2003 Evo 8. The walk of shame!
Discussion
TGCOTF-dewey said:
Interested to hear a bit more on the 9 > 8 engine swap. I've seen the odd one and every write up suggests it's a PITA to work out. This must be 10+ years ago on MLR though.
Is it straight fwd now?
Hi, I imagine the whole process is pretty well documented by now. I did mine in 2010, it's probs mine you remember from threads about it on the MLR if you were on then. I didn't do an engine swap, just put the entire MIVEC top end on to the original block. That in itself is pretty straightforward, other than figuring out a way to get an additional oil supply to the head.Is it straight fwd now?
At the time, the wiring was the real headache, for me anyway. I couldn't find the 9 engine loom that I needed to run the MIVEC, and there's about an additional 10 pinouts used on the 9 ECU to make it work. I was on Evo.M, an American site, as some of the members on there had done it, but the pinout diagram for the American ECU was different to mine and it ended up being a process of working out which sensor required what voltage, then looking at which pinouts supplied that voltage and making a harness from scratch. I was doing mine at the same time as another lad ( Kenny ) was doing it to his Evo 5 time attack car, we both had the same issues with wiring, and I seem to remember swapping relevant info.
With hindsight, and if I did it again, it would be easier to swap the whole engine, the oil feed is already in place, and it would be quicker than swapping out parts from one block to another, but I was offered the head, turbo, inlet and ECU from a car that had a busted crank, so bought them.
It would have been even easier to just have bought a 9 to be fair, but where's the fun in that!
So, it bluffed it's way through for another year! 
I ended up taking it to a place a few miles away, which was handy as I needed to burn off half a tank of 2 year old fuel while driving off boost.
After getting the tank down to almost empty and brimming it with it's favourite tipple of VPower, I selected the low boost setting of 1.2 bar and set about reminding myself after 26 months without it, why I adore this car. There's witchcraft going on here. I have a 987 Boxster 3.2S and a Mk1 MR2, both great cars. The Evo, despite the weight it carries with all the 4 wheel drive hardware etc, somehow makes both of those cars feel clumsy, the way it turns in and just dances through bends, the feeling of weightlessness and endless grip, the throttle adjustability, all really defy physics.
My suspicions that it wouldn't hit the target of 1.8 on the high boost map were confirmed, with a max of 1.4 showing on the gauge. To that end, I removed the battery and tray to access this, which is my first line of interrogation.......
....aftermarket 3 port boost solenoid. These usually fail in a way that only allows 0.8 bar, but the first one I fitted, seemingly not liking an extended period of lack of use when I was changing the head and turbo etc, restricted boost to 1.4 bar which prematurely ended a mapping session. It took me ages to dope out what was wrong the last time, that sensor was relatively new, whereas this one is probs 13 years old now. So, at less than £60 delivered, and with the symptoms of the current problem similar to the first, it's ordered for tomorrow, and hopefully a quick and easy fix. It's come to light that there a million cheap Chinese copies of these now. I've ordered mine form a reputable source ( R-spec performance in Bicester, thanks Dave ), so I at least should be able to rule this out even if it doesn't fix it.
With the battery and tray out, I thought I'd try and address another long standing and, on the forums, frequently mentioned issue with Evo's, that being the common complaint of a poor gearchange after a replacement clutch. I had the clutch done at 44k miles when it started, not surprisingly, to slip a few weeks after multiple 7k rpm launches at Santa Pod, and in the interests of pleasant use and driveability, used another standard Exedy. It's only done 6k miles since the change.
However, the gearchange has always seemed worse since then. The 6 speed is in my opinion, quite agricultural in feel generally, the 1st to second change is baulky when cold, reverse is just a pain on occasion and high speed quick changes from 5th to 6th don't always seem to line up accurately, all of this seemingly worse after the clutch change. Typically, I never found time to take it back. to be looked at. I suspected this to be the culprit........
