In another post I had covered that I was fabbing up a direct discharge from the blower to the TB on my '87. Well the ducting is complete, and I had planned to try to get to the xxOH injection this weekend. I was planning on running xxOH without IC for a bit.

On my last dyno session (late July, 97°F, high humidity), the inlet air temps were all within 220° - 235° at the end of each 4th gear pull with the large front mount Spearco and very large fans blowing at the front of the car, and a dedicated "squirrel cage" fan directly to the IC.

Well I called the shop today to set an appointment for next week, and they have refused to run my car on their Mustang Dyno. They have said that at the WHP level that I am at, that there is no way I can get by without an IC, unless I am using xxOH with a 125 shot of N2O to cool the charge. I am in disbelief. These were the folks who convinced me to move to the xxOH (plus maybe the near gaurantee of an additional 50 WHP and 70-80 ft-lbs of torque). He has said that he would expect to see an additional 6 psi boost (17 psi total) from where I was to the direct set-up. He feels that my combo with 8 psi will come "undone" without the IC.

What do I do now? Do I ditch the new direct ducting and go back to work on completing the 5.5" FMIC that totally surrounds the radiator? Or do I go find another shop? I have been using this shop for ~6 years and really like their work, plus they are reasonable.

What would you do?

Aaron

 

What shop? Have a guy off 290 that builds custom twin turbos on Vipers, Vettes and Mustangs to mention a few that does awesome duct work.

 

Conleys on the N side. The duct work is not the issue, it is now that they will not run the car again unless it is either IC'ed or sprayed.

Aaron

 

aaron your always on the edge...........first one to get turned down by a dyno shop ...have you thought about alcohol injection or water? that will cool down the charge.......finding a place to put it is a pita but the c-5 guys are having success with the systems ........it think with the pressures your going to see with your boost and adding n2o is going to lift your heads.......maybe a small shot 50hp just to cool the charge if your already set up for it.........what fuel are you running?

 

well... in a way its good they are concerned about the well being of your engine.. while it maybe dissapointing, its better to be dissapointed then to be looking at a blown motor and expensive endeavor.

I am not familiar with xxOH injection can you elaborate? I am guessing it is a form alcohol injection no?

I think at your level and flow with the limited space available, maybe a front mount setup Like I have would work.. I am running a 4" thick OBX large bar and plate intercooler in front of the radiator with no AC condenser. my IAT's at 23psi never went above 115* on a full blown 1-4th pass on a 90* day.. the intercooler was working very well. but.. plumbing it may be a bit of a problem with your blower discharge as my inlet points down towards the pass side headlight area then goes into the IC. I did not recognize any significant pressure drop across the intercooler, I am sure some but thats what your going to get with a mechanical intercooler.

the other option is maybe a A2W setup... I was talking to BTF and he had some new cores he was looking at sized pretty good for a vette setup.. would just take a little bit of thinking and routing and some fab skills. if ya lived closer I would be glad to help ya either way.. I love running ductwork.. its like artwork to me..lol

lemme know what ya come up with!!

Chris

 

As mentioned in the first post, the whole point of the change was to give alcohol (xxOH stands for either methanol (MeOH), ethanol (EtOH), butanol (BuOH), etc.) injection a try. Based on the WHP that I put down in July, they had suggested between a 100-125HP shot of N2O in addition to the xxOH injection.

With regard to lifting the heads, I am running the 3/4" deck heads that are specifically made for boosted / N2O applications. It is just that I had went away from N2O many years ago to the FI because I wanted to go another route.

Maybe this is just a sign that I need to finish the large IC.

Thanks for the comments,
Aaron

 

Chris,
Thanks for the feedback. As mentioned above, the xxOH is short for alcohol (the engineer inside coming out). I think the difference in the IATs between our combos is the amount of air that is being compressed. I could take a P1 (or a T3 turbo) and put it in front of a large restriction and get high boost, but with a decent IC could cool the relatively small volume of air.

Based on the info from ATI on my modified Procharger, the blower is trying to push right at 2250CFM through the engine. Naturally, the piping, IC, and engine wants to resist the additional air, and as such, the engine (in it's current tune with the Spearco IC) will see just under 11 psi. Being as the ducting is quite restrictive and the Spearco IC is space limited in a horizontal lay-out, the IATs climb tremendously.

The 5.5" FMIC in vertical flow would eleviate these issues, but I fear cooling issues. The IC I had previously run was 3.5" thick.

I am not really sure where to go from here, other than to bite the bullit and complete the 5.5" IC.

It is just real disaapointing to find that I fabbed up the direct route for nothing (though it looks really nice). It is just a bunch of my design time (drawn on ACAD prior to build) and fab time. This sucks!

