Agree on the ITBs... lot of squeeze for not a lot of juice. I think I would only do it with a standalone.

There's a guy local to me building a 2.4 scalpel for his NC... I've been waiting for him to finish it so I can get a ride.

 

What level is he building to? That could be an exciting ride, do report if/when it happens!

All this talk is making me second-guess my decision those years ago to go look at that cheap SE (MSM) ...

 

I'm not sure of the compression or cams, but know he's using the Fab9 intake manifold.

 

I remember, you were the first to post up the Scalpel kit when I started this thread haha. Never thought I'd be considering it until now, after getting a tiny taste of N/A power. Fab9 is pretty active in the NC FB groups and I've seen them post a few dynos between 220-230whp, along with one or two independent folks posting similar results. You're right about the heat and hardware part and if those numbers are feasible, I think the simplicity to power ratio would be a great happy medium.

What I really should do is ask Bryan at Fab9 the minimum compression/cams it takes to get to that estimated 230whp ceiling. If I could hit that ceiling with medium cams/compression, a Fab9 intake manifold, e85 and leave the door open to forced induction a couple/few years down the line, that would kinda be the best of both worlds. I'll shoot them a message this week, actually.

I'm hoping their claims on the gains with that manifold are correct. It's not cheap horsepower ($1,000 for the damn thing!), but a 10whp gain across the board on a naturally aspirated engine isn't anything to scoff at. One of my buddies just installed said mani on his car over the weekend. Patiently waiting for him to dyno the car so I can see some firsthand results.

 

Fun thread man, looking forward to seeing you at MTTC round 1!

Will be fun to watch you put the scalpel together. You know you wanna...

 

Yo, thanks Ed! Super stoked for the TTC. I'm shooting to make it to the April and May events too!

 

If I'm being a bad influence, I'm just going to shoot for the stars here and avoid the intermediate power level stage for my recommendation... LS swap it, keep N/A reliability, and enjoy

 

Alright, now we're getting somewhere Maybe wisdom is accepting all the scope creep at once instead of convincing yourself you'll be happy after the next upgrade. I'd be lying if I said I haven't spent multiple hours looking at everything necessary for an LFX swap on this car. N/A setup on this car just shy of 300whp would be a dream....

Second set of Hypergrams showed up today. Got the RC-1's mounted up on all four. Beads on these tires are stiff as fuuuuu. Had to air em up to 50+ PSI with a ton of lube to get em to seat. Just a little scary.



Looks badass though. Very excited to get these on track. I'll mount them on the car later this week and get a "heat cycle" on them in the canyons before Chuckwalla next weekend.



Bigger header's supposed to show up tonight too.

 

FWIW, the original RC1s were fastest with the stickers still on, no heat cycles. Not sure if the S2 compound is the same.

 

I love OG RC1s. We set a class lap record at our season opener at our local track a few years ago with them, 9mo later we backed up the time within a couple tenths on the same set of tires at the finals.

 

All those high compression 2.5 builds were doomed to fail. This engine is just not built for this. Search around the FB groups you'll see all the big players giving up and reverting to KISS.
Makes a lot more sense to buy the fab9 manifold, that's what I did. Just for the sake of keeping daily drivability and an easy tune.
Gains only start though from 5500 rpm. But we're idiots and we buy it anyway.

 

A big part of the high-rpm 2.5 fails have been because they had no crank damper. Fluidampr now makes a crank damper that is suitable for the 2.5 and should help a lot with revving them higher.

 

I'll have to do a little poking around to try and find the differences between the OG and the current compound with the RC-1's. Thanks for the insight, Ed. I kinda just assumed all tires liked an 80% heat cycle on them before competition.

I'm running one of those new Fluidamprs on my engine currently. Time will tell if it saves the engine or not. I've read a bunch about oil pan design/baffling making a big difference in survivability as well on these motors. The only option that used to exist for a properly baffled oil pan was the Esslinger unit which comes in at over $2k. Moroso just came out with one that's "only" $700, though. I have an additional baffle installed in the stock oil pan right now but will likely spring for the Moroso unit on my next engine.

 

Are those Moroso pans actually available yet?

EDIT: A quick google showed that they are indeed available. I assume the whole engine has to be pulled to install a new oil pan? I am still working on my friend and trying to get my old 2.5 NC back...