... the 2 small bolt heads you can see to the right of the rusty counterweight are just a couple of several that hold a plate for the gear linkages to the top of the box. I've never had this apart personally, but I suspect it would be the way anyone doing a clutch might remove the linkages mechanism complete, rather than dismantling them separately. Again, I'm guessing that it's possible that the fitting could be tightened back down in a slightly different place, as there will be some slack around where the bolts go through the holes, which would allow for some discrepancy.
Before I set about that, I figured it couldn't do any harm to lube every joint I could get at, and after doing that, the change before and after was noticeably more free and less notchy ( before and after comparison with the car not running, as this was a bit of an afterthought, and the car was already in bits by then! ). I'll spray some more stuff in there periodically while it's apart, but if it's no better when running it's not too big a deal to get to it again, at which point I'll see if the linkage plate will adjust, then work through a clutch bleed, and pedal adjustment, and finally a change to a different brand of trans fluid if all else fails.
I ended up taking it to a place a few miles away, which was handy as I needed to burn off half a tank of 2 year old fuel while driving off boost. After getting the tank down to almost empty and brimming it with it's favourite tipple of VPower, I selected the low boost setting of 1.2 bar and set about reminding myself after 26 months without it, why I adore this car. There's witchcraft going on here. I have a 987 Boxster 3.2S and a Mk1 MR2, both great cars. The Evo, despite the weight it carries with all the 4 wheel drive hardware etc, somehow makes both of those cars feel clumsy, the way it turns in and just dances through bends, the feeling of weightlessness and endless grip, the throttle adjustability, all really defy physics.
My suspicions that it wouldn't hit the target of 1.8 on the high boost map were confirmed, with a max of 1.4 showing on the gauge. To that end, I removed the battery and tray to access this, which is my first line of interrogation.......
....aftermarket 3 port boost solenoid. These usually fail in a way that only allows 0.8 bar, but the first one I fitted, seemingly not liking an extended period of lack of use when I was changing the head and turbo etc, restricted boost to 1.4 bar which prematurely ended a mapping session. It took me ages to dope out what was wrong the last time, that sensor was relatively new, whereas this one is probs 13 years old now. So, at less than £60 delivered, and with the symptoms of the current problem similar to the first, it's ordered for tomorrow, and hopefully a quick and easy fix. It's come to light that there a million cheap Chinese copies of these now. I've ordered mine form a reputable source ( R-spec performance in Bicester, thanks Dave ), so I at least should be able to rule this out even if it doesn't fix it.
With the battery and tray out, I thought I'd try and address another long standing and, on the forums, frequently mentioned issue with Evo's, that being the common complaint of a poor gearchange after a replacement clutch. I had the clutch done at 44k miles when it started, not surprisingly, to slip a few weeks after multiple 7k rpm launches at Santa Pod, and in the interests of pleasant use and driveability, used another standard Exedy. It's only done 6k miles since the change.
However, the gearchange has always seemed worse since then. The 6 speed is in my opinion, quite agricultural in feel generally, the 1st to second change is baulky when cold, reverse is just a pain on occasion and high speed quick changes from 5th to 6th don't always seem to line up accurately, all of this seemingly worse after the clutch change. Typically, I never found time to take it back. to be looked at. I suspected this to be the culprit........
... the 2 small bolt heads you can see to the right of the rusty counterweight are just a couple of several that hold a plate for the gear linkages to the top of the box. I've never had this apart personally, but I suspect it would be the way anyone doing a clutch might remove the linkages mechanism complete, rather than dismantling them separately. Again, I'm guessing that it's possible that the fitting could be tightened back down in a slightly different place, as there will be some slack around where the bolts go through the holes, which would allow for some discrepancy.
Before I set about that, I figured it couldn't do any harm to lube every joint I could get at, and after doing that, the change before and after was noticeably more free and less notchy ( before and after comparison with the car not running, as this was a bit of an afterthought, and the car was already in bits by then! ). I'll spray some more stuff in there periodically while it's apart, but if it's no better when running it's not too big a deal to get to it again, at which point I'll see if the linkage plate will adjust, then work through a clutch bleed, and pedal adjustment, and finally a change to a different brand of trans fluid if all else fails.
