The 97 GS-T project begins

[proteusx301]

I'm new to the forum, however I've been lurking around for about 4 months now, ever since i bought my car. I'm in no way new to working on cars, however this will be my first high performance engine rebuild. I've done many engine rebuilds for work, however they all used factory parts and by the book procedures, so they were mostly cake. I just basically wanted to get on here and lay my plans out on the floor and have some other people look at them, perhaps throw in some of their own ideas or recommendations. Any helpful information is always welcome.

The basic plan is that I'm shooting for between 350whp to 400whp for a daily driver. Engine management will be a EPROM 95 ECU with DSMLINK. I'm not the kind of person to do a job halfway, so someone tell me if im cutting corners somewhere.

ENGINE- donor motor is a 95-96 7-bolt
Block will be sripped bare and hot tanked
cylinders will be overhoned ten thousandths
deck machined flat
stock pistons and rods reused, havent decided on what kind of piston rings yet
clevite 77 rod and main bearings
ARP hardware kits will be used when applicable
balance shafts will be removed
cometic head gasket
ARP headstud kit
head will be hot tanked and cleaned
mating surface machined flat
3-angle valve job, using stock intake valves, and evo exhaust valves
port job
hks cams (havent decided on 264/272 or 272/272 yet)
all of this of course topped off with complete rebuild gasket sets
all new timing belt components
Evo III exhaust manifold
Evo III turbocharger
Evo III O2 housing
RRE 3 inch downpipe mated to a 3inch high flow cat, 3 inch cutout added to DP
Apexi N1 catback
225 lph fuel pump with rewire
STM tank-to rail fuel kit
STM return kit with FPR

All this will of course be supported by the appropriate engine management and monitoring gauges. I will be re-using my existing transmission, havent decided on a flywheel and clutch kit yet. Well thats basically it for now. Thanks in advance for any advice that is given.

 

[jjrock5]

Very cool. I like the FMIC.

 

[ryan lemley]

Geat looking project. Good luck.

 

[NiKKUH_BOViCE]

Whoop whoop thats the sound of da police!!

 

[Aproductions]

too bad they won't catch him when hes done with the rebuild

 

[NiKKUH_BOViCE]

too bad they won't catch him when hes done with the rebuild

i only said that because in the photo of the garage there are a few cop cars on lifts in the background. So I assumed the guys a cop and hes using the police garage. IF you are, please dont track me down? I drive real slow.

 

[92AWDHX40]

Nice build the FMIC is really nice.

 

[Boomdeeze]

Nice build man!!! This car will be sweet when ## done

 

[proteusx301]

i only said that because in the photo of the garage there are a few cop cars on lifts in the background. So I assumed the guys a cop and hes using the police garage. IF you are, please dont track me down? I drive real slow.

No I'm not a police officer. I just work on their cars, and EMS as well.

An update on the intercooler install; wasn't able to do it this weekend. One of my cooling fans quit on me on the way to a New Year's party and the car was overheating at long lights. I figure the last thing i need to do is put a 3 inch thick intercooler in front of the radiator. Last night I ordered the Mishimoto fan kit with aluminum shroud, should be here this week. Not really a big deal, seeing as its not climbing out of the 30's for the next week and a half around here.

 

[joe sobo]

so i take it you are driving your car with a stock engine while building one up? good plan .

 

[proteusx301]

so i take it you are driving your car with a stock engine while building one up? good plan .

Yup. Other than needed maintenance, I'm not opening up the stock engine. Its a healthy little sucker though. 131k miles, still 170+ on all cyls compression ratings, 15 psi DD. I'm currently working my way down a 'to-do' list of all the stuff I can get done without opening up the stock engine and running with the stock motor. That way, once the engine is swapped, it will be able to run on the stock ECU maps during the break in. Once that is done, all the stuff that requires tuning, will be installed in stages, (injectors, increased boost, fine tuning, etc...).

 

[noonan98turbo]

Have you thought about going external wastegate? 16g's are known for boost creep.

 

[proteusx301]

I will be running an atmosphere dump wastegate and will have more than enough fuel and engine durability to handle a decent amount of creep.

 

[oneslowwdsm]

That thing looks sweet! Wish I had more cash to dump in mine!

 

[giovanniv]

Have you thought about going external wastegate? 16g's are known for boost creep.

