whats up g2ic family… with the untimely announcement of my departure to japan, my turbo build is going to have to expedited a little bit. my goal with this this build is to have everything with my turbo build to be custom. I’m going to get all my piping custom bent/cut/welded. this leaves me in a rough situation. Ive never messed with anything turbo and my knowledge is somewhat lI’mited, even with the graces of google, i cant get all the answers i need.
so i would like to take this slowly but with a purpose, if that makes sense to you. i would like to gather all the information i need 1 step at a time so i don’t get ahead of myself or miss something.
as far as internals, i know that pistons are going to be a large factor. low comp pistons correct? but how do i know how low and whats to high? whats a good brand for turbo set ups? what kind of pistons would be the best for a long term use in a turbo set up? whats a good daily drIver psi to run? initially i thought 7-10lbs was good for a daily. but people have been telling me i could run 12-14lbs all day with no issue.
btw this on a b18a1 completely rebuilt from top to bottom with the help of the machine shop of course. it also has after market everything except cams and cam gears. too much to list…=]
any help is appreciated…
Sounds like some fun stuff! I did the custom piping as well. Although, for costs and time purposes I just orded up some pre bent piping after deciding what route I wanted to go with the build. cxracing has good prices on pre bent piping if you are interested in that. Unless you’re lucky duck and can get some bent for a low cost or nothing. If you motor is built I wouldn’t see why 12 lbs wouldn’t work. I have a non built motor running on 12lbs but I drive this about twice a week if its nice out. But when i do run track i lower it to 4 lbs.
yea, i was looking at cx racing pipes too because of the price and how many you get. if i could find just a bunch of straight pipes so i can get my shop guy to bend them how i want. do you know if you can un-bend pre-bent pipes?
i was just curious about running 12lbs for a daily because i think it seems kind of high for just regular driving but i dont know how much is to much. i just know that most cars i know of that come turbo are usually in the area of 7lbs…
Uhm…i’ve never heard of getting a pre bent pipe and straightening it out cause usually they would just order the straight one to begin with. I probably wouldn’t go more than 12 lbs if you have a stock block. If I drove mine daily i think I would leave it at 9 or 10 lbs to be safe? I’m actually driving around on 4 lbs right now lol! cause my clutch is slipping and I haven’t had time to get the new clutch in :[.
the power your engine will make is more of a concern then psi. don’t worry about psi i drove on a stock b18a at 18psi and had zero problems. the only time i drive my car is to go racing or to beat the shit out of it. i’m sure it would have handled daily driving amazingly. on a fully built engine you’ll be able to run 25psi all day if you want. either way when you daily drive you’re not always driving WOT so you won’t hit full boost often. on normal to fast acceleration i would hit maybe 10psi and my setup spooled 18psi at 3800rpm at WOT.
for the pistons try to stay around the stock compression if it’s a daily. 8.5-9:1 is good. you don’t want to go to high if your tuner isn’t comfortable with high compression turbo setups. but if you go to low you’ll lose some low end torque and spool time.
what are your goals? this will help us to help you. my setup is 100% custom from every little bolt and nut to my piping, manifold, exhaust, etc.
i was just curious about the pipes because all the piping packages ive found dont come with JUST straight pipes. they come with ones at angles and that not what i want.
thanks. i guess i was under the conception that if your running a high psi then your motor is always under whatever psi your running. i didnt think that it only applied when your WOT. thanks for clearing that up for me.
my goal with my turbo set up is to have something like yours. i havent seen what you have, but the direction you took when building yours is what i want. i want the entire set up to be MINE. i want so that when people see what i have then they will very easily be able to distinguish the kind of person i am.
as far as power, i want my turbo to tell me yes everytime. i want it to be on the same page as me at any given moment. if that makes sense to you. the main thing im curios about is what metal to use when making the pipes. aluminum? steel? gold?