Looks good, amazing how much dust in 9 months I must say. Cool car though and rare!! 
Heaveho said:
...and with covers the car always has to be clean before you use them, otherwise they can scratch,
Yes, that is the one faff about covers, car has to be spotless. That said, I've just rolled my RS Megane out of the garage after 10 years under a cover, it's remarkably good. Not super clean but by no means bad. Yesterdays excitement was the arrival of the new boost solenoid. I decided I wanted the new one in a more accessible area, since this isn't my first rodeo with dealing with suspected rogue issues, and as mentioned it was somewhat buried under the battery tray. I couldn't access my scissor ramp, which would have made things easier, so had to go in from above.
To that end, I bought a couple of connectors so that I could extend the hoses for the 3 port and already had some extra silicone hose. After a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, I ended up mounting it just beneath and in front of the airbox on an existing support bracket, which means it's very close to where the original would have been, very short cable run, slightly longer vacuum pipe run. And easily accessible. I've left the cables and pipes temporarily much longer than necessary, as experience has taught me that if I chop them now, I'll undoubtedly think of a better solution afterwards! Also, previous experience has taught me to put soft sticky pads between the 3 port and whatever surface it's being mounted to, as otherwise the thing transfers the sound of the internals through the car while it's hammering away!
The weather's crap here, so I haven't bothered testing it yet, and I have no real idea if I'm on the right track. While I was on with that, I've also been trying to find a solution to the awkward and notchy gearchange. Having lubed everything I could get at, I looked up some info on clutch pedal adjustment, and the comments from those who had done this were encouraging, so I had a look. I tried the change beforehand, to confirm how bad it felt, then attacked the pedal adjuster, winding it in to raise the pedal. I did this until there was no freeplay, then backed it off again until I had about 3mm slack. This seems to have made a significant improvement to the 6 forward gears. I then turned my attention to the detent on reverse. You have to slide a release up under the gear knob to select reverse. I couldn't be sure the gear knob was allowing the slide to go up as far as possible, so lifted it up slightly. Again, this seems to have improved things. I'll drive it when the weather isn't so crap.
The solenoid is mounted on the bracket beneath allen bolt. The plumbing and wiring will remain a total clip until I'm sure this is where it will permanently reside! It's pretty much impossible to take a pic of it in situ. It's sitting on a foam pad with a cable tie to hold it at the mo, I'll find a more permanent fixing for it if it seems happy there.
This is looking up from the floor beneath the clutch pedal. You can see the threads on the end of the rod in the U shaped bracket. Adjustment couldn't really be any easier, loosen the locknut, put a little pressure on the pedal, and the rod turns by hand. I probably had 5 threads showing initially, maybe 3 now.
If just moving the gear knob and adjusting the pedal really has made the difference I think it has, I'm going to be pretty pissed off with myself for not dealing with it sooner. The whole process took less than half an hour!
To that end, I bought a couple of connectors so that I could extend the hoses for the 3 port and already had some extra silicone hose. After a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, I ended up mounting it just beneath and in front of the airbox on an existing support bracket, which means it's very close to where the original would have been, very short cable run, slightly longer vacuum pipe run. And easily accessible. I've left the cables and pipes temporarily much longer than necessary, as experience has taught me that if I chop them now, I'll undoubtedly think of a better solution afterwards! Also, previous experience has taught me to put soft sticky pads between the 3 port and whatever surface it's being mounted to, as otherwise the thing transfers the sound of the internals through the car while it's hammering away!
The weather's crap here, so I haven't bothered testing it yet, and I have no real idea if I'm on the right track. While I was on with that, I've also been trying to find a solution to the awkward and notchy gearchange. Having lubed everything I could get at, I looked up some info on clutch pedal adjustment, and the comments from those who had done this were encouraging, so I had a look. I tried the change beforehand, to confirm how bad it felt, then attacked the pedal adjuster, winding it in to raise the pedal. I did this until there was no freeplay, then backed it off again until I had about 3mm slack. This seems to have made a significant improvement to the 6 forward gears. I then turned my attention to the detent on reverse. You have to slide a release up under the gear knob to select reverse. I couldn't be sure the gear knob was allowing the slide to go up as far as possible, so lifted it up slightly. Again, this seems to have improved things. I'll drive it when the weather isn't so crap.
