Dell'orto's unreliable modern piece

[Dell'orto 3,666]

So both Jon and I are rotary guys from way back - we met back in the 90s while both driving FCs, and hung out in Paraparaumu. People from the region will know of the reputation it had for breeding some rowdy, rough, rugged and the occasional pretty quick rotary. Legend has it the very first rotor DX came from there!

Naturally because of this, Jon wanted to build a bridgeport motor for this car. I wasn't super into the idea, as to do a bridgeport justice, it'd need way more serious gear than the car came with. Plus they aren't the most user friendly things for low speed, around town, general cruising, and I really just wanted something pretty quick but still usable. The stuff the car came with would easily support 220kw, which is heaps for a road car in reality.

So I put the kaibosh on the idea. Stock ports are fine for what I want!. I get a message from Jon a few days later

"Hey, it looks like they must test run these crate motors" Ahhh, why do you say that??? 'There's a bit of rust in the cooling jacket..."

Oh FFS, I guess this is happening then. I got many pic updates over the following days as he quite gleefully hacked into my BRAND FUCKING NEW irons

Now the first issue that I'd need to tackle anyway, was a decent clutch, because even a mild tune REW would torch a standard clutch without much hassle. No worries says Jon, I've got the old clutch from my Skyline, it'll be perfect for this.

An OS Giken TS2B twin plate, with the necessary pull/push converter. Had done sub 1500km before he did a big upgrade, so ideal, albeit overkill for what I wanted.

While it was in bits, I figured that I might as well get it all balanced, just for peace of mind. So the whole rotating assembly was sent off, returned all matchy matchy, and duly assembled.

[SHGWAG 2,174]

On 24/11/2020 at 22:05, Dell'orto said:

"Hey, it looks like they must test run these crate motors" Ahhh, why do you say that??? 'There's a bit of rust in the cooling jacket..."

Indeed they do, and sometimes shit hits the fan and they ship the motors anyway...

 

For anyone buying a fresh crate motor, you should pull down and inspect prior to installation.

Separately, they aren't balanced all that well from factory. So if you're upping the boost or revs, best to get the rotating assembly balanced.

 

[fuel 1,884]

I was literally about the link the same video too! that coolant muck looked exactly the same!

[Dell'orto 3,666]

7 hours ago, SHGWAG said:

Indeed they do, and sometimes shit hits the fan and they ship the motors anyway...

 

For anyone buying a fresh crate motor, you should pull down and inspect prior to installation.

Separately, they aren't balanced all that well from factory. So if you're upping the boost or revs, best to get the rotating assembly balanced.

 

Honestly, had Jon not attacked it, I wouldn't have bothered. I knew they test ran them, but this was the first one I'd seen pulled apart. It was perfectly fine for what I initially wanted, rotors weren't terribly off either. Have seen some big mismatches on old motors though!

[Dell'orto 3,666]

Back to the story at hand - with the motor now ported, it left me with quite a dilemma. I bought this car with a specific budget to get it all done and dusted. I procrastinated for a few months while figuring out the next step. I even debated using the stock twins and the existing bolt on stuff, but deep down I knew that the stock turbos would just end up hurting the motor.

One of my other good friends is a bit of a encyclopedia for turbo knowledge so I turned to him for advice. I was after something that could flow 400-450hp without giving away too much response. The ideal turbo would have been the Borg Warner EFR8374, but I couldn't afford a $4500 turbo. So the next best option was this guy:

 

A Borg Warner S300SX-E, sorta the poor man's EFR8374. I chose a slighter smaller than usual 1.0 AR twin scroll turbine housing in an attempt to keep the boost threshold at a reasonable point, at the expense of some top end power. Given the most powerful car I've owned before was a 220kw turbo 4age, giving away some horsepower wasn't a real concern!

I made another trip up to Auckland to dress the block up and install the motor - the turbo looks fucking huge compared to a bare bones 13B!

And pretty snug in an FD engine bay too

Because pedantry, I replaced most of the bolts on the motor, and engine bay, with shiny new gold passivated ones. I also splashed out and bought new coolant and washer fluid bottles, as the ones in the engine bay were all fucky. I also made the unusual (apparently) call to retain the stock OMP. Everybody says they fail yada yada yada, but I've not seen any concrete evidence that the electronic ones do. And also modern ECU tech can control them, so why the hell not? 

Modern ECU tech also means I ditched the Power FC once again, but this time replacing it with a Link G4 plug in

It also meant a decent fuel system upgrade in the form of 1050cc primary injectors and 1550cc secondaries fed by one of the other wonders of modern tech, a brushless drop in fuel pump, capable of suppling well over 500hp worth of fuel. Thank god the days of Whinebro pumps are over!

With this in the hole, only minor fabrication was needed to get it ready to fire up!

[ProZac 1,023]

Epic to see you've got yourself another one of these, looks like you're well down the rabbit hole with it! With the way prices have gone though, its easier to justify the outlay, hah.

On the list of cars I regret selling, EEM46 is at the top of the list, but at the time I was working away from home and it was just sitting, somewhat brokenly in the garage, never getting touched. HPA are doing epic things with it, and they're promised to let me drive it when I'm down there doing work for them :-). I've seen the graphs from its new setup, makes a solid 400hp to the rears on the stock port motor (they havent opened it), and has boost in by 3000, so has pretty epic response too. The quote I have on it is that it is 'fast as fuck' :-).

