johnminer

New times and video posted on #16 and #17.

I just got my car running and driving yesterday. I wanted to start a thread to share my experiences and to help anyone else with a similar setup.

I bought this car 2 years ago from a buddy who got an assignment overseas. He had the car sitting in his garage collecting dust because it needed some work. I had a 2010 SS at the time but it was an expensive toy that sat in the garage for 6 months out of the year (I live in Minot, ND). When my friend got orders I offered him $1,000 for his car. I was surprised when he said yes. I traded the 2010 Camaro in for a new 2013 2500HD and still had a camaro to play with .

I fixed the lower intake manifold leak on the LT1 that was spitting oil everywhere. The car was running and driving with the LT1/T56 so I posted the entire car up for sale and I also posted just the LT1/T56 for sale in the local classifieds. Someone wanted the LT1/T56 and was willing to pay my $2500 asking price. So now I had a free 1997 Camaro SS and $1500 to spend.

Two years ago I thought this Denmah guy is making some awesome power using 5.3's and cheap turbo parts, maybe I can do the same.......LOL. I bought a 2001 5.3 and a 1996 4l80e from AAA auto salvage out of Minneapolis for $1200. At this point I still didn't realize how much money I had left to spend. I started the build and the money spent started to add up. I realized that I wouldn't be able to buy everything needed in 1 year so I went NA for the first year.


Parts I installed on the car:
-"Denmah Turbo Kit" from VSracing but with a 78/75 turbo as I wanted a 3" hotside exit to match the used Huron Speed V1 Truck manifold Kit I bought. 80lb Siemens Deka Injectors
-Walbro 255 with racetronix hotwire kit. Will be upgrading to a 450LPH pump. Stock 3/8 supply and 5/16 return with Aeromotive BRFPR.
-Mid West Chassis K member A-Arms/Stange shocks/300lb spings and a manual steering rack. 4l80e Cross member. Short torque arm to tunnel mount with DS loop. SFC (not installed yet).
-Tick Cam 223/223 at 114+5, BTR .660 springs
-Circle D Single Billet Disk 2c stall and HD-2 Shift kit installed
-Huron Speed V1 Hotside



Thats most of the big ticket items installed. I'm learning a lot about HPtuners daily. I'm using a AEM wideband and a 2bar OS. Yesterday on the first drive my VE histogram was reading wrong due to me setting up the scanner wrong (I had a PID installed that was messing with the MAP sensor). I fixed that and will start doing all my tuning this weekend. I couldn't help but get into boost yesterday on the first drive. It's running really rich 10.5 AFR at 7lbs. It does build 7psi by 3500rpm in 2nd. Ill post more videos and logs as I keep tuning it. The local 1/8th mile opens on the 16th/17th of May so hopefully ill get some track times too.

Thank you to everyone! I've read more threads than I can remember and I wouldn't have been able to build this car without your help. I really appreciate it!

First Drive:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKMI...ature=youtu.be

johnminer

Saved for updates/info

Trans-am Curacao

I am in the same boat. But mine a used a powerglide with trans brake. I have the gt45 turbo in the trans am and just tested few times going 10.74 best at 134mph

97_ek

iTrader: (5)

Congrats on getting her going man. I'm hoping mine will be running and driving in a month. All depends on when this Huron Speed group purchase gets here.

JustAFooL

iTrader: (45)

Well, since I hope to be driving mine in the next couple weeks, how does boost feel compared to other NA cars even if it's just on 7#?

johnminer

That's awesome! I'd love to see a 6.9 in the 1/8th before I leave Minot and move to Texas in June.

How much boost are you running? What weight? What was your 60ft?

I've got some 275/50r15 MT ET Street Radial's for the rear pro stars. My rear end is stock (3.42's), but i'm hoping it will last awhile being auto/turbo.

johnminer

I really like the Huron Speed V1 Hotside. Its a nice piece. My Huron Speed DP doesn't fit with the MWC k-member, but that's my fault. I didn't ask if it worked before I purchased and I also picked it up used, never installed for $600.

johnminer

It feels awesome! The sound alone is nice. Two days ago was actually the first drive, but the 1st time I got on it after filling up the transmission all the way I thought the wastegate opened. It made a loud BOV type sound. I didn't think anything off it. I drove around for a few more miles trying to get in it and it was a dog/didn't build boost. I was just happy the transmission was working as I made a mistake last week on the HD2 shift install (I made a thread in the transmission section with my problem/solution). I went home and looked over the car and the charge pipe off the turbo came off....LOL.

