Project Thread Supercharged Supra

[JBrady]

John, Just left you a voice mail.

Some things are comming to mind that suggest that you are PUMPING a bunch of the air and fuel out the exhaust.

Your injectors should NOT be out of flow at 500hp and you as noted are adding additional fuel with the methanol.

The exhaust blowing off points to a BUNCH of energy release in the exhaust instead of flowing the burned A/F that has given much to the crankshaft.

Two 2.5" pipes have nearly 9 sq/in of INTERNAL pipe area. A single 3.0" has about 6.5 sq/in and many have made 700rwhp on a single 3" pipe. You are NOT out of exhaust capacity for your ENGINES current output but rather for the TOTAL energy capacity and exhaust system demands of the charge burning in the exhaust instead of in the cylinder where it can make power.

So, IMO you have WAY more power in the current combo. Almost worth putting a STOCK 1uzfe under than blower to baseline your FI combo.

Since no pictures yet let me post one off my crappy cellphone I took 2 days ago of your engine on the dyno

 

[scotturnot]

Some things are comming to mind that suggest that you are PUMPING a bunch of the air and fuel out the exhaust.

The exhaust blowing off points to a BUNCH of energy release in the exhaust instead of flowing the burned A/F that has given much to the crankshaft.

Two 2.5" pipes have nearly 9 sq/in of INTERNAL pipe area. A single 3.0" has about 6.5 sq/in and many have made 700rwhp on a single 3" pipe. You are NOT out of exhaust capacity for your ENGINES current output but rather for the TOTAL energy capacity and exhaust system demands of the charge burning in the exhaust instead of in the cylinder where it can make power.

So, IMO you have WAY more power in the current combo.

This makes a lot of sence to me. Do you think this could be due to the overlap of valves with the special grind Cams? I am currently pondering this very subject for my motor. I think you might be on to somthing here.

 

[scotturnot]

Our compression tests produced some odd results. The left bank of cylinders consistently gave us 160psi of cranking compression, while the right bank produced 175psi. While a number of things could cause this, both Dennis & Mitch felt it was probably coming from an intake camshaft that was indexed or ground slightly off. This was borne out by comparing the actual injector duty cycles of both banks in order to achieve the same AFR’s.

This really supports the idea of the cams dumping boost. JBrady, I think you got it!

 

[spf_lexus]

Been thinking about the stage I or II cams from Lex but don't know if it would mess with my stock ECU. Would it guarantee a check engine?

 

[cribbj]

OK guys, here is the dyno graph from our 498.3 HP run. Before you ask, no I don't know why we had such a dip in the torque there at 5300 and 5400. The same dip appears in a couple of other runs as well, so I believe Dennis' dyno may have been having load valve regulation problems. I was also tweaking the onset of the methanol injection and the dip could have been from methanol flooding the system momentarily, then the engine sucking it up & recovering.

BTW, the values shown are corrected to STP (29.92 inches Hg barometric pressure, and 60 degrees dry air.)

What was very encouraging to me about this run is that the HP was still climbing even at 6900 RPM. I'm sure if we'd let it go to 7000 RPM, we would have made the magic 500.

After this run, although we made 3-4 more pulls, we were never able to achieve these numbers again, and I think I found the reason this afternoon when I pulled the plugs in the motor. #1 had a broken off porcelain insulator, which I think happened during one of the several backfires we had where we were afterburning methanol in the exhaust. We borescoped the cylinder and didn't see any trace of det on the piston, so I really think the broken insulator was from backfire.

Here's a vid showing our little methanol afterburner:

http://s169.photobucket.com/albums/u228/cribbj/?action=view&current=MVI_3626.flv


And our 498.3 HP pull: http://s169.photobucket.com/albums/u228/cribbj/?action=view&current=MVI_3629.flv

 

[cribbj]

Also a couple of pics of the motor on the dyno, using my ghetto wiring harness again. We're all still amazed that it's continued to work without a single failure. These first two are also some nice shots of the S&S headers.





Our little belt walking problem:



Plugs after 2-3 heavy pulls on Sunoco 104+ These are 1357



And 2468:

 

[cribbj]

And here's the little bugger that kept us from hitting the magic 5xx. This was while running on C16, with loads of methanol and charge air temps not over 110 degrees F. No signs of det on pistons, so judging by how the ground electrode looks blown away from the center, my money is on backfire causing this. (Or maybe that's just wishful thinking....)

