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After selling my GN (TA49 24psi on meth)a few years back, I have been wanting to do a turbo LS. I have approx. 3k miles on this combination:
LS3 with 226/232 112+2 .626, BT springs , cast iron manifold & 2.5 to spintech mufflers unknown stall built 4l60e, 3:42 Olds rear, MT DR, aeromotive FP
Subject car
Here are my goals: car to be street driven power range 500-600rwtq reality is doing turbo for looks and sound cuz 2500lb car moves pretty good NA, prefer no meth but open to E85 After reading a ton of turbo/turbo build threads I believe a 2.5" piping with a BW variant turbo. I don't have much room for an IC so I might have to do meth. Thanks for any advice.
Wow, very nice project. Why the BW variant? They are powerful, and reliable, but take up a lot of space. You could get away with a lot more compact turbo and meet your goals. Something like a precision or turbonetics 76/68 or 78/68 would easily do it, and spool would be extremely fast. One of the rules of picking a turbo is to picking a turbo is to get the smallest turbo that will meet your HP goal. If you go BW, were you thinking 300 series? 500-600 rwtq with an LS3 should be cake I would think. I see that done on 5.3's with small turbos all the time.
You could do 2.25 or 2.5 on your hotside, either would work fine. Indy cars are twin turbo, hot air and run on Ethanol with 15 PSI boost. The company I work for sponsors a car, and I got to work in the garage with them one day with the Honda engineers, tuning the engine. I asked way more questions than they really wanted to answer. I was surprised how simple the setup is. I think you could make an LS3 run hot air on E85. The only question would be can you make your HP goal without detonation. You may be limited to something like 6 lbs of boost going hot air. The combo will be very sensitive to IAT, you will want to get air to feed the turbo from outside the engine bay.
Thanks- in my current configuration my IATs are pegged on the scanner so I will definitely need to cool the intake charge. Possibly intercooler mounted vertically in front of radiator/condenser? Meth might be the best choice considering the space required is small.....
62 vette- thanks! Had a Morris Minor years ago RHD should have never sold it.....funny thing the anglia is a "long" wheel base at 90" vs Morris 82"
Your IAT is maxed out without any boost? Where is your intake air coming from? Without boost it should be fairly close to ambient, are you drawing air from right behind the radiator? I am A to A intercooled, and unfortunately my turbo sits right behind the rad, and I never even get close to maxing out, it only goes about 30 degrees above ambient with a lot of heat soak. I'm aware of hot air cars running up to the 250f intake air range. IAT gets droped in the intake runner of the cylinder head though when the ethanol from the main injectors evaporates. By using methanol injection, you only change the point of the temp drop from after the IAT sensor to before it. I see no significant advantage to using methanol vs E85 either hot or cold. There is a minor one because of the lower stoic ratio on the methanol you do have a little more fuel to evaporate, but it is a relatively small difference. What is the max for the IAT sensor?
The more I look at your car the more I like it. Did you convert it to left hand drive? I like the smoothies on it, but I would probably paint them a contrasting color to the black, like almond, coral, or salmon, one of those colors from the 50s. Is that radiator a PRC outa Indiana? I have one in my '41 olds that looks a lot like that. I'm guessing a vintage air system too, so you have a condenser on the front of it?
Seeing your engine bay I'm not sure where you could fit a turbo. You could probably gain power, just as it is without turbo charging, switching to E85 with IAT like that. I would think if you found a way to draw the air into the turbo from in front of the condenser you would drop IAT considerably.
Have you considered pulling it all out and making a custom recessed firewall that would allow the engine to move back about 6". Then you would likely need to raise the trans tunnel. A lot of work just to add a turbo. Prior to the LS engine invention we old school guys used to do that to get big blocks in those prewar cars. It is certainly a challenging looking situation.
Acquired converted to right hand drive. Paint was done in mid 80s for Car Craft shoot. Original color and wheels looked like this car from England
I plan on re-spraying back to original color and the wheels the same ...VA air with Billet Specialties access drive
Radiator is an AFCO unit. Was thinking that turbo would go where filter is with intercooler in front of condenser. I have a gap above the radiator and shroud to bring cooled air charge back into engine. Engine is setback a good amount now as I basically sit over rear axle. Maybe LT replace the cast manifolds a little meth call it a day and skip the turbo?.....
Great at least one old school guy appreciating a non BBC or Hemi anglia!
Last edited by waderaces427; Feb 7, 2017 at 09:00 PM.
Yeah, I'd probably stay away from the turbo. It's not like it isn't a very unique piece to begin with, Anglia with an LS3. You could drive it all the way to Louisville in August to the street rod nationals. And unlike those other ones with the BBC or Hemi's you could afford the fuel to do so, and not have to stop every 30 minutes to fill up. And maybe even embarrass them in a little show of performance. I may see it there, if you bring it.
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Anglia LS3 Turbo 
