Buying a 2g Eclipse this weekend, upgrade path

[Disturbance]

I'm going to pick up a 98 2g Eclipse GST this weekend. It is bone stock with 180 thousand miles. I have done tons of research on DSMs and spent countless hours compiling an upgrade path list. Im going to be shooting for around 400 hp and just wanted to post up my list of upgrades and get everyones opinion on these parts.

First of all the motor rebuild:
ARP head studs
Cometic head gasket
Topline complete gasket kit
Balance shaft eliminator kit
4G63 timing belt
Balancer tensioner pulley
Crank shaft timing trigger plate
Timing belt idler pulley
Timing belt tensioner adjuster
Turbo to manifold gasket
Manley forged pistons 8.5:1
Manley H beam steel rods
ACL tri metal rod and main bearing
Manley race series forged crankshaft 88mm
This will be my first motor rebuild, I built this list up reading tons of posts on this site. Is there anything anyone thinks i do or dont need or opinions on parts please share with me.

Upgrades after the motor rebuild:
Injen intake
Fuel pressure, air fuel ratio, boost, EGT gauges
Greddy type R BOV recirrculated
Turbo smart manual boost control
DN performance tubular header
Walbro 255 fuel pump
Import Evolution IEFPRSS fuel regulator kit
Evo III 16g turbo
Evo III o2 housing
2g turbo install kit with SS oil lines
ACT 2600 clutch
Apexi afc II neo fuel managment
Precision turbo 880cc injectors
Extreme race FMIC
ACT xact flywheel
RRE race down pipe w/ cat
Apexi n1 cat back
AEM high flow fuel rail
DSMlink
Again, anything i do or dont need or what would be better please share with me.
Thank you for any help that anyone can give me.

 

[Disturbance]

Thank you everyone for all the info, it helps a lot! Im kind of in between what exactly i want to do, i will probably just stick with the 7 bolt at this point and just be looking for a 6 bolt bock locally that i can start building on the side in case my 7 bolt is one of the ones that fails. This car will be my occasional driver/ project build. Might take some of you up on the PM offers once i get into this rebuild!

 

[JusMX141]

ARP head studs- Absolutely mandatory.

Cometic head gasket- Sure, why not. Great gasket for the $.

Topline's complete gasket kit sucks. I literally believe the eBay Evergreen gaskets are better with the exception of the valve cover gasket.

Balance shaft eliminator kit- Mandatory as well.

4G63 timing belt- Just buy the OEM kit.

Balancer tensioner pulley- If you're eliminating the balance shafts, why do you need this?

Crank shaft timing trigger plate- Is yours damaged?

Timing belt idler pulley- Just buy the OEM kit.

Timing belt tensioner adjuster- Just buy the OEM kit.

Turbo to manifold gasket- Use an OEM 7cm gasket- NOT the laser-cut stainless pieces.

Manley forged pistons 8.5:1, Manley H beam steel rods
- Look into Evo VIII pistons and rods- they will get you to your HP goal, and save you about $400.

ACL tri metal rod and main bearing- Sure.

Manley race series forged crankshaft 88mm- How do you know you'll need a crank?

Injen intake- If you're down for spending $200 on an intake, sure...otherwise eBay has the same thing without the name for $50.

Fuel pressure, air fuel ratio, boost, EGT gauges- Replace the EGT with a Wideband o2.

Greddy type R BOV recirrculated- Replace with 1G BOV, save $200.

Turbo smart manual boost control- Any MBC will do.

DN performance tubular header- Look into the FP cast manifold for half the money and cooler engine bay temps.

Walbro 255 fuel pump- Yeah buddy.

Import Evolution IEFPRSS fuel regulator kit- Giggity.

Evo III 16g turbo, Evo III o2 housing- Uh huh.

2g turbo install kit with SS oil lines- Complete waste of money. Buy an oil supply line and a j-pipe, make everything else work from the T25.

ACT 2600 clutch- I'd go with a 2100 for a FWD, but it's your left leg so do whatever. The tires will spin way before a 2100 slips.

Apexi afc II neo fuel managment- Complete waste of money.

Precision turbo 880cc injectors- Can't be tuned with an AFC.

Extreme race FMIC- Get it.

ACT xact flywheel- Oh yeah.

RRE race down pipe w/ cat- There are cheaper options.
Apexi n1 cat back- Replace with an eBay Tsudo or SRS system, save $400.

AEM high flow fuel rail- Complete waste of money. The stock fuel rail can make 900hp.

DSMlink- I'm confused...why do you want Link AND the AFC?

 

[JusMX141]

Just removed 22 posts of off-topic nonsense including some talk about an XBox 360 that, well, obviously has nothing to do with DSM Tech.

Special thanks to twisted954 for shitting all over this thread.


We coo?

