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monster turbo3 build
Topic Started: Jun 17 2011, 05:53 AM (36,544 Views)
bogs
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Duct tape heals all wounds

Also sitting down if he is going to talk total into the car.
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Scoobs
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:D

Lol i think we all wanna know XD.
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t3ragtop
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Turbo3 and Twincam Tweaker

i started collecting parts specific to building the engine and then on to all the other project parts 21 months ago. by march of this year there was a pile of parts stacked from the basement floor about 6 feet cubed - easily as big as the car itself. i was concerned about having enough room to cram everything under the hood.

i kept nearly every receipt and now have 2 manila envelopes that are full. a couple of months ago i went through them and tabulated the big ones and quit counting at $3200. that included machine shop charges to hot tank and assemble the engine using my supplied parts except for the ring set that came to about $600. the liquid to air intercooling system components were huge money, the megasquirt kit and accessories came to about $600, the acer netbook, solid state hard drive (which cost more than the computer itself) came in around $500, powder coating was around the $500 mark, aluminum radiator $200, silicone radiator hose set $70, stainless steel fasteners (on a bi-weekly budget, i had a personal relationship with smilin' johnny the counterman) was close to the $500 mark. you see where this is going. i'd estimate the total, low, at over $4600.

jess tremblay at turbine tech and mike cove at 3 tech performance made me deals on the turbo stuff and the custom head that absolutely can never be matched. my turbo and intercooling supplier, frozenboost.com gave me a 10% discount, and even smilin' johnny at metro industries gave me a break on metric s.s. fasteners.

even more precious than the money, i have an easy 4000 hours in this project, largely because i was an engineer in a previous life and everything is specified, documented, sketched and re-sketched, notated, checked and re-checked in 6 big 3 ring binders. after i started the actual mechanical installation and fabrication started taking place on the fly, there are fewer notes and more photos to document the build. i have at least 20 times the pics in files on my computer than ever made it online. most of the work i got accomplished over the winters were assemblies of component "modules" that got bolted on in sequences building layers over the course of putting the car together during the last 10 weeks.

when i ran into the floor repairs, it added a bunch of time i hadn't planned on and there was no sense in rushing that work. it ended up being a major project all by itself. the weather this summer hasn't been all that cooperative, either. it has been hotter than the hinges of hell or pouring rain like a cow pissing on a flat rock - or both at the same time. i'm telling you that i am envious of guys who have decent shops to work in. i used to have a full hobby shop that was 24' by 40' where i restored over 200 vintage saabs, built custom competition .45 colt acp pistols, and restored mid 50s modern heywood wakefield furniture. a cruel change of fortune forced me back into the city and made me downsize everything in my life - or at least change the way i did a lot of stuff without my barn.

anyway, since i had sort of specialized my professional engineering gig to process controls, automated sortation, and industrial speed controls, the engine management stuff was a small system that roughly fell into my baliwick. when i started in engineering i worked in a thermal dynamics lab for the world's largest contract and research laboratory while i attended classes at the ohio state university in electrical engineering. i did projects at battelle like testing the heat tiles for the space shuttle and working with the solid rocket fuel that nasa used in the sts program boosters. i also worked with a bunch of solar technology back in those days for the dept. of energy and weapons development for the dept. of defense.

having retired from the engineering career and while i'm trying to wind down by doing environmental investigation work, i really missed having a complicated project and this turbo3 build has neatly fit that bill. i never thought for a minute that i would miss the tedious calculations that engineering requires, as a matter of fact, i used to bitch about having to do the math. it's funny how things turn out. one thing i do realize now, though, is that it's a lot more painful when you're the one paying the costs of project development. :whistle
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Coche Blanco
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Troll Certified

You're one of the few engineers I respect. But that's another topic...

Anyhow, great work and thanks for telling me how much I'll never spend on my Metro. :)
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t3ragtop
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Turbo3 and Twincam Tweaker

c.b. to tell you the truth, i have worked with a bunch of engineers who were dumb as a bucket of rocks so i get your point. thanks for the compliment. i always tried to keep in mind that stuff i built had to operate in the real world instead of some fairy land. i actually worked my way through college in my mid-20s while i was an instrumentation tech, putting together the nuts and bolts to make measurements on some sophisticated, large scale integration systems. all of that kept me in the real world.

there's a very real but defined area where the theoretical and the practical overlap. most engineers exist in that theoretical part without benefit of ever living in the part of the world where they actually have any experience turning wrenches or welding. i was mentored by a real rocket scientist whose engineering discipline was mechanical engineering. all those old guys are gone these days. most of the "kids" who were in my classes in the college of engineering at osu had never actually worked on anything of note. while i was putting in my time in classes, i was also working a full time job actually building stuff.

i have always said that i prefer machines to people - i can always get machines to do what i want them to do. people are random. :P i found out that i didn't like wearing a suit and doing the lunch meetings. i have never owned a pocket protector or worn a calculator on my belt. i'm at home when i'm sparking a welder or up to my elbows in grease. that sort of stuff helps me translate all that crap that's whirling around in my head to the actual fabrication and construction work.

anyway, i'll be pressing on today, trying to finish up the exhaust system and finishing the checkout on the megasquirt. i ran into 2 small things with the controller during the last round of checks. i overlooked 2 jumper wires, one that kept my i/c hx fan from running and another that affected the v/r sensor's waveshape. the controller is disassembled on the bench to add those 2 jumpers and i'll have it back in the car tomorrow to continue. i'm very close to trying to start the engine on it's base tune.

so far, i've cranked the engine over to fill the oil lines. the oil idiot light goes out and i've gotten good oil pressure on the gauge. the fuel pump runs and i get good pressure on my fuel pressure gauge. the megasquirt is happy with the engine sensor calibration. i've calibrated the tps voltage and current to reflect it's range, 0% and 100%. and i've calibrated the afr/ o2 controller in free air and the map sensor to reflect barometric pressure.

i still have to do calibrations on my static timing and base timing to tweak the trigger wheel and dial in the dwell calibrations on the coils. if my wiring is correct on the ignition side, after i do those alignments i should be able to get the engine to run at idle. after i get a fairly stable idle, i can proceed with the tuning process, taking the car on test drives and logging engine data to massage the fuel and ignition mapping at various boost levels.

onward and upward.
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Coche Blanco
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"never actually worked on anything"

Exactly.