The solenoid is mounted on the bracket beneath allen bolt. The plumbing and wiring will remain a total clip until I'm sure this is where it will permanently reside! It's pretty much impossible to take a pic of it in situ. It's sitting on a foam pad with a cable tie to hold it at the mo, I'll find a more permanent fixing for it if it seems happy there.
This is looking up from the floor beneath the clutch pedal. You can see the threads on the end of the rod in the U shaped bracket. Adjustment couldn't really be any easier, loosen the locknut, put a little pressure on the pedal, and the rod turns by hand. I probably had 5 threads showing initially, maybe 3 now.
If just moving the gear knob and adjusting the pedal really has made the difference I think it has, I'm going to be pretty pissed off with myself for not dealing with it sooner. The whole process took less than half an hour!
Hmmm, bit of a win / lose day so far. My efforts with the gear shift have been rewarded with a much sweeter action when the car is warm now, it's never going to compare to a Ford rocket box for ease of use, but it's significantly better, as is selecting reverse now, which has been a right pain on occasion.
Sadly, replacing the boost solenoid hasn't solved the problem with it not hitting target boost. It also now seems to have lost the ability to switch maps, as both settings are now giving an indicated 1.4 bar on the gauge, as opposed to the 1.2 the low boost setting is meant to be restricted to, so if anything, things have gone backwards here. The car runs absolutely fine in every other respect, No knock, no steps in the power delivery right through to the red line, although the boost starts to drop away after hitting 1.4, which I don't remember happening when it was hitting the target. I'm pretty sure that once it used to hit 1.8, it held it.
Next stop is the actuator. I'll be disappointed and surprised if it's that as it came new with the replacement turbo I had to fit a very few thousand miles ago. Still, if it is, that would also be an easy fix.
Sadly, replacing the boost solenoid hasn't solved the problem with it not hitting target boost. It also now seems to have lost the ability to switch maps, as both settings are now giving an indicated 1.4 bar on the gauge, as opposed to the 1.2 the low boost setting is meant to be restricted to, so if anything, things have gone backwards here. The car runs absolutely fine in every other respect, No knock, no steps in the power delivery right through to the red line, although the boost starts to drop away after hitting 1.4, which I don't remember happening when it was hitting the target. I'm pretty sure that once it used to hit 1.8, it held it.
Next stop is the actuator. I'll be disappointed and surprised if it's that as it came new with the replacement turbo I had to fit a very few thousand miles ago. Still, if it is, that would also be an easy fix.
TGCOTF-dewey said:
Both mine (actuator and recirc) were shot after a long layup. But the 7 had a plastic recirc unlike the 9.
Funnily enough it was this thread, which reminded me about Evotune.
Jamie sorted mine out for me.
Thanks, I'm going to try and remind myself how to check the operation of the actuator. It'll go to Jamie if it has to ( I've already primed him for action ! Funnily enough it was this thread, which reminded me about Evotune.
Jamie sorted mine out for me.
), but I've already given him a fortune the last time I saw him, and I do like working on the car anyway. Well, at leat, I do until I have to admit defeat!As you say, mine has the later BOV, so shouldn't be an issue.
So, minor miracles have occurred today, and every exhaust manifold heat shield bolt has been removed unscathed, something I thought would be the impossible ask! The one right at the bottom of the lower shield is a right little treasure to access, working blind with just enough room to swing a ratchet, and very little hope of an accurate shot with the WD40. I've put the lpwer shield back on loosely with a couple of bolts for now until I figure out how the hell to get it out of the engine bay. I think it's going to involve removing the rad brackets for a few more mm of space.
