I just want to share some of what I have learned and done with my 87 lxi hatchback project car. I decided to turbocharge this car about a year ago, and progress has been extremely slow, for a variety of reasons, including lack of motivation, money, connections, and a complete lack of aftermarket parts for this car. I had to make almost all of the parts myself, and I don't really have the tools to be doing this. Here is the basic setup. The turbo is a mitsubishi "big 16g" that I bought from MVP Motorsports last summer. The turbo manifold is all me, constructed out of 1/1/2" mild steel weld L's. The runners are 12/3/4" long, and the turbo sits off to the passenger side of the engine bay, more in front of the transaxle than the engine. By the way, this was a total pain in the ass to set up, the accord engine bay has no clearance and I had to modify everything from the power steering line to the a/c lines to getting a thinner cooling fan to make this fit. Also, this manifold generates an incredible amount of heat, and despite wrapping everything I could think of with heat reflective tape, it still managed to melt some insulation and do some other minor damage. Right now, the car doesn't even have its hood. I will probably take the manifold off, and wrap it with header wrap, because it just adds way too much heat to my engine bay. The downpipe is a very non restrictive 3" diameter, as is the entire exhaust system. (The air conditioning still works, by the way) The air filter is in the fenderwell, and since the intake tube goes where the battery used to be, the battery now sits in the back, next to my sub box. Right now, there is no intercooler, so I just used 2/1/2" exhaust tubing for the charge air pipe to the throttle body. The oil lines were also a challenge, try buyinga fitting that connects to this turbo. I had to make this fitting out of a fuel line fitting, and then had a shop make me the AN lines. Obviously, I also had to remove the oil pan and weld in a fitting for the oil drain line. The intake manifold is a modified 88/89 2 stage unit. The runners have been enlarged almost 1/4/" in the transition area after the butterfly valves, and 4 450cc injectors from a first gen turbo eclipse were added to the bottom of the manifold. Since the runners are not straight, each injector is at a different location/angle, necessitating individual fuel lines. I couln't find a shop to do this, so I did all of this myself. The injectors are controlled by a supplemental injector controller from 034 efi. This unit is very inexpensive and highly functional, programmable via windows. Just don't hook up the rpm trigger wire to the coil, this is how I destroyed the first controller! The intake manifold is controlled by an msd rpm activated switch, set to open the butterfly valves at 3900 rpm. When I sarted driving and tuning this car, I made several stupid mistakes, which basically cost me my engine. (The egt gauge reacts way to slowly to be worth shit, and the factory oxygen sensor is only good to tell you rich, stoich, or lean, but not by how much) I had a problem with the injector controller because of the rpm wire, which resulted in it going lean under boost to the point of making the engine backfire(!!!) and I did not start out with retarded ignition timing, so I got some detonation... Now I have 3 cylinders around 150psi compression, and #4 is at 90... The engine blows a cloud of smoke out of the crankcase breather vent under boost. By the way, with a turbo engine, it is very important that the engine does not inhale blow by gasses under boost, as this severely lowers the octane of what is in your cylinders, and invites detonation. Anyway, here's what you guys really want to know, how much power does it have? I have no idea, but if you roll away from a stoplight like normal, and then press on the accelerator aggressively, the boost comes on slightly below 3k rpm, with about 8 psi by maybe 3400. The tires both break loose with 5 psi, and the boost goes up to 8 or 9, so I have to manipulate the throttle to keep the engine off the limiter. This traction problem is very violent, and I am worried about breaking my motor mounts, or something else. When I drop the shifter into 2nd, the tires keep spinning for maybe another 10 feet, before the car gets enough traction to make the piece of shit clutch slip. It's funny to do this shit in front of a typical modified civic or integra. So what's next? Forged internals, better rings, a better clutch, closed loop detonation control, a better fuel pump, an air/liquid intercooler, and of course 20+ psi. (The factory wastegate is set at 15, but I have modified it to allow lower boost pressures for now) As far as I know, there is only one other person (Justin) who has built a turbo accord on this list. To you I ask, how did you get your pistons and rods, and what is the stock rod length on this engine? I would like to use Wiseco pistons, Total Seal rings, and Eagle rods. (?) Also, what type of clutch are you using? I am thinking about a Clutchmasters stage 3. As far as the closed loop detonation control, you know I am talking about the J&S safeguard. This unit is awesome, with individual cylinder knock control, TPS and MAP connections to solve boost related problems, and its monitor is compatible with the Bosch lsm-11 wideband 02 sensor. Are you using this thing? I will be for sure!
Peace, and see you guys on the streets!
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