Building a 400bhp+ 2.5 ltr 944 Turbo

[PSH]

Thanks, Matt.. she is nice isn't she?...lot's of work gone into her, bare shell respray including underneath and a ceramic topcoat to finish off. All painted by my eldest son and his partner Luis at their business RSH performance, that must be nearly 5 years ago now, I'm still waiting for them to respray my car, one day... This cossie is rather special, it's shell is a full rally-spec version, my son drove over to Ireland to collect it and bring it back on a trailer. The engine is over 500bhp and about to be increased to 650bhp, he's just received the new pistons with valve cutouts and a whole host of other parts as a start, knowing him and my eldest it will take very little time to get the engine out, full strip down and back on the road. this thing has impressive brakes to match the power, 6 pot calibres and water-cooled too.

It frightens me, I like a less aggressive punch when the boost hits, my son likes it to be very hard, so plenty of lag low down but boy do you need to hang on when that boost kicks in, that's just how he likes it, back end overtaking the front on the roundabouts, he's been like that all his life...lol

He borrowed my car once, had a friend with him, the friend who I know well said he'll never get in my car with him driving again...I didn't want to hear the details, best not. The good thing after that though was that he said the brakes needed sorting and then stripped them down and rebuilt them for me, they were certainly a big improvement after his tinkering..

Pete

 

[Matt_at_Rushworth]

Pete,

Its funny how the biggest difference we see is between the boost profiles of cars and their owners preferences, we built alot of stuff early days that was very similar, nice big boost kicks and good top end figures. Its certainly been looked after looking at the photos.

Nowadays we find ourselves building more compact, solid power street cars 6/700hp type stuff thats A road and B road friendly!

Your lads welcome to give me a message if he's ever sourcing performance parts, we deal in a huge range and can always offer competetive prices.... plus i have a CNC shop / Rapid prototyping on site should anything need making bespoke.

Matt

 

[PSH]

Thanks, Matt, I'll let him know, he's always trying something new... I remember his sierra cossie block being dumped on me for some tinkering on the mill many years ago, can't remember what it was now, something to do with oil feed. I do recall machining small semi-circle cut-outs in his pistons in the top ring slot to hold the rings against the bore wall better and thus less blow-by, an old racing trick I believe. West Midlands wouldn't daunt him, he gets work done all over the place, I laughed at him the other day when he drove to Coventry to pick up an air horn of a train, said he needed something louder to warn people, it was essential shopping he said, very tongue in cheek, of course...

Pete

 

[blade7]

Nice, but the 86-88 Cosworth is the daddy road version. I did have those wheels on mine though.

I know a lot of Cossie fans who would disagree with you on that one..My son has owned two Sierra based versions, his friends have owned various types too, including the RS500...they all wanted the Escort as it was the dream car to own...all great cars but I think you'll find that the Escort Cosworth is seen as the top dog in most Fast Ford circles...

Pete

[/quote]

I was going to trade my 3 door Cosworth in for an Escos when they came out. When the road tests showed they were 10 mph slower, and had a weaker gearbox I lost interest. The RS500 is still the top dog.

 

[PSH]

You should have got an original 86 951, faster than both cars top end and standing qtr, plus nearly as fast as the escort to 60mph too.. BTW, my son's escort is RWD, hench his new registration, he's not a fan of 4WD, as I said he likes to drift. He converted it himself, well him and my eldest who has just rose jointed his own RS Turbo, built the system himself. It will be nice to see that back on the road, much less power of course, but still produced 325bhp on the dyno perhaps ten years ago now, it's a 2.1 ltr Zetec/CVH hybrid, that block has been on my mill bed too...

 

[blade7]

You should have got an original 86 951, faster than both cars top end and standing qtr, plus nearly as fast as the escort to 60mph too.. BTW, my son's escort is RWD, hench his new registration, he's not a fan of 4WD, as I said he likes to drift. He converted it himself, well him and my eldest who has just rose jointed his own RS Turbo, built the system himself. It will be nice to see that back on the road, much less power of course, but still produced 325bhp on the dyno perhaps ten years ago now, it's a 2.1 ltr Zetec/CVH hybrid, that block has been on my mill bed too...

The 86 951 was only about 3 mph faster, and the 944 had a yuppy image back then. And as some of my mates had Cosworths it wouldn't have gone down very well. That and I'd had around 10 mk2 RS Escorts up to that point, so I was a Ford nut back then. I had a modified 86 RS Turbo before my Cosworth, fast but I didn't get on with the front wheel drive, so got rid after a few months. My Mrs Fiesta ST has only done 25k in 6 years, I'd buy her a new car, and tune the ST up if I was a lot younger.

 

[PSH]

[/quote]

The 86 951 was only about 3 mph faster, and the 944 had a yuppy image back then. And as some of my mates had Cosworths it wouldn't have gone down very well. That and I'd had around 10 mk2 RS Escorts up to that point, so I was a Ford nut back then. I had a modified 86 RS Turbo before my Cosworth, fast but I didn't get on with the front wheel drive, so got rid after a few months. My Mrs Fiesta ST has only done 25k in 6 years, I'd buy her a new car, and tune the ST up if I was a lot younger.

