$3k for a turbo lt1 build? LOL.

 

Its not a 93, but I put together a twin turbo for a 92 for $300 15 years ago using donated turbos and vette manifolds. $3k is just a generic, random price, turbo setups can be $5 to $5555555 do not pretend like there is some exact value. The same goes for engines, how much does a brand new LT engine cost from a dealership? If we are being "correctly matching our variables" then a new engine could cost $5000+ the example was only showing how you can avoid screwing up your one, reliable daily driver, which could sometimes match the price of the other option. Those examples exist; I am one such individual. When I was 17, I opened up my engine when I should have just left the blower on it.

 

Kingtalon, we all get your logic, your math, and how engines work, but you are barking up the wrong bush. People turbo and supercharge and spray lt1s all the time to 400-450rwhp, and people add heads and cam and make 400-450rwhp all the time. We all agree 450-475ish rwhp is the limit of a stock lt1 bottom end, regardless of how you get there. The rules of thumb of no more than a 150 shot, no more than 8psi boost, no more than 6600rpm on stock bottom ends (but you cant do all 3 at the same time) are because those all get you around 400-450rwhp on an lt1. The difference is the cost of each way to get there. With THIS PLATFORM, the 92-97 LT1, the hands down most expensive way to get to that 450ish limit in HP is boost. Yes, you can build a Chinese, backward manifold, home built turbo kit for cheap, but that shitty turbo built by 6 year olds in china has more of a chance of failing and adds weight (the enemy of speed if you are capped at 450hp). Like was said earlier, the reason little bitty 4 bangers always go for boost is because:
A. Naturally aspirated they can't get enough air in due to small displacement
2. Tiny 4 banger engines are cheaper to build a forged bottom end because of smaller/cheaper parts, 1 cylinder head instead of 2, half the rods and pistons, yada yada.
D. Chassis being front wheel drive needs a better power to weight ratio than a comparable power to weight ratio rear wheel drive car, the rwd car is going to walk away off the line so you need more power to catch up (hard to cut a 1.6 60 with fwd) hence why when you go to the track youll see a 10 second turbo civic trap a lot higher than a 10 second camaro.

You have taken this thread so far away from the OPs original post, you should have started your own thread "Why I believe LT1s should use boost instead of heads/cam".

There are plenty if guys here who went the boost route, making 600-1000rwhp, none (reliably) on a stock bottom end. The last reason you hear everyone say "stay NA, no boost on stock bottom end" is because as Hot Rodders, nobody can leave well enough alone. How could you expect someone to put all that time and money into a boost build, and be happy with 400-475rwhp, and not get the urge to turn up the wick? Smaller pulleys are cheap, a little turbo costs about the same as a bigger turbo. Why would you spend a bunch of money building a baby turbo kit, only to not be able to reuse anything later when you decide to upgrade? At least starting with heads and cam, you can keep the heads on whatever size boost build you do next, with a baby cheap turbo build, you have to start from scratch if you decide to go bigger. It's not the guys with 400-450rwhp boosted stock lt1s that have motors fail, it's the guys who have 400-450rwhp stock bottom end LT1s that get bored one weekend and turn up the boost.

 

And ZERO experience. Don't ever change for nobody. You are far too entertaining.

 

This guy must **** a brick when he takes his oil cap off

 

I've never blown an engine, except my very first, and it was due to cleanliness reasons (thus, I am not recommending first timers, who only own a single engine, who have never opened an engine before, to open their engines that they care about). I think this is a valid example that was gained through experience, that is, air on Earth is not clean. You cannot escape the particles in the air, anywhere. Something coming out of factories in China is going to be shared with the world, not just China. Man is capable of producing a variety of toxic compounds. Air filtration is not only important for the engine, it is important to the human body as well. Our bodies naturally have many defenses against incoming pathogenic air particles, such as the peyers patch right after the turn down in the pharynx. The bodys plan has implemented an air velocity (only air going the right speed will send the heavier particles out of suspension into the peyers patch) trap for molecules around a certain mass threshold. This is an example of how genetics, DNA sequences of information available for implementation and planning of physical structures(keep in mind these evolved to natural pathogens, not man made compounds), can model and predict certain airflow behavior without the use of an advanced scientific computer analysis. Some things you are just born knowing, doing.