I don't think he will have to worry about creeping since he will be running quite a bit of boost on the e16g anyways to get the 350-400hp out of it. Besides he has the mods to handle the boost anyways....

 

[proteusx301]

Still having trouble deciding on camshafts. I found FFWD's King Kams (FFWD Connection - Race Injuns That Will Freeze Your Brain fourth one down the page), and after going through 20+ pages of search results, I have yet to find a single review or someone installing them on their car. Right now I'm down to 3 cams for my decision.

HKS 272/272 - the tried and true, but expensive
Kelford 272/272 - from what I'm hearing are showing themselves as nice cams
FFWD king kams - haven't been able to find any information other than the manufacturer's website

I'm leaning very heavily toward the Kelfords, great power for my initial build, but have potential for future plans. It would be nice to see a review on the FFWD cams though.

 

[JonP]

I envy the amount of space you have for your bay . I have my box (maybe a little smaller then your's), a small tool cart, and my motor with no other room for anything else.

 

[richard33]

I have a fairly similar set up that your looking for. In order to reach your goal of 350-400 on that turbo, your gonna have to run a lot of boost. You should see the availability of e85 around you so you can set your boost that high. I had e3 16g @ 30lbs 850's and a walbro 255 pump. I never got it dynoed but Im guessing it made around 350ish. Those injectors were maxed out with duty cycles of 105% so if you do e85, get like 1200s. With the cams, I have brian crower 272s. The rest of the head is stock and I feel like they still make good power.

I didnt read your whole write up but if you didnt get a clutch yet, go with a street disk or something. I got a 6puck sprung clutch and my car crankwalked a month later.

Good luck with the build. Regardless if you hit 400 or even 350hp, youre gonna have a lot of fun with that setup

 

[SFrymyah]

Still having trouble deciding on camshafts. I found FFWD's King Kams (FFWD Connection - Race Injuns That Will Freeze Your Brain fourth one down the page), and after going through 20+ pages of search results, I have yet to find a single review or someone installing them on their car. Right now I'm down to 3 cams for my decision.

HKS 272/272 - the tried and true, but expensive
Kelford 272/272 - from what I'm hearing are showing themselves as nice cams
FFWD king kams - haven't been able to find any information other than the manufacturer's website

I'm leaning very heavily toward the Kelfords, great power for my initial build, but have potential for future plans. It would be nice to see a review on the FFWD cams though.

From what i've been reading recently, you're going to be stretching your legs a little with the 272/272 combo on the 16g. its also going to be pretty lopey. I suggest going with a 264/272. I was reading a link earlier that AMS tested both HKS setups on a 16G and the 264 made nearly 15 MORE lb/ft of torque over the 272. HP numbers however, were almost identical. The 272/272 would be great if you ever decide to move up in turbo though. Furthermore, i also recommend Delta Cams for your setup. You can place an order for whatever cam profile you want and send your originals back for nearly $200. Their cams are regrinds that are modeled from the HKS units.

edit - heres a couple links that might help you out. First is the test AMS did
http://www.amsperformance.com/camtest.php

these two are very recent threads regarding delta. I'm placing my order with them tomorrow based on info found in these two threads.
http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/cyl...355352-what-delta-cams-264-272-272-272-a.html
http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/cylinder-head-short-block/357735-running-delta-cam-regrinds.html

 

[Clinical]

Loving the build.

The car looks great, black 97-99 eclipse GST/GSX's look great!

 

[proteusx301]

I envy the amount of space you have for your bay . I have my box (maybe a little smaller then your's), a small tool cart, and my motor with no other room for anything else.

The part thats going to drive you nuts is that I have 3 bays, .

Thanks for the responses richard33 and SFrymyah, some good info there. This project might get changed to a mid 300s build initially, and then work from there. Good info on the cams too, thanks. A 264/272 setup would remove some of the bottom end loss as I understand it. Seeing as this is going to be a primarily a DD street car, with occasional trips to a road course, that might be a good idea. After the initial break-in, I'm planning on installing 1000cc injectors, more boost and tuning from there. I bought the E316g on sale, brand new, it was too good of a deal to pass up, although I will probably be going with something much bigger in the future, as I am starting to get some ideas for the car.

All further entries on this build will now be from a blog, found at: http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/blogs/proteusx301/