I figured you guys could help me out. Unfortunately I do not own a third gen at this time...since my '83 was hit on Deer Park Ave while I was stopped at a red light. Well here is my new car..until I find a nice GTA, 4th gen, or a TTA. 2.3L Turbo Tbird...auto totally stock. Has 120k miles on the engine..but the car was babied...I know the previous owner. I want to first rebuild the engine...or put a new 4cylinder in. Give me some suggestions on what to do with her. Here is a pic.

James
Jims83TA/Jims88TC

Here is a pic of my Tbird:

 

I was thinking of getting a turbocoupe but just couldn't buy a blue oval car

Check out these sites they are very helpfull stangnet turboford

Nice car and good luck modding.

 

First get a boost controller. Since this is old school turbo tech you can get the manual adjustment style for around $30. The boost is probably at 10. I dont know if the TC's had the 'premium switch' that would set boost at 14 like the SVO's. Raise the boost to 14psi and install a gillis or bosch bypass valve. Dont worry the engine can take it (even with 120k miles) it comes with foarged internals and a 8:1 CR. Then work on your flow. Do a cold air induction with the 3" K&N cone filter. Also do 3" downpipe and 3" exhaust. Look for a set of E6 manifolds. If you can port everything (manifolds, intake, heads) then there is more free horsepower. Next on order would be a cam upgrade (cam was a real bottleneck on 2.3T's) and a large VAM. I dont know if your TC is a LA2 or a LA3 ECU but both of them are good ECU's that can take you to the 12's with some tuning. Check the injectors, if they are green then they are 30#, if they are brown they are 35#. You want the brown tops. Also look for a Volvo 740 front mount intercooler. They match the flow of the engine good and a front mount is cooler then the top mount. If you want to get crazy into tuning you'll need a Ford EEC-IV tuner. They are expensive so find someone locally who has one and try to rent it. You can get your TC into the 13's for under $1000. Read up on www.turboford.com

 

my brother has one..

he's done boost controller, t3 turbo, custom header, intercooler from a grand national, and cold air intake..

he goes on one of the turbo bird websites...

 

If it's an '88 then I'd start by upgrading the turbo, the little IHI RHB5 just sucks.

Depending on the deal you find and what you want out of the car, you could go with an earlier T3 (the manual tranny cars use a larger turbine side which will spool slower but breath more). The 60trim T3 is good into the low 300 hp range. If you want just a little more you can get it built with a GN wheel which should be good into the mid 300hp range, or a hybrid for more then that. You may want to look into trying a Holset HY35W (off of a '99 or so cummins dodge auto). The HY35 is basically an HX35 compressor like is used on the rest of the cummins but with a smaller turbine. Nice thing is that they use exactly the same manifold side flange, and can usually be had fairly cheap. Another nice thing about them is that they're good for up to around 540hp with over 22psi boost. The bad thing about them is that they won't spool that fast so you'll need a bigger converter to get good performance with it. An HX30 (the next step smaller) would be a better match for most, tops out at about 485 hp and uses the same flange, but I don't know of any stock applications that you can get one off of easily.

Big downpipes/ported manifolds are nice. If you can get rid of the converter and run a straight through muffler you'll pick up a lot more responsiveness then you will on an NA car. For that matter, anything that will get you more flow after the turbo will help it spool faster. There's lots of ways of getting more boost out of them, ranging from using a boost controller, to putting a restriction and a bleed in the wastegate line to cutting the wastegate actuator and threading the shaft so that you can adjust it's length like the GN guys do.

Man do I miss my Cougar XR7.