This is the next phase of " locate my missing boost ", and will allow me to access the actuator arm, which is now the main suspect, either through seizure or lack of preload. I'm starting to wonder if dementia has set in, as I can't remember a time after the new turbo was fitted that it's been right, so maybe it was a cock up from day one of that going on. Its done very few miles since then. It'll be a right giggle trying to check the preload if I can't completely dispense with the lower shield, but it's not impossible. Something to look forward to tomorrow! Everything is having a WD40 bath until then now, A, because I want beer, and B, because if something on the actuator is seized, I want to give it every chance.
If this is the fix, happy days. It might start to get more involved if not.
This is the next phase of " locate my missing boost ", and will allow me to access the actuator arm, which is now the main suspect, either through seizure or lack of preload. I'm starting to wonder if dementia has set in, as I can't remember a time after the new turbo was fitted that it's been right, so maybe it was a cock up from day one of that going on. Its done very few miles since then. It'll be a right giggle trying to check the preload if I can't completely dispense with the lower shield, but it's not impossible. Something to look forward to tomorrow! Everything is having a WD40 bath until then now, A, because I want beer, and B, because if something on the actuator is seized, I want to give it every chance.
If this is the fix, happy days. It might start to get more involved if not.
Right, finally remembered how the lower exhaust manifold heat shield comes out. The removal of the brackets holding the rad to the slam panel allows about 3 mm of forward movement on the rad. It's still mega tight, but that's how the heat shield finally gave up the fight and came out. All to not much reward sadly, as I can't see anything wrong with the actuator or the preload.
I fastened the largest cable tie money can buy around the actuator rod, slid it up against the locknut, and clamped a set of mole grips on to the end of it. And pulled. Movement, and it seems as it should. I took the R clip off the adjuster and tried to slide the rod off the pin, but there's clearly enough preload on it as it doesn't want to come off, so that's that.
I've left the cable tie on and tucked it as far forward as possible out of the way of heat sources in case I need to revisit that. I've also left the heatshields off for access should I need to be in again, and to repaint the lower one in matt black, and re-polish the upper one with the mop, as they're looking a bit gash after the lay up. The visible mounting bolts are minging and that'll be sorted before reassembly.
Then I remembered I've got one of these, and after a 20 minute scrat about in the garage, I've retrieved it...........
......so now, tomorrows plan is to rig this up again off the OBD socket ( no idea of why I removed it in the first place ), set it to read the MAP sensor, which I now can, as it's got an Evo 9 inlet manifold, it'll then read the boost pressure and this will hopefully allow me to see whether the boost gauge is having me over or telling the truth.
I used to use this to read inlet temps, which it also did from the inlet manifold, but I also use a k-type thermocouple at the throttle body reading into a Lascar digital gauge, which sits neatly in place of the original digital clock, now relegated to my spares box. The Lascar gets info from as near as possible to where the air enters the cylinders, including the heatsoak the area suffers from, and I tended to pay more attention to that than the Scangauge in the interest of engine longevity, and drive accordingly if temps were briefly high from sitting at lights or in traffic.
I'm going to be chasing vacuum leaks after this if it doesn't give me what I need, so that'll initially be a smoke test, then who knows. I need it fixed, I'm already addicted to driving it again, so want to have it right before the crap weather ruins my fun.
I fastened the largest cable tie money can buy around the actuator rod, slid it up against the locknut, and clamped a set of mole grips on to the end of it. And pulled. Movement, and it seems as it should. I took the R clip off the adjuster and tried to slide the rod off the pin, but there's clearly enough preload on it as it doesn't want to come off, so that's that.
I've left the cable tie on and tucked it as far forward as possible out of the way of heat sources in case I need to revisit that. I've also left the heatshields off for access should I need to be in again, and to repaint the lower one in matt black, and re-polish the upper one with the mop, as they're looking a bit gash after the lay up. The visible mounting bolts are minging and that'll be sorted before reassembly.
Then I remembered I've got one of these, and after a 20 minute scrat about in the garage, I've retrieved it...........
......so now, tomorrows plan is to rig this up again off the OBD socket ( no idea of why I removed it in the first place ), set it to read the MAP sensor, which I now can, as it's got an Evo 9 inlet manifold, it'll then read the boost pressure and this will hopefully allow me to see whether the boost gauge is having me over or telling the truth.
