Rhyscar's Toyota Levin - 2zzge Touring car - finished*

[Roman]

4 hours ago, mjrstar said:

B series honda is open deck die cast aluminum

Oh wow, didnt know that. Thought everything of that era was mostly steel block. 

But might just have my Toyota hat on...

Sorry/not sorry for spam 

[GARDRB]

14 hours ago, Roman said:

Oh wow, didnt know that. Thought everything of that era was mostly steel block. 

But might just have my Toyota hat on...

Sorry/not sorry for spam 

How dare you..

B-series, H-series, K-series, SR20, 2zz (and just for you all the cheap "nasty" modern Toyota motors) = alloy
Everything else = Iron block strength

Edit so as not to spam Rhys' thread, if Toyota had started making the S-series in the late 80s when the SR and B-series came out, an alloy 3SGE BEAMS would have been a great engine

Edited February 24, 2025 by GARDRB
SPAM SPAM SPAM

[Rhyscar]

Yeah it doesn't move much. Probably biggest flex will be under big compressions as with mac strut all spring pressure goes through tophat. I've tied the cage through the strut tower so this brace is really just to tie the two 'legs' of the cage together, and get whatever triangulation stregnth I can from the lightweight slam panel at the top of the firewall. It's as decorative as it is functional, but my engineering brain couldn't let myself not do anything. 

[Rhyscar]

15 hours ago, Roman said:

Oh wow, didnt know that. Thought everything of that era was mostly steel block. 

But might just have my Toyota hat on...

Sorry/not sorry for spam 

Toyota was behind Honda in the 90's in terms of engine development. This engine is more a competitor to the B18cr, but came out when Honda was already doing K series things.

The 20v's made 220hp in group A form, but geez it must have been a lot of work, as that HP is very difficult to achieve from a 20v. Whereas B18cr makes that HP without too much effort. 

Beams was good head, but was never awesome because of old-design 3sge bottom end was originally developed for group B rallying in 222D which never came to fruition. 

Even with the 2zz they dropped the ball at ecomony and boring cars - develop this awesome engine made for 9000+ and then put it in boring overweight hatchbacks with shitty exhaust manifolds that would damper all the good noises they liked to make. It's a story of what could of been if they had this engine in the ae111 2drs for example... 

 

Toyota does mass production and reliability amazingly first and foremost and performance comes second.... but its also now the biggest auto manufacturer whereas Honda is struggling

 

[Roman]

It really boggles my mind, that there was never an MR-S with the 2ZZ. 
Even if it was only a super limited run, come on! 
How does a Fielder wagon or a Toyota Will get one, but not the mid engined car haha.

[mjrstar]

Was a guy in hamilton car club with MR-S he converted to 2zz and had some tuning done. It went OK, but maybe needed a diff ratio or gearset to properly liven it up. It wasn't super competitive on the 1600-2000 class and he's a pretty experienced driver.

He sold it pretty cheap on trademe, bought an open wheeler and won some events.

/ maybe admin to create sub- thread whilst we fizz over tuned n/a Japanese motors.

[Rhyscar]

Yeah even with some tuning, the gearing and final drive in them isn't very sporty (even worse if he was using 1zz gearbox). 

4.8 or 5.1 final drive livens them up A LOT.. I'll do this eventually, but a few other things to get sorted first. 

[Roman]

Could have been factory ECU as well perhaps.

[kpr]

How much does the oil pressure drop in the top end?    have noticed the ones ive tuned the drop a little  up top, but nothing to significant.   usually limit them to low 8000rpm  and seem to survive a 6 hour lemons race.
may have some link logs have saved off dyno runs, can look if your interested 

[Rhyscar]

On 25/02/2025 at 17:12, kpr said:

How much does the oil pressure drop in the top end?    have noticed the ones ive tuned the drop a little  up top, but nothing to significant.   usually limit them to low 8000rpm  and seem to survive a 6 hour lemons race.
may have some link logs have saved off dyno runs, can look if your interested 

Dropped off to 55psi, which seems to be the point they go bang (if prolonged at that pressure) 

So I did some digging through my old invoices when we built the engine in 2012, and we never installed a MWR oil pump, but a brand new Toyota one. Which isn’t bad, but isn’t great either and 100% explains the pressure drop off I’m getting. 
 

Will be interested to compare with other logs of 2zz oil pressure you may have. 
 

Thanks to Dave for putting me onto Matt Gill, because I’ve been talking to Boundary pumps in the US of A. They have a special gear and billet backing plate option that they reckon will hold pressure through to 9000rpm. Seems like the way to go, but haven’t seen any logs yet with data to back it up. 

https://boundarypumps.com/shop/toyota/2zzge/2zzge-billet-oil-pump-assembly/

[kpr]

peaks at  74psi,  drops to 66psi at  8500rpm.    This is off one with aftermarket cams, unsure if stock oil pump.   is the only one i can find a log off
i would expect be lower over all once got some more oil temp in it.   is only 75c in this log.        Is only 1psi in it between 8000 and 8500rpm, so isn't falling off a cliff

 

 

[shrike]

16 hours ago, Rhyscar said:

Dropped off to 55psi, which seems to be the point they go bang (if prolonged at that pressure) 

So I did some digging through my old invoices when we built the engine in 2012, and we never installed a MWR oil pump, but a brand new Toyota one. Which isn’t bad, but isn’t great either and 100% explains the pressure drop off I’m getting. 
 