It was late so I went to bed. Yesterday I moved one of the couplers in to a better place and tightened all the clamps. It made boost great after that. I had a lot of looks driving though town yesterday. I still don't have the front bumper on and the DP is currently 18" long.....hahaha. I plan to get a new DP made and a manual cutout installed at the catback connection.

I can't stab the gas as it goes super rich and stumbles. If I roll into it it runs okay. Its raining today so I cant work on the tune, but tomorrow and Friday i'm going to hammer out the VE table. HPtuners has been the largest learning curve. I read all the time and I still feel like I only understand 3 things.....I made a thread on HPtuners (same screen name) about getting the 2 bar map sensor to read properly in the scanner. Yesterday it was reading correct in the Table, but way off in the histogram/gauge. I had attempted to make a custom PID to log boost and I was using the MAP sensor in my PID which throws off the MAP readings. I deleted that last night and the table/gauge MAP reading match now. So i'll have a properly working VE histogram to work with tomorrow.

Here is a screenshot that shows boost building 1lb at 3500RPM and full boost (140 KPA. my key on is 93KPA so thats 47KPA increase which = 7lbs) coming in around 4200RPM. This was 2nd gear and you can see I was around 70% throttle or less.




It feels good, but i'm sure it will feel great when I lean it out some to around 11.2-11.5ish.

I'll probably put the 10lb wastegate spring in after I feel comfortable with 7lbs. I'm not sure how long the single 255 walbro will last. I also want to lower my base fuel pressure to 43 or 50. Currently its at 58psi and the FPR i installed is in a shitty spot where I cant adjust it.....I'm dumb. I'm going to move it soon, just waiting on more AN fittings to come in.

JustAFooL

iTrader: (45)

Looks great man. I'm attempting to tune mine as well, I know all about that learning curve. I got Banishs DVD and watched it , it helped a lot actually seeing someone do it as opposed to reading about it. I've also got a really good base tune given to me from a great tuner. I won't say his name yet because he is talking about doing mail order tunes, but he is well known on the FI section. I'll gladly send you a copy if you would like to compare.

What WG you running? Where did you reference the the vacuum line from it too?

johnminer

I would love to compare the tune. More info is always better.

I'm running the 44mm wastegate and 50mm bov from the vsracing denmah kit. I'm using the small spring in the bov. I couldn't get the BOV to open with my mityvac when it had the large spring in it. I also had to tap the plunger with a rubber mallet for it to open the fist time.

Viren said they stick sometimes on first use if sitting for awhile and to add anti seeze on the stem. The small spring does hang open at idle.

I'm using the 3/8th hole on the driver side of the intake right after the throttle body. I'm also ruining a squeeze performance vacuum block. I'll get w picture later for you.

johnminer

Had a little fun on Friday night. I got the car out to work on the VE table. I also had to take care of some KR I was getting. While lugging the car in 3rd up hill around 1800-2500 RPM I was getting a lot of KR. I ended up lowering the timing in these areas and also adding more fuel. That took care of the KR problems in those areas.

I then started on the VE table. I did a lot of runs from different speeds and then at the end I copied the VE - AFR error table from the Scanner and uploaded it into the Editor VE table and multiplied by the .5% option. I did this 3 times all together about 60 minuets of driving. Temps outside were in the 45 degree area, so ill need to check everything again when it warms up.

I then cruised through town to get some gas at the other end where they have 91 without ethanol. It was 11 or so at night and everyone was out messing around with there cars. A STI pulled up and started looking over. I still have just the 5 ft downpipe on dumped and the noise peeked his and 3 buddies in the car's interest. My buddy and I asked if they wanted to go somewhere outside of town to see how they would do and he seemed excited. We got out of town on a deserted road and I asked what he wanted to go from. I assumed he wanted to go from a dig being AWD and I was still on 275 steet tires (need to get MT ET Street Radials mounted). Surprisingly he said he wanted to go from a 20 roll. I didn't get any video's, but my buddy was able to log the runs so we could look at everything. Once I hit 2nd gear I started putting bus lengths on him. I asked what he had done to it and he said its "Stage 2".....whatever that means LOL. I then asked what power he thought it was at and he said about 350. He did have 3 buddies in the car, but I don't think that mattered. Every run was the same. I was very happy with the car.

