Slow Spool on the 2.3

[99gst_racer]

There's no real blue tinge to the exhaust anymore although it still likes to blow black. I had my wife follow me while I hammered on it and after she passed through the cloud, she told me it smelled like raw fuel and not oil.

Andy, have you ruled out the possibility of a bad/mis-calculated Jeff-O chip? Without good logging software, it's hard to determine exactly what that chip is actually doing for you.

I'd be more than happy to pull my dsmlink from my car and install it in yours. That way we can get a good garunteed tune on it to rule out the possibility of a poor tune caused by a defect in your chip. My home is your home, so let me know if you want to stop by and we can try it out.

 

[project_tsi]

YES YES YES I love that idea!!! For some reason I forgot that your car was down Paul, and I didn't think about that.

Andy, drive your ass up here one weekend and we'll finally be able to see some logs from that thing like I've wanted for a while now.......

 

[andymoraitis]

Andy, have you ruled out the possibility of a bad/mis-calculated Jeff-O chip? Without good logging software, it's hard to determine exactly what that chip is actually doing for you.

I'd be more than happy to pull my dsmlink from my car and install it in yours. That way we can get a good garunteed tune on it to rule out the possibility of a poor tune caused by a defect in your chip. My home is your home, so let me know if you want to stop by and we can try it out.

Six different chips have been installed since the stroker went in. Two were for the 16G and four were for the 50 trim combo. Since all of them were late on spool, there's no way that Jeff could have screwed up six chips. Also, the chip that was in it after the rebuild was the same one that was used to on stock cams and also on the Comp 200's. Simply enough, the spool died when the cams went in. I really don't see how it could be anything else.

The 50 trim chips are almost identical to the older chips except for less max advance (8 degrees) and a richer tune (11:1). I appreciate the offer and I just may take you up on it to see what we can figure out. My gut, which is rather large, still says that the cams are off and that we need to advance the intake to get the best results but it would be great to see what kind of airflow the motor is moving and find any snags.

 

[andymoraitis]

I wanted to offer a quick update for everyone who's been following this thread closely. Anyway, Kyle came over on Saturday night and we re-timed the motor to add one tooth of advance on the intake cam. She went back together this morning and after doing some troubleshooting to get the car running (I mistakenly put the A/C plug on the cam sensor), she fired up to the most hellatious idle. After a few more adjustments to the BISS to get the motor to idle at 950-1000 RPM, we went for a test run to check spool.

And the results were huge! I now get 25-26 psi at 3900-4000 RPM as opposed to the 4400-4500 I was getting before. The boost curve is linear and smooth with no "I just got rear ended" sensation. Once it starts, it climbs evenly. I let Kyle drive and he was impressed with the overall feel. Did I mention that the idle is absolutely sick?

Just as an FYI, vacuum under idle and decel changed significantly. Where I used to get 16 in/hg at 700 RPM on the old setup, I now get 9-10 in/hg at 900-1000 RPM which is more in line with what I was expecting for these cams. Also, decel vacuum decreased from 25 in/hg to 20. Overall the motor now feels like it should and the expense of building the 2.3 has paid off. I still have some tuning to do since the motor now knocks a bit more, but taking fuel pressure to 45 should help a bit. I'll also be swapping the hacked MAF for an unhacked one and that should also help. With the increase in VE from the cam adjustment, I'll also bet that I'm at max IDC on the 650's. Time for some 750's. Other than that, I couldn't be happier.

Here's to friends who drop what they're doing to help out no matter what. Thanks to Kyle for taking the time to lend a hand. I owe you big!

 

[AL92]

Hey Andy you have my interest now..You went to aftermarket gears to do this and can you cheat and just ziptie the belt and put it back like think read on RRE site for cam swap or did you have to take off everything to do this? And only 1 degree did this much?
And you left the exhaust cams alone.any benefit to playing with them?
I get around 14in hg on my crower stage 3s on my 2.4 currently. I put them in stock and of course used 2.4 timing gears,2.4 timing belt.

