Turbo on 2000 Limited 5.0

Well guys, I don't even have it yet and I'm looking at going turbo.

I think I'll be going STS style with the turbo underneath the the body. I'm hoping I can find room somewhere closer to the front to mount it. If not, I may just go classic style and cut the muffler out and install the turbo in its place.

Tim was kind enough to point me at a turbo for sale locally. I'm checking it out now. I sent the specs to James Henson to see what his thoughts are.

Here's the specs:
t4 F1-68 turbine .68 a/r housing 3" exhaust outlet with a 72mm compressor blade 4inch inlet, 2.5 inch outlet, journal bearing. Also, see compressor map attached. I have a vague understanding, and that concerns me.

Now, the next issue is oil routing.
Oil in to the turbo would be handled from a T off the oil pressure sending unit on the block. Return oil would need a scavenge pump to the top of the oil pan, or in the timing chain cover. The scavenge pump adds quite a bit of cost to the setup. I think saving a few bucks in this area would spell disaster. So, this seems to be the best pump out there:
http://turbowerx.com/Scavenge_Pumps/Exa-Pump/Exa-Pump.html
Stainless steel oil lines will have to be used. As I read about under cab mounted turbo's oil issues seem to be a huge issue. This is going to require careful thought and routing.

My real issue is routing the air filter and compressed air up to the engine bay.
The frame rails will be the the way. I saw one guy notched out his frame for the plumbing and re-enforced the frame by welding metal around the plumbing line (3 inch or 4 inch hole). I'm concerned about running the two pipes and think this will be the biggest challenge. I really don't want that air filter under the truck.
See what this guy did on his ranger?


As for Maf? Pro-M all the way, in a blow thru design.

Fuel pump, injectors, sct go without saying. I'll be having James put together a care package for me along with the Pro-M.
Aeromotive Stealth 340 pump
Bosch uscar (EV6) 60lb injectors part # 108191

I'll recycle my boost gauge and wide band o2 from my supercharged 4.0 ohv.

I'll be using stainless steel for everything under the truck as rust always seems to be an issue.

Also. intercooling. I learned from my last project that cool intake air is incredibly important. People say on under cabin turbo's you don't really need it as the compressed air cools on the way up. Not good enough for me. Im going to go air/water so I have flexibility as to where I mount the intercooler. This could change, but intercooling of some form is a must.

My eye's are watering at what this is going to cost.

I see 02Limited turbo'd his, but he must have had quite a few issues and fell off the forum.

Not much info on guys completing something like this to be found. All input appreciated.

This will be a long process.

 

[Dono]

Trucks back.
I'm extremely happy with the noise level now. Some valve train noise from the motor, but that's clearly to do with the cam. No tap-tap-tap or anything like that.

I saw Tim tonight, and he sent me away with a bag of plug wires. I wont have a chance to do any plug wire swapping tonight as I still need to go pick up the vehicle I left outside the exhaust shop.

The bad news is that its going to get colder and there is an inch or so of snow expected tomorrow. There will be no real tuning happening. Maybe some drive around logging. In the next few weeks I'll at least know if my motor is going to give me any more grief and I'll be able to find anything else that isn't quite right (Yes, after the plug wires are replaced) before I contact James to see if he's settled in to his new endevor and has time to start some tuning on the side.

With the gt40p heads I was fighting a warm start issue with James. He was struggling as he'd make a change, but no change was noted after applying the change to the pcm. It was a bit frustrating for both of us. Interestingly enough, this issue is gone. I don't understand how this could be, but there is no question that the head change fixed this issue (there was nothing else changed, just heads).

My confidence kept hitting all time lows thru most of this year trying to sort thru all the issues that kept coming up. I actually feel cautiously optimistic (if not down right giddy) that I might actually be on my way to accomplishing my goal of not only a working truck, but one that is powerful with extremely nice street manners.

I continue to learn from errors I made. Some things that occurred there really was nothing to learn from other than '**** happens' when your playing the modification game. The other thing I know for sure is that without Tim being there every step of the way this is what would have happened:

 

[vroomzoomboom]

The other thing I know for sure is that without Tim being there every step of the way this is what would have happened:

yeeep....that means, no turbo would have been put on....no stroker motor would have been put in....and thousands upon thousands of dollars wouldnt have been spent.
you welcome buddy!

it dose have a rumble to it. don came by to pick up a pc from me thats been a pain in the arse for me lately. i was able to hear him pull in the driveway lol. it is no were near as loud as it was when we put the motor back in either. it runs real nice to. i also stood outside to listen to it as he drove away. i couldnt help but snicker that i could tell he wasnt even on it all that hard and you could hear a little roar from it along with the sound from the turbo. your not going to fool to many people if you as me. she isnt a sleeper lol

 

[ford99_1979]

Good progress guys and good job sticking to it! Never over but it's another hurdle overcome. Try and share a video of the truck. I want to hear it.

