My car has been down at TRZ Racecars for 3 months now, we finally started building the headers yesterday.

We're using 321 stainless steel, 1 7/8" primary diameters, .065" thick (16 gauge). We had the header flanges custom CNC machined from 7/16" thick 321 stainless bar stock. The tubes are just tacked into place right now. We're going to finish up both sides today, and then Tom well finish TIG welding them on the bench where he can Argon back-gas the 321 stainless tube to prevent the welds from sugaring up inside. So the PT-52's whould be mounted in place by early next week.

 

Well I have to say it looks pretty damn good for now bud. keep us posted all of us in the middle of these projects, I still think Guido has the edge though....


Sean

 

Lookin' good!

Andris Skulte
Z28tt - 89 IROC T56 DFI Twin Turbo
Dart Little M 400 buildup in progress - AFR 210's, Callies Dragonslayer crank, some kind of rods and pistons

 

Here are some shots from today. The headers are basically done, with the exception of fully TIG welding all the joints, they're just tacked right now. The #6 tube needs to be tacked into place, and a straight piece needs to be added onto the #5 tube.

I looks like I'll have the car back next weekend or early the following week.

 

do u think the strenght of the header will be strong enuff. becuz 16 gauge ss is kinda on the thin side. becuz at skool the 16 gauge steel we have is thin as hell and even with a 1/16 tungstang on the tig torches we have the stuff doesnt weld right. but then again you or who evers welding it might know few better things then i do. since ive only been welding for the past 3-4 yrs. but those r lookn good. cant wait to see the hole engine dun.

 

16 gauge 321 stainless steel is the best material selection for custom tubular headers, with the exception of Inconel (but that's too expensive for anyone other than the CART teams. Alot of off-the-shelf headers are made from mild steel which doesn't have the high heat tolerance and strength of 321 stainless. It's welded using 347 stainless filler rod. Tom at TRZ told me he's been building headers for 20 years and this is only the second set he made using 321, the other set was for NMCA/NSCA and NMRA racer Chuck Samuels. The materials for the headers alone cost $3000, but they'll last forever. A

The weight of the turbo doesn't rest on the headers anyway. We're going to fabricate a pair of brackets that bolts to each cylinder head and the turbo housing. Even the best material will sag over time due to the high heat.

 

yea i think with his 20 yrs over my 4 yrs he should know his ****. how much hp u lookin out of that thing?

 

My setup is nearly identical to John Meaney's 1300hp TT Vette that was in the January PHR, except I am running a SBC 427 vs. John's SBC 400. Also, he used a cast aluminum 18* intake manifold, I have a custom Hogan's aluminum sheetmetal intake. I'm looking for around 1200-1300. We'll see in a month or so when we put it on the dyno. It'll be a pump gas engine, so whatever it can make while still leaving a margin of safety against detonation.

 

If the 16ga SS isn't welding correctly, something is probably wrong with the preparation. Are you backpurging with Argon? If not, you won't get good fusion on the backside. Are you welding everything with a tight, perfect fit, or do you have gaps? Make sure your tungsten is super sharp, with a straight angle (probably 15-30 degree angle) You shouldn't need anything exotic for 16ga, but for super thin stuf (beer cans), a pulser is pretty handy.

 

The header are merely tacked right now, they'll be fully TIG welded in an Argon filled chamber to prevent sugering inside the tubes and to provide the best possible welds. The guy building them for me has been doing them for 20 years, his shop is one of the better know chassis/fabrication shops for the NMCA/NSCA and NMRA racers. There are 3 other cars in his shop rght now getting custom turbo setups. Most of them are big singles though, 108mm and stuff. Tom, the owner of TRZ, actually got his start way back when with some influence form the Indy car scene. He has built turbo headers in the past, when those cars were running turbo's, and they would first design the turbo's with CAD to ensure the the optimal primary diamter, length, and length equality.

As you can see from the close up pics, the tubes are cut square, and none of the corners are cheated. There are no gaps between the tubes, that would allow the 347 filler rod to produce 'slag' inside the tubng, reducing it's diameter and hindering flow. These are professionally made headers, not soemthing just pieced together by someone who doesn't know how to build headers or weld. After they are finish welded, the headers will be put in a burnishing machine that not only polishes the 321 stainless to a chrome like luster, but it also acts as a mild 'Extrude hone' by smothing out any tiny amount of 'slag' or filler material that doe make it inside the tube. The inside of the tube will ahve the same 'roll of coins' appearance as the outer weld beads.

