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Intercooling!

Originally I thought the intercooler would be a quick and cheap project I could simply throw money at.. I was wrong. The sizes I could find were either too small or too large. The issue of exits being incorrectly placed was not a major issue.. So what was?

I wanted the intercooler to be placed in front of the radiator but also not block any more surface area with end tanks than needed. The solution? I turned to CAD- Cardboard aided design! I used the dimensions of a Garrett intercooler core and worked out how big I could make the end tanks to fit.

The CAD model was perfect and I was able to remove the pieces and lay them out in some 1.8″ 5052 Alumunium. After some cutting and tacking we had a pretty great looking intercooler! I fired up the Primeweld 225 and went to town. Things were going very well!

Until the pressure test… After several attempts to find the leak I kept on chasing an area between the core and the end tank. I would grind it down and reweld it a few times. Eventually I got frustrated and took it to a radiator repair place and they verified what I couldn’t believe- the core was leaking but in an area that would require the end tanks cut off and welded. After talking to the company I bought the core from they told me that Garrett was not being helpful and “they were truly sorry.” I won’t buy anything from Garrett again and had to cut off the tank, fix the core and then weld it again. Visually it doesn’t look as good as it did originally and I am going to hold a grudge on this one!

The end result should work well. The end tanks do not block the radiator and it appears to work well. One more project in the books!

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Turbo Time!

From the beginning I knew I wanted to turbocharge the 7. I started looking online and bought all the pieces from Ace Race Parts and started cutting, chopping and grinding to get a manifold together. Initially I had the manifold pictured but landed up replacing it with one that accepted round tubes directly.

Above shows where we started but the finished manifold is seen below.

I got some great tips from my friend Jim and should have used a bigger cup. Lesson for next time! I did backpurge the manifold and the inside loops perfect! You can see the wastegate flange off the side. It isn’t optimal but they are oversized to do what they can about the gases.

Pictured is the GT3076 Garrett turbo charger. It wouldn’t fit inside the body work very well so I opted to put it outside the bodywork.

The Precision 46mm gate was picked to keep tabs on the gases. I considered the ebay generics which are substantially cheaper but opted to “buy once and cry once”after the intake manifold situation.

Thanks to Jim I got my welds to look much better. Flexible bellows were installed on the downpipe and the wastegate tube that merged back into it.

Above is the finished exhaust. The muffler tip was cut back further but all in all it sounds great and looks great in person. Up next the intake piping and intercooler work

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Turbocharger Arrived

Turbocharger Arrived this week and I quickly mounted it in a mock up fashion.  Finding the size nuts and bolts for it is proving it be a royal pain in the ass.

It is a used unit from a junk yard off a stock motor which should be good enough for mock ups and to get things rolling.  The air exit pipe actually fits in a good spot. Hopefully it will stay within the body lines.

 

Missing the factory heat shield but  can make one fairly easily.  If anyone knows the nut size or part number for the turbo please let me know. 

The turbo came with 1 oil pipe but  the other is missing and will need to be bought.

The turbo mounts further out then I would like but hopefully it will work.

Water lines need to be made/purchased. Unfortunately without using the stock radiator and coolant tank it may be another custom effort

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Turbo Time!

For the first 5-10 miles the car was “fast enough” but quickly it I adapted and wanted more power.

Note the 3 core radiator, ducting and new coolant overflow tank,

I bought several turbo chargers with the intention of matching one to the car. The consideration was not only size for power but also footprint for fitting under the hood.  One problem I have had was an incredible amount of heat that builds up in the transmission tunnel and in the foot box.

Additionally I bought a 2004 Miata engine with VVTI and intended to have it bored and built for power.