[/quote]

ah yes, I hear you, I used to be a Ford man too...both my eldest sons are Ford men, Richard has modified a few ST's, those were focus though, has one in the works now... this is for 400bhp, all the mechanics are done, just waiting to get it into paint.

 

[PSH]

Ok, so getting back to proper cars, ie Porsche's. I discovered something today, think I may need to take a look at my EBC and it's boost settings. To tell a story, I popped over to my son's work to collect my car's interior, it's not been put back in yet since he worked on the car. The car when leaving my house was a little hesitant to start, low battery type of thing. I had to move the car a couple of times while there as his parking bay was full of cars, I then loaded the car and started the engine, took even longer to start and so I thought best to get my son to check it while there. So he came out and i tried to start the car again.. nothing... this went on for a while with all the usual checks showing nothing. My son said it's probably just the battery being low and that the big injectors wouldn't be helping. So he got his little booster out, when I say little, it's tiny for a booster, approx 14 x 6 x 3 inches, connected it up and the car started, the thing spun over so bloody fast I'm surprised it didn't take off, that's some booster he has.

Anyway, he told me to keep the booster in the car and I set off for home taking the long route to try and get some charge back into the battery. I decided that I needed some highway speed so headed for the A41. Here I found an empty road on a particular favourite stretch that's safe and thus ideal for opening up, something that I've not been able to do fully since the new mods were fitted.

I'll start by saying this thing is a bloody 'rocket ship' I shit you not, I won't bore you with yet more descriptions of how well she goes and get back to the topic, boost. This is the first time that I've managed to use a good amount of throttle through the gears although still not WOT, I mentioned previously that she seemed to hit the redline very fast, well now I think it's not the redline but the boost setting. In third, she felt like the clutch spun, very possible as it's happened before, the torque in this engine is far too high for the Sachs Motorsport 930 clutch disk, so I carried on into 4th and the same thing happened again, she's never had clutch slip in 4th. It then dawned on me that it wasn't clutch slip as the revs didn't rise, I did a few more runs on the same bit of road but this time noting the RPM, I was nowhere near the redline, this was happening between 5 and 6 rpm. This left the boost to check, on checking the stepper boost gauge it had recorded a boost of 1.6 BAR, that's above the safety limit of 1.5 BAR that I've set the ECU too. Clearly I was experiencing and 'over-boost' scenario, so my next job is to check the settings on the APEXi EBC, perhaps it has lost what they were set at when the car had no battery connected for a while?

I'll take a look at this tomorrow when I put the interior back in, the weather should be a little warmer, I hope. Did I say how fast this thing is?.. oh yeh... I did, didn't I...

Pete

 

[GPF]

Hi Pete,

The Apexi will allow boost spikes if it builds up quickly - mine does anyway. (AVC-R)

From memory, there is a setting in it that controls the trade off between responsiveness and control of spikes so it may still have the correct limit set but may be insufficiently damped. It may need this adjusting to slow the rate of boost increase in order to retain enough control to stop it overshooting. In mine you can set that for each gear.

Could also be the wastegate is not opening fast enough of course

Best Regards

Graham

 

[PSH]

Hi Pete,

The Apexi will allow boost spikes if it builds up quickly - mine does anyway. (AVC-R)

From memory, there is a setting in it that controls the trade off between responsiveness and control of spikes so it may still have the correct limit set but may be insufficiently damped. It may need this adjusting to slow the rate of boost increase in order to retain enough control to stop it overshooting. In mine you can set that for each gear.

Could also be the wastegate is not opening fast enough of course

Best Regards

Graham

Hi Graham

thanks for the input, yes mine is the AVC-R too, the only EBC to have IMHO. I'm aware of the tradeoff between control and boost via duty cycle. My cycle is set high which removes most lag but as you say you need to be aware of boost spikes, this is why I have an audible boost gauge to warn me when over 1 BAR, perhaps I should set this a little higher?

After refitting most of the interior today I took a look at the settings, yes the boost was being held back as it was only set for 1.2BAR which I hit so damn quick it caught me out. I had been thinking when first getting the car back from my son a few weeks ago that I was hitting the redline in 1st and 2nd, I wasn't, the EBC was restricting the boost after hitting 1.2BAR which it hits in a mere second or two. I have now increased the boost cut out to 1.5 and reduced the duty cycle a little to 70% which IIRC is still double what is recommended to be set at to avoid spikes.

I really should spend more time learning the APEXi as it has many features that I don't use, features that would give even more power and control, perhaps that's for another day..

I'll finish off the interior tomorrow morning and then perhaps take the car out again to see how she is now, I suspect they'll be an even faster rocket ship on the road...

On a separate note, I've just taken another look at my son's little booster pack, it's much smaller than I had thought, measuring 7.5 x 3.5 x 1.5 inches, it kicks a hell of a punch for something that you can stick in your pocket, IIRC made by Artek.

