Miata Turbo Forum - Boost cars, acquire cats. - Jake's Rolling Turbo Dumpster Fire (trigger warning: bandaids)

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1991 Silverstone NA. Ran like shit. Idled like shit. Slow as a dog. Perfect ghetto-turbo candidate. Grabbed some stainless tees and made something approximating a turbo manifold and welded the exhaust housing of a 3000GT VR-4 turbo to it. Mounted that business in my engine bay and took lots of pictures of my turbo Miata because I'm a twat like that.
http://www.homemadeturbo.com/attachm...ine=1471113702
Found enough garbage lying around the shop to make a two-piece downpipe because I didn't have the right bends to make a shape that would come out of the car in one piece and I'm all about dat serviceability. An oil feed line happened at some point. Hacked up my dipstick tube and drained the oil into there because if it's good enough for Greddy it's good enough for me.
http://www.homemadeturbo.com/attachm...ine=1471113702
Such garbage. Was in at least three wrecks before I got it, then I went and wrecked it again because traction is a confusing thing and light poles just want hugs.
At least it looks competent from one side of the car.
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Wrapped my manifold with durex "her pleasure" heat wrap so people can't see my garbage welds. Getting this thing on and off is now 10000% more of a bitch because the heatwrap interferes with the nut heads. Great job. Also, while welding I warped the flange so now the exhaust leaks until the metal expands from getting hot. Fabulous and totally not annoying in the slightest.
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Look at that Quality (tm) drain tube. Yeah.�
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Widebands are too good for me and vice-versa so I got a $20 narrowband. If boost=yes and rich=yes then car=great.

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Fried rice. The passenger door was replaced with a white junkyard passenger door. Instead of looking like a poor person with mismatched door panels I decided I'd rather look like a snapback-wearing vapebro.
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Proof I'm the second coming of Jesus is the fact I made this duct-taped monstrosity work. The charge pipe is heater hose and HVAC tubing makes up the intake ducting. I did this entirely to prove it could be done. It worked great for two days.
http://www.homemadeturbo.com/attachm...ine=1471113702
Lol. Should probably mention that I'm running unknown spark advance, no dipstick (so no idea of oil level), and a knock-off Vortec FMU for fuel management. I'm a smart cookie.
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Had to extend the wiring harness for the VAF. Used the same color wire for everything because I'm a badass.
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Got some silicone couplers but one was the wrong size because of course it was so more duct tape happened.
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Then I finally got the right size. Really wish the black couplers were as cheap as these blue ones.
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At some point I re-did the door cards, center console, arm rest, leather door pulls, steering wheel, shift knob, and reupholstered the seats. Also made a little panel for my boost gauge and narrowband.
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Then I got a hardtop because a deal came along.
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apt-get remove rice
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Got a right-angle drill, drill bit, tap, blah blah blah then fucked it up and somehow made the hole too big so three layers of JB weld happened for my oil drain.
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My dope-ass panty-dropping drain tube.
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Bought a cheap wastegate actuator and mounted it 100% legit
https://www.miataturbo.net/data:imag...EAAAICTAEAOw==https://www.miataturbo.net/data:imag...EAAAICTAEAOw==https://www.miataturbo.net/data:imag...EAAAICTAEAOw==https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media...tszbeqfxii.JPG
Mazda 323 GTX PCV valve, a breather on the exhaust side, hooked up a vacuum line to the wastegate actuator, then ran out of daylight to put the undertray and intercooler on.

Worth noting I did an ATF engine flush after two of my lifters collapsed. Worked great. Engine now runs better than it ever did. Also worth noting the amount of oil left in the engine when I drained it to do that flush was approximately half a quart. Oops.

Got a timing light and set my timing to 6 degrees BTC. The previous setting? 20 degrees, apparently. This engine has taken a stupid amount of abuse.

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Mitsubishi 3000GT VR-4 intercoolers and piping.
https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media...7pi0xdquhw.JPG
Intercooler will go in here with some undoubtably ghetto-fabulous ducting

Went for a test drive. No weird smells, didn't lean out under boost (wastegate cracks open at 5psi), no pinging, didn't overheat. Was slow as balls though with just 5psi of unintercooled boost with such retarded timing.

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Oh. Retarded the timing too much because I read the timing marks wrong. Go me.

So that brings us to today. After work I've got to jack the car up and slap the intercooler in the bumper, put the undertray on, and advance the timing from 4 degrees to 6 or 7 degrees, then another test drive.

I hope you cringed.