I used to use this to read inlet temps, which it also did from the inlet manifold, but I also use a k-type thermocouple at the throttle body reading into a Lascar digital gauge, which sits neatly in place of the original digital clock, now relegated to my spares box. The Lascar gets info from as near as possible to where the air enters the cylinders, including the heatsoak the area suffers from, and I tended to pay more attention to that than the Scangauge in the interest of engine longevity, and drive accordingly if temps were briefly high from sitting at lights or in traffic.
I'm going to be chasing vacuum leaks after this if it doesn't give me what I need, so that'll initially be a smoke test, then who knows. I need it fixed, I'm already addicted to driving it again, so want to have it right before the crap weather ruins my fun.
Edited by Heaveho on Thursday 21st September 00:55
So, having exhausted my own time and resources with this, it went back to Evotune in Durham yesterday. The phone call this morning resulted in a mixture of delight and embarrassment for the owner, and serves as a lesson as to the perils of leaving a car standing for an extended period of time whilst perhaps not having the best memory.
The delight was that this morning on the same dyno it was mapped on 4 years ago, with no changes other than the new, identical 3 port boost solenoid ( which made no difference to the feel of the car ), it made 410/400, up from the original 391/380.
The embarrassment being that the car has 2 boost settings ( which I knew ) operated by the now redundant and deleted water spray switch in the centre console. When pressed this lights up the water spray symbol in the cluster to signify the application of high boost. Or so I remembered it. Wrong. In order to facilitate high boost, you have to keep the switch pressed for 3 seconds. The light in the cluster will then continually flash. This is the actual indication that high boost has been selected.
I'm feeling like a bit of a dunce with this revelation. However, I'm only £80 out for dyno time, and finding out it's got more than I thought, plus the fact there's clearly nowt wrong with it other than the pillock that owns it having a bad memory is worth it.
I can't get it back until tomorrow as I live right next to St James Park in Newcastle city centre , there's a home game here against PSG tonight and it's manic here already, so that's that for today. Small price to pay. On the plus side, after this saga, I'm not likely to forget next time.
The delight was that this morning on the same dyno it was mapped on 4 years ago, with no changes other than the new, identical 3 port boost solenoid ( which made no difference to the feel of the car ), it made 410/400, up from the original 391/380.
The embarrassment being that the car has 2 boost settings ( which I knew ) operated by the now redundant and deleted water spray switch in the centre console. When pressed this lights up the water spray symbol in the cluster to signify the application of high boost. Or so I remembered it. Wrong. In order to facilitate high boost, you have to keep the switch pressed for 3 seconds. The light in the cluster will then continually flash. This is the actual indication that high boost has been selected.
I'm feeling like a bit of a dunce with this revelation. However, I'm only £80 out for dyno time, and finding out it's got more than I thought, plus the fact there's clearly nowt wrong with it other than the pillock that owns it having a bad memory is worth it.
I can't get it back until tomorrow as I live right next to St James Park in Newcastle city centre , there's a home game here against PSG tonight and it's manic here already, so that's that for today. Small price to pay. On the plus side, after this saga, I'm not likely to forget next time.
Happy with that. It's interesting that even on low boost ( 1.2 bar ) it still makes nearly 400 brake, but the torque is down by about 80 ft/lbs. The difference between low and high ( 1.9 now ) feels very noticeable though, it's manic in the lower gears on full throttle with all the beans on tap.