 

[twisted954]

You should probably delete the facts out of the thread...overlook the OP's questions AND then insult the only person in this discussion that brought facts to the table while everyone else fumbled through wikipedia and links to buddies builds that only actually validated literally every last thing I said. HAHAHAHA...hey, it's good for business when you guys fail...

 

[Disturbance]

thank you jusmx141, great info. Someone had told me that i would need the Apexi fuel managment and dsmlink, i didnt think so, so thank you for verifying that. as for everything else on the parts list i will take your advice and go with that, i have seen plenty of your posts and seen how much knowledge you have with turbos and these cars.

 

[99gst_racer]

You should probably delete the facts out of the thread...overlook the OP's questions AND then insult the only person in this discussion that brought facts to the table while everyone else fumbled through wikipedia and links to buddies builds that only actually validated literally every last thing I said. HAHAHAHA...hey, it's good for business when you guys fail...

We only delete misinformation. Such as your post earlier where you said: "ANY integrated thrust bearing 7 bolt WILL 100 PERCENT absolutely fail due to crankwalk...100 percent of the time...that is guaranteed"

Give me a break. I hope you don't believe that every single engine produced for 3 years has crankwalked... I'll gladly neg. rep that. You should probably stay out of 7-bolt related threads.

 

[JusMX141]

thank you jusmx141, great info. Someone had told me that i would need the Apexi fuel managment and dsmlink, i didnt think so, so thank you for verifying that. as for everything else on the parts list i will take your advice and go with that, i have seen plenty of your posts and seen how much knowledge you have with turbos and these cars.

I'm not gonna lie- starting out, I didn't know what worked with what cars/mods and so on. It was very hard. Listening to others can be 100% helpful or 100% disastrous at the same time. I was fortunate enough to have a close friend who was very trustworthy with the information. He's since left the DSM scene and always checks back in to see what's different....and he's blown away at the amount of streetable 10-second cars that exist today which just weren't around 8-10 years ago. Most of this is due to better tuning platforms.

Link gives you full control of basically every function that the factory ECU carries out. It may not be as convenient for on-the-fly adjustments as an AFC as your passenger's seat will become a Notebook PC holder for a while, but as far as range of tuning there really isn't much that can compete with Link dollar-for-dollar.

Don't want to confuse you any more, but being that your car is a '98 it should be equipped with a flashable factory ECU. If you decide to choose Link, you'd have to make the decision to sell the flashable ECU and buy a '95s EPROM ECU which is required for Link to function.

 

[Disturbance]

I'm not gonna lie- starting out, I didn't know what worked with what cars/mods and so on. It was very hard. Listening to others can be 100% helpful or 100% disastrous at the same time.

Link gives you full control of basically every function that the factory ECU carries out. It may not be as convenient for on-the-fly adjustments as an AFC as your passenger's seat will become a Notebook PC holder for a while, but as far as range of tuning there really isn't much that can compete with Link dollar-for-dollar.

Don't want to confuse you any more, but being that your car is a '98 it should be equipped with a flashable factory ECU. If you decide to choose Link, you'd have to make the decision to sell the flashable ECU and buy a '95s EPROM ECU which is required for Link to function.

yeah i have knowledge with cars and everything just never worked on or built a DSM, grew up in a family that only drove and worked on fords haha, so needless to say they arent happy im bringing home a 4 cylinder.

Ok, where do you reccomend i buy the 95 EPROM ECU from?

 

[H4G64T]

I personally wouldn't recommend going with the flashable 2G ECU. Ceddy is a one man team and his updates are infrequent at best. Not so say his work is bad. However, I am going to base this more on a well known local DSMer who basically stated that the processor in the 2G flashable ECUs is vastly inferior. So if you go the route of a flashable ECU, at least go with the Evo.

The flashable ecu's add the opensource but they still have a slower processor. For a car that still retains full function of many sensors, the processor will be a factor. For a car that has stripped itself of everything but the bare minimums, it's not as noticeable. The main factor is the coding and how the ECU keeps track of things. That's the biggest perk with the Evo ECU configuration IMO. it just does it's job smoother.

In regards to that, the same tuner made this comment:

The Evo ecu has a better processor and is opensource which allows for some more flexibility with custom setups. V3 is by far the best DSM alternative. For the average Joe, sticking with V3 is just fine. For people like myself, the Evo ecu is a better fit but it's not a conversion for everyone.

If you run a MAF setup, the Evo ecu seems to do a much better job of smoothing out the transitions. If you run Speed Density, V3 is much simpler than the patches that have been created for the Evo ecu.

Mind you, this came from an individual who is a co-owner of a DSM tuning shop, so this is why I am recommending to either get an Evo ECU or V3 rather than using your flashable ECU.

