New year, new build...v.3.0...R?

[xt2005bonbon]

Man, great work and dedication. The engine looks good.

[BrandonspecB]

Have you got a wiring diagram for the engine harness by any chance? I'm going to start wiring a custom loom to mine too a Link ECU and a wiring diagram would be very helpful.

Cheers.

 

The wiring diagram I used was out of the factory service manual. Click Here

 

If you have any specific questions let me know.

 

Today I got the cylinder heads on. I was hoping to do more, but had some stuff come up. The 12mm studs are beefy. I was wondering if I was going to have to machine the heads to get them to fit, but the 12mm part is just the threads in the block. Everything above that is the same diameter as the 10.5mm studs.

 

There is one issue that with the larger studs. They have to be installed before the dowels are pounded in. I didn't know this and pounded the dowels in first and then had to pull them back out. It's interesting installing dowels with the studs already threaded in.

 

I must say I am very impressed with Outfront's quality. I purchased a used case from them, but all the hardware on it is brand new. They included brand new cylinder head and trans alingnment dowels and a new crank key.

[BrandonspecB]

Ran into some issues with the upper oil pan. Pulled the oil gallery plugs out of it to clean it and pulled the threads out of one of them. I won't have a new pan until probably next week.

 

There is still a lot to do. Been getting the wiring harness all laid out. Need some extra loom to finish it.

 

Put a black intake manifold on it. I like the red, but it gets dull and dirty real quick.

 

One of the things that I believe has been causing trigger issues is the movement in the crank trigger wheel. I made a video showing it HERE. The engine is exactly at TDC on cylinder 1. There is a mark on the crank sensor and I'm thinking the trigger wheel needs to be bolted down when the tooth is exactly centered on that mark. I sent this to Haltech to see what they think.

[BrandonspecB]

Car should run tomorrow. Only a handful of things left to do.

[BrandonspecB]

The start of round three.

 

Engine runs and the car drives again. It was a massive pain in the ass though, thanks to Subaru and a typo in the service manual.

 

Car wouldn't start because the main engine relay wasn't turning on. After hours of trying to figure out what was wrong I found that the service manual has the color of the wire wrong for the 2.5L turbo diagram. It labels the output for that relay as Lg, which is light green. This is the color of wire I wired to the Haltech to control that relay. If you look at the 2.5L non turbo and 3.0L diagrams, their main relay output wire is LG or blue with a green stripe.

 

Once I figured this out I had to open up the wiring harness, find the blue with green stripe wire, and wire it up to the ECR output in the Haltech. And then it fired right up.

 

 

It was really nice to drive it again. The steering, clutch, and shifter feel so good. The power between idle and 3000 RPM is so much better than my daily. And it sounds way better than the daily too.

 

As much as I like driving it, I'm a little burned out. Probably take a few weeks away from it and then start tinkering again.

[xt2005bonbon]

As much as I like driving it, I'm a little burned out. Probably take a few weeks away from it and then start tinkering again.

 

 

Just a 'little burned out'? Come on man. Do you realize the amount of work you have accomplished? When I get to the Salt Lake valley, I need to come see and hear this.

[BrandonspecB]

Whenever you're around here let me know.

[Tlobbo]

Just spent an hour or so reading through all of this. This build and you are simply amazing!

[BrandonspecB]

Well, thanks!

 

For your kind words, here's a video of some part throttle acceleration getting on the freeway. I was going to make a video of me going out and ripping on the thing, but something on the camera mount was vibrating and it totally ruins the sound. This is one of the only clean clips.

 

Part Throttle High RPM Accel

[xt2005bonbon]

Too short!

 

 

Why did one of the LEDs flash at you in the center cubby?

[BrandonspecB]

That's the knock light. Picked up some noise after the shift.

[CEVENN]

I LOVE THAT!

Really amazing job, congratulations!

[xt2005bonbon]

That's the knock light. Picked up some noise after the shift.

 

 

That was my guess actually

[BrandonspecB]

Been a few months since I updated this. Had a few things happen. Some good, some bad.

 

My biggest issues with this engine have been oil pressure and triggering problems. I've spent the last few months getting these things worked out as best I can.

