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Engine Specific Info and Questions => IDI Engine => Topic started by: idgtd on March 15, 2009, 08:44:34 pm
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I finally got the turbocharger conversion done on my 1.6 NA rabbit. I used the factory manifolds and t3 for the conversion, and I am very pleased with the results. I installed the Spruce preturbo thermocouple and a boost gauge to keep track of things. The car was overfueled (pump was turned up by the PO) before and had a pretty smokey exhaust at WOT. Now, the exhaust is clear, EGTs peaked out at about 1280 F and she's making about 8 psi of boost. I'm happy with the performance for now so I think I'll wait until I get my Saab 900 intercooler installed before I add anymore fuel or boost. Anybody else got a 900 intercooler installed?
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Got any photos of the IC ? How about your conversion ?
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Thats awsome! Can't wait to see how this thing does for ya. Noticed any difference in fuel milage?
I recently finished an engine that i did a conversion on and can't wait to see how it does.
Keep us updated on its preformence
Heres mine waiting to go in
(http://i617.photobucket.com/albums/tt251/camboscams/02-04-09_1716.jpg)
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I'm charging my camera as we speak. The IC I'm going to use looks like this:
(http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt10/idgtd/turbo_cooler_saab.jpg)
I haven't run it enough to get any fuel economy numbers, but I'll keep track. I was getting about 45 - 50 mpg. The turbo makes a huge difference in performance with this car, but like I said, it was overfueled before. Now I have enough air to burn that extra fuel and then some. The exhaust is clear as can be once the turbo spools up. What did that intake manifold come off of?
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I don't remember what the intake came off of right this second...
Are you using the factory sandwhich oil cooler?
I would really like to see more of your intercooler setup (where did you get it, and where are you going to put it)
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I'm thinking about setting up the IC like the with A/C Callaway units.
(http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt10/idgtd/Mk1_ac.jpg)
And using a small unobtrusive scoop under the chin of the car to direct air through it.
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I'm surprised that the turbo/manifold will fit like that! I hope it wont require any big hammer time on the fire wall...
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my concern is the axle shaft, my axle is very close to the turbo with just a flipped stock turbo manifold, definitely not that low, good luck none the less
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I thought some of the aftermarket kits were set up like that, with an adapter on the factory dual downpipe manifold. Maybe not.
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A Saab 900 intercooler!
I saw a lot of those back in the day... 8)
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Yea that concerned me after i bolted it together, so i took some measurments everywhich way and then crawled under the car and it will have about an inch to two inches clearence to the firewall, might need a heat sheild :? . as for the axle shafts it clears them by a long shot.
(By the way this is going in a MK1 Rabbit)
I like that intercooler setup, where could those be aquired from??
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I flipped the manifold on my mk1 rabbit and the turbo is super close to the axle, but my turbo is lots closer to the block, having it farther away like yours might make it fit better.
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Well thats good to hear Truckinwagen.
BTW did'nt intend to hyjack your thread idgtd, my bad. :oops:
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Well thats good to hear Truckinwagen.
BTW did'nt intend to hyjack your thread idgtd, my bad. :oops:
It's all good, I've been out beating on the car anyway. Right now I'm working out my air filter situation. Currently, I just have a cheap cone filter on there, but I'm working on installing an airbox and filter from a VW gasser. I like the clean factory look and the fact that I can get filters anywhere. Also it kinda fits and I had it lying around.
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Well thats good to hear Truckinwagen.
BTW did'nt intend to hyjack your thread idgtd, my bad. :oops:
It's all good, I've been out beating on the car anyway. Right now I'm working out my air filter situation. Currently, I just have a cheap cone filter on there, but I'm working on installing an airbox and filter from a VW gasser. I like the clean factory look and the fact that I can get filters anywhere. Also it kinda fits and I had it lying around.
I like the factory look too, I just put the T/D from a 83 Jetta in my Rabbit and set it up the same way it was in the Jetta with the filter on the passenger fender. I had to cut the little snorkle on the end off & block the hole and made an outlet on the engine side, 2 in. pvc elbows and some 2 in. shop vac hose to a small scoop I put in the Grill. You can't see it at all and I find I use that dremel tool a lot nowadays. The problem is that the thing is loud even with the opening in the grill. I gotta figure out some kind of baffle or something because I just don't like the sound of it. When I took the motor out of the Jetta I didn't se anything on the end of the air filter box other than that snorkle which was only about 2 in. long, I wonder if they had something else on it from the factory because I can't imagine what that would sound like with nothing on it. :lol:
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The problem is that the thing is loud even with the opening in the grill.
As in turbo whine, or just engine noise?
That is also a hurdel i will have to jump here soon, is ironing out an intake system...
idgtd, you think you could provide us some pictures of your conversion, they might aid my project along as well?
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Ok, no laughing. This is still a work in progress.
(http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt10/idgtd/100_0031.jpg)
Really it's nothing special, just your run of the mill NA TD conversion.
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Pic looks good!
What type of turbo are you running?