Also if you can come across a free 96 or 97 ECU, ECM Tuning can now convert those to EPROM, and the cost to do so is roughly $60.00 less than the typical price of an actual EPROM (not to mention it may not be socketed yet).

 

[turboboy4]

Is "twisted954" bensbaby's brother from the link forums?????? Almost thought we were going to here a "SHUTDOWN" thrown in there somewhere.

Sorry had to do it....

OP, just do a ton of reading before making choices and pick out the parts from peoples setups that are similair to your goals

 

[H4G64T]

Is "twisted954" bensbaby's brother from the link forums?????? Almost thought we were going to here a "SHUTDOWN" thrown in there somewhere.

Sorry had to do it....

OP, just do a ton of reading before making choices and pick out the parts from peoples setups that are similair to your goals

Stop. Just stop. Hater. I'm an engineer and I ran 13s on my 500 horsepower car years ago. Show me your logs!

 

[Disturbance]

my main thing is i want a ecu that can hook up, run dsmlink and keep the check engine light off so i can still pass emissions and everything.

 

[ed1380]

The 98-99 can be programmed to pass emisions

 

[H4G64T]

my main thing is i want a ecu that can hook up, run dsmlink and keep the check engine light off so i can still pass emissions and everything.

Both a 95 EPROM and a 96-97 converted will handle that task.

 

[Disturbance]

Both a 95 EPROM and a 96-97 converted will handle that task.

ok i will look around for both.. dumb question but what does EPROM stand for so its easier for me to search around for it haha.

 

[H4G64T]

ok i will look around for both.. dumb question but what does EPROM stand for so its easier for me to search around for it haha.

It's really an EEPROM, which stands for:

Electrically-Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory

---

However, no one will call it anything other than an EPROM, they won't ever use the full text. Only get the 96-97 if it's free or under 20.00 shipped. It's not worth it otherwise, because it will cost $140.00 to have ECM Tuning convert it for you. Expect to pay $200.00 or so for an EPROM. So if you pay more than 20.00 for the 96 to 97, total costs start to approach the cost of an actual EPROM.

 

[ed1380]

There's an eeprom on the classified for $150 now


When you get it can I have your ecu ?

 

[91stocker]

I dont know if this has been asked yet but, why are you building the motor? Does it need to be rebuilt?

If not the stock motor should handle close to your power goals. If this is your first dsm and your first motor build, i would advise to just take it slow.

Start with the upgrade path
Tech Guide: 2G 4G63t Upgrades - DSMtuners

 

[Disturbance]

It's really an EEPROM, which stands for:

Electrically-Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory

---

However, no one will call it anything other than an EPROM, they won't ever use the full text. Only get the 96-97 if it's free or under 20.00 shipped. It's not worth it otherwise, because it will cost $140.00 to have ECM Tuning convert it for you. Expect to pay $200.00 or so for an EPROM. So if you pay more than 20.00 for the 96 to 97, total costs start to approach the cost of an actual EPROM.

ok i get it now haha, never messed with electronics or computers on cars. So if i get the 96-97 i take it to a shop and have them convert it to EPROM?

 

[H4G64T]

I don't think anyone but ECM Tuning (ECMTuning, Inc.) can convert it to EPROM.

 

[Disturbance]

There's an eeprom on the classified for $150 now


When you get it can I have your ecu ?

if its still for sale after i get the car than yes, all my money is going just to get the car so i will have to wait for my next paycheck, hopefully it doesnt sell by than.

 

[ed1380]

No. You'll need to send it in to be converted.

I still don't see the reason to spend $800 when you can do the same for $200

 

[Disturbance]

I don't think anyone but ECM Tuning (ECMTuning, Inc.) can convert it to EPROM.

ok i get it now, haha thanks for baring with me trying to figure all this electrical stuff out

I dont know if this has been asked yet but, why are you building the motor? Does it need to be rebuilt?

If not the stock motor should handle close to your power goals. If this is your first dsm and your first motor build, i would advise to just take it slow.

Start with the upgrade path
Tech Guide: 2G 4G63t Upgrades - DSMtuners

has bad piston rings right now so i figured i will have the engine out i might as well rebuild it to handle future mods

 

[JusMX141]

Are you sure it's the piston rings? The last three low ends I disassembled for low compression reasons didn't need rebuilt at all...the engines all had valve sealing issues which caused the low compression.

Our stock low ends are surprisingly durable.

 

[Disturbance]

Are you sure it's the piston rings? The last three low ends I disassembled for low compression reasons didn't need rebuilt at all...the engines all had valve sealing issues which caused the low compression.

Our stock low ends are surprisingly durable.

its an older lady and she said she took it to a mechanic because there was smoke coming out of the exhasut and the mechanic told her a bad piston ring was letting oil slip past and burning making the smoke.