Here's a pic I took which kinda shows how the turbo's will be located, very similar to how John Meaney had his made...

 

is that the mack daddy TPIS mono blade? was thinking about this intake on my project like yours (half the HP too).

 

Yeah, that's the TPIS Monoblade. I've been running it for abou a year. When the SBC 427 was normally aspirated, I was able to get enough air through it to make 650hp on the dyno. That makes sense, since it is rated for 1300cfm (2cfm/hp). It takes an LT1 TPS sensor, by the way. It took me several trips to the auto parts store, and a couple fo calls to TPIS. You'd think TPIS would know what TPS goes with their own product...

 

Those are looking really nice Monty!

You are getting what you paid for. That is for sure.

 

We're mounting the turbo's this evening, here's a shot from earlier this afternoon where we were mocking up the right side turbo location. Looks like we'll be done this weekend, finally...



Here's a closeup of the completed rightside header. The left side is done as well.

 

Absolutely beautiful. Reminds me of Steve's Project Insane Asylum. http://www.stevenkamis.com/cars

 

If you look at Monty's site his dyno sheet had 650hp and 580 lb ft of torque, so he has 550 hp to go.

No slam intended but Monty is in the process of having 1200 hp built.

 

I've just wet my pants...

 

Purdy!! Some day when I win the lottery.

 

That dyno sheet is from my pump-gas, normally-aspirated SBC 427. That was a good street engine, if you look at the torque curve, it made 500+ ft lbs from 3000 to almost 7000 rpm. That sucker pulled everywhere, and it was totally streetable.

I'm hoping to get 1200hp with the TT setup, and if I do everything right, I think it's a good possibility. But if I don't meet it, I think it will still have been a good project. I'm fairly confident that 1000+hp and around 900 ft lbs is possible on pump gas. It's really just a matter of octane.

 

Out of curiosity, how long will an engine like this last (year or two?)

 

Is this thing gonna be streetable?

 

Thats the beauty of turbocharging. when you want the power, you step on the pedal, when you want a little more than that you click the boost controller up a few notches (to a tested boost level for the applictation) and you have it. any other time the car cruises along at its normally aspirated self. The locla kids here have some really wicked rides and 800-1200 hp running around on the streets. just turn the boost down for the street.


Sean

 

Any pics/dyno/quarter mile times sheet of the rides? Are we talking 2 cars have this much power or 200? You imply that a good chunk of street cars are making his power.

That means there are alot of street cars running 8-10 second 1/4 mile times.

 

I thought he was looking to do the 1200 "RW" HP (sae) thing but either way looks like he's on the right track.

 

I apologise, I did not mean there are third gens in the local area, I live in Japan, and I was refereing to the abundance of the turbocharged cars in this area. Local cars include Skyline GT-R's Mazda RX-7's and Toyota Supra's I work at a little shop in the local area that builds RX-7's for street racing. We do not have a 1/4 mile track on Okinawa so I cannot give you track times, the best I can give you are 150meter times. 1992 Mazda RX-7 from our shop running a Garret T-67, Electromotive computer, and a set of Mickey Thompson E/T drags netted a 6.23 run with a 1.69 60' .417 reaction time. GT-R class that day running a T-88 34d turbo, and Nitto 555R extreme drags ran a 5.54 1.5 60' with .426 reaction time. I am using a lot of what I have learned on the japanese street scene in my ride. Watching a RX-7 rotary engine produce close to 550 hp from a 1.3 liter (theoretically) is pretty amazing. Adapting some of the turbo ethics and boost usage techniques has helped me to the level of knowledge I have now. The rest will come from trial and error here. Getting the power out of the engines is not that hard honestly, getting them to hold together under full race conditions, thats a different story. One other thing ot add is that our "pump gas" in japan for premium is 104-116 octane which really helps running the higher boost levels.

Sean

 

This is the RX-7 I was mentioning

 

This is the RX-7 we are currewntly building...