I would add a Fluidampr and that oil pan as reliability mods for sure.

 

is this in regards to the de-stroked scalpel, or your standard 2.5? Just curious, as in theory the de-stroking should take care of the 2.5s falling apart under high rpm track abuse.

 

I've read that the oil pan can be snaked out if you lower the subframe a bit. I'm lazy and hate working in tight spaces, though, so I'd probably just remove the subframe to swap the oil pan. I'm cheating over here with the lift and shop equipment though.

That and the Fluidampr should help the issue a ton. The 2.0L damper has to be reused on the 2.5L engine for the swap because the 2.5's damper has a different trigger pattern and is set up for two belts instead of one. Running a balancer designed for the 2.0 on a 2.5 at 800+ rpm past the 2.5's factory redline can't be helping haha.

 

I can't recall but how much power are you making now? The only "problem" I see with spending so much money on the destroke kit is if it only gets you ~230whp, that's a fair bit of $ for not a whole lot of power. I guess depending on what route you go you could always add a turbo. For an N/A build though, I'd just be careful in terms of how much $ you put into the thing and what power level you end up with. I see some folks who do some crazy N/A builds on NBs with the 1.8l. Cams, headwork, built block, ITBs, etc. and they're making ~200whp if that? I'm not picking on anyone but what a waste of money to me. Better to do a k swap or an LS. Of course when you take a step back bigger picture everything is a waste of money, but you know what I mean.

Obviously a turbo build has drawbacks but you get more torque with that peak whp number as well and hp/dollar is usually better. Building engines is pricey. Ultimately of course it comes down to what you want. What someone else said I would definitely agree with. ITBs are not worth the squeeze. N/A folks love to drool over ITBs (they're usually loud as hell) but they're hard to tune, usually give up low end power, etc. It's like that super hot girl you want to date (but she's crazy).. the grass ain't greener. A good intake manifold will get you 9/10ths w/ less headaches. N/A builds are obviously quite popular with hondas and seen a bunch over the years. While I'm sure tuning has gotten better/easier w/ ITBs over the years, I still don't think it's worth it. I honestly don't know the drivetrain limitations of the NC platform (if they're similar to the NB or what in terms of busting trannies) so that's obviously a consideration if you try to push a lot of power. No doubt N/A cars are more reliable on track. I guess I said a whole lot without saying anything.

 

No no, you've said a lot and they're all valid points! Haha.

Yeah, I'm with you on ITBs for sure. Cool novelty but I'd rather put the money into going fast as much as possible haha.

Here's my breakdown. The car's currently making (or should be making) ~175whp. High-comp N/A build should get the car to 220-230whp. If I go turbo, my move would be Fab9 low mount EFR kit which would make... enough power to blow the bottom end and driveline if I so desired. Basically more power than I could ever want or use. The NC driveline is a little more stout than the NA/NB. 5 speed transmissions seem to hold around 300whp for street use. I've heard of a couple guys pushing theirs to ~330. 6 speeds are still good for just a little more power.

N/A build seems like it'll come in cheaper overall. ~$3k for the Scalpel kit I'd go for. Probably $1k in machine work (I figure less but I'm trying to be realistic. Just in case the donor block needs a line hone, cylinders are out of round, etc.).
The turbo kit is $5k.

I'll need bigger injectors either way. I figure I should upsize the fuel pump even if I go N/A, so I'm factoring injectors and a pump into both builds as well.
Also, on a kind of silly note, I can probably get away with the stock radiator for a bit on the N/A/e85 build if I go that route. I haven't seen my coolant temp rise above 199* while ripping the car since the 2.5 swap, and there's still plenty of opportunities to better seal my ducting. Highest ambient temps the car's seen on track have only been 75*f, but I've never seen coolant temps get above 194* in those scenarios. The radiator in the car was replaced by the PO before I bought it so I'm not concerned about it popping anytime soon.

Like you said, though. Lots to think about. My current thought is that an N/A build will make me happy power-wise and be simpler/require less turning of wrenches. However, if I want more power after that, I'm going to have to get a turbo kit anyways.
There, I also just said nothing glad I still have a whole season to think about this.

 

Don't want to throw the thread off the current topic but had to share this. My buddy with the Caprice found a video from Chuckwalla back in December where I went two off and accepted my fate

 

nyOOOOOOOM off into the sunset