 

[4pointslow]

Scared the Crap....

Dono,
You got me good.
You scared the crap out of me.
I clicked on the link in my email to see this page load with a white truck on fire, and the "truck is back' being the first thing you stated I thought WTF? did it catch fire at the shop? Then luckily I realized it was not your truck in that picture. LOL. My heart is still skipping beats every once in a while now.

Glad to hear it is running well, and sounding like a mean machine!
You have been through many trials and have overcome them.
That truck is awesome!

 

[Dono]

Here is what the plugs look like.

I bet you can't even imagine the price of these?
$30.00 each. cough, gag...watering eye's. The whole bit.
Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but I do have to question the value.

Yea, there are many times this summer that I had visions of something like this happening (surprise engine fire). Problem was, it would be tough to explain to the insurance company with no motor in the engine bay.

 

[Dono]

Those NGK wires were being toasted, without a doubt.
I'm hoping these ceramic booted high temp Accel 9002's work better.

The boots are pretty coo. They actually are ceramic. No bending, thats for sure.

One boot just barely made it on the plug. The header is in the way. A bit of twisting of the boot and it slid on. Keep in mind that between the gt40p headers and the plugs being in unusual orientations there is nothing remotely factory about this placement. I sure hope the ceramic holds up as well as the manufacturer says it will.

And...motor is now running smoother. I need to make sure all the 'bugs' are ironed out before even thinking about tuning. I did turn up the boost slightly the other day. I have seen 3 lbs so far. I don't want to push a thing as I want to actually be able to drive the truck for a while and am not ready to risk a head gasket. No signs of detonation, and that's a good thing.

As the truck sits, stepping hard on the gas creates all kinds of havoc that I am not used to.

Lots of snow in the forecast.

 

[vroomzoomboom]

i do want to add something. last week don stopped over to help me with my home pc, i would have picked it up from him, but my ranger decided to not start. while he was getting the computer up and running i had asked him if i could borrow his truck (dont really like taking other peoples trucks for drives without them in it, but....)
now keep in mind. both of us have the same motor...sorta. i jump in it and start it and WHOA! this thing is nice and quiet! then i put it in gear and drive away WHOA! this thing doesnt snap your head off when shifting! and it also has a nice ride! i can hear myself think, HELL im comfortable! when i compare his truck to mine, there is no comparison. he did a good job with it, with everything that is done and keeping it good to drive as a DD. made me kinda jealous.
my truck kinda punishes you for being in it.....

 

[Dono]

I have something interesting that's been happening to my overdrive to mention here.

I was always back and fourth with James on my overdrive. I felt 2600rpm on the highway at 110km (70mph) was too high (factory 273 gears and 31" tires with the pcm re-programmed for the taller tires), and kept giving James a hard time as sometimes the rpms would drop to just over 2000rpm at this speed.

Every time he sent me a tune I'd see the low rpm's for about 3 days (6 warm-up's with highway driving). Then, I'd end up at 2600 rpm's at this speed and could never get back to the magical 2000 rpm's without a battery pull or a re-flash. It sure sounded like something in the pcm learning was killing my over drive.

So, in go the new plug wires. I didn't pull the battery cable or anything installing as it was just wires.

Guess what? 3 days later I am now cruising on the highway at 2000rpm. I have to conclude that my fairly new NGK plug wires had been toasted by the heat from my headers a long time ago and I just assumed they were good as they were fairly new.

I don't understand what the pcm was learning to cause this symptom. I am super happy to have this nice low rpm when cruising as the motor definately had the torque down low to support this at low loads.

Its clear to me now that the tuning can't be very spot on since James was trying to tune my truck while it had this miss. Probably at least 2 cylinders not firing all the time because of the wire insulation having broken down. I'll do a bit of logging to see where my fuel trims are. At least no codes have popped up. The positive part of this is I will have all issues sorted out before tuning resumes.

If we were to discuss who has bigger balls, I'd say Tim. No question. He wants to start his tuning process asap. Its crazy slippery out there. On the highway I have to stay in 4 wheel drive just to keep the rear end from trying to pass me (ask me how I know ). I felt like I was 16 again trying to straighten out at highway speeds. We are on the prairies, so as long as you don't hit the ditch sideways its one of the safest places to go (personal pride was not going to let that happen though). This weather makes all those times we dropped and re-installed that front dif worth while.