Turbonetics Custom turbo
1992 Mazda Cosmos 20b (3 rotor not available in the US)
Electormotive TEC II engine management
6 1600cc/min injectors (160 lbs for you domestic guys)
BBK 58mm throttle body on custom sheet metal intake
Twin Aeromotive fuel pumps
Custom stainless steel exhaust manifold
Current engine is bone stock internals with 38,000 miles on it, should be in the 700hp range when complete, the engine is only in for test and tune of the electromotive system, as soon as tuning has been figured out the engine gets pulled and another "ported" engine gets installed. I know you all do not have a lot of knowledge on the rotoary and what a ported engine is, but it should be laying down close to 1200 hp when the race engine is installed, and yes, this will be streetable, and street legal....


Sean

 

when ever guys talk crap about late model RX7's I always tell them that the 3 rotor japanese one is the mack daddy! I have been told by a few that there was no such motor. HA!-there it is, eh! as far as high powered street cars, there are probably less than 20 making that kind of power or more here in the front range area of the rockys (colorado) and only one in wyoming that are actually driven around and meet street legal or "king street" specifications. definitely far from a large chunk.

 

Some more good progress in the last couple of days, but still not done.

Both turbo's are mounted, both down pipes are made, headers are completely done. Now it's just the rest of the exhaust, wastegates, intercooler, and secondary brackets, shielding, etc. Probably won't be done till middle of next week.



Here's a mockup of the left downpipe.


And a mockup of the right downpipe. I had to leave before he could tack them into place.

 

Where are you going to put the IC? right up there in front of the Radiator?

BW

 

lookn good!!!

 

Since Japan was in you location profile, I figured that there wasn't too many Camaros over there.

I have a 2800 pound car with ~500 hp at the crank. This is at 5800' elevation

The car has run

- 1.53 60'
- 4.48 330'
- 6.98 660'

150 m = 492'

As for your Japanese 116 octane gas, what is the metric to english conversion for octane???

 

Yeah, the intercooler goes in front of the radiator. We fabbed some new brackets to mount and relocate the radiator to move it about 2" lower, and tilted about an 1" back. This will allow us to mount the IC in front of the radiator without interfering with the operation of the hood. We're starting with a 20" x 16" x 3.5" Spearco (1500cfm) core, so wiwhen the end tanks get fabbed, the intercooler will be about the same size as the radiator.

 

That''s outstanding Monty, I love to see people making progress. Looks damn good.

 

I do too!! Namely myself.

Been busy with school 4 nights a week and car still sitting at cage guys house. Although that is almost done and looking SUPERB!!

Looking VERY good monty!
Those guys do some great work. Thats for sure.

 

Hey Monty have I told you lately that I hate you . Looks great.

Since you lowered the radiator make sure you have something to fill that space and best would be to form some sort of seal between the hood and the radiator, otherwise a lot of air will flow up and over the radiator instead of through it when the car is moving, losing a lot of cooling potential.

 

rhuarc30, You've got 4 hot cars, what are you talking about!

That's a good point, and since I see you've also got a C3, I know you know what you're talking about. Since out cars cooling systems are borderline as is, that's definitely soemthing I've been thinking about. I've got the Spal dual 11" fans behind my BeCool aluminum radiator, that helps alot, but I am concerned about the radiaot sealing you're talking about. What I've been thinking about doing is building an aluminum sheetmetal air dam/duct that route the air from the air dam beneath the bumper through the radiator and intercooler. I have to replace my urethane front bumper cover anyway, it's wavy and has some superficial cranks in it. So I'll have access to the that area. There's just so much going on in that area with the pop-up headlights, vacuum reservoir, front braces, etc. The front-tilt hood is a real challenge in this situation.

 

Hey Monty,
Aren't you worried about the Be Cool being able to keep the 1200 hp under raps. I don't know how much bigger your Be Cool is that mine but I know that I don't trust mine with my application. Mine gave me a couple of scares when I was turning the 550 mark. I'm moving on to Griffin now. Ofcourse to keep 1000 hp under raps the price of the system is quite a bit more than my Be Cool was too. Just Curious if you were planning on upgrading.

