IT RUNS!!! - My 500whp build - Element motor and Moore Performance Twin Scroll Kit! by dexterous

10 minute(s) of a 312 minute read

A quick update, I finally got a new fuel pump controller worked out. I purchased a nice Honeywell pressure sensor thats designed for high temp applications from LSX Tune.com. I forgot to take a pict of the sensor prior to installing it but if you look on the counter to the right of Abby (she likes TGVs) you can see it sitting there.

I added a 90 degree 1/8 NPT fitting, a hose barb and a cushion clamp left over from my fuel system to the mix and I am very pleased with the results.

In other news, I am getting the car tuned on Friday! I am taking the car over to the local Mustang dyno at J&S Dyno for a quick session with Nate from TPG (the local tuner in Pittsburgh). The tune will not really be for power, its just to get the car dialed in on pump gas at wastegate boost (18psi). We want to be 100% sure that its behaving as well as get the 93oct map finalized so that the car is 100% functional. From there I plan on driving it until it has around 2000 miles on it (two more tanks of gas) and making a decision about where to go next. If all goes well I will be swapping over to E85, synthetic oil, etc at the 2000 mile mark. From there its anybody's guess as to what happens but as of now I just want to be done with this project so that I can enjoy the car. If I can get one track day out of this season I will be very happy.

I also installed an Innovative LC-1 and WB O2 gauge over the weekend. Here's the gauge running through its initialization (the car is not running so its not at 7.4:1, LOL):

I welded another bung into my down pipe right next to the stock one:

Here's where the controller is:

Here are the serial input/output cables:

LOL, I dont parking lot race. I live very close to PIRC (formerly known as Beaverun) which I frequently go to. They are under new ownership this year so I have no idea whats been changed and what's still the same there. They have a track day on Sept. 29t and another on Oct 27th. I have done that last Sat in October track day a few times and its always been pretty interesting or at least as interesting as ran/sleet/snow and slicks can be.

8-9-2012

The saga lives on. I am being told that I need to swap my tomei timing belt guide because its possible that there's a defect in the machining of the part. Apparently Tomei didn't radius the piece correctly which causes the guide to rub the belt during high stress conditions. Has anybody heard of this?

At the risk of calling out names of people who would otherwise not want called out I guess I will tell you the story and hope that nobody gets pissed.

Moore Performance was contacted by the shop that they are currently having all their cars tuned by and told that there was an issue. This shop has apparently had a customer with a timing belt failure while the car was doing a track day. Afterwords they did a postmortem examination on the car and discovered that it appears to have something to do with the Tomel guide. They held the Tomei guide up to a stock piece and noticed a machining defect on one of the edges that caused the belt to rub during down shifts. I am guessing they figured that it was isolated but shortly the first car another car experienced a similar failure under similar circumstances while doing a track day. My guide was new in 2010 so its a much older piece than the ones that failed.

At one point I had inquired about getting this shop to tune my car and sent them a full mods list. They apparently sent a letter to Moore Performance informing them that I would not be permitted have my car tuned there unless I removed the Tomei guide and installed either a stock piece or a Cosworth. They obviously feel very strongly about the situation.

Element Tuning installed the guide when they assembled the motor. I am very confident that Steve (Element's in-house engine builder) knows what he is doing so I am very sure that my guide was installed correctly. I am going to chalk this up as yet another case where the STOCK parts are the BEST parts.

8-10-2012

I only have a moment but everything went just fine. 370whp on a mustang at spring pressure, no timing and no real effort to make power. We just got the AFRs and let it do its thing. More details later!

No, a friend is in the process of arranging for him to come in and tune a small group of cars. There's no date for that yet and as of 1PM today the likelihood that it will happen soon is quickly vanishing.

Nate from TPG Tuning (a local guy) tuned my car at J&S Dyno.