 

[4pointslow]

Explorer

Glad you got the engine back in before the weather got real bad.
Misfires can be a pain in the but sometimes cant they?

If spark plugs wires end up with really high resistance the secondary ignition voltage will be very high, sometimes as high as 40-50,000 volts. These high voltages going around and across other wires can induce voltages and cause all sorts of weird problems.

I once had a 1988 S10 blazer that would have a check engine light come on only under wot. Turned out to be about 40,000 volts going through one bad ignition wire causing a false knock sensor code since it ran across the wires to the knock module. All the other wires were about 7,000 volts which was fine.

Got to love how things fail sometimes.

 

[vroomzoomboom]

its not who has bigger balls, its who has been shocked by a faulty coil more *twitch*
now for rpm's i remember driving brads truck home when i bought it (the stroker truck as i call it) around 120kms (i think thats 75mph) it was around 1900-2100ish rpms with 33's on it and i think 3.73's. now with evil, when ever i have gone to the states with it, i only like doing around 70mph because its spinning around 2500-2600 rpms with a 30 inch tire (245/50's) with 4.10's. you would think i can remember what it does at 100kms (60mph) but i cant lol. i think its around 2200rpms

 

[Dono]

At 100km/hr I'm under 2000 rpm when everything is locked right up. I was starting to think I was looking for the holy grail of rpm's. I couldn't explain what was happening to anyone in a way that made any sense. With this motor, 500 rpm makes a huge difference in noise and mileage. We will see what happens to this 'holy grail' over the next week or so.
I'll be going to see my parents this Christmas and the question is...do I drive my explorer that I haven't been able to make overly reliable in the past year, or go the safe route with a little <cough> Honda suv <cough>.

It's kinda like giving in, I hate that.

 

[vroomzoomboom]

If we were to discuss who has bigger balls.......

gotta pop the cherry sometime....

 

[4pointslow]

I'll be going to see my parents this Christmas and the question is...do I drive my explorer that I haven't been able to make overly reliable in the past year, or go the safe route with a little <cough> Honda suv <cough>.

It's kinda like giving in, I hate that.

Think of it this way, less miles and wear on the Explorer.

 

[Dono]

ok, so my lockup is gone for 2000rpm on the highway. WTF?
Whatever is going on here is very strange.

When I started trying to see if James could figure out the issue, we could see that the torque converter was doing what the pcm was telling it to. This issue is not new to the truck, and I 'think' its working like it was designed to, I just want the lockup to occur sooner and be a solid lockup.

 

[2000StreetRod]

closed loop?

Was the PCM in closed loop when it didn't lockup?

 

[Dono]

Was the PCM in closed loop when it didn't lockup?

Yes, closed loop is not the issue. Temp is up. Closed loop flag is keyed. I'll have to do more logging and see maybe add different pids (and hope the pids work).

 

[4pointslow]

Overdrive light

Does your overdrive off light work?
from 2600 to 2000 seems drastic, most lock up torque converters only drop rpm about 200. Is yours custom?

Are you sure it is going into overdrive?, that would make more sense with a 600 rpm difference.

 

[Dono]

That's what I thought on the overdrive only being a few hundred rpm.
I did wonder about the overdrive button, and the truck definitely goes in to overdrive.

I agree that this is very strange. I even thought my tach might be off, but I can hear the difference in rev's also. I just don't understand where the difference in rpm's is.

 

[Turdle]

OK
When James and I were doing the tuning on mine there was an issue almost exactly like this, however I had another symptom which went along with it.

Whenever I would try to slow from 50+ miles per hour to 30 ,Using engine braking, as in coming off the highway to my city limits, the engine would speed and slow, almost like I was revving it up, but it was doing this all by itself, with steady TPS idle voltage input.
Whenever this occurred I would loose lock up, and only a pcm reset would bring it back


I don't know the term James used, but there is a fuel injector pattern for slowing speed, and how they switch off or pulse during engine braking. This is where he made the adjustment to fix the issue. Once the uncontrollable "vroom vroom vroom" was fixed I never had another issue with TC lockup.

 

[Dono]

Once the uncontrollable "vroom vroom vroom" was fixed I never had another issue with TC lockup.

About how many rpm shift was the "vroom vroom vroom" when it was happening? I'm seeing something like that, but James and I thought it was the TC locking and unlocking. Not a huge rpm shift when its happening for me.