 

[GVR4592]

Hey Andy you have my interest now..You went to aftermarket gears to do this and can you cheat and just ziptie the belt and put it back like think read on RRE site for cam swap or did you have to take off everything to do this? And only 1 degree did this much?
And you left the exhaust cams alone.any benefit to playing with them?
I get around 14in hg on my crower stage 3s on my 2.4 currently. I put them in stock and of course used 2.4 timing gears,2.4 timing belt.

I believe he advanced it 1 TOOTH on a stock gear, not one degree.

 

[project_tsi]

Correct. He advanced the intake cam (which is clockwise btw) by one full tooth. The ex. cam was left alone. I'm sure even more gains could have been had by switching to full adjustable cam gears and tuning it on the dyno, but for what has happened here, its phenomenal.

Andy estimates that the intake cam was advanced 3-4* over straight up.

This clearly shows that these cams from comp were not correct.

This really makes me want to pick up a set of adjustables.

 

[GVR4592]

What headgasket are you using Andy and how many times has the head and/or block been resurfaced?

These things could account for the change in cam timing.

 

[andymoraitis]

I'm using an OEM composite with ARP's. The head has never been decked and the block went through it's first rebuild when the 2.3 went in around early April. Interestingly enough, when I was troubleshooting the no start issue, I checked cold compression on cylinder one and it usually runs at 180 full hot. It was now showing 180 cold.

I do agree that I need cam gears to get the best possible adjustment. I would guess that with one tooth of advance, I'm probably somewhere around 4-5 degrees advance on the intake since it was probably off 2-3 degrees on the straight up install. I'd like to get it to around 3 degrees of advance on the intake and one retard on the exhaust before taking to the dyno to see how she performs.

 

[andymoraitis]

can you cheat and just ziptie the belt and put it back like think read on RRE site for cam swap or did you have to take off everything to do this?

We took everything off since I didn't have a proper tool to depress the tensioner, but there's no reason that you can't set the motor to TDC, ziptie the exhaust cam and loosen the belt enough to advance the intake. I'd still spin the motor over manually to make sure that it's right but other than that it should work without having to do a full teardown.

 

[99gst_racer]

That's awesome, Andy. I'm glad you figured this out.

 

[Caithness]

Your spool was slow for a 50 trim, but the way you did the testing could also have made your numbers seem worse than average.

Most spool numbers people toss around on the internet are 4th gear numbers. Testing in third gear could add as much as 500 rpm until full boost.

Starting from a lower RPM also decreases spool time. People can start from anywhere, but starting from 2000 rpm seems to have been the norm in a few threads I've read on spool time.

Gearing and vehicle weight are the other factors that affect test results, but you don't deviate much from the norm so they wouldn't have skewed your numbers much. Just something for others to keep in mind when looking at spool numbers.

You gave specific numbers, but one additional thing to watch for is numbers for "Full boost". "Full boost" means nothing, a specific boost number at a specific rpm may mean something if you know the test conditions (the stuff listed above). It's much better if it's the result from a map sensor log- just looking at your boost gauge and then at your tach while going WOT in a high gear tends to lead to inaccurate results at best. Vendors love to shout "Full boost 3800 rpm GT35R!!!" but they rarely tell you that was on a bored out 2.4 in fifth gear going up a steep hill and full boost was 14 psi.

I'd be interested in your spool time if you started at 2000 in Fourth. That might get you closer to the "norm".

 

[92awddsm]

Your spool was slow for a 50 trim, but the way you did the testing could also have made your numbers seem worse than average.

Most spool numbers people toss around on the internet are 4th gear numbers. Testing in third gear could add as much as 500 rpm until full boost.

Starting from a lower RPM also decreases spool time. People can start from anywhere, but starting from 2000 rpm seems to have been the norm in a few threads I've read on spool time.