Thanks again for the input Graham, much appreciated

Cheers

Pete

 

[PSH]

Well, this mornings test drive after the EBC boost/duty adjustments yesterday was rather enjoyable... I think that must have been the issue as a couple of fast power runs along the same stretch of road, showed none of the issues from yesterday. What I really love about this car is not just it's speed which, to be honest, is ridiculous but it's drivability.. response is instant, even when in traffic a short blip of the throttle is just so much fun, along with that response there's such a lovely burble sound on overrun, not to mention the very loud 'dump to atmosphere' from the dump valve...On an open road when driving hard, to add to the whooshing sound you also have the chatter of the wastegate when going rapidly through the gears... This car sounds nothing like a standard 944, either WOT or on overrun which is probably my favourite sound with the occasional 'pop' amongst the burble from the exhaust.

I can't wait for when we can all get out to a meet, let's hope it's not too far away...

Stay safe guys

Pete

 

[PSH]

Hi guys

I've been playing with the car today, took some video, it's crap but will buy myself something to hold the phone in future.

First, my son called me to say a solid-state DME relay (well there's no relays per se in these ) had arrived from the States, must be more than 6 weeks since he ordered it, anyway, better late than never.

Now some video.

Alas, I had to edit these to less than 60 seconds as Imgur won't allow anything larger, or if it does, I haven't discovered how to yet.

Car stationery with the engine running.

[link=https://youtu.be/y4sSRt69rz0]https://youtu.be/y4sSRt69rz0[/link]

Now, this video has no picture, just sound as the phone was held trapped in the glove box lid, so a little muffled. This was just me attempting to give some sound to the engine when accelerating. This was pulling out right onto the A41 from a fuel station near Stanmore. Not a good spot as visibility to the right is a little obscured by trees so needed to be sure before pulling out. Also, I tried to find a gap with some distance in the traffic, I guess the car that had just pasted going my direction had about 10 seconds lead so I wasn't going to get up to any real speed, in fact, I only coasted into 4th because I had caught up with him too fast, so all the action is up to 3rd. The road speed here is 60mph which I would guess was the speed of the car in front. I topped just over 100mph before needing to back off to play safe. It's a short video so hopefully won't bore you guys for too long and it's nowhere near full throttle as the data will show, just me playing a little...

[link=https://youtu.be/3BXOJmfG7fw]https://youtu.be/3BXOJmfG7fw[/link]

Here's the data log from that short burst, Throttle 68.2%, RPM 6623, and boost 1.34.. sorry about the quality, I had removed the roof for the drive and there was too much glare.

EDIT: I have now put the YT links in this post..

Pete

 

[PSH]

hmm.. is it only me not hearing sound?

EDIT: ok think I have it sorted, I have changed from Imgur and used my Dropbox account, for some reason the Imgur video wouldn't play sound? #

Pete

 

[blade7]

Don't fancy signing up just to view, stick them on youtube. And Atmo dump valve, You chav [].

 

[PSH]

ah.. didn't realise you'd have to sign up to see it.... I'll put them on Yt, didn't even think of that...lol

 

[PSH]

Morning all

My son has sent me some photos of the car when he worked on it a few weeks ago, I won't post all of them but here's a fair few.

First up the rear brake disks were changed and the calibres had their plates removed and cleaned, here's the car on the ramp with the disks removed and work started on the calibre. The front disks were renewed last year, the calipers hadn't been touched and so they were also done this time around, along with the rears. Note to self, get those calipers cleaned and painted.

Caliper with plate fitted, I think this is before any work was done, I only have the one picture showing the plates so assume this to be the case, I do have plenty with the plates removed but will only bore you with one.

with plates

with plate removed

New fuel lines... top

And bottom

Pipework both inlet and boost, These have been sprayed in an epoxy chrome finish paint, I have only just realised when looking at these that my son sprayed the MAF body too, that's a nice touch. The boost pipes were totally reworked, removing all of the rough welds etc, some of you may recall that these pipes were made in a hurry the night before the car's MOT 5 years ago, they were only supposed to be 'test pipes' well they certainly passed the 'no leak' test..

Inlet pipe with MAF body

Boost pipe, throttle to the intercooler

Boost pipe, turbo to intercooler

I think this is the first inlet pipe from the turbo, I just can't remember what the smaller tube goes to?

Inlet Manifold

To conclude, two pictures of the before and after, I hope you'll agree with me that all this work that my son did was worth it, it was a great surprise when he returned the car to me.

Before

After

In other news, I'm still waiting for Porsche to re-open so that my son can do all the other bits promised...come on Porsche, get your act together...

Pete

Edited: 'calibre' now corrected....

 

[blade7]

Er, do you mean calipers Pete []. Where did the fuel lines come from?

 

[PSH]

Er, do you mean calipers Pete []. Where did the fuel lines come from?

Er...yep, that's the one...not sure where he got the lines from, I'll ask..

 

[PSH]

Paul, the fuel lines were custom made by my son using Aeroquip parts, think he bought most from the 'Torques' company.

Pete

 

[blade7]

Thanks Pete, I know there's a couple of yankee kits around. But you get stung for the dreaded duty and tax.