 

I've managed to get oil pressure to stay steady 70 psi and a slow drop to 60 at 7300 RPM at 205F oil temp. This is probably the very best this oil pump can do. I think it was sized with no headroom for a stock spec engine and once you open up bearing clearances, add a turbo and oil cooler, it just doesn't have the volume to maintain pressure at high RPM. It may well be that a high power EZ just can't keep bearings alive for long periods of time. I'm definitely going to find out though. I already have a plan to run an external oil pump if need be.

 

What I've done to the oil system is reduce as many losses on the suction side as I can. Suction side restrictions contribute most to pump cavitation. I removed the pickup screen, rounded every corner in every passage on the way to the pump, put an extremely thin coating of RTV on the oil pump front cover to prevent any leakage, and bought a brand new oil pump which includes the entire rear timing cover, gears, and front cover. Not cheap. I also use Redline 5w50 oil.

 

Trigger issues were caused by the cam signal dropping out under heavy load conditions. I would get engine position errors around 25 psi boost or anytime I used anti-lag for stationary or rolling launch. I still don't know why the cam signal drops out. Haltech doesn't know either, but they have a work around. Instead of setting the triggers up to use a cam signal all the time, they have a mode for cars with very powerful, noisy ignition systems that uses the cam signal for 8 engine cycles to sync with the crank signal and then it ignores the cam signal and runs full sequential off the crank signal only. So far it works beautifully.

 

It works so well that I was out having an absolute blast with the car. Rolling launch is one of the funnest things. It lets the engine get into boost in low gears at engine speeds that it normally can't. Then when you let go of the button it's full power immediately.

 

I ended up having it set a bit too aggressively and popped some exhaust valves open into a piston. Damnit. So, the heads on the car have already been machined a bunch and my best option for getting the car running again was buying a used engine and swapping heads. So that's what I did.

 

That brings me to today. I went and bought a drum of VP X85 and converted the car over to ethanol. E60 to be exact. The Haltech fuel control is sooooo good and it was a shame having to run open loop with meth injection. I decided I wanted all my fuel going through the injectors, so the fuel control can maintain a perfect AFR under all conditions, all the time.

 

So, that's where I'm at. I made my YouTube videos public again. I got over my paranoia and figured I'd share what I built.

 

Here's my ethanol update vid: Ethanol Conversion Update

 

Hopefully this weekend I'll get out and get some rolling launch vids. I made it less aggressive so it won't bend any valves again.

[taj_fwd911]

Awesome stuff mate. Read all this a while back but only just made an account to be able to participate in the thread.

 

I'm in the early stages of building mine myself in Australia so I'm sure I'll have questions along the way if you don't mind!

 

For example (lol):

1. My new forged rods measure the same at the big end as yours (or 55.00mm/2.16535"). Is it a definite the King Racing bearings won't work without opening up the rods? I noticed that 2.1673" measurement in their catalogue had an asterisk next to it explained as "indicates maximum housing diameter".

 

2. Do you happen to know what the rod & main bearing clearances ended up at (and any reasoning for targeting a specific size)?

 

I really admire your persistence with it mate, really hoping you get to drive it as much as you'd like to soon, and enjoying the youtube clips too.

[BrandonspecB]

Don't mind the questions at all.

 

So this is going back a ways, but if I remember right the machine shop ended up calling King and asking them what size journal and big end the bearings were made for. They ended up not opening up the rods but had to turn the journals down on the crank.

 

As far as clearances that first engine had 0.0015" main and rod clearances and failed from the smashed pan blocking the pickup. 2nd engine was opened up to 0.002" main and rod because they thought that the clearances may have been too tight. I hadn't yet figured out why the first engine failed. 0.002" is way too big. The Outfront engine sheet doesn't give me exact clearance, but a range. Mains are 0.001-0.0015 and rods are 0.0015-0.002.

 

My personal opinion is keep them on the large side of factory spec for power. I think 0.001 for the mains and 0.0015 for rods is where they should be. The factory spec for mains is 0.0004"-0.0012" and rods is 0.0006"-0.0017".