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Factory VW Garrett T3. Right now I'm still waiting on my intercooler to come in. I'll post pics of that as it goes in.
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After running the Rabbit around for awhile with just the turbo elbow and a short (12") pipe to keep the soot out of the engine bay, I finally got my exhaust put on. I loved the shriek of the turbo, but the noise was pretty loud, so I ordered a Techtonics 2.25" exhaust with the Magnaflow straight through muffler. Now that it's on, I can't believe how quiet it is. Just a little turbo whistle in the backround. Almost too quiet. Maybe I should put a cutout in the downpipe. :twisted: Then I could have my cake and eat it too.
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After running the Rabbit around for awhile with just the turbo elbow and a short (12") pipe to keep the soot out of the engine bay, I finally got my exhaust put on. I loved the shriek of the turbo, but the noise was pretty loud, so I ordered a Techtonics 2.25" exhaust with the Magnaflow straight through muffler. Now that it's on, I can't believe how quiet it is. Just a little turbo whistle in the backround. Almost too quiet. Maybe I should put a cutout in the downpipe. :twisted: Then I could have my cake and eat it too.
I just did the same conversion on my Rabbit with the Magnaflow straight through oval type muffler {center inlet and outlet}, I was afraid it was going to be pretty loud too and it's twice as quiet as the N/A engine was. It's too quiet like you said and you can hear all the other little things that are better not heard :lol: PS. What have you seen as far as boost with your T3 and EGT's as well. When I put my everything rebuilt engine in with a Garret T3 Stage 1 turbo from MJM Turbos I haven't seen over 6 pounds of boost yet and the EGT's would climb to about 1350 with the stock T/D pump on it accelerating fairly had through the gears. I had to take the T/D pump off waiting to re-bush and seal it because it leaked and was hard to start, long cranking times but ran just perfect oherwise. I have way less power now with the N/A pump on it but the EGt's came down a good bit. I haven't messed with the wastegate actuator plumbing yet. I have a feeling though that the turbo might actualy be too big though. It is just a rebuilt T3 but with a what they call a stage 1 conversion to a larger compressor wheel, how much bigger I don't know but it is definately bigger just looking at it but I didn't get any specs on it .like a dumb ass when I ordered it.
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I just did the same conversion on my Rabbit with the Magnaflow straight through oval type muffler {center inlet and outlet}, I was afraid it was going to be pretty loud too and it's twice as quiet as the N/A engine was. It's too quiet like you said and you can hear all the other little things that are better not heard :lol: PS. What have you seen as far as boost with your T3 and EGT's as well. When I put my everything rebuilt engine in with a Garret T3 Stage 1 turbo from MJM Turbos I haven't seen over 6 pounds of boost yet and the EGT's would climb to about 1350 with the stock T/D pump on it accelerating fairly had through the gears. I had to take the T/D pump off waiting to re-bush and seal it because it leaked and was hard to start, long cranking times but ran just perfect oherwise. I have way less power now with the N/A pump on it but the EGt's came down a good bit. I haven't messed with the wastegate actuator plumbing yet. I have a feeling though that the turbo might actualy be too big though. It is just a rebuilt T3 but with a what they call a stage 1 conversion to a larger compressor wheel, how much bigger I don't know but it is definately bigger just looking at it but I didn't get any specs on it .like a dumb ass when I ordered it.
I'm running an NA pump that was turned up wayyy to far before I got the car. It has always smoked alot if you got into it, so I was just careful and pedaled it to the smoke limit. Now with the turbo, once the engine is wound up (over 2700) I have 9-10 psi of boost, and EGTs are about 1200. However, if you are cruising at say 60 in 5th and boot it, the EGTs will climb to about 1300 briefly before the turbo gets spooled up enough and then they drop. Thats mostly because I don't have the LDA to cut back the fuel when there isn't any boost.
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yikess 1300 LOL keep an eye on that thing.. all you need is for one day to look over and see 1500 and then as soon as you see the gauge... BANGG :( lol
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yikess 1300 LOL keep an eye on that thing.. all you need is for one day to look over and see 1500 and then as soon as you see the gauge... BANGG :( lol
Why do you say that? When it was an overfueled NA the EGTs were higher than 1300 for minutes at a time during climbs, and the engine has performed pretty well for over 120k miles like that for me, and many many miles before for the PO. VW states that the maximum turbine inlet temp for the TD is 820 C (~1500 F), so I'm pretty sure the NA engines can handle a brief transient (2-3 sec) of 1300F without issue.
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There is something that I forgot to mention in the original post. I had pulled the head to replace the head gasket and inspect the head when I did the turbo conversion. At first glance in looked good, just needed some cleaning up. But, I decided since the head had upteen hundred thousand miles on it, I should at least put new valve seals in and check the guides and stems. When I pulled the intake valves, I saw that they had about 1/4" of crud built up on back of the heads. So much that the first 1/3 of the valve lift wasn't doing much. I had noticed the car seemed down on power from when I first got it and up on smoke, but I figured that it was just its age catching up to it. So, if you have your high mileage head off, check the intake valves for deposits.