All I am trying to say is this: a mass dial (turbocharger like device) is a valuable addition to any vehicle, provided correct implementation.
It doesn't even have to be a turbo, it could be electrical. The issue is always cost: how much electricity does it need? how much exhaust gas? It just so happens that we have exhaust gas available anyways. Just like we have rotating crankshaft pulley available for other forms of forced induction. Anything, even the axle turning force could be harnessed into driving rear mounted devices. While using the crankshaft pulley to drive devices may harm engine bearings, exhaust has been shown to effectively drive something and not harm bearings. So yes I keep leaning towards turbocharging, but let us never get stuck on thinking that that is "just the way it is", let us keep looking for new ways to do the same thing.

 

I am glad we agree that this particular, one kind of engine, has its limitation "set by piston" as I have mentioned,


I mentioned several times my ultimate recommendations are for people who want 500-750rwhp or more (no stock LT series bottom ends need to apply when cost is a factor)


What is happening here, is you are still thinking as if boost is something extra to a vehicle. The atmosphere is your boost if nothing else. It just so happens that when you do not own a "mass dial" you are at the whim of the atmospheric variance. In other words, if you had an LT1 and drove it below sea level, it would pop at some point. I am not in here suggesting everybody turbo their 400whp capable engines and turn it up past that; I am showing how a turbo can be installed, and that the engine may NOT produce a single drop of more horsepower (wastegate is set to 0.1psi) yet there will still be many benefits to the system, such as improved economy on the highway. Another would be the shape of the torque curve- it normally has a wavy appearance, due to the natural breathing of the engine and varying VE. With a mass dial, you can adjust wastegate duty cycle per RPM (or speed), thereby "filling" all of the shortcomings of the graph (anywhere that atmospheric pressure would have you below 99%VE you can turn it up to 99%VE). And it is transferable to a new engine, should you replace yours (they all will eventually). You can install an 800rwhp turbo setup and run it at 400whp with no drawbacks, if you are creative with the plumbing and materials/science. It has other applications as well, for example now you have the plumbing setup correctly (you can daily driver an OEM engine at 400whp with plumbing that supports 700whp or more, by adjusting inserts/restrictions to improve exhaust gas velocity temporarily) you have options for a variety of platforms and engines to move into. I am trying to get you to see how a turbo and it's plumbing is a valuable addition to any vehicle, any platform that relies on the atmosphere (all of them) because of its inherent ability to improve efficiency and adjust for a varying atmospheric signal. Why be at the mercy of fluctuating conditions? Control the engines conditions strongly; make modifications which allow us to hold temperature and pressure where we want it. It has nothing to do with any particular type of engine, it has to do with ALL engines. This is GENERAL thinking guidelines, break out of the habit of thinking about one type of engine in particular. We all know nitrous is the cheapest way to hit the piston limit; let it be known, kingtal0n said "use nitrous cause its cheap, not turbo" It isn't just about power output, you have to think about the long-term longevity, the quality of the oil, the actions of the pcv system, the spaces between the journals and bearings, and the forces which motivate us to "do things" to our cars.

 

We all know exactly how the Turbo works, and it's benefits. Apparently you don't understand the basic law of physics, conservation of energy. What I mean by that is, if you put a turbo on a car and limited that turbo to 0.1 PSI at the waste gate, you'll LOOSE fuel efficiency. Every. Single. Time. You are doing more WORK for the same amount of output. Less efficient, literally. I don't think you actually understand WHY turbo motors CAN be rated higher in FE than NA. It's not because of the turbo. It's because of the SMALLER engine. The Turbo makes up for that smaller engines lack of power when needed. That is all there is to it.

There's limits to this of course. If you stick a 600cc engine in a Chevy 1500, then Turbo that, you'll likely gain MPG under BOOST because of how VEHICLE FE works in relation to BSFC, resistance, and weight.

You never answered my question though. Why does an NA Corvette get BETTER Fuel Economy than a Turbo 2.0 or 2.5 WRX STI????? The Corvette doesn't have a turbo, makes more power, has more torque, is faster, yet gets BETTER FE...... Explain that....

You are going around spreading information that is misleading to a point that makes it wrong. You are writing so much you end up spending more words to define what you've previously said to specify what you meant. Which was NOT what was being discussed to begin with.

I mean, I gather NOW that your initial response was talking about how a newb building his first engine ever, by himself, should do it with an LM7, welding his own pipes, on a Turbo from China, and leave everything else stock, for $300-$3K he could have himself a 700rwhp car......... Of course you mention this in the LT1 section, and you mentioned NONE of that in your first response. But you got it all cleared up........