Funny story:

Several years ago I was doing a track day at a motorsports complex that also hosted auto-x events. I watched one of the auto-x guys attempt to do a "hot lap" on the actual track which ended up being the most interesting event of the day. He made the first lap at low speed and then when he got back to the front straight he decided to do a full speed pass. Unfortunately, he didn't think about the difference between going 40-50 mph through cones verses going over 100 miles per hour faster than that into a sharp turn.

At the end of the front straight there was a 90 degree turn, 20 yards beyond that there was a sand pit, 20 yards after the sand pit there was a brick wall. You guessed it, that jackass bought the race complex a new brick wall...

Obviously this was an isolated "lone douchebag" event but my point is that there are some pretty profound differences. Some people get it and some people dont. I must agree with Moore Performance that auto-x seat time does put you into a position where you should be able to learn how to track your car more effectively. But like MRF582 said, they are very different.

8-14-2012

Guys, my car has been running well but I think I am going to down-sizing my turbo a good bit. This is really the first experience that I have had with this turbo at WOT and I think its just way to large for my goals. My current turbo is rated at something crazy like a max of 720hp and as you know, my goal is 500whp. I contacted Comp Turbo (the vendor who built my turbo) and had a nice chat with one of their tech guys. He suggested a much smaller wheel setup that would be much better for spool. At this point its just a question of when I am gong to make the change. Do I drive the car for the rest of the warm months or do I send the turbo out right away and get it re-worked. Hmmm...

8-16-2012

Here's a 4th gear pull from tonight:

Code:

A/F Sens 1 Ratio (AFR)Boost (PSI)Ignition Timing ()RPM (RPM)Target Throttle (%)
20.56-10.0428.523821.01
20.56-9.952423541.23
20.56-4.3728.52334100
20.560.5333.52406100
15.51.1931.52557100
15.621.81292653100
14.812.5327.52773100
14.133.2425.52893100
13.554.2225.53043100
13.445.2223.53195100
13.216.23213373100
12.867.44183524100
12.639.114.53716100
12.1711.75123885100
11.0315.944.54112100
11.0318.64.54289100
11.0319.0354529100
11.0319.225.54770100
11.0319.585.54983100
11.0319.636.55216100
11.0319.2575405100
11.0318.7775575100
11.0318.9275831100
11.0319.175986100
11.0319.12106185100
11.0318.93116416100
11.0318.8111.56711100
11.0318.7612.56894100
11.0318.82137082100
11.0318.8313.57255100
11.037.782470090
11.6-11.362457130.14
13.32-11.32452201

Ok, I am convinced. The turbo stays and the car gets drunk. Due to my little fuel issue earlier in the year, Phil has strongly suggested that I run the car the way it is until 2000 miles. At 2000 miles I will be swapping to E85 and Redline 15w50. I will NOT be swapping turbos (at least not this year).

In other news, I see that a ton of tuners and engine builders have been experiencing cracked blocks lately. They all seem to have the very latest "post tsunami" build date blocks which is exactly what I currently have. A friend recently told me that Maxwell Power is no longer building new blocks due to this issue. I talked to Nate from TPG and he is also aware of the situation and feels that the stock blocks are only good to about 500whp on a dyno-jet or 450whp on Mustang. Has anybody else heard anything?

In the meantime, I think I am going to get the car tuned on E85 but limit the power to 450whp for the balance of 2012 and 2013. Then during the winter of 2013/2014 I will look into either swapping to an older "pre tsunami" block or possibly do sleeves. Who knows, maybe there will be a better solution out by then.

8-17-2012

I wasn't going to post this but what the hell. Here's the graph and info:

The thing that made me want to switch up the setup is that strange 45 degree angle that the torque follows. Given that the boost graph will look almost identical to the torque graph one could conclude that the car hit max boost (18psi) around 5250 RPM on the Dyno. Maybe Nate still has the logs. The thing that I dont get is that the weight setting on the dyno is 3625lbs which in my mind would load the car even more than normal for a Mustang 1100. I will have to look around for other big turbo graphs to see what they look like.

Obviously this isn't a "high performance" tune but I was expecting it to have a bit more "get up and go" in the 3000-4000 range.