what you want is a medium to small size turbo. you will sacrifice high end flow and big hp numbers but the power will be there when you want it. a GT2860RS would be perfect for you. you can get about 350hp with this turbo and it has incredible spool on a b18. i have a GT2871R (compressor just a tad bigger) and i have instant power at any rpm. of course there is a bunch of good turbo’s out there for your application but i personally like the garrett GT series. i have a thread in the general section if you want to check out my setup.
the piping will depend on your budget. stainless will be more expensive then aluminum. the material plays a tiny little role (heat absorption) but it’s nothing to worry about. go with what’s in your budget and what looks nicer to you. normal steel will rust if you don’t get it painted or powder coated but will be the cheapest in terms of material.
piecing together a good turbo setup isn’t too complicated. you have a goal and it’s about the same goal that i had when i built my setup. don’t go overboard on a 30X12X4 intercooler. id say 90% of the setups i see always have bigger intercoolers then they’re setups require which will cause turbo lag. try to keep piping short. don’t go with a top mount if your goal is instant power. a log manifold up to a ram horn with anything in between will be perfect.
when i saw your car, i saw mine. the way you did your pipes is EXACTLY what i want to do. shape,cut,weld… what was your process and where did you get your pipes and what metal is that? and how did you get the battery to sit like that? i really dont want to spend 50$ on an odyssey mount.
how did you do your intercooler and how much of the front bumper did you have to cut on the inside to get it to fit?
how come you have breather lines on the lsv and not the original one?
one of my goals it to keep my ac. do i HAVE to get a half size radiator and will i have clearance issues with turbo and the manifold?
how necessary are the oil and water temp gauges? im going to have the aem a/f gauge and oil pressure gauge for my all motor build.
what size intercooler would be good? same as yours?
and the spring rate you have, how is it? stiff, firm, soft?
great. i was thinking that the pipes actually played a large role for heat absorption. that was one if my main concerns.
what was your process and where did you get your pipes and what metal is that?
-it’s stainless. got my piping, manifold, exhaust all custom made at RD turbo locally. very talented guy.
and how did you get the battery to sit like that? i really dont want to spend 50$ on an odyssey mount.
-on it’s side? it was just temporarily tie raped so that i could dyno tune it. afterwards i made a bracket out of stainless like the one’s you can buy and put it on the passenger side frame rail.
how did you do your intercooler and how much of the front bumper did you have to cut on the inside to get it to fit?
-you actually don’t have to cut much depending on size. i cut more then i had to.
how come you have breather lines on the lsv and not the original one?
-ls-t was in 2008 and ls/vtec-t was in 2010 so just more upgrades. my ls-t was a stock b18a1 with arp headstuds.
one of my goals it to keep my ac. do i HAVE to get a half size radiator and will i have clearance issues with turbo and the manifold?
-if you go custom you can keep whatever you want. you can run a full rad and it’s better to do so. i would have liked to keep my full rad but at the time i didn’t know my fabricator was as good as he is. if i was to redo my setup today there would be a few different things.
how necessary are the oil and water temp gauges? im going to have the aem a/f gauge and oil pressure gauge for my all motor build.
-not necessary but a nice thing to have when you run your car hard or drag/lap/race with it. turbo honda’s have a hard time keeping cool and oil temp can get hot if you’re running it hard for a while. nice thing to keep an eye on in my opinion. not to mention that the coolant temp gauge in the cluster is horribly inaccurate. my engine is running a little hot at the moment but the gauge shows normal.
what size intercooler would be good? same as yours?
-depends on power level. mines rated for 400hp about.
and the spring rate you have, how is it? stiff, firm, soft?
-definitely not soft. i would consider it firm and a good balance between street driving and lapping. for lapping only it’s on the softer side.
great. i was thinking that the pipes actually played a large role for heat absorption. that was one if my main concerns.
-don’t worry about it. say you want 300whp you’ll get it with whatever material you choose to go with. there are much more important things such as the turbo and manifold and exhaust.