I'll always have the memories of dailying it to Waiau and back and hacking it around the track up there. Back before kids when I could afford a $300 a week fuel bill, lol ;-).

[ProZac 1,023]

Also, I managed to find the JDM factory service manuals for these, (not the USDM ones). They're in japanese, but can still be handy. Hit me up on a message / faeboes if you want em :-).

[ajg193 9,270]

17 minutes ago, ProZac said:

Epic to see you've got yourself another one of these, looks like you're well down the rabbit hole with it! With the way prices have gone though, its easier to justify the outlay, hah.

On the list of cars I regret selling, EEM46 is at the top of the list, but at the time I was working away from home and it was just sitting, somewhat brokenly in the garage, never getting touched. HPA are doing epic things with it, and they're promised to let me drive it when I'm down there doing work for them :-). I've seen the graphs from its new setup, makes a solid 400hp to the rears on the stock port motor (they havent opened it), and has boost in by 3000, so has pretty epic response too. The quote I have on it is that it is 'fast as fuck' :-).

I'll always have the memories of dailying it to Waiau and back and hacking it around the track up there. Back before kids when I could afford a $300 a week fuel bill, lol ;-).

200 km a day in a tang? You mad?

I'm quite impressed actually

[Dell'orto 3,666]

On 27/11/2020 at 12:43, ProZac said:

Epic to see you've got yourself another one of these, looks like you're well down the rabbit hole with it! With the way prices have gone though, its easier to justify the outlay, hah.

On the list of cars I regret selling, EEM46 is at the top of the list, but at the time I was working away from home and it was just sitting, somewhat brokenly in the garage, never getting touched. HPA are doing epic things with it, and they're promised to let me drive it when I'm down there doing work for them :-). I've seen the graphs from its new setup, makes a solid 400hp to the rears on the stock port motor (they havent opened it), and has boost in by 3000, so has pretty epic response too. The quote I have on it is that it is 'fast as fuck' :-).

I'll always have the memories of dailying it to Waiau and back and hacking it around the track up there. Back before kids when I could afford a $300 a week fuel bill, lol ;-).

Yeah I think with how mental the prices have gone I'd probably break even if I were to sell it, which is insane. 

I'm sad that you never got to complete your highflow twin project with it, that would have been super interesting to see. My turbo encyclopedia friend is friends with Andre too, so have been keeping tabs on it. I still cry every time they put a new video up of it though 

[Dell'orto 3,666]

Right, so a couple of months pass with little finicky wiring stuff being done, and the last of the fab work done. A big V mount set up wasn't in the budget, so Jon made new pipework to run from the GReddy elbow to the existing GReddy cooler, and welded an elbow to the turbo outlet to make a fairly short straight shot into the cooler. 

Now with the power figure I had in mind, a measly 3" exhaust would never do. So we made the call to go 4" the whole way - 3.5" outlet off the turbine housing necks up to 4" as quickly as it could physically fit

It runs into a 4" Adrenalin R centre muffler, then back to the existing 4" section (Which actually turned out to be like 96mm, weird) with the Apexi muffler.

https://imgur.com/0i3fcX6

Nice and tucked up, heaps of clearance! Now it was ready for the first start up

https://imgur.com/h0DfDBE

Naturally, it fired up super easily, even with the base tune on the Link. A little more fettling and it was time to hit the dyno!

 

 

 

 

[Dell'orto 3,666]

A few months pass and I finally get a chance to get away from work so I can finally get this thing on the dyno.

Naturally, there are a couple of minor last minute tidy up jobs we needed to do, so ended up working until about 1 am the day of the dyno to get it all dusted. Nothing like a bit of deadline pressure to get the adrenaline going!

Anyway, after what seemed like an eternity of driving, we ended up at GDS Automotive and unloaded the car. It was quite cool having a chat to one of the former top import drag racers from back in the day and I pestered him with various questions about the GTRs that he was involved with way back when, until it was finally time to get tuning.

It was all pretty uneventful, the car behaved the entire time - testament to the job Jon did in building it (and me for the component selection haha). I had a fairly lofty goal of 450hp at the wheels, which I figured we'd probably have to lean on the turbo to produce. So you can imagine my surprise when we went into the dyno cell for the second to last run and seeing 345kw flash up on 18 psi! Glenn gave it one last run with 19psi (the maximum boost pressure he felt comfortable with - stock seals and undowelled) and it put down 351kw/470hp at the wheels.

Pretty fucking stoked as you'd expect, and it sounded super crisp on the dyno

https://imgur.com/rdeTcTW

I took it for a little drive once we got back to Jon's, and couldn't stop grinning the entire time - only a little shady given the car still wasn't complied for NZ roads by this stage, but whatever, it's only illegal if you get caught right?

Did the last couple of engine bay tidy up bits (ie install the FEED manifold cover and polish the strut brace) then stood back and admired 18 year old me's dream car

Did one final video to keep my enthusiasm up, then had to jump on the plane to head back home again....the last time I'd see the car for several months as it would turn out.

https://imgur.com/dKj7OpA