 

To say boosting a stock bottom end anything is more efficient vs heads and cam is not focusing in on the failure rate power per power, we all know the engine is basically an air pump, more air in, more power out, but there is a big difference, boosted is forcing more air into the motor vs ingesting a maximum amount thru heads and cam, The number one failure (All being equal, proper timing, air fuel ect) will be the ring butting on the boosted motor, ring butting is not as present if any in NA motors, so you can keep adding more cam & compression to a NA motor until piston failure and make more power, whereas in a boosted stock motor, you will reach the limit very quickly.

 

You have zero experience other than being a bookworm?

Pics of these sick setups you type of.

Oh, regarding the rest of your post:

 

[QUOTE=hrcslam;19135381]We all know exactly how the Turbo works, and it's benefits.

How is the wastegate setting have anything to do with engine vacuum during cruise? It does not. I am strictly saying, during a cruise situation, turbochargers reduce the energy requirement of breathing. If you drive a turbo car and get 30mpg, then disconnect the turbine so it no longer spins (or slowly), economy will decrease as the piston works harder to fill the cylinder, it will show up as higher injector duty cycle at the same speed with very little influence on engine vacuum while cruising. There is a fuel efficiency benefit during highway cruise to having a proper turbocharger configuration.


Actually engine size has very little to do with economy. It is the vehicle weight, and rolling resistance, which plays the major role. If you install an LSx engine from a 3800lb vehicle (at 25mpg) into a light chassis at 2800lbs, now it will provide 31mpg (the way I tune them). Engine "size" only plays a minor role concerning rotating mass, i.e. heavier internals use more energy just to spin, but often the difference in modern engines (2L vs 6L) is negligible next to the weight of the vehicle's impact, especially when you take into account that the larger (heavier) internals engine often spin more slowly (you will cruise with 1500rpm from an LSx where a 2L would cruise at 3200rpm). In some cases there is an economy boost when going to an engine with a larger displacement and slightly more compression due to this feature alone (being able to idle at a lower rpm for example) when compared to a similar power output, smaller displacement engine.




Sorry, let me consider your question. I discounted it because I thought you were being rhetorical. WRX STI is an all wheel drive vehicle. The rotating mass there is enormous. They are also similar in weight to the vette (I believe both weight around 3300~lbs). As I said already, weight is the largest factor, followed by rotating mass. Simply put, the WRX has more mass to rotate (a more robust drivetrain) more friction coefficients (AWD) and a similar vehicle weight. The engine size (2L vs 6L) as I have mentioned already, plays very little role. The higher compression V8 in your example further reinforces the idea that simply both engines together at idle, the higher compression, lower rotating speed of the V8 would probably give a similar or even better economy.



Whatever information I provide that you do not like, you are free not to examine it. Whatever information I provide is never with the intent of distracting or confusing. It only looks wrong sometimes because I use radical examples which could not possible occur to illustrate key points. Even if it makes me look "wrong" the objective was never to be "right" but merely provide a new viewpoint objective lens through which to view automotive finesse.

 

This sounds like misinformation. I think you are missing that many "boosted" engines typically run more than 1.2~3.5psi of boost pressure, which is what you get in theorectical airflow when you provide an engine with a slightly better head and camshaft. In other words, you would see "ring buttoning" on N/A engines if they could actually reach the power level (torque output at that specific RPM) that a cam/head engine could, which it cannot. The one thing to take away from all of this is that the OEM piston configuration is unhappy at even modest power output, and should be dealt with before anything else somehow, IMO.

If you could take two identical engines, boost one and add a head/cam to the other one, then by adjusting the mass dial (boost control per rpm) to exactly simulate the head/cam modification, they would lead similar lives, and the turbo engine should last longer and get better fuel economy.

 

Does everybody want me to post examples of turbo engines I have tuned in the past, comparing economy and power output vs cost? because I am trying not to clutter up threads with unwanted pictures and data. Not trying to show off. Just helping you guys think.


I am not trying to "get out of doing it" either. I will gladly post my data, tuning and otherwise, always do.

 

No. Please don't. Everyone here believes you!

 

King troll blew up his first motor because cigarette cancer. King troll boosts stock bottom ends like a bauce.

 

This thread is one of the best unintentional trolling I have seen in many a moon. Well done gents, well done.

