TurboWood

It's hard to believe it has been 6mo since my last update. Progress has been slow, but I'm really close. The engine has started a handful of times, but none have been w/o issue. As you can see from the picture above the ECM is BIG. This forced me to move the surge tank and catch can. Fortunately there was enough room in front of the heater box (barely). I also had to remove the vacuum pump which was mounted to the back side of the head on the exhaust camshaft side. After finishing that I went forward with try to start it. In approximate sequence, here are the issues I've faced: - Wiring harness has only one knock sensor, but engine has two: The ECM was based on a later model engine which only used one. I did not know this going in, but I'm assured the newer ECM is programmed to work with one - Wiring harness has no CEL output: Sent harness back to supplier for them to add it. This is now solved - ECM has wrong Operating System loaded: Sent ECM back to supplier for them to update it (not possible to do w/o special GM equipment). This is now solved - Wiring harness connector for throttle body does not match the throttle body I have: Step 1) supplier sends me throttle body they think will work. It does have the correct connector, but not the right bolt pattern for my manifold (3 out of 4 bolts). I sent this back and they did not opt to send me the right one. Step 2) I buy the right throttle body, it bolts up and has the right connector, but the ECM throws trouble codes. Step3) Supplier sends me pigtail from ECM to adapt to my original throttle body. Everything works, but new throttle body is useless. - Wiring harness has no tack output signal: It turns out this ECM has no standard tack output (GM went full LAN). Supplier sent me an autometer device that interrupts the power signal to the coils. This should work, but since it was not wired into the harness in the first place I would have to dig into the harness to get to the proper wires. The standard GM harness had dedicated power for the coils, but this aftermarket one does not. The power wires split in the middle of the harness. Soooo, I decided not to use this device and just bought a Dakota Digital device that connects to the OBD port. This means I can't log data and have a functional tach, but at least it should work. The other point I forgot to mention was the autometer device was non-tunable. This meant I had to interrupt the right number of power wires in order to match what the Caterham tach expected. As you can imagine documentation of this is poor, but Bruce did help me. I just decided the Dakota box was a better bet. - Engine surges wildly during cold start (I mean really surges... 1500-3000rpm most of the time, but up to 6000rpm on occasion): I'm still trying to figure this out. At the moment I have two theories. 1) The engine is running very lean which is causing something in the calibration to freak out. There is evidence of this as the engine stabilizes when the ECM decides to add a lot more fuel. It adds this fuel because the O2 sensor is not working (explained below) and has defaulted to 0v - lean. 2) I'm missing sensors, specifically the barometric pressure pressure and a pre-throttle temp/press. These sensors are definitely missing, but I don't absolutely know the impact. The ECM is calculating -10C intake manifold temperature which I would think would cause a rich condition, but evidence doesn't point that way. I've also been told the pressure sensor is needed for the internal boost control in the ECM. Long story short the supplier has agreed to give me pigtails for these sensors. This is my pacing item at the moment. - O2 sensor doesn't work: The harness supplier told me really any GM sensor would work so long as it attached to the harness. So, I did some looking and found one that appeared to work. I installed it and somewhat blindly attached it to the harness by reaching under the car. After a few starts and seeing no response from the sensor I asked the supplier about it. They alerted me that the sensor I had purchased was not right and as a result the wires were connected in reverse (heater circuit to sensor). They told me this usually kills the sensor because you are applying 12v to it. After modifying the harness to work with the sensor properly I reinstalled it and started receiving trouble codes about the sensor. I replaced the sensor and after starting a few times received the same codes. I then tested both sensors and found them to both be dead. Ugghhh. I still don't know what caused the second one to fail for sure. The best guess I have is that the ECM wasn't properly reset before installation which caused it to apply too much voltage to the O2 sensor too quickly on the heater which cracked the sensor. Unfortunately there is no resistance speck for the heater so I can't know for sure if the sensor is the right one for the ECM. I do have a friend in the O2 sensor supplier world looking into this to see if he can find out. At the moment I believe everything is ok and when I install a new sensor it should work [crosses fingers]. So, there ya go. The only real things I have left to sort out once the engine runs properly are a few cosmetic things, an alignment, and check for leaks (I know of at least two that will take a little attention, but I need the engine to idle before I can trouble shoot properly). It's so close, but I've been fighting what I paid to be the easy part (ECM/harness). The supplier in question is Alfa Fab Industries which specializes in standalone ecotec applications, but I have the distinct impression they have not ever done this with the factory turbo engine. It appears to me that they usually use the NA 2.4L and then add a turbo. That said, they have still saved me a lot of time and effort. The issues I list here have been painful and unexpected, but it definitely suggests making my own harness would have been way harder. At least this way I have somebody to call that has some responsibility to help me. They have been largely supportive so I don't want to leave super negative review. It's just that most of the issues so far have been due to various oversights on their side. I'll post a pic soon. Daniel

PM sent.

hmm, that does raise the risk of cavitation. I suppose so long as you are getting good oil pressure out of the pump then you are ok.