Will be interested to compare with other logs of 2zz oil pressure you may have. 
 

Thanks to Dave for putting me onto Matt Gill, because I’ve been talking to Boundary pumps in the US of A. They have a special gear and billet backing plate option that they reckon will hold pressure through to 9000rpm. Seems like the way to go, but haven’t seen any logs yet with data to back it up. 

https://boundarypumps.com/shop/toyota/2zzge/2zzge-billet-oil-pump-assembly/

Dry sump?

[Rhyscar]

@kpr did that one have a cooler or remote oil filter? I'm wondering if I've got a pressure drop through the housing as I haven't smoothed out the flow patht... So could be causing it to drop a little sooner than expected. 

Another thought I had was that I don't know anything about the pressure relief on the 2zz.. is it same as oldschool pressure reliefs where you can run a shim/washer to increase it's max a little? Oil pump and pressure relief are easily accessible so might be worth mucking with? 

 

hahaha @shrike if money were free, and parts could be purchased with Doorts (a much more enjoyable currency than $$ obv.), I'd be all over this option. I've asked a contact to try track down a TRS sump for me... however I expect it will be out of my budget. 

 

[shrike]

1 minute ago, Rhyscar said:

@kpr did that one have a cooler or remote oil filter? I'm wondering if I've got a pressure drop through the housing as I haven't smoothed out the flow patht... So could be causing it to drop a little sooner than expected. 

Another thought I had was that I don't know anything about the pressure relief on the 2zz.. is it same as oldschool pressure reliefs where you can run a shim/washer to increase it's max a little? Oil pump and pressure relief are easily accessible so might be worth mucking with? 

 

hahaha @shrike if money were free, and parts could be purchased with Doorts (a much more enjoyable currency than $$ obv.), I'd be all over this option. I've asked a contact to try track down a TRS sump for me... however I expect it will be out of my budget. 

 

@Roman made a custom sump for his 4GR, I am sure with your skills you could make your own dry sump.

Annoyingly the pumps themselves seem to be the main cost, though I wonder if there is a cost effective pump option around

https://www.mr2oc.com/threads/budget-dry-sump-system-brain-storming.683834/

Interesting thread that may also be of interest to Roman too

Ebay dry sump pump

Aliexpress pump

Id probably want to pull apart, check tolerances and reassemble etc before use but they are still a chunk of change

Scope creep I don't know how much a aftermarket oil pump for the 2zz goes for and maybe im just keen to see a dry sump project :p 

@yoeddynzever made a dry sump pump before?

[Rookie]

Dry sumps aren't cost prohibitive if you have a bit of nous, I built one for my Lotus 7 and all in I was under $1000, mind you that was 10-15 years ago. 

The trick is finding a pump for a reasonable price, for what we are doing you can basically build any design sump and tank and they work somewhere between ok and excellent, so there really isn't much to think about there. I found that waiting to the end of the Nascar season and looking at Ebay USA is pretty good, find a good brand like Dailey or Auto Verdi, Auto Verdi are good because they keep records of what the pump was used for and which team etc and you can write to them with the serial number and find out the history. 

For example

Auto Verdi Pump

To me at least spending $1000 on a dry sump more than paid for itself when compared to engine reconditioner bills for run bearings.

 

[440bbm]

sumps are the easy part, 

making the tank properly in the shape u want to suit the area of car u want it in is slightly more tricky with maths depending - but the good old CAD has eliminated most of that problem once you understand the volumes required correctly. 

and as above /rookie stated buy a pump thats correctly staged to suit your application. there are soooo many options out there and isnt as spendy it really seems.
making the brackets/pulley/ positioning is probably the harder part of it all ( engine and bay depending )

[Rhyscar]

@Rookie thanks, it surprising how cheap the key parts are! Although, I'm under no illusion it won't be it's own version of hell trying to get the whole setup right. And yeah, I don't have anywhere to put the tank except in the boot which means heaps of large braided hose.. 

At this stage of the project, I just want the thing running and driving. So even if costs were equal, I'm 100% going to go the easiest route for sure. Boundary pumps are 1week + some airfreight away and should hopefully provide some reassurance it won't all fall apart at 9000rpm..

 

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to indulge in the dry sump idea sometime in the future.

 

[Roman]

All of the fucking around to dry sump it will cost you at least another year of not driving your car.

Bolt in option and gooooo

 

[440bbm]

all of these things are correct factors. when enoughs enough and u just wanna fang the thing, ya start taking 'shortcuts' LOL. 

[Roman]

Dry sump can introduce as many problems as it fixes. 

Blame user or installer error if you like, but i think ive seen as many trackdays come to an early end from oil leaks, oil flying out, oil spills, belts flying off, etc from dry sump issues as much as anything else. 

Also max irony points when someone loses oil pressure because of a sandwich plate coming loose that was only there for sake of monitoring oil pressure.