It begins....

I'm running an 18" Magnaflow rear muffler, X pipe and these headers. I'll try to get some video up next week.

Thought you guys would be interested in this. Here's my dyno sheet, latest numbers are in blue, numbers I had last year are in red. Peak for the blue line is 398rwhp and 372 torque, red was 358rwhp and 351 torque. Two years ago the car made 372rwhp, it wasn't running right all of last year.

To make more power I'd have to swap out cams and heads, so I'm sticking with what I have unless something happens to the heads or head gasket.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Doc,congrats, those are some nice numbers for your car.LS1 correct?

Yep, 2002 LS1 motor. I'm at the power limit of my cam, to gain more power I'd have to go to a different cam and a set of ported 243 heads. With those I'd probably get up to 440-450rwhp.

Hey Doc, what cam are you using? Impressive numbers!

It's an EPS cam that PatG spec'ed for me. 226/230 cam, with a I think a 111 +4 LSA, I'll have to go look at the cam card.

Heard from Cervelli just now, the car is done! He deleted the torsion bars, installed the Elephant Racing spherical bearings and rear trailing arm bearings, did a corner weigh/balance/alignment and installed the NA 5th gear.

Will be picking the car up this Sunday, should be a sunny 60* day, can't wait!

Roads are clear and dry, going to be picking it up tomorrow morning!

For the first time in 6 months, the car is resting in my garage, woot!

It's running exceptionally well, the additional power/torque gains are very noticeable. Engine is very eager, revs extremely quickly and pulls effortlessly. The exhaust note is intoxicating.

I installed a NA 944 "tall" 5th gear and was worried there would be a big "hole" shifting from 4th to 5th, but you can't even notice it. The revs drop more than before, but the motor has so much grunt now that it easily pulls the taller 5th gear. I've kept my short 5th gear in case I decide I need to reinstall it, but I doubt I will.

I have a few niggly things to chase down, the entire car got rewired and none of my center console switches or the radio are working, I need to check the clip on the heater flap control, have the AC checked out and ground the 914 drivers headlight as they cycle non stop. Plus I need to get some SFI padding on rollbar and figure out how to get the stock seat belt receptacles to play nicely with my new recaro spg xl seats.

2 more months before my 1st track event, so plenty of time to shake out the car and get everything attended to.

I'll try to post some video of the exhaust note, it's epic!

Good stuff, Doc. Glad you're happy.

I did some calculations a while back on changing 5th gears. Assuming a 6800 RPM red line with the 3.38 final drive of the turbo trans and a .73 n/a 5th gear, you have a theoretical top speed of 205 MPH requiring 420 RWHP to get there. Maybe you need to schdule a trip out to the salt flats.

Rich

Oddly enough the salt flat were one of the reasons why I went with the Quick Time bell housing. They require a scatter shield to run on the flats and the QuickTime has one built in...

I'd like to head out there at some point, it's not too far from me...

docwyte wrote:Oddly enough the salt flat were one of the reasons why I went with the Quick Time bell housing. They require a scatter shield to run on the flats and the QuickTime has one built in...

I'd like to head out there at some point, it's not too far from me...

Rich L. wrote:you have a theoretical top speed of 205 MPH requiring 420 RWHP to get there. Maybe you need to schedule a trip out to the salt flats.

420 RWHP seems a bit low. A lot more research may be in order before you target a top speed...folks doing these attempts know the non-linear equations required.

Here's a great article from our well know friend of Rennlist.

Intro..."You can hear Carl testing the limits of available traction 3 times as he pushes into the throttle until the tires break, then modulates and pushes in again. There is no lifting out of the throttle at these speeds unless you want to go 'round! Final speed attained for the world 928 record was 216.63537 MPH"

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Here's the highly respected website where I found the video and a great write up (though 1st person usage switches to 3rd person towards the end of the article):

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Rich L. wrote:Good stuff, Doc. Glad you're happy.