Awesome. You even caught him mid-shift, nicely timed .

Nice post. I'm definitely seeing the same drain back issue. I don't now yet if it will cause any issues for me, but I would certainly prefer the oil tank to stay full of oil. I assume you put the check valve between the high pressure pump and the engine? In my case that won't work because I'm using the factory oil pump (crank driven inside the engine) fed by the oil tank. I wonder if anyone makes a 0.1psi check valve? Daniel

Good to see another turbo! Congrats. Daniel

SP built my T-9. Hopefully it will be running soon so I can actually try it out! Daniel

It's difficult to see, but a keen eye may have noticed my oil pressure was 8bar in the picture! When I wired the ground I assumed the clutch switch wire would be grounded since I have no clutch switch. It turns out it was an open circuit. The good news is that Caterham ran the wires within an inch of where the clutch switch would go. All I had to do was pull back some electrical tape to expose the wires, connect them, and wrap it back up. Now my oil pressure and water temp sensors are properly grounded . Daniel

One more step closer! FYI, in case anyone needs this info in the future, the CEL is activated by ground. The only things that appear to be an issue are the horns which I believe are not grounded properly, and the fog light. I'm not sure if the fog light is wired on US cars, but the connector was there so I bought one and hooked it up, but no dice. Daniel

I'm almost there!!! I have only a handful of assembly steps left and most of the wiring is complete. The main engine harness is being made by a company in MI and should be at my house next week. It had to go through one loop of adjustments, but should be good to go now. The only remaining wiring is for the alternator, tach, and CEL. These all require the engine harness. From the attached pic you can see how gigantic the engine computer is (sitting on the pedal box). I had not planned well for such a large brick. I think GM must have gone out of their way to make it big. The harness is also big which is going to be a challenge to package neatly. I'll do what I can and plan on some future cleanup after it's running. I hooked the boost control solenoid up to the vacuum pump which is driven off the intake cam. This is a bit of an experiment to see if I can manage to pull the WG open at part load to help fuel economy (yeah, I know, wtf). It's super easy to undo if it doesn't prove fruitful and that would allow me to pull the pump. The pump came with the engine which was meant for the european market originally. I think the newer ecotecs in the US have this now too. I assume it's mostly to avoid a loss of brakes if the throttle sticks open. I realized today that the turbine housing was not tightened to the center housing of the turbo...DOH! Thankfully I had not added fluids yet so it just required pulling a few easy to remove parts. It also forced me to try removing some of the parts (water and oil lines mainly) without pulling the exhaust. This turned out to be helpful and I found a way to remove one of the turbo water lines with the turbo in the car (a feat I had previously concluded was impossible). As you can see the engine bay is full. I think I've managed to leave enough space between parts, but there is no excess space anywhere. When I started I knew this would become an issue, but I had a pleasant level of denial at the beginning. In the end I think I've successfully proven you can fit 10lbs of shit in a 5lb bag! With any luck next weekend will be fluids and cranking for the first time! Daniel

Those headlight brackets look like a short version of what goes on a CSR. The end that mounts to the chassis straddles the front upper A-arm mount. On the CSR this arm mount is outside the body. Looking at pictures of the S3/SV it looks like the upper mount is inside the body. So, if I were to guess you would have to cut some of the body to get the light mount to the A-arm mount. I think you need to look for a set that does as Skip has suggested. Daniel

It's good to see #334 (I think that's the number), and indeed it's a good choice. Now I have to wait to see #335. Let me know when #334 is up for sale .

A few more I missed: - Mounted the horns. If you have a keen eye you can see them in the 4th pic. I had to make some nuts to get these to attach to the mounts I bought (originally for other reasons). The mounts just look like a big p-clip basically, but are thicker (made of aluminum) - Installed crank pulley and dry sump mandrel/belt. No big drama here. I was just waiting until I was mostly confident the engine wouldn't need to come out again.

