't too boring and you could understand what I was trying to explain. If you have any questions, feel free to ask :)

 

Best regards,

Gray Gear

[2GodBDGlory]

Cool! Thanks for providing a good explanation.

[Bartybum]

15 hours ago, Gray Gear said:

This is my current version of the taillights, but I am not really satisfied. The shape is kind of hard to do with these 2 circles, and I don't really like the small radar dishes sticking out.

What if the dishes were trans red? Another suggestion would be to do what syclone suggested and use the inverted 2x2 dish, and come up with some other creative brickery for the other parts of the taillights

[Touc4nx]

this looks pretty cool. and quite compact for the amount of functions !
Just one thing I don't understand, why using a 36 tooth gear on the steering system in the front ?

 

[Gray Gear]

@syclone Yeah I thought about going with the older style Taillights as well, that might solve my problems.

@Bartybum They are supposed to be trans-red, I just dont have them (yet?) in that color 

@Touc4nx The 36t gear is there to connect the HoG steering. That's not there yet 

 

[Gray Gear]

Finally  a small Update. I finished the rear Bumper and reworked the taillights. I was not happy with my old taillight design, but I am happy with these:

I was unable to close the gaps in the rear bumper completely, but that was to be expected if I curve it.

If you have any improvement suggestions I'd be glad to hear them 

Edited June 15, 2021 by Gray Gear

[syclone]

Honestly doubt the leftover gaps could (or should) be closed - from the looks of it they are no bigger than those usually left in between panels, great work there 

Lights look spot-on, the fact that the rear section is curved makes all the SNOT connections even more impressive! The new sides look much better than the stepped look of the previous version, and follow the curve of the panels upfront very well. 

The boot lock is a nice touch , perhaps one of these with a silver 1x1? Or too oversized?

Edited June 15, 2021 by syclone

[Gray Gear]

I will not only do instructions for a clean version of this car, but also a clapped out drift missle version, with color mis-matching bodypanels because they had to be replaced after all the small accidents drifters get into on the togue. Something like this:

To be able to do this I challenged myself to build the car to follow the lines of the bodypanels on the real  car. So now it is theorethically possible to make every single bodypanel a different color, without using stickers!

 

@syclone thank you

Funny you spotted that single stud below the taillights. It is not supposed to be the trunk lock, the lock is about 1 stud higher on the real car. I left that stud there to attach some kind of 1x1 plate round, maybe one of these pink "Dots" hearts or something similar. Many Japanese cars have some cute little stickers, decals or cutouts. I like that, it ads some character. Sadly there is no "Broken-Heart" printed heart tile, that would have been perfect 

[2GodBDGlory]

I like the idea of building the mismatched body panel one!

[langko]

I like it so far! Agree the lights look better. Your bodywork skills are seriously good, crazy how closed off everything is without looking cluttered.

[syclone]

15 hours ago, Gray Gear said:

Funny you spotted that single stud below the taillights. It is not supposed to be the trunk lock, the lock is about 1 stud higher on the real car. I left that stud there to attach some kind of 1x1 plate round, maybe one of these pink "Dots" hearts or something similar. Many Japanese cars have some cute little stickers, decals or cutouts. I like that, it ads some character. Sadly there is no "Broken-Heart" printed heart tile, that would have been perfect 

Oops, my bad, somehow missed the placement of the lock even though there's a photo of a real one above 

The idea with the "stickers" sounds great, will certainly add some character to the car! For the broken heart, perhaps one of these services like Bricksanity could do it.

Interesting concept for the drift missile, can see a lot of personalisation possibilities there. Perhaps someone will even remove some panels to emulate one the more destroyed ones like Noriyaro's skyline))))

 

[Matiss56]

That's a really nice shapes on the pop-up headlights 
I just can't get my head a round how you made them 

Also, the car looks awsome, can't wait to see the final result 

Edited July 4, 2021 by Matiss56

[Gray Gear]

Fist of all I built the other side of the car, so the car body is now the same on both sides. The Rollcage was replaced with LBG liftarms.

And I finally finished the trunk:

Honestly this was such a big pain in the a$$, unbelivable. First of all, because I curved the bumper I had to curve the edge of the trunk as well. Very fun if it has to be 1.8 studs high to match the sides.

And second the way the trunk is mounted is a real pain because the angle of the rear window is so shallow it was really difficult to get the trunk edge to align with the edge of the bumper. But after countless attempts I found a solution that works.

Anybody has an idea for a mechanism to keep this open, without looking real stupid?

 

I am having real trouble with the hood as well. It is such a big flat surface it always ends up looking really weird. I am probably going to install hood vents, that always solved this problem in the past.

That's it for now 

Edited July 13, 2021 by Gray Gear

[LvdH]

The mix of system and technic panels to create such a smooth bodywork is very impressive. I really like this area in particular:

[syclone]

Wow, absolutely stunning so far. Both the spoiler and the trunk look fantastic, all of those intricate connections pay off for the end looks, those subtle curves are delightful.

For the trunk, would be perhaps be possible to mount a pair of 53586? Or the "window frame" would bend under the weight of the trunk? Though they may not have enough resistance to maintain the hatch open...

As another option, perhaps a collapsible support under the trunk, that would fold in 2 when rear hatch is closed?

[suffocation]

The bodywork on this beast is phenomenal

[Hrafn]

Looking amazing!

For the hatch, there is always the Technic ball joint (https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=32474) and a connector like https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=32174

 

[sm1995]

Some of the best technic bodywork I’ve ever seen. Very impressive!

Looking forward to the final product!

[MinusAndy]

This looks like your best yet!

I love that you’re building “ordinary” cars with such attention to detail. It’s way harder to build a recognisable version of something like this than say, a flagship Ferrari or Lambo and you are capturing the nuances of the bodywork really well. When it’s done you should post it on the 180/200sx owners club forums, I bet they would love to see it.