I regularly "out-build" and "out-think" engineers that I talk to. It may have more to do with the fact that they are engineers for the government....
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t3ragtop
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Turbo3 and Twincam Tweaker

uh-oh! my parts guys sent me a 2.5" mandrel bent 180 in aluminum instead of 409 stainless steel. :smackface i found that while i was setting up the welder to finish the exhaust today.

on to plan b. i got the hyperblinking turn signals doped out. even though i had a solid state flasher, it seems that they have a minimum resistance that they'll work with. i replaced the front turn signals with incandescents and now the lights flash at a normal rate. one other tip - metros seem to switch the ground to the lights so to use a solid state flasher, you have to reverse the connections which means that instead of plugging the flasher directly into the fuse block, you have to make jumper wires with male and female spade connectors and mount the flasher off of the fuse panel. also, the standard flasher is a 1" cube and it doesn't fit directly into the space for the oem flasher anyway.

i chased my headlight problems down to a bad combination switch. anybody have one for a 91 vert?

i've been chasing an oil drip, a real slow one, since i filled the block a couple of days ago. i found it today and i really can't believe this one. there is a pin hole in the oil pan about two thirds of the way up on the front side. i laid under the car for a half hour before i saw a little trail of oil about 1/2" long. the pin hole looks like a black speck in the powder coating. i dug another really nice oil pan out of the garage and got it cleaned up. when i drained the oil i got 3 and a half quarts back out of the 5 quarts the system holds now. the other quart and a half must still be in the cooler, remote filter, and lines. i'll get out there early in the morning before the sun heats the asphalt up to swap oil pans.

i fiddled with the megasquirt a little while and got it to see the v/r signal while cranking the engine over at starter speed. after i get the oil back into the block i'll pop the ignition fuse back in and try to verify my base timing with a timing light. i set the static timing using a machinist's gauge to find tdc on the #1 piston and located the trigger wheel's tooth #1 on the center of the v/r sensor while i had the engine out of the car so the absolute most it can be off is not more than 2 1/2 degrees. 36 teeth and 36 spaces with the leading edge of one tooth to the leading edge of the next one is 10*. that means that one tooth is 5* and one space is 5*. the leading edge of a tooth to the center would be 2.5* and from the center to the trailing edge would be 2.5*. heck, i'll have a hard time seeing 2 1/2 degrees with my timing light but it's on my check list so i'll do it.

the exhaust is on hold, probably for another week, while i wait for the correct part to arrive. some reflective thermal sleeving i ordered to cover my i/c heat exchanger supply hose came today so i'll dump the i/c coolant water, pull the hose off, and thread it through the sleeving. it's good up to 2000 degrees f and reflects 80% of the heat around it. anything that drops the i/c coolant temps is a good thing.

i'm still on the learning curve with the tuner studio application software but i'm figuring it out as i go along. i'll get some more time with that tomorrow. too.
Edited by t3ragtop, Jul 30 2011, 10:36 PM.
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t3ragtop
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Turbo3 and Twincam Tweaker

since i had to pull the exhaust system down to replace the oil pan....
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no pretty powder coating on this one. it got a bitch coat of black rust encapsulator (because that's what was handy.)

i took care of some more rustproofing and paint on the bottom of the floor pan.
over where the muffler hangs on the bottom of the trunk floor.
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rear floor pan and fuel tank.
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here's what happens when you blow rustproofing into the frame horns. that pea green shows the entry hole. look at that seam dripping the phenolic/ zinc phosphate coating. normally, you wouldn't even think that the seam would be open like that. rust starts brewing in there and the entire frame horn is rotted in short order.
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here's the i/c coolant hose insulation installed.
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bogs
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Duct tape heals all wounds

Very nice :thumb
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Mikemetro
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T3
I have a 92 vert parts car. Anything that will fit your 91 that you might need give me a shout
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Geo dude
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Hey MikeMetro. I need some parts too! (if T3 doesn't need them.)
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t3ragtop
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Turbo3 and Twincam Tweaker

what i most need right now is a combination switch for the headlight beam selection and turn signals for a 90/91 mk2. that different from the 92/93 mk3.

but thanks for the offer.

my car's power unit is modified beyond the point of accepting any engine parts or controls so most parts from a stocker vert won't do me any good.
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Mikemetro
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Forgot yours was.a 91. If you need one I have one off my 89 hatch.. Just send me a pm
Edited by Mikemetro, Aug 2 2011, 04:08 PM.
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t3ragtop
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Turbo3 and Twincam Tweaker

mike, the verts have a different steering column from the hatchbacks due to the air bag on the open car. the clock spring assembly for the air bag takes up about an inch so the vert's combination switch has mounting feet that set back more than the hatchback's. also, the hatchback has a contact for the horn while the vert's horn switches are 2 buttons on the cross arms that feed through the clock spring assembly.

all that said, i really do appreciate your offer. ^o)
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Bad Bent
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Facetious Educated Donkey

Beautiful piece of work t3ragtop :thumb

As a draftsman I worked with all types of engineers so I appreciate what you do. :thumb
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