I finally have updates, and I'm happy to say the updates are significant. It's not running yet, but it's closer. I couldn't figure out how to order the photos in a useful way so I'll try to tell you which pic to look at. - Pedal box & throttle pedal (2 first pics): I made a spacer and a new cover (blue protective film still on the cover) for the pedal box. This was necessary to fit the DBW throttle pedal. I made the box out of channel aluminum, but of course I could not find the exact dimensions I wanted so I had to machine the part I had. It was originally 2x1x1/8" channel which is now 1-7/8x5/8x1/16" (ish). That was sort of a pain because I was dealing with a 3ft section which meant I had to machine it in sections. This was limited by the travel of the bed on the mill and the part would vibrate violently if I went far beyond the vice holding it. The spacer is two pieces (one U-shaped and the other straight) riveted together to make the full perimeter. The pedal itself is mounted to the main bolt that the clutch and brake pedal pivot on. There were two 3/8" spacers that Caterham conveniently used which have been replaced by the square looking parts next to the pedal. I made a plate that bolted to those square parts and to the pedal. Then was the challenge of attaching the two pedals which were now working in different planes. The GM DBW pedal moves through approximately 20° and from what I can tell most cars have a 2" travel of the throttle pedal. I figured out that this was achievable by just linking the two parts together as is thanks to the motion ratio on the Caterham pedal. The second picture tries to show you the linkage, but it's not a great view. Basically the link is made by welding two 3/8" rod-ends together to make a sort of offset turnbuckle (that is not adjustable). To link these rod-ends to each pedal a stud (really a cut bolt) was welded to each. - Wastegate & exhaust manifold (7th, 9th, and 10th pics): I ended up changing my mind on where to mount the WG. I had originally put the v-band under the turbo, but this created a bad angle between the main flow and the bypassed flow. It also created issues with other plumbing that needed the space which would have been consumed by the tube from the manifold to the WG. I moved the WG as it is shown here now. It's tucked right up next to the block as low as I could make it. This barely clears just about everything. The WG is difficult to package due to all the hoses that need to connect to it. There are four lines attached to it (other than the exhaust gas): boost, vacuum, water in, and water out. This makes the small size of the WG require a rather large packaging space. You can sort of see this in the dark picture. Once the WG was mounted to the down-pipe the rest was relatively easy. I had already cut some tubing that got me from the WG to the exhaust manifold. Unfortunately it was not possible to install the manifold with the long pipe welded to it (I tried it before welding). This meant I needed to add another v-band to the system which you can see nicely attached to the manifold. I still need to clean up some of the welds (internally) and add some heat shields, but it's largely done. - Air intake (8th and 11th pics): This turned out to be relatively easy, but had me worried for a long time. In the picture showing the compressor inlet you can see why, there is a large -16AN hose end right in front of the compressor. After some thought and testing a bunch of different fittings I discovered that I could reroute this large hose (this hose is the return line on the dry sump: important!) around the turbo by using a 90° fitting. This cleared the way for what you see in the other picture which is a partially completed inlet tube (next to the compressor outlet pipe). This was made by welding three bends together. In a later picture you can see a big empty space behind the oil tank. This is where the air filter will eventually go. I'll talk more about how this space became so empty later. - Turbo oil drain (6th, 12th, and 13th pics): I had not been looking forward to this for a long time. I knew it wasn't that difficult in principle, but figuring out the angles and making it work with the engine was just tricky. The stock system uses an o-ring joint with a hard tube that goes to the turbo. This is convenient for an OEM to assemble. The aftermarket has made adapters to AN fittings which is great if you have room for it. Unfortunately my engine mount goes right in front of this hole in the block. Fortunately the engine mount plate had a hole put in it for just this purpose, but it's not large enough to fit the 10AN fitting the aftermarket companies offer. My turbo is also very low so the tube needs to have tight bends at each end to maximize the angle of the straight-ish portion. On my millionth and one internet search I discovered that Cummins uses corrugated tubing with an o-ring joint on their turbo oil drains. They also have a variety of lengths for different applications! I bought one that I thought would be about the right length and a 6" piece of 3/4" tubing. I machined the tubing down until it barely slipped into the block. After machining in an o-ring grove two pieces were welded together at about 35-40°. The cummins part was not designed for a Garrett turbo so I had to open the holes a bit, but after that it was a matter of bending it and cutting to meet the steel tube. The end result is quite good. I can install the oil drain tube into the engine w/o removing the turbo or any other surrounding part. I very happy that I didn't have to remove the 1.5" water pipe that you can see in the pictures. It's possible, but a pain. Once the drain is in the block then the turbo side is just a challenge of getting your hand in the right place to tighten the bolt. The other happy byproduct of this is that when I disconnect the turbo from the exhaust manifold and this drain tube provides a slight support to hold the turbo. With the light addition of a bunjee cord around the center housing of the turbo it can hang from the chassis w/o issue. This is the only up side to the chassis tube that goes right over the turbo. - Oil tank (5th pic): This is the big one (for me at least). I knew it was physically possible to fit the oil tank behind the turbo, but I also know it was very tight and that there were really know straight surfaces to attach it to. After spending hours trying different orientations of the tank I came to the conclusion that it must move rearward. If I moved the tank up to clear the exhaust with the tank vertical then it hit the hood. If I moved it down then I had to tilt the tank in multiple directions to get it to fit. To move it rearward I had to cut a hole in the passenger footwell and move the battery. Moving the battery has the added benefit of making more room for the air filter which was originally planned to squeeze between the coolant overflow tank and the battery. Now I have space to make a nice box and put a naca duct in the hood. Of course figuring out where to put the battery is another story...two steps forward, one step back. Cutting the footwell wasn't terribly difficult. That portion of the footwell is all one piece so I wasn't cutting through riveted/sealed joints. I drilled some holes in an arc to help remove a chunk of material, but ultimately went to town with a rasp. The upper tank mount is actually inside the footwell, bolted to the front surface. The tank is pulled as far back as possible before the clamp starts interfering with the mounting bolts. The lower mount is also attached to the footwell, but on the outside. This surface has a 30° angle so I made some wedged shims for the inside and outside. The final result is good. There still isn't a great amount of clearance with the exhaust (or WG), but it's secure and should be ok with some heat shields. - Intercooler system (3rd and 4th pics): I bought a radiator from Bell Intercoolers and cut out the shroud to the radiator. It's a tight fit! The nose cone just barely touches the lower corners of the radiator now. I made sure to make the bottom of the radiator the cold side so hopefully my paint will survive. Then it was a matter of welding some 3/4" tubing to it and routing that around the engine radiator. Then it was just about connecting all the bits together. The pump is strapped to the vertical tube under the intercooler. The other things that were completed are: - Turbo oil feed (-4AN braided hose from block to turbo) - Turbo water cooling hoses (some factory lines combined with random hoses from autozone). The trickiest part was combining the turbo and WG water feed/return. To do this I made double banjo bolts (yes, they can be purchased but I didn't want to wait and it ended up being better to have a socket head cap strew instead of the typical hex head). - Fuel line from car to engine. This was harder than it should have been. It took way too long to figure out that the fitting on the engine was the same as what was on the car side (shocking really) which was an M14 inverted flair. Once I figured that out I bought a stock part for the car which on the CSR 260 is a crimped hose barb fitting with this inverted flair. Unfortunately the fitting that I got with this replacement part was slightly different from the one that came with my kit. The biggest issue is that it was smaller in diameter which would limit fuel flow. This is the last thing I need when trying to push >300hp. So, back to the internet where I found a Porsche shop that had a bunch of these fittings in different orientations. Apparently Porsche uses these a lot. So, I bought a 90° fitting and everything worked. The major to-do's remaining are: - Final install of turbo, oil tank, exhaust, etc. - Build firewall for oil tank - Build air box and finish intake tubing - Route crankcase vent tubing - Blow-off valve - Mount battery somewhere (next to steering shaft possibly?) Easy peasy Daniel