 

I was told by BeCool that with my electrc fan setup and the radiator that I have, that I'm good to 600ci and/or 1000hp. The thing about turbo engines is that when they are not undoer load, there's no boost, so the engine acts mild since the CR and cam are mild. The engine will actually run cooler than a 600hp SBC in normal operating conditions. The reality is that at full throtte, full boost, you're going to be going so fast that you'll run out of room before the engine temp rises noticeably. I'm gonna push this motor hard on the dyno, to get a good peak hp and tq reading, and then de-tune it to run on the street.

 

Cool, just curious what your thoughts were on it. Let me know if you have any problems with it if you don't mind. That would save me a little money if I could just run my Be Cool.

 

wow! this car is gonna be really nasty.
i really thinnk you will love the PT 52's,
im running one on my syclone.
similar to the 51 except more efficient at higher boost.
even at 19lbs, my 52 seems to be just warming up.

be careful not to cook your brakes with the driverside downpipe.
id hate to hear you lost your car on a test drive. good luck with the custom build. it looks really good.

e

 

Thanks Sy2449. I'm probably going to build a heat shield for the master cylinder and maybe thermal coat the MC as well. The downpipes are getting thermal coated too. I expect it will take me a while before I work all the bugs out and get the heat under control.

 

Here's a couple more shots from today. I didn't get pics of it because I ran out of space on my MemoryStick, but the exhaust is done and the wastegates are mounted. The only thing left to do is the intercooler and cold air plumbing, and the support brackets for the turbo's. The new Spearco core was supposed to come today, overnight UPS. Figures that the car will be done this weekend and I've got "honey do's" all weekend...




We also put a v-band at the downpipe, exhaust pipe flange. If the turbo's are as effective at silencing the exhaust as everyone tells me, I may just no run the exaust past the downpipe, or I may make a little turn out pipe myself when I get the car back.

 

im just curious.....

most of what i hear on a PT52, is that it will support a maximum of 600hp. i know there is a lot more to consider than just a silly hp number from PTE's web page, but dont you think if your goal is 1,200 hp you should have used a more aggressive compressor wheel? im just wondering if when flowing that much air the 52 will be out side of its efficiency range, or close to it. either way, i think even at 1000 hp your car is gonna rock. still looking good! im jealouse.

also, if those are .81 exhaust sides, your car is gonna be loud. id recomend mufflers with a dump at the base of the downpipe. that way you could cruise the neighborhood, and run the strip.

e

 

Hey Monty, did you change your steering shaft location with the universals or is that the way it is? If you did change it could you send me some info on the parts you used. I'm changing mine out to the manual rack and I'm thinking for 3" down tubes I'm gonna have to move my steering shaft. Thanks

Dave

 

buy a k member, you shouldn't have to go to a manual rack to do it

 

Sy449,

That's what I hear about the PT-52's as well. I based my selection on what I've seen used on other twin turbo SBC 400+ and on the recommendations from Harry at PTE and Jeff at Fast Times. Jeff and I called PTE back in December and told Harry what I wanted to do and he recommended the 52's.

The underlying theme on my engine build has been to maximize efficiency. I'm told that the 60-1 is a very efficient compressor, that should provide me with the necessary boost while not producing excessive intake temps. If it doesn't perform the way I want, I can always swap turbo's or just individual housings and wheels to tailor it.

I think you're probably right, I probably will only make around 1000 or so on pump gas, but really, even that's rpetty excessive for the street. I'll be using an HKS wastegate controller to limit boost on the street.

The exhaust housing is .85, but I don't really know how loud it'll be. I'm concerned about the exhaust because I live in a very conservative community, but they keep telling me it's not going to be loud. This is my first turbo car/engine, so all of that kinda stuff is yet to be seen for me.

Lil Qik,

That steering shaft and universal is part of a retrofit rack and pinion steering system (Steeroids). The shafts and universals are from Flaming River - they make some nice components.

 

understatement of the year from mr monty about park ridge...LOL

hey when you get this thing back i cant wait to see it

 

89Procharged,

What part of town are you from? I'm not a native Chicagoan, I've only lived here about 4 years.

 

i live in chicago, near o'hare. i live right off of the kennedy expressway (I90) at the austin exit

my g/f used to live in Park Ridge by oakton and greenwood

i'd love to see your ride one day just stop by to shoot the **** and tell you what i'm doing

later

email me privately if you want to talk more