Looking at the logs the car settles at 130KPA for most of the run and thats about 37 KPA above my key on so about 5PSI for the runs. This was on the medium wastegate spring.

I'm commanding 12 degrees of timing but at 5200 RPM or so it drops to 11/10 and the car stumbles a little. I think it may have to do with torque management as the IAT was 45 and the ECT was under 204 (where I have it pull -1 degree). Any ideas what to change to make it stay at 12 degrees?

Thanks!

johnminer

I've got a couple of updates. I installed the larger spring (I think) in the Chinese 44mm wastegate and it didn't net me any more psi. So I put the medium spring back in and the small spring together. It's hitting 8-9 psi now and it pulls a lot harder.

I made a mistake in my pcv setup. I was running my lines like an NA setup where the clean air was coming from the throttle body and not in front of the turbo compressor and it was pushing some oil out of the valve cover breather I have on the passenger side. I put the oil cap back on, removed the breather but didn't move my clean air line. I did 5-6 pulls on the new springs and it felt great until my last 2nd gear pull. I hear a loud pop around 5500 rpm, let out and the car slowly came down from the rpm and shut off while coasting at 35mph.

I thought I blew it up. I coasted to a stop, got out and noticed oil in a few places. I looked back at the log and didn't see any lean spikes or anything crazy. It started up and I got the car back home. It seemed to run fine. No knocking, missing, oil pressure still 60 at idle.

I think I blew the cam position sensor Oring or maybe the rear of the valley trey? I looked at the rear main and it doesn't look to be leaking from there. It is coming from the back of the engine up high and then running down the bell housing.

I cleaned all the oil up and put my pcv system back to the way it was with the breather. I plugged the throttle body clean air line that was putting positive pressure under boost in the valve cover.

I started it up and everything seems okay now. It is leaking a little bit of oil still from the rear top of the engine.

I have to beat my buddy at the 1/8 mile street car shootout tonight. Hopefully it doesn't shut off on me again at the top of second. I'll report back with my times.

johnminer

I made a 4th run and I pushed so hard on the brakes trying to build boost for a better 60ft that I seperated the line at a joint I made (my fault).

Hopefully I can get the brakes bleed and fixed and build more boost at the line. I was hoping for a 1.6-1.7 60ft and I think with practice I'll get there.

These runs are at around 9-10psi. My cars weighs 3360 and I weigh 230 so a race weight of 3590. I'll upload a screenshot when I get home.

johnminer

Attached is a screenshot of my third run. I think I've found a reason why my car hesitates and the car has shut down on me twice while doing a second gear pull. My car died on me after my fourth run and it would not start. When I went to key on I couldn't hear the fuel pump prime. I checked my 20a mini fuze on the racetronix hotwire and the metal isnt broke on the inside, but the plastic on the side has melted and I think i'm losing fuel pressure.

I'm going to replace the fuze and also lower my base fuel pressure so the single walbro 255 doesn't have to work as hard. I will upgrade to a single walbro 450 soon.

MonmouthCtyLS7

iTrader: (6)

Nice car...

johnminer

Ran a new PB on Saturday night. I was in a round robin to call out the #12 car on the Wichita Falls KOTS. There were 5 cars racing to run the #12 car. I won the round robin.

1st Race: 02 Camaro 6 Speed on nitrous. Video at 2:43. He missed 2nd.
2nd Race: New C7 Z06 automatic on Radials. Badass Car.
3rd Race: ZL1 Camaro automatic on Radials. Not sure what mods. Video @5:00 in.

I beat those cars for a chance at the #12 spot. #12 was supposed to race #11, but he broke. #12 got on the list last week. Its a nitrous 5.3 swap foxbody and a th400. I got caught sleeping on the tree and he won pretty easily. The race would have been close, but I gave him a .5 second head start. The foxbody moved all the way to #6 on the list.

I had a great time and am currently #11 on the list. 2 people broke and took there cars off the list. The ZL1 1 raced is now the #12.

That was my first time racing instant green/no time and it was a lot of fun.

johnminer

Here are the times from this Saturday. The real time slip is from last week. The time slips weren't printing for some reason.