Turbo question

[BubbaRay]

i have a j reg 1992 318i and i want to turbo it i have the intercooler and manifold and downpipe but i do not no what turbo to go for and what psi can i use i have no clue plz help

[BubbaRay]

can somebody plz help as i am stuck now

[chu346]

What kind of power do you want?

What is your budget Ԛ£Ã”šÃ‚£Ãƒ”šÃ‚£?

What intercooler do you have?

[BubbaRay]

200 bhp

Ԛ£650

and i have a front mounted intercooler of a rover turbo

[Turbo-Brown]

What's the original power output of the engine? And what's the compression ratio too?

From that we can work out roughly how much boost you'll need to get to 200bhp.

As a guess though, you could probably get away with the T25 from the same Rover 2litre turbo engine and if you wanted a real challenge, you might even be able to make the Rover brain control the whole shebang.....although they do have wierd trigger wheel patterns so that'd be a headache for starters!

From what I've seen, the Rover ICs are on the small side and I'm guessing you don't want to lower the compression ratio of your engine so you need the coolest air possible going into it.

[chu346]

I should think your going to need about 14psi+ to get that kind power from a 1.8, and I can see that taking you over your budget.

Have you considered a 2.5 engine swap or maybe just buying a 325i?

[Turbo-Brown]

So what's it got at the moment? is it 96bhp or 107bhp?

You're probably not far out with 14psi Chu, possibly a bit of an ask with a Ԛ£650 budget, but anything's worth a try!

[chu346]

I thought those engines were about 115bhp.

[Turbo-Brown]

So we're looking for a 74%ish increase which would suggest mabey 11psi or so, perhaps a bit less if everything's kept as free flowing as possible.

Mabey it would be better to go for a T28 or something a little larger than the T25 in that case.

Next question is whether the compression ratio will cause problems at 11psi.

[chu346]

C/R is 8.8:1

Does the car have a cat?

[Turbo-Brown]

Oh in that case 11psi should be fine

As I say, it'll need lots of flow capacity to make the power so restrictive standard exhausts are out, it'll need the intake air to be as cold as possible so look at the area of the IC.

Now on to the management side of things: What's going to be used?

[chu346]

Well if he gets MS it will leave about Ԛ£150-Ԛ£180 left for things like; intake pipes, injectors and of course the turbo.

[Turbo-Brown]

I love spending other people's money

[fuzzy]

is Ԛ£650 a realistic budget for a turbo conversion? or at least for a turbo conversion that will last a while i would expect it to be a lot more by the time you buy a decent turbo and other bits and bobs needed.i wouldnt recommend buying a second hand turbo either and ive even had lots of problems in the past with supposedly recon turbos.if you can stretch to it buy brand new as its not that much more than recon.will the standard headgasket handle almost doubling of power from 105 to 200bhp?

[BubbaRay]

My car is a 318i 8v 119bhp i was thinking of using a 320d turbo but i aint got a clue to be onest do i need a managament system cant i use the cars ecu but if i did that how would i control my boost

[iKst]

If you are on a tight budget you have to make compromises. Used turbos are not too bad, if there is no play in the shaft and blades look ok it will probably run OK for many more kilometers. Im a beginer on turbo E30 myself, but this is how i would spend my 650 pounds (=1000 eur).

- T3 or T28 turbo, around 200 eur.

- basic megasquirt set is 140 usd from US, thats around 150 eur. delivered. You have to build it yourself and it probably isnt easy, but it can be done if the money is tight.

- for M20 turbodiesel manifolds are not expensive and it looks like they can be modified to fit (i just got 324td manifold that im working on for 50 eur). For 4 cyl. engines you can make a log style manifold for not much more i suppose.

- I got a Volvo IC for 90 euro with some piping, i hear they are even cheaper in UK.

- Some larger injectors, 535 ones for M20 turbo, i dont know what injectors will fit to M40. Maybe stock nissan 200sx s13 injectors ? They are very cheap and good for around 250+ hp.

You can spend the rest on new gaskets, metric blue head bolts, custom made downpipe, boost gauge etc.

I think it can be done, but you have to take time to find cheap parts and you have to do as much as possible yourself.

[BubbaRay]

Thank u very much bud

[Turbo-Brown]

think the turbo from the 320D will be waaaaaay too small!

[BubbaRay]

how much was ur twin turbo convertion as i no where i can get a free 2.5ltr and it is a runner with box and ecu

[miamistu]

about Ԛ£4500 ish and that was with me doing all the work, although the ECU was Ԛ£750 and the brakes and wheels constitited other big chunks at over Ԛ£600 each.

Piss, I forgot to sign in, I'm at a mate's house (this is Turbo-Brown by the way )

[BubbaRay]

wow fook me ur car on google videos

[Turbo-Brown]

Yay! Signed back in as me

Isn't on google vids that I can see.

[BubbaRay]

o there is a black one on there that is a twin turbo 325i

[BubbaRay]

My car is a 318i 8v 119bhp i was thinking of using a 320d turbo but i aint got a clue to be onest do i need a managament system cant i use the cars ecu but if i did that how would i control my boost

Can somebody plz answer this for me and also what is magnisquirt

[Avner]

You should get a turbo from a car that has similar power to the amount of power you are aiming for, preferebly with a similay engine displacment. I would try to get a Subaru or Volvo turbo.
There are options other than stand alone managment (remaped chip or raising rate fuel pressure regulator for example) but in my view they are not nearly as good.
You can control boost with a simple bleed valve, the reason for managment is to control fueling and optionally ignition timing, not boost.

Megasquirt is a cheap stand alone mangment ECU that is available either as a kit or prebuilt.

After seeing some dodgy shoestring budget turbo installs attempted, my view is that they either fail, underperform or end up in the long run costing more than doing it properly in th first place.

Avner.

[maxfield]

Engine managmetn system to control fuel timing etc.

[Turbo-Brown]

o there is a black one on there that is a twin turbo 325i

Aah, mine's brown I'm afraid

[fuzzy]

After seeing some dodgy shoestring budget turbo installs attempted, my view is that they either fail, underperform or end up in the long run costing more than doing it properly in th first place.

Avner.

thats my feeling on the matter as well as ive learned the hard(and expensive) way

[BubbaRay]

So you guys think i should not do it then because my budget is not big enough. What about just doing a engine convertion what do u guys think i should go for if i went down that route

[gareth]

drop in a 3.5 M30 for less than a grand. if you're jammy and can make some bits yourself then it's a very cheap conversion. the costly parts are the donor car (easily got a mot-less manual 535i for Ԛ£300-500), prop (Ԛ£50-150), M3 exhaust (used Ԛ£200, could be homemade from the donor car exhaust), E28 535i rad (Ԛ£120 new). and any brake and suspension upgrades needed. a LSD (Ԛ£200-300) would be very handy too but not essential to get it running.

don't forget that a lot of bits drom the donor car and the old engine can be sold on to recover some of the costs

[BubbaRay]

ye my boss has a 3.5 m30 engine in his 4 door saloon he had his convertion done is eastborn about 8 years ago lol it goes well i could do that but i wanted something different to be onest

[gareth]

it's hardly common!!!!

[BubbaRay]

ok i will look into it. where would i get 3.5 m30 engine from

[gareth]

your best bet is to buy a complete mot-less E34 535i manual as that will cost what most breakers will want for just the engine and then you will have the complete running unit and can check everything over first. keep an eye on ebay...

[BubbaRay]

ok will do bud cheers