 

[stevechumo]

What plug range did you run? I used to have the complete melted plugs with my previous Honda when I ran platinum and range of 7 plugs. I think range of 5 would be good. I'm currently running range of 5 NGK plugs ($2/each) and they work great.

 

[cribbj]

Steve these were Denso Iridium IK22's

 

[spf_lexus]

that engine sounds mean with the m90, props! the high pitch almost matches the exhaust note dB for dB. I think i made my next power adder decision, those S & S look solid, good bends and compact.

Just curious... whats a good iridium plug for a 7psi setup? i have ngk v-power at range 6 right now but want to replace since i rebuilt the engine. Know the part #? Im bored I need to mod something haha.

 

[UZZ-TT]

I really want a set of COP'S from you~ I can't wait for you all to get this whole setup ironed out! Again, great work, cool stuff- have fun!

 

[Zuffen]

John,

Your set up is quite different to mine.

My Opcon has a large cast curver plenum running the opposite way with the t/b (90mm) bolted to the end. The plenum would be 8" long and around 3.75" diameter.

I note your comment on the 8 rib slipping at 18psi. I hope my dedicated 8 rib will hold up when I move up beyond 15psi.

I'm also running 13/4" 4 into 1's with dual 3" system running through some trick cats.

I'll take your intercooling efforts on board. I've been talking (ok Emailing) Andrew and I'm looking at using his W2A intercooler unit in my manifold.

On the unequal distribution of air do you think it would of any benifit lifting the supercharger by 50mm and having a larger more balanced entry for the air? I know you can't and fit it under your bonnet but I could put a case of beer on top of mine and still shut the bonnet!

Sounds cool and nice flames!

Keep it up it will give me someone to chase.

 

[cribbj]

John, Just left you a voice mail.

Some things are comming to mind that suggest that you are PUMPING a bunch of the air and fuel out the exhaust.

Your injectors should NOT be out of flow at 500hp and you as noted are adding additional fuel with the methanol.

The exhaust blowing off points to a BUNCH of energy release in the exhaust instead of flowing the burned A/F that has given much to the crankshaft.

Two 2.5" pipes have nearly 9 sq/in of INTERNAL pipe area. A single 3.0" has about 6.5 sq/in and many have made 700rwhp on a single 3" pipe. You are NOT out of exhaust capacity for your ENGINES current output but rather for the TOTAL energy capacity and exhaust system demands of the charge burning in the exhaust instead of in the cylinder where it can make power.

So, IMO you have WAY more power in the current combo. Almost worth putting a STOCK 1uzfe under than blower to baseline your FI combo.

John, I got your voice mail last night, and just read your comments and you do make a good argument for the cams being the reason for all that exhaust energy. If only that energy could have been pushing pistons instead of blowing off exhaust pipes, eh? Certainly a good reason to have adjustable cam gears, if only it were possible to adjust the intake timing separately from the exhaust.....

Well, we're going to give this motor a well deserved rest for awhile, and Dennis is now going to go through the 2nd motor and get it built, and we'll plan to flog it on the dyno around the middle of December. I think we'll do something a little different with the cams this time, plus he'll fabricate a set of long tube 4/1 "dyno only" headers for it with slightly larger primaries and collectors. We're also going to fabricate a dedicated cog belt drive for the supercharger, and I'm going to start doing some testing of nitrous nozzles for the methanol injection to see if they'll produce a good pattern. Certainly nitrous nozzles ought to "package" more compactly than the Snow nozzles.

BTW, the hybrid shimless & shim under bucket valvetrain performed perfectly, although we only went to 7000 rpm a couple of times with it. Highly recommended.

 

[scotturnot]

John, I have a extreme amount of interest in what you do with respect to cams and adjustment. Please get with me to discuss what you are thinking. Right now my engine is on the stand so its the perfect time for me to tear into this and work on solutions.

 

[Lextreme II]

The engine sounds fantastic and the rpm keeps going. I would think it can easily hit 7,500 to 8K. At 6,900 the engine has not sign of flattening.

 

[JBrady]

John,

You can certainly build and try different headers if you like but IMO you are throwing money at the wrong problem.

As I said before I think it would make GOOD sense to find a good STOCK longblock to test your SC and accessories. Benchmark against known quantities. Probably cheaper than the dyno headers. As you know JustenGT8 runs over 530rwhp on a completely stock unported engine with stock cams and valvetrain. This on 17psi turbo boost. He ran 25psi successfully with his twincharger setup. I really think eliminating as many variables as possible will help you zero in on making this efficient and powerful.

Regarding the dyno sheet you posted. Is that the format from the Superflow? I really dislike dyno graduations that are not equal for torque and power. Your dip from 5300-5800rpm LOOKS like 300ft/lbs when in fact it is only 35lbs. I like to see the crossover at 5252 and the visual representation of torque vs power. I also like seeing the widest possible chart from the lowest to highest RPM available. Being a street engine I would like to see data from 2000rpm.

Back to my earlier observations. On a 4 valve/cyl head with relatively wide valve angles (intake to exhaust) crossflow can really be an issue. On a naturally aspirated engine this is not nearly as critical as on a supercharged engine. This is where careful steps especially in overlap must be taken when designing the valve timing.

 

[cjsupra90]

John, I got your voice mail last night, and just read your comments and you do make a good argument for the cams being the reason for all that exhaust energy. If only that energy could have been pushing pistons instead of blowing off exhaust pipes, eh? Certainly a good reason to have adjustable cam gears, if only it were possible to adjust the intake timing separately from the exhaust......

John (cribbj), Technically you can adjust them independently but you are locked into 7.5* steps for each cam from either side of straight up timed...

 

[cribbj]

Scott, I'll reply to you by email in about 12 hours when I get across the pond. I've run out of time here, and am about to board.

David, thanks, and yes the motor seems very comfortable up in the higher revs. Probably a lot more comfortable than its builder, who cringed every time we hit 7000. I'll have to get him some valium for the next session, because I want to test the valve train mods that we did up to maybe 8K.

John, I hear you on the headers, it's just that for each "family" of motor that Dennis dyno's, he likes to have both an adaptor plate for the dyno, and a set of long tube dyno headers. We're doing a cost sharing deal on these, so they're not going to cost me too much. Hopefully once these are made, the next time we can do B2B runs on 1) Stock manifolds, 2) S&S headers, and 3) the long tube dyno headers.

If we do this, then he'll be completely ready to dyno anyone's 1/2UZ-FE motors, should they start to catch on around here. Already this motor has drawn the attention of the dirt track crowd, not so much for its power output, which we all recognise is not where it needs to be yet, but for its smoothness, durability, and reliability. You missed it, but we really flogged this motor on Wednesday & Thursday, and probably made between 10-15 WOT pulls up to 7000 RPM, and it just kept going without missing a beat. At one point we were concerned about the supercharger giving it up, and we had to cool it down with a couple bags of ice, but at no point did the motor give any indication that it was in distress. Even a hard core engine builder like Dennis is fired up now, and he wants to see what this little motor is capable of.

Chris, yes you're right, I guess we could separate the Intake/Exhaust scissors gears and reindex them on the next tooth, but what a PITA to do "on the fly" :684: Shame that one of the best features of the 1UZ (the scissors gears) limits its fine tuning capability.

 

[cribbj]

Regarding the dyno sheet you posted. Is that the format from the Superflow? I really dislike dyno graduations that are not equal for torque and power. Your dip from 5300-5800rpm LOOKS like 300ft/lbs when in fact it is only 35lbs. I like to see the crossover at 5252 and the visual representation of torque vs power. I also like seeing the widest possible chart from the lowest to highest RPM available. Being a street engine I would like to see data from 2000rpm.

Dennis is still running the old DOS software on his dyno, so all we have from it are printouts. I too would like to see the data starting from a much lower RPM and will ask Dennis to start logging earlier next time.

This graph was an Excel spreadsheet that I knocked up quickly, and I let Excel pick the scales. You're right, the difference in scales makes the torque dip appear way worse than it actually was. Here's the same graph reformatted:

 

[JBrady]

Dennis is still running the old DOS software on his dyno, so all we have from it are printouts. I too would like to see the data starting from a much lower RPM and will ask Dennis to start logging earlier next time.

This graph was an Excel spreadsheet that I knocked up quickly, and I let Excel pick the scales. You're right, the difference in scales makes the torque dip appear way worse than it actually was. Here's the same graph reformatted:

MUCH better!

I need to learn that feature on excel!

Did you by chance capture the boost curve? Can you get the data from Mitch?