 

I have to disagree, I have yet to see ring butting failure on a stock bottom end due to head and cam configuration but I have seen many on boosted motors, You will always hear to keep the boost level down to X psi due to piston and ring failure, You never hear to keep cam specs at a certain level because catastrophic failure will occur, can you have piston failure on a head and cam setup, of course if the tune is not spot on and it detonates itself to destruction. Yes a turbo will give you better fuel economy but when it comes to Horsepower who gives a hoot about fuel economy, now granted some prefer moderated gains and still maintain fuel mileage, but for myself, I go for the horsepower understanding that "at times" horsepower & fuel economy do not mix...

 

We are starting to get what you were trying to convey, but you are taking the round about way of getting there, and leaving some of your arguments open to misinterpretation. It's gone so far off topic that people replying are trying to find how your replies relate to the OP, but they don't, and the topic has flown away, so lets keep running with it if the OP doesn't mind.

OP, if you are sick of us ruining your thread, say so and Kingtalon will start a new thread and we will keep going there.

Lets go back to your example of a turbo engine with the waste gate at 0.1psi. What you are getting at, and I agree, is that you could ALWAYS have 14.696 of pressure due to the turbo always providing that little extra as you go up in elevation and atmospheric pressure decreases. If you were at an elevation where atm was 13.696, the turbo would add 1psi and you would be back to 14.696 and driving as happily as at sea level. The problem is at sea level, like hrcslam was getting at, is that if the turbo/supercharger is not HELPING, it's doing nothing or HURTING your efficiency. If you drove around right now NA to get a baseline mpg and 1/4 mile pass, then put a turbo on it set at 0.1psi, you would lose mpg and 1/4 mile because you added weight and either are using rotational energy if supercharged to move the belts and turbine, or you restricted your exhaust if turbo.

The wrx vs vette fuel economy comparison isn't fair as you stated, but a car like the new camaro with options for a turbo 4 or a lt1 direct injected v8 is fair, same car/aerodynamics/drag but look at the mpg and HP, the v8 has more HP/mpg. Or look at a 4.8 00-06 Tahoe vs the 5.3 00-06 Tahoe, the 5.3 is better HP/mpg because it doesn't have to work as hard (it's more torque/mpg with the 5.3 vs 4.8).

The ford Ecoboost is a prime example of turbo mpg. Unloaded, they get awesome mpg, I had my buddy's 2014 f150 ecoboost for a weekend and unloaded I drove to get a 7x16 enclosed trailer and got 24mpg highway, because it wasn't under boost unloaded. I got the trailer, and on the way home, same route and speed, it got 12. You get Eco, OR you get boost, you can't have both. My 1.6l escape ecoboost was the same, it got 30 average if I babied it, but 18 if I beat on it, under boost it sucked fuel like a mother ******.

The thing you need to consider on this forum with this conversation is that these cars generally are not being used for fuel economy or climbing high mountains. They normally are set up and tuned for their local track, that sees close to the same conditions every time the person runs them. Ed Wright, one of the veteran Hot Rodders and racers on here, races Super Stock or Super Street and told a story about the east coast vs west coast class. The classes were the same, same rules, same setups, and the east coast guys were always chasing the records the west coast guys (or vice versa i cant remember) were putting up. Then they had a race somewhere else and the fast group couldn't get near the times they used to put down. If the cars were all turbo, I get what you are saying, they may have been equal. But you are in LTX land, the land of "I was 16-20 and didn't have enough money for an LS so I bought an LT", people are mostly trying to go decently fast for cheap. Heads and cam is the easiest and cheapest way to wipe the floor with 99.99% of the cars on the road, 400-450rwhp in a 3300lb car is damn fast. Most people here do not want to spend more on a turbo kit than they paid for their whole car just to make 400-450rwhp. This crowd is generally looking for a cheap, reliable way to beat the local crowd at their local track.

And 1 big elephant here, is if your car makes that cool WOOSHing sound from boost, it god damn better be able to beat the guy who spent $1600 on an LE2 package, or you look like a poser or rice. The name of the LTx game is having the underestimated LT1 beating more expensive rides with LS or 5.0 or hemi powa. Generally the last thing people are looking to do is draw attention by having they ugly, cheap LT car go WOOOOOOSH, and then get smoked by a stock 5.0.

A car that goes potato potato potato potato and runs 11s s way cooler than a car that goes WOOOOOOSH and runs 11s.

 

kingtal0n,

Your arguments are severely dated and ignorant. **** like was discussed and rehashed more than 10 years ago. Get with the times. Still awaiting pics of your sic combo.

 

This is a reason to never move to Florida, we have to deal with these "special" people on a daily basis