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Good Tip!! The engine i'm putting the turbo on is brand new, but when i started the rebuild the intake valves were, as you said, the first third of valve lift was just to get past the crud!
How many miles does the engine have on it before the turbo kit?----How many miles have you put on it with the turbo?
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Good Tip!! The engine i'm putting the turbo on is brand new, but when i started the rebuild the intake valves were, as you said, the first third of valve lift was just to get past the crud!
How many miles does the engine have on it before the turbo kit?----How many miles have you put on it with the turbo?
I'm not really sure how many miles the engine has. When I got the car, the odometer said 71k miles, but it was stuck and had been for awhile according to the PO. I ran the car for a good bit before I fixed the odo. It now reads 187k miles. The PO had also run the car out of oil at some point, and had to get another engine for it. They weren't sure, but they thought that the odo was replaced (since it didn't work at that point either) when then engine was replace with a "low mileage" pull. So, I know it has at least 190k, but unless the engine was brand new when it went in, probably much more. The chassis has ~350k. Right now I'm at about 600 miles with the turbo on it.
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yikess 1300 LOL keep an eye on that thing.. all you need is for one day to look over and see 1500 and then as soon as you see the gauge... BANGG :( lol
Why do you say that? When it was an overfueled NA the EGTs were higher than 1300 for minutes at a time during climbs, and the engine has performed pretty well for over 120k miles like that for me, and many many miles before for the PO. VW states that the maximum turbine inlet temp for the TD is 820 C (~1500 F), so I'm pretty sure the NA engines can handle a brief transient (2-3 sec) of 1300F without issue.
Yes i know they can handle up to 1400 max on the n/a's anything after that, and your in no-mans land. i dunno, i guess the risk of having a hole melt in your piston is a little more than I'd like to have happen. lol but still 1300 for minutes at a time, that's pushing it.. i think you guys got lucky? you are a blessed one :) lol
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I guess I'm just looking for something more confirmed than a feeling that it's too hot. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to toast my engine, but I hear different egt numbers quoted all the time in different circles and I wonder where they come from. The only official one I've seen is the number for the TDs. Other people have told me that over 1200F is instant death for the NAs, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Hell, on my engine the head and pistons showed no signs of heat distress or pitting when I had it apart. Maybe someone that had a heat related failure at 1300F will pipe up here and give some insight. Either way, once the engine is wound up it drops to 1150 - 1200F, so I'm just careful with the fun pedal at lower engine speeds.
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That's amazing you are running those EGTs without oil jets for the pistons or an IC. Yet congrats on the extra boost + hp. As mentioned before though, I'd play it safe until you get that IC.
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yea, i think its about time to do an EGT gauge now. never had much smoke before, but then again, never had a turbo pump before. i can take off from a stop sign, floor it and start grabbing gears. if the tires dont break loose, it fills the intersection with smoke. i can even burp the throttle and get it to smoke now. kinda weird tho, boost doesnt seem to come on as quick. but when it comes on, it really comes on. once it hits 10 psi is when it really puts you back in your seat. maybe thats about when the LDA kicks in? also, did the governor mod, but im honestly not that impressed by it. sure it gives me full fuel, but the extra PRMs are pretty useless i think. it doesnt pull that hard past a certain point, then you grab another gear and it keeps pulling.
i really want to find someone around with another TD rabbit that i can race.
Hey josh, feel like drag racin the spearco truck again?
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Just noticed this was back up again so time for an update. I've got a few thousand miles on the conversion, so far so good. Runs like it always did, just faster. Fuel economy is down a little, dropped maybe 2mpg. Still, totally worth it. Still working on my IC install, but it's coming along. It's funny how the EGT's behave with different cruising speeds. Flooring it at 60mph causes the egts to climb rapidly as noted before. Flooring it from 65, the behavior is totally different since the turbo is spooled up a little more already. Egt's only get to 1200 then before they start dropping. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the conversion. I'll keep updating this as the miles rack up.
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And time for another update. I've put another couple thousand miles on the car. Everything is still working fine. I have a funny boost issue to sort out though. If you get into it on a long straight, and hold it down, the boost will rise to the factory maximum (~10psi) and stay there for awhile as the revs climb. Then at some point, the boost starts to creep up again and will max out at 14psi. It's kind of like the wastegate is opening, but not all the way so eventually it gets overwhelmed by the exhaust flow. Anybody else had this happen?
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My pc at home is not working right now so I can't post pics. But if you click on my profile and then show post you will see how I used a blackstone intercooler on my Rabbit.
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Time for another update. The rabbit is still running like a champ. I figured out the wastegate issue as well. The wastegate valve was stuck slightly open at 0 psi. It would move a little as the pressure on the actuator came up, and then it would stick again, never opening fully. Now that it is freed up my boost is nice and level. I've also finished my intercooler install. I decided against the using the Saab IC, and instead did an AWIC with a large heat exchanger in front of the radiator and A/C condenser. The IC works great! Egt's have dropped to 1000 while on boost, but I still need to get some thermocouples and actually measure the efficiency of the unit.