 

Larger clearance gives more room for components to flex under power. That's usually the reason clearances are opened up a bit for engines that are built to make power. There's quite a bit more to it though. Lots of good articles online from trustworthy publications that go into more detail.

Edited November 10, 2021 by BrandonspecB

[taj_fwd911]

Awesome info mate, thanks very much! I'm just about up to ordering some bearing sets for my engine now. I see ACL now make big end bearings so I may go with those, then either King or OEM for mains - I've seen more posts than just yours regarding King's big end bearings not working without resizing rods or journals.

 

There's a group on facebook called "Boosty EZ Boiz" if you're interested in joining that - There's a post there that pretty clearly shows excessive bearing crush at the parting lines with King's installed in a factory-sized conrod.

 

At the moment I have my block at a machine shop for closed-decking, block o-ringing, and drilling/tapping to suit the 12mm head studs. Have gathered rods, valve springs, 12mm 625+ studs in the meantime. Just need to make a decision on pistons and weigh up some head work like oversize exhaust valves + porting perhaps

Edited November 13, 2021 by taj_fwd911

[BrandonspecB]

What turbo and how much power are you looking for?

[taj_fwd911]

What turbo and how much power are you looking for?

 

A GTX3582 with a 1.06AR exhaust housing right now. But i'll be converting from internal to external wastegate - undecided if I just weld the flapper on that one or buy like a 1.01 v-band housing.

 

Hopefully in the region of 450kW atw, i think the turbo should get there at roughly 22-25psi on E85

Edited November 13, 2021 by taj_fwd911

[BrandonspecB]

That is probably the perfect size for this engine. I've thought about swapping to one about that size.

 

Bit of an update. Got an ethanol content sensor installed. Car is true flex fuel now. I still have the meth injection system and can enable it if the ethanol content is below 20%.

Edited November 15, 2021 by BrandonspecB

[SoobyDoobyDoo]

This thing is badass. Thanks for the vid! Is that exhaust stock? Sounds a lot like the Tribeca exhaust (which actually really sounds really good out of the box when you get on it). Ever thought of doing aftermarket (not that there’s really anything available…lol). I’ve thought about some magnaflows or something with a custom y. Just for a little more tone. Will probably need to be replaced in the next year or two anyway, slowly getting a tad bit louder…

[BrandonspecB]

I have been noticing a bit of an oil pressure drop when I accelerate hard in lower gears. This is a quick drop and then recovers, so I'm thinking it's the oil sloshing under hard acceleration. Found this baffle from a New Zealand company called Possum Bourne Motorsports that builds EZ30s. Going to throw that in and see if it helps.

 

I've been pretty anti social media for a while, but started an Instagram because I want to reach out a bit more and tune more cars. I'll be prioritizing updates to the car there. I hope to get it dynoed soon with some ethanol and high boost. Hope it survives.

 

Instagram is @brandonspecb

[LegacyGT007]

Have you looked into an accusump setup? If I remember correctly, when an oil pressure sensor is used with the kit it detects the lower oil pressure and injects oil into the engine to prevent oil starvation until the pressure returns to a normal range. Might be an added level of protection. My buddy recommended I install one if I decide to track my car or drag race.

[BrandonspecB]

I had looked into doing that. An Accusump works great for oil slosh, especially with a solenoid valve controlled by an ecu. You have complete control over when it discharges. I set up a friend's drift car this way and it works amazing. But it doesn't help with oil pressure/flow issues from a pump that is cavitating or can't flow enough.

 

So for the slosh issue I've been having I'm going to give the baffle a shot. I'm betting it will help a lot for those oil pressure dips from accel because the rear of the stock pan has a nice ramp to it. The high rpm pressure is a separate issue that I'm just going to have see how things hold up, especially at higher power.

[xt2005bonbon]

So for the slosh issue I've been having I'm going to give the baffle a shot. I'm betting it will help a lot for those oil pressure dips from accel because the rear of the stock pan has a nice ramp to it. The high rpm pressure is a separate issue that I'm just going to have see how things hold up, especially at higher power.

 

 

I don't have an oil pressure sensor at this time. How bad do you think it is on the EJ257 engine, with stock oil pan/baffle on hard acceleration?