Very nice, that must be a lot of fun
I suspect that the turbo is at its flow limit at high revs, so the difference between wastegate settings is less relevant there anyway as even on the high boost setting it won't be sustaining 1.9 bar to redline, it'll fall back to nearer the 1.2. But of course the high setting gives you that massive midrange
samoht said:
Very nice, that must be a lot of fun
I suspect that the turbo is at its flow limit at high revs, so the difference between wastegate settings is less relevant there anyway as even on the high boost setting it won't be sustaining 1.9 bar to redline, it'll fall back to nearer the 1.2. But of course the high setting gives you that massive midrange
Hi, yeah, that's exactly what it's doing, it peaks, then drops back off. The initial 1.9 peak feels mental. It ran a 3.9 seconds to 60 at Santa Pod with 360 brake and less torque about 8 years ago. If I could justify risking another clutch, I'd like another go at that now, but I'm not shelling out for that again in a hurry! Strangely enough, I find that launching it off the handbrake at 7k rpm with the driveline preloaded is good for quarter mile times, but not so much for clutch longevity!I suspect that the turbo is at its flow limit at high revs, so the difference between wastegate settings is less relevant there anyway as even on the high boost setting it won't be sustaining 1.9 bar to redline, it'll fall back to nearer the 1.2. But of course the high setting gives you that massive midrange
The difference between low and high boost is, er, significant! The torque is what makes it as a road car. The standard Evo 9 80 series turbo is good for about 30 psi, mine's at 27-28 I think. It's right on the edge of what the rods and 4th gear will put up with at this level, so that's all it'll be getting.
Yeah, some of the road testers' descriptions of how they got 'the numbers' out of these cars back in the day are somewhat eyebrow-raising, and not something one would do often to one's own car! There was this period of time where many performance cars had 4WD and copious power, but still a traditional three-pedal driveline, so getting the last few tenths out of it could be brutal.
Sounds like you've got the engine in a real sweet spot there. I think a lot of owners of these kind of cars end up over-doing it, they keep upgrading whatever their current limiting factor is, and then quite often end up saying that in hindsight the car was actually best to drive with about 350-400hp in terms of the balance of peak power, midrange, and responsiveness.
samoht said:
Yeah, some of the road testers' descriptions of how they got 'the numbers' out of these cars back in the day are somewhat eyebrow-raising, and not something one would do often to one's own car! There was this period of time where many performance cars had 4WD and copious power, but still a traditional three-pedal driveline, so getting the last few tenths out of it could be brutal.
Sounds like you've got the engine in a real sweet spot there. I think a lot of owners of these kind of cars end up over-doing it, they keep upgrading whatever their current limiting factor is, and then quite often end up saying that in hindsight the car was actually best to drive with about 350-400hp in terms of the balance of peak power, midrange, and responsiveness.
I stole the launch technique from John Barker of the appropriately named Evo magazine, which apparently he in turn had stolen from someone more technically minded than either of us. 7K rpm, handbrake on as hard as possible, clutch at the biting point so that the entire drivetrain is already preloaded and not taking the shock of a fully dropped clutch launch. Sounds like you've got the engine in a real sweet spot there. I think a lot of owners of these kind of cars end up over-doing it, they keep upgrading whatever their current limiting factor is, and then quite often end up saying that in hindsight the car was actually best to drive with about 350-400hp in terms of the balance of peak power, midrange, and responsiveness.
I usually used to drop the last of the clutch travel and release the handbrake simultaneously on amber at Santa Pod, as the resultant brief period of wheelspin would prevent a red light start. It was pretty kind to the car, but obviously the clutch bore the brunt of it, and after 11 launches at Santa Pod, I had clutch slip at 44k miles. Can't complain, it had also had a few launches at Thorney Island raceway before that, so fair enough. Those days are over now, I had my fun.
I read the stories of other owners getting carried away with chasing numbers, but I've always felt that about 400 was a good number for mine on the road. In some respects, even that compromises the handling, for instance, flooring it as you come off the large roundabout at J8 of the M27 used to make the front end go light enough to affect the direction of travel as the front end just stands up in those circumstances and understeer gets a hold. Very specific circumstances for that to happen though. Generally it just goes exactly where it's aimed at.
I've got a huge amount of respect for Evotune that look after it. 3 other people, all respected in the Evo community, had mapped it previously. I never felt I was getting all it had to give. Jamie found 40 hp and 45 ft/ibs extra, converted it to a speed density map and smoothed out the delivery, transforming the performance and driveability. I used to drive from Southampton to Durham when I lived down there to get him to work on it rather than use anyone local.
I live in Newcastle now, a bit less of a commitment!
Gassing Station | Readers' Cars | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff