New swap-4G63T

[jeffball610]

I'm finally getting around to posting an update on my leaking head. It's not a major issue. It seems it's only one valve on cylinder #4. I presume this happened due to a bad valve guide. I bought the head with a bent valve and, if memory serves me, it was this exact valve. Looking at things, I think I could simply re lap this seat and valve and get it up and running, but I assume the issue would return so I bought a used head to rebuild.

You can't see much in the pictures because there isn't much to see. The most evident thing is just the lack of heat presence on the bad valve due to hot compression gasses not being present. The valve seat and face don't even look like they're bad until you really get in there. In any case, I have plans to rebuild a different head and do some upgrades and "while I'm in there" mods.

Cylinder #4

Cylinder #3

Valve seat


Valve face

[iceman510]

As a past and present owner of maybe 7 or 8 4G63T engine vehicles, I can relate to the valves seeming to bend easily, but being hard to detect visually.

Good luck with it, and if you have need of any stock components, I have valves, rockers, lifters, etc sitting around from a few projects and a head I upgraded to Evo hardware.

[jeffball610]

It's been a while since I updated anything. Lots to report, and I'll update it in several sections. First is just a recap. I took the long drive to the "Canby Make Up" event at Powerland near Portland, OR. The round trip drive was about 3,400 miles. I didn't take too many pics. I was busy enjoying the drive, but here's one at the column in Astoria, OR.


After returning from the trip, the car had a rough idle and turned out to be a bad valve. So a head refresh was in order. I decided to do a full rebuild on a spare head using quality parts from BC Racing.








"While I was in there", I decided to finally redo the wiring harness. The previous one worked fine, but used connectors and wires that were 30 years old and had been hacked and spliced to work. I used all new wires from Mil-spec and new connectors from Sheridan Engineering.



The harness (here shown on the old head) was "tucked" and hidden to keep things clean and neat.



After getting things back together, I managed to make it to the Route 66 JDM Classic and Nissfest in SoCal. Neither event was really my style, but it was nice to meet some people who appreciate the tin cans and recognize the work I've put in to make this my own car.





So, after nearly 1000 miles of proving the parts work, it was time to do more...

[jeffball610]

...performance upgrades. It started with cleaning up the lower coolant routing that always leaked and was simply not up to the task of what I've been asking it to do.

Here is a poor picture of the old set up. The grey tube comes out of the water pump makes a 180 degree turn to the lower radiator outlet. It also contains the coolant return for the turbo.


It was replaced with a new water pump with more direct fitting tubing. I'm not an aluminum welder, so my friend Trevor of Trevtec welded up the new outlet and coolant return fittings.




Once again, "while I was in there", I replaced the stock oil pressure diverter in the head with a unit from Kiggly. The 4G63 has a "dummy" valve in the head that doesn't regulate oil pressure in the head very well. In heavy race conditions, oil can build up in the head and starve the oil pick up. It can also cause the hydraulic lifters to tick. This unit regulates this pressure to keep that from happening instead of simply bleeding off the oil.

Ignore the braided line there. This was so I could remote mount the oil pressure sensor. I've heard that mounting it to the engine can cause erratic readings and it should be "shock mounted". There's a few other dress pieces there from STM Tuned in there too.


Next on the upgrade path were some better tires. The 320 tread wear Firestone Firehawk Indy 500s did well enough, but my plans to make more power and turn harder necessitated an update to the contact patch. So I went to Gummy Grip, a local performance shop that sponsors our local SCCA autocross region, and got some Bridgestone Potenza RE-71Rs installed. These are 205/45/16s.



I didn't notice too much difference on my first autocross in over 5 months, but the course was rough and I was told these needed a heat cycle to break in. I'll get another shot to test them out on November 30th at an open track day hosted by the local SCCA. And yes, that is a dyno you see...

[jeffball610]

So #4G63510 made its first dyno session over a month later than expected and its first ever. Right out of the gate on the street tune at 10psi it made 285whp.