I'm not sure what to think about that '78 turbo. That's a lot of money in an old car which may not have added value and may have made it difficult to use on the street. I've driven a car with a multiplate clutch and super light flywheel on the street (albeit not a 7) and found it very unrewarding. On the other hand it has a turbo and I do like turbos. The work looks well done, but the engine bay is more busy than I would have like (now I go hid in a corner where the owner can't see mine). Does anyone have any idea what differential is in it? I would worry of ripping it apart if it hasn't been upgraded (assuming the '78 version was not so strong). Daniel

Is that true? I agree the external dimensions are the same (or similar), but I thought the chassis was much different to support the different suspension. Or by frame did you mean the body? Daniel

ooooh, an F40. For me that is where Ferrari peaked. Daniel

so what is #360?

I hope I never come to a situation where I find justification in selling a project I spent >1500hrs on and subsequently barely used.

Thanks!

cool!

Can you elaborate on the BAR? What did they do? I've heard mixed messages. Congrats! Daniel

I've never been a fan of clutch safety switches. I realize it may be emotionally driven, but the idea of putting axial thrust on the crank before there is oil to the thrust bearing doesn't sit well with me. I've disabled it on multiple cars for that reason. It also makes remote start easier if desired. Daniel

you know....turbos allow you to tune the power

where is the like button Daniel