Gearing and vehicle weight are the other factors that affect test results, but you don't deviate much from the norm so they wouldn't have skewed your numbers much. Just something for others to keep in mind when looking at spool numbers.

You gave specific numbers, but one additional thing to watch for is numbers for "Full boost". "Full boost" means nothing, a specific boost number at a specific rpm may mean something if you know the test conditions (the stuff listed above). It's much better if it's the result from a map sensor log- just looking at your boost gauge and then at your tach while going WOT in a high gear tends to lead to inaccurate results at best. Vendors love to shout "Full boost 3800 rpm GT35R!!!" but they rarely tell you that was on a bored out 2.4 in fifth gear going up a steep hill and full boost was 14 psi.

I'd be interested in your spool time if you started at 2000 in Fourth. That might get you closer to the "norm".

Generally, spool times and logging runs are done in 3rd gear here in the dsm community. I dont know about where you are at but most of us dont have a safe place to run our car from 2k rpm to full boost in 4th gear. If I did that, I would be running somewhere north of 100mph which isnt safe on public roads.

And he also stated in the first post that this was from 2500 rpm, 25psi boost, and on a 2.3. Even in 4th gear, it would not reach full boost before 4k rpm. Do you consider that normal for a 50 trim on a dsm? I know a few 2.0 engines that will spool a 50trim before 4k rpm and mine personally will spool the 60-1 to 25psi by 4200 in 3rd.

The problem has been found and somewhat corrected now. The best contributions to this thread would be donations to Andy's paypal account for a set of adjustable cam gears. Anyone care to help?

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[CanadianTSi]

Just for comparision my car with a 50 trim, the Magnus and Cams Spools 24psi by 4300 in 3rd and 4000 in 4th.

Used to be about 3900 in 3rd on the stock cams/IM.

 

[andymoraitis]

Let's hold up a minute here guys. After nothing but a fuel pressure adjustment, spool is back where it was before (4400-4500), but the motor feels MUCH stronger throughout the spool range. I think cam gears are in order to see if a little bit less advance works better. While I'm at a loss to explain why there's a difference today with only an FP change (that should have helped incidentally), I'm much more pleased with the spool characteristics of the motor overall. There's no lugging to reach 10 psi. Instead the motor spools very smoothly from 0-25 psi and when it hits 25 psi it's hauling the mail.

The only downside is that driveability is greatly affected by so radical an advance. While the car is warming I can smell raw fuel in the engine bay from the ECU dumping extra fuel to deal with the more aggressive nature of the cams. Compression has also gone up by 15 psi in each cylinder to 190 across. Interestingly enough, I could never break the tires loose in first gear in the rain rolling off the line and punching it. I actually laid into it in 3rd and when she hit full boost, all four were spinning. Thankfully I was going straight.

I haven't given up on this yet, but frankly I care more about the overall performance of the car than I do the spool numbers. Yes, earlier is better, but how many of us race at the track from a rolling start in 3rd gear at 2000-3000 RPM? If I need to move it on the street, I know how to shift fast enough to grab a lower gear and get the motor and turbo online very quickly.

Next will be a set of cam gears to dial everything in properly. In the meantime, I have an unhacked MAF arriving in a couple of days and that should help the idle and some of the driveability issues. regardless of the stumbling blocks, this thing is still a pretty badass little ride. Just ask Kyle.

 

[andymoraitis]

Just a quick update:

I changed out the hacked MAF for an untouched one (even the bottom screw still had original silicone) and the idle, while still wicked as hell, holds at 1000 RPM much better. My throttle tip-in issues have also virtually disappeared and the car feels great both idling and under boost.

