1.6 turbo high flowing manifold polling
 

Hi All,

I've been building my own 1.6 turbo in the UK but found a huge gap in the market for a good flowing manifold at ebay prices..
In the end I bought the below manifold from a chap on this forum and have been looking into having patterns made to re-produce them.

What are your thoughts? am I wasting my time and should I just fit the thing to my own car or is there a market for them?

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1369854871

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1369854871

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1369854871

Thanks for your thoughts
Paul

wasting your time, use a 1.8?

Probably a reason for that right? Quality, flow and eBay price don't really mix.

I really think it is possible, if the design is right then the casting price should stay in the sensible range. Obviously I could opt for the Chinese route at which point price drops along with steel quality...

Right. Well there are plenty of chinese options. If you're going to make it in the UK then we'll have to pay the premium to ship it over to us in the US no? There are quality options for $200, it might be hard to find the niche.

Edit: Looks like quality options don't start until around $400. Still...

Yes you could be right, shipping to USA would be about $90 alone although this could be much improved if I could find someone prepared to stock in the USA. This way I could get a pallet price.

What price range would be interesting to you in the USA?

That manifold is a super rare HKS 1.6 unit.

I have no idea of the origins of the manifold but know the design is good. Having searched for absolutely ages I could not find a single image of anything like it. Does not have any markings on it whatsoever.

Paul

The problem as I see it, in the US at least, is that only our 90-93 cars had the 1.6. Most of the people boosting a 1.6 are doing it because they can't afford to swap a 1.8 and boost it, so you have to be at the same price as an Ebay cast log, which I doubt you could do with decent quality. Looks like the Ebay logs are in the $130 range, if you can't sell them for $129 each or less then don't bother.

No offense to Viperormiata or the other people building mean 1.6s, but I would bet that the average joe boosting their 1.6 is less willing to pay more for higher flow/quality vs the equivalent 1.8 owner.

lmfao. Blue state post.

OP, I can guarantee 100% that you have an old HKS manifold. I can't point you towards any dyno's, charts, etc..but I can tell you that it was later sold through Cork Sport for a while. No idea if it's a quality cast that will crack or if it's bomb proof like the begi/fm lot. The "collector" is hardly perfect and any large T2 frame turbo has a chance of smacking the hood.

Good luck. I'll be here scrounging for pennies to help me finish my feeble 1.6 car in hopes of making 200hp and 130trq.

Sorry, a local FB group all have 1.6s and every other day someone there is asking if the ebay kit is the way to go. Maybe you aren't all like that but that's 10 vs 1 :party:

I don't really agree with you regards the 1.6 and 1.8 because I have the 1.6 and I'm quite happy to turbo it. Yes the 1.8 can produce more bhp but it's only 200cc different so not always the best option to ditch the 1.6.

With the exchange rate difference between UK and USA I could never get close to $130 I would expect the best I could manage would be closer to $325 inc delivery, although I have yet to finalise costs.

It looks like the downpipe would be tough with that manifold. It could work better flipped as a lowmount? Equal length runners are nice but probably not a must have for most. As others have pointed out it would be tough to compete with that ebay log.

On the subject, I think the best turbo placement is mid mount like theBegi/FM cast pieces. afaik they are not available for 1.6 and in any case have sharpish merges.

My take on this was to try and make a better flowing sidemount log.

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1369865427

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1369865427

Apparently you missed the slew of noobs asking about the begi S4 knockoff and the infamous TURBO NOT HIT BLOCK (exclusively 1.8). Point is, it's everywhere. Ever since the miata became cheaper it became more popular, and since the 90-93's are the cheapest they became the go-to car for the heathens and miscreants commonly known as reject honda owners. "Hey guys, I just bought this miata for 1200 bucks, I wanna turbo it for pennies, please help?! Be gentle on my virgin anus". Cheap car, cheap people, cheap parts. Get enough of them together and places like Club Turdster become a reality. It's the inevitable cycle of car platforms. It will slowly work it's way up the ladder.

Give it time. There are already a few stand outs with NB's. Check out CR.net and you will see plenty more.

Here's what you would be competing against as far as cast 1.6 ebay manifolds. There may be some untapped market of rich fucks with 1.6s that I don't know about, but nobody I know with a 1.6 would be interested in a $300 mani vs the $130 ebay one. Again, maybe it's different in the UK where you have more 1.6 cars. But the people that I know who have 1.6 cars bought them because they couldn't afford a 1.8, not because they prefered the 1.6. And those people aren't going to pay extra for quality and high flow.


Oh I'm not denying that they don't exist for the 1.8. I'm saying as an extremely anecdotal data point, that I see more of these with 1.6s than 1.8s, that's all. I wasn't sure if it was the same in the UK since the 1.6 was sold there for longer than the 1.8.

I actually perfer my 1.6L. I like the way it revs much better than the 1.8L. It just feels like it's more fun to drive. I will turbo my 1.6L and am not gonna put a ebay manifold on it either.

oh boy you're gonna really not like what happens when everyone see's this :laugh:

Is that like a support group of some kind?

You are objectively wrong, your 1.6 does not rev better than the 1.8.

It started as "Indiana Miata Owners" but now it's more like "Indiana Miata Parts Classified".

https://www.facebook.com/groups/246249845503978/