Aaron

 

OPPS (xxoh).......should have known you'd already be there.....when I ran boost with n20.......10 psi boost and 100 hp n20 wet spray....cast iron protopline heads( and chevy has the best head bolt pattern in the business) I was leaking pretty much between each cylinder...cleaned the copperright off the gasket in those areas........granted I was using normal head gaskets, but they did have the steel o-rings around the cylinder............one cylinder lite the other when the intake valve was open and boom, I was picking up parts on the side of the road.......I'm going to have to research the c-5 section, I know there's at least one guy running meth only with 18 psi boost.....thats why I went with it.

 

From what I've herd the bigger the nitrous shot the more dangerous it is and you don't gain any more cooling. If you are just doing it for cooling I'd be running a 35 or 50hp shot. Once you do 100hp or what not you are getting into the same problems that you have by adding 100hp to an N/A engine, ie more timing retard.

 

Hey AKS, Vince here. What I have found to work well with our applications with this much Hp is the Snow injection with 2 nozzles. For more info either go on their website or Injection Connection can lead you in the proper direction with application tips and I am pretty sure he stocks them. They are extremely reasonable and the kit is exceptional. I blow my application off at 14lbs and don't have an i/c. talk to ya'.vince

 

Vince,
How long have you been running with no IC and 14 psi? How much flow is your V7 pushing? Are you still running on a siz rib? The guys at the dyno shop seem very concerned with just running the xxOH injection (they recommended Snow Stage II dual nozzle as well). How a bout a big pic of the engine so that we can see more detail.

I cleaned up the rest of the direct ducting today, and plan to at least drive it a bit and see what the IATs are doing.

Thanks for the words of support.
Aaron

 

Aaron,

I am running the snow dual nozzle with no IC as well. I was running my T trim at approx. 12-13psi.
I have mine setup with a toggle switch because the Snow tank is so small. When I boosting hard for long periods of time, I will activate the injection. on colder days and when not under constant boost I would leave off the injection. Once it is on, the temps will go from approx. 180* to around 110* or so instantly!
I want to figure out a better way to do this because I know I can get a lot more power out of my combo by adding more timing when the injection is on. If I had a bigger tank I would just leave it on all the time and tune accordingly. However, I am playing it safe this way just in case if I run out or if the pump fails for whatever reason.

 

Paul,
If I understand correctly, you are saying that with no IC or xxOH injection, you will be at 180°F IATs after a full pass. Do you know what volume of air you are pushing from the head unit. I am trying to see if there are some others that are pushing their combos to the level that mine is being pushed (that's the reason for the Qs on blower volume).

I will sure try the xxOH injection in a direct mount, but the dyno shop is convinced that with only xxOH injection IATs will be higher than where I was with just the IC. They feel that the xxOH injection does not have the "reserve" to be able to pull temp from the inlet charge over a full pull, without the use of N2O.

They say that the xxOH injection alone would be worth a shot if I was down in the 500-600WHP range, but in no way want to see me blow the motor on their dyno.

Thanks again for the words of encouragement.
Aaron

 

Aaron,

I have no idea what volume of air I am pushing through. How do I calculate?

The t trim is only a street blower rated at 1200cfm. so it no where near the 2000+CFM you are pushing.

 

Try another shop.

 

I'm going to throw some thoughts out here. I personally haven't used alcohol injection, but have been around multiple guys that have had real good results.

The boost level and power level you're talking about isn't unheard of running unintercooled with race fuel or straight alcohol.

The common theme I keep hearing from guys running alcohol injection and pump gas is how they're cutting back on the gas as a fuel, and relying more on the alcohol. Basicly, as boost goes higher the gas injector PW stays as is was at a lower boost level, and the alcohol takes over as the enrichment fuel.

On another hand I've heard in boosted applications with alcohol being the primary fuel, there's power to be gained by intercooling, do to the increased air density. Even though the intercooling isn't necessarily required. These are race type or setups where intake tract restriction isn't a factor. Not the same issue as you've got going Aaron.

I'd be more worried about where that 100 hp NOS shot is going to put you. Better be real careful with timing. You're going to see big power gains there.

As for alcohol kits - check out http://www.alkycontrol.com/. Buick guys are running big boost on pump gas with Razor's kit.

Personally, I'd try the alcohol only on something of my own. I'd also be putting at least one of the alcohol nozzles as close to the supercharger discharge as possible.

 

What are the details on you alky injection? How much are you pushing in? NO2 is going to be more dangerous than just water/xxOH, IMO.

 

I had forgotten that I had not posted these pics.




I am still working on the large IC install, but time is a bit short at the moment, as a a major Home Improvement project is consuming all of my time.

Aaron

 

Time to get some more powder coating done?

 

Yeah, finish the install, take it to the dyno to prove it's worth, then powdercoat or paint it. I believe I will go with "Infinitely Wet Black" on the transfer duct. Probably cost under $40 for pc.

Aaron