As an experiment, I used 2000 RPM as a starting point to test spool instead of 2500 and I saw full boost at 4200 instead of 4400-4500. Let me put this to bed for any future perusers of this thread. Truthfully, spool time has become a non issue for me. With the cam adjustment, the compression is way up and the motor's making excellent power on such low timing. If I have to grab another gear to get the R's up to where they need to be for the car to pull so bet it. I could care less if I see full boost at 4000 or 4400. As long as it's consistent and the motor pulls strong, spool numbers are a bunch of crap. When I leave the line at the track, I have full boost in a fraction of a second. Who cares about anything else?

 

[topstreet]

As long as it's consistent and the motor pulls strong, spool numbers are a bunch of crap. When I leave the line at the track, I have full boost in a fraction of a second. Who cares about anything else?

Great to hear and WELL PUT!

 

[andymoraitis]

Even though my spool issues haven't improved, I'm going to continue to update this thread with information as I come across it.

Following the cam change, I started to smell a strong exhaust gas odor in the engine bay. Since the car also had nasty throttle tip-in issues due to the hacked MAF I thought this was the culprit. In any event changing the MAF helped a great deal, but the issues remained. Thankfully, my pal Jim (Auto RS T) was visiting Auburn for the day and found the source of my leak. Apparently, the slot where a wastegate arm would attach on the front of the turbo was wide open and puffing exhaust gas. The hole has since been plugged with a stud which was also welded in.

I also found a small leak at the bottom of the wastegate recirc pipe where it enters the downpipe. This is certainly the result of me bending it to gain access to the power steering bolts. With the exhaust leaks fixed and the motor now running at a proper A/F, throttle tip in and driveability are where they were before the cam adjustment. Kudos to Jim for finding the leak in less than 30 seconds.

The only thing left to check is the flapper itself. Paul told me it was sealed with a full weld, but if it started leaking out of the wastegate arm hole it may have cracked. The hard part is that it's hard to see down there, but I'll get under the car tomorrow and pull the O2 to have a look. In speaking to Keith, he feels that a busted weld can certainly cause some of the spool issues I've been having. Either way, I feel like I'm getting closer.

I do need to add some information about the cam change and it's effect on highway driving. Previosuly, any attempt to accelerate in 5th gear required an eternity for boost to build to 25 psi. On a recent highway trip I could half throttle the pedal at 3000 RPM and have 25 psi jsut before 4000 which is markedly better than it was before.

I'll be sure to update this thread once again after I have a look at the flapper to see what's up. What sucks is that this turbo was off once before to change the manifold gasket. Had I known that I should have checked the flapper, I would have done so then. Argh!

 

[andymoraitis]

Just updating again guys. Dan and I had plans to change the compressor cover from a B to an E this weekend since it'll certainly allow for more boost on pump due to a cooler intake charge. As it turns out, I'm going to put those plans on hold until the weather warms up again since I did find a couple of loose manifold nuts that were leaking exhaust before the turbo.

On a third gear pull, I now see 23 psi by 3900 RPM and full boost around 4200 or so. It's certainly better than it was and the difference is pretty apparent. If we can pull the cover without yanking the turbo we may have at it just to see if the seal is leaking. Another thing to consider is that the needles have been off of my gauges before to remove the indiglo faces from the previous owner. Who knows if they're exactly right. I may pick up a spare cluster just to try it and see.

That's it for now. If I come across anymore information I'll be sure to update accordingly.

 

[mavisky]

Glad to hear you're getting some improvement Andy. See you Sunday.

 

[project_tsi]

I got your message. I'm still bringing the comp cover and misc tools JUST IN CASE.

 

[CanadianTSi]

I was able to remove my E cover with the turbo still on the car...so it is possible

 

[99gst_racer]

I may pick up a spare cluster just to try it and see.

My parts car has one w/ your name on it. We can swap them out next time you're up this way. Just let me know if you're interested.

 

[92awddsm]

I can also send this cluster I have. I dont have a use for it right now(I dont have a 2g).

 

[project_tsi]

Bah!!! I vote for a big ass 5" tach. Uber sweet.