★ Russianred's Turbo Build Thread! ★ *UPDATED 4/15* ★

[Russianred]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

Thanks bro! I'll have pics of the stance after I adjust them properly. Yeah, basically doing a head overhaul and some upgrades, as well as a re-tune with more boost!

 

[Bee Dizzle]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

you got new wheels?

 

[Russianred]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

Hehe not yet bro, not nice ones anyways - that's the next / only thing I have left to do really..

 

[Erik123456789]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

oh boy Nice man arp headstuds are sweet, looking forward to it. How much is "more boost"?

 

[Russianred]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

I'd like to get retuned at 11 or 12 psi for daily, make around 300whp.


Tore everything off yesterday.


Marked the distributor:

Marked the cam position:

Scenery:

Block:

Starting from the right piston.

Piston 1:

Piston 2:

Piston 3:

Piston 4:

The cylinder walls are super smoooooth so that's a good sign.

I'm thinking the valves are so white because it was burning coolant due to the head gasket. See the individual cylinder pictures. The walls are smooth, but there is a small ring of oily buildup near the top of each bore, I'm assuming in the area where the piston does not travel up to. Is that indicative of worn piston rings?

Taking the head in tomorrow to get a plane test to check for warp, leak-down test to check for any cracks or coolant leaks, vacuum test to check the valvetrain, and full degrease with resurfacing. I'd like to also clean-dip my IM and some other components while I'm there depending on the price.

Standard oil gauges feed lines are 3/8 NPT fitting I believe. The Sunpro gauge I have has some smaller size fitting and no store carries it. I need to figure out the size of the smaller Sunpro gauge fitting (that takes the small nylon tube fitting usually) and find the corresponding adapter to the standard 3/8 oil line. The premise is to replace the nylon tubing with steel braided line. I have looked at every auto store, every hardware store, and can not find anything. Summit Racing?

Any thoughts or ideas on how to figure out the size of that fitting?

 

[mr. smith]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

I'm impressed! can't wait to see it up and running again.

 

[Erik123456789]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

nice dude i love reading other peoples builds lol and why'd you mark the cams and distributor? Thats what all the timing marks are there for.

 

[Russianred]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

Update! Awesome news. Going to pick up the head from the engine shop in an hour. No warp, passed pressure-test and vacuum tests with flying colors, resurfaced 0.005 of an inch. Also it was cleaned and degreased, so I hope it looks purdy!

Bad news is that one of the top bolts on the downpipe seized in the hole near the top and snapped off, and an extractor bit broke off inside too.. So now I have 8mm of metal blocking up one of the holes and ruining most of the threads. The machine shop quoted me $100 to repair it! They would be using a Heli-coil thread insert after extraction etc, but hell $100!? That's like theivery. I'm just going to extract everything myself (without using an extractor bit), expand the hole, and rethread it for a larger size bolt. I can post a pic, but it's pretty self-explanatory - imagine a broken off seized bolt blocking a hole.


Also in the events - cleaned the whole intake manifold. There is the top plenum:

Notice the Blacktraxx IACV adapter plate. I tried to get it off, trust me. It won't budge regardless of what I do. Melted to the IM with Hondabond lol. I guess I'm going to leave it, and just put some more RTV around the seal just in case. I pressurized the IACV inlet/outlet areas on the plenum at 20PSI and not a single leak from behind the IACV as it is, so I don't think it will present a problem at all.

Inside of the clean plenum:

Another thing I did was port the exhaust manifold. Notice how in the first pic the opening is uneven, and obstructed. I believe this casting imperfection could have easily cost me a few horses during my last tune.

After:

Straight up expanding the port resulted in some internal sharp lines edges. To fix this aerodynamically, I blended the ports after expanding the main opening. It looks like there is a sharper edge there, but there really isn't - it's all round, polished, and very smooth transition.

Other (more obstructed) side:

Thoughts or comments appreciated. Will maybe do some more polishing of the exhaust and intake manifold runners, but no more porting since I do not have the time and professional facilities to port-match each runner to the head ports myself.

 

[F23A1AT]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread!

there is a small ring of oily buildup near the top of each bore, I'm assuming in the area where the piston does not travel up to. Is that indicative of worn piston rings?

Standard oil gauges feed lines are 3/8 NPT fitting I believe. The Sunpro gauge I have has some smaller size fitting and no store carries it. I need to figure out the size of the smaller Sunpro gauge fitting (that takes the small nylon tube fitting usually) and find the corresponding adapter to the standard 3/8 oil line. The premise is to replace the nylon tubing with steel braided line. I have looked at every auto store, every hardware store, and can not find anything. Summit Racing?

Any thoughts or ideas on how to figure out the size of that fitting?

I think that is just where the piston doesn't go all the way to the top of the bore. I read in my Haynes manual that one should use some special tool to remove it before the pistons come out.

I would just upgrade to a electrical oil pressure gauge. It does away with all the line running and fitting hunting. I guess to find the size take the gauge to a auto/hardware store and have them go through their fittings to test them until the right one is found.

Did you have to replace the head-gasket or something? BTW that engine is clean as fuuuuuuuuuu.

 

[Russianred]

Re: Russianred's Turbo Build Thread! *UPDATED 5/25*

Thanks! Yeah man I've replaced the head gasket and going to install ARP studs tonight. That is a clean engine? Damn, I thought it was dirty.

It's impossible to find this fitting at the store. All stores carry 1/8 as their smallest fitting, and this one is much smaller than that but I have no clue what size it is. After ordering two wrong fittings from Summit, I think I'll just settle with a local store to source it, and while I'm there invest in a EGT bung, and an extension to my oil return line so it's less taught when it's connected.

As for the oil gauge, I prefer mechanical over electrical naturally, but the 'kinks' need to be worked out properly, that's all. I don't like electrical because they have a delay or are sometimes not as accurate as mechanical gauges in the reading. Also, the sensor can break.