We were trying to get the stock boost solenoid controller to make some extra boost, but it appears my Synapse waste gate is not set up for tuning like that. I have a Tial unit on the way, but we increased boost using the port combinations Synapse has. At 14psi it made 345whp. The dyno wasn't able to load the turbo correctly in my opinion and we were fighting phantom knock, but it still worked out. Ignore the torque readings, as there was intermittent RPM signal loss to the dyno and it wasn't reading correctly either.


Proof that the dyno was not working right for me (he has several cars making 800+whp) I accidentally made 17psi on the way home and almost wet myself when the tires spun in 3rd gear. That should equal around 400+whp and I let off around 5500rpm before I ended both mine and the car's lives.


I'll have some videos up eventually

[cambo]

Impressive power output, it must be a blast to drive. Nice to see you've been putting some miles on it.

[JordanTr]

Very impressive! And oh so sleepy with the roof rack!!

[bertvorgon]

Impressive numbers for sure!

Funny you should have the problem on the dyno, I had that same problem with mine. He said the my turbo was boosting TOO FAST!
What the hell is that all about. I had put race gas in my auxiliary tank and my cold "race" plugs to really be able to ring my motor to it's true potential.

He farted around with his lap top thingy, all the while my engine was getting warm and of course my plugs started to foul at stupid idling pace.

Then, when it came time to get on it the first time, he could not get the dyno to load and then my plugs crapped out. I put fresh plugs in, then he fiddled with the damn lap top again, then got on it.

Ultimately he said my engine revved too fast to time the loading. he gave me a token reading but said that it was not a true reading of my horsepower.

Oh well, it is just a number and my real world ass lets me know the power I am making.

[jeffball610]

Ultimately he said my engine revved too fast to time the loading. he gave me a token reading but said that it was not a true reading of my horsepower.

We were thinking it might have been spinning on the dyno. Where my tires lined up was where the dyno brake was at, so the surface was smooth without much traction. This was also an inertia dyno (I'm probably wrong about the type) where it just has a weighted roller without any external loading or adjustment. Obviously the 510 is much lighter than most cars, so not the most accurate as far as what will happen on the street. I was mostly just after getting fuel and timing close. The ECU adjusts the rest based on what numbers are coming in.

[jeffball610]

Here's a quick video of the wheel spin I discovered in 3rd gear ;-p

https://youtu.be/eZrqru41GjI

[jeffball610]

I'm still up and running. Here's a quick video from last weekend's autocross event.

https://youtu.be/XxjKuNhhPHI

[icehouse]

That autoxing looks so hard to navigate. haha Ours is on a racetrack so it's can get to wild with cones.

Did you ever find out why you had bearing material in your oil? To much timing?

[jeffball610]

Did you ever find out why you had bearing material in your oil? To much timing?

I still don't know. The only thing I can really think of is that there was material in the head when it was rebuilt that hasn't been filtered out. I had really high oil pressure and I'm not sure the oil filter was doing its job. I'll keep an eye on it, but I'm still confused.

[Three B's Racing]

Did you ever find out why you had bearing material in your oil? To much timing?

I still don't know. The only thing I can really think of is that there was material in the head when it was rebuilt that hasn't been filtered out. I had really high oil pressure and I'm not sure the oil filter was doing its job. I'll keep an eye on it, but I'm still confused.

Bearing material in your oil could be an indication of crankshaft flexing from hugh boost torque. Typically what you see is front crankshaft bearing damage as the crank flexes in the middle it places a smaller area of the cranks journal on the bearing eating it up.

[jeffball610]

Bearing material in your oil could be an indication of crankshaft flexing from hugh boost torque. Typically what you see is front crankshaft bearing damage as the crank flexes in the middle it places a smaller area of the cranks journal on the bearing eating it up.

I'm certainly not running "huge torque". The bearings looked fine other than typical dry start wear. I was running aluminum bearings anyway and the material looked more bronze. It could have been the oil changing the color, but I'm still not seeing any signs of unusual wear. I'll be changing my oil soon and I'll report back. I think I'm going to send a sample to Blackstone and see what they say.