I did some calculations a while back on changing 5th gears. Assuming a 6800 RPM red line with the 3.38 final drive of the turbo trans and a .73 n/a 5th gear, you have a theoretical top speed of 205 MPH requiring 420 RWHP to get there. Maybe you need to schdule a trip out to the salt flats.

Rich

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Cd for the 944 turbo is .35
frontal area is 20.3 sqft
HP for 205 mph - 519

Thanks...very helpful...
Per carl:
Final Results
Horsepower: 760 at the tire, 900 at the engine; Torque: 701 at the tire, 825 at the engine.

519hp at the crank? So you'd need around 450+ at the wheels then. Of course the surface itself sucks up a bunch of power, anyone watch the Top Gear episode where they were at the salt flats. Clarkson was there in a ZR1 Corvette (638hp) and he struggled to get to 175mph...

So I've pretty much stamped out all the little niggles. I replaced the missing bushing and clip on the heater flap rod and now my car isn't trying to turn itself into a sauna. Got the 914 drivers side headlight motor wiring all figured out, dash lights are working, put new street tires on. Need to have the shop pop off one rear tire and rotate it on the wheel and rebalance though, the way it's set now requires a lot of weight and is making the car shudder.

Last up is to have the AC system leak checked and charged. Here's the way the car looks with the new vinyl we put on yesterday.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Well, did some clean up this off season, went to two electric fans so I can have a low/high setup with over run.

Also changed the routing of my PCV system, as I'd been blowing smoke on decel and I thought I might be scavenging too well. Once I capped the valve cover vents I immediately blew the dipstick out of the block. Uh oh, positive crankcase pressure...  

Leakdowns showed 10-15% on all cylinders, so no broken ring lands or cracked cylinder walls, but general wear.  Motor has around 75k miles on it now and 3 track seasons. I looked around at rebuilding mine, but it was literally cheaper to buy a built motor.

I ended up ordering one from Thompson Motorsports, went with forged rods/pistons, everything balanced/blueprinted, then stepped up to a set of their CNC ported 243 heads.   

Hopefully get the motor back from them in another week or so, then break it in and get it on the dyno the week after. Looking for around 450rwhp...

Sorry to hear about the old motor, hope I"m not heading down the same road.

wow... just what you needed, more power! Sounds fun

Motor ships today! Shop said they've seen as much as 470rwhp from this motor, depending on intake/exhaust configuration. Woot!

I've also gotten everything I need to install the Boxster/996 ABS system. That's going in as well.

It's taken a long time and many changes, but the car is really beginning to evolve...

Doc, are you still running the single fan with your rad or did you end up going dual?

Ended up going with dual 11" electric fans. With the single fan you lose the "hi speed" for A/C as well as a low speed over run fan for when you've parked the car and turned it off.

With both fans blowing on hi speed I've got 3600 cfm now too, so that should help.

Doc, I was looking at the dual Spal setup with the shroud, haven't measured to see if it will fit though. Are you using just two individuals? My car has no a/c but seems like I would get much better control with two smaller fans. I considered adding a controller in so the single fan can be run at low speed also, but adds a lot of complexity to the circuit.

I really just need to see how the car handles the hot weather and traffic, just thinking ahead though!

No shroud on mine, just the fans. Having the radiator open on the back helps cooling on track. On the street my temps were fine with the single fan, I had the PCM control it, hi speed only, coming on at 190F

Things are moving along. Old ABS pump and ECU are removed, wiring is basically done for the Boxster ABS setup and then we'll mount and plumb it. -10 AN fittings have been added to the both valve covers, plus some for a crossover tube between the two, from there a -10 will go down to a catch can that'll vent to atmosphere. The other catch can will collect from the LS6 valley cover.

Motor should be going in today, we've gone with 50# injectors to add some head room as well as a Katech tensioner setup to get rid of the failure prone factory one.

Hopefully have this thing fired and breaking in on the dyno this Friday/Saturday.