My shit also seems to lean out with time on the track (assuming heat soak, could be dying fuel pump). I would have had no idea this was happening if I didn't have a wideband gauge. The more I think about it, the more i'm pretty sure that is where my detonation damge came from on my pistons.

Another time my IAT sensor plug came loose and when that happens all sorts of shit goes wrong with your fueling. I noticed something was wrong when i noticed my WB02 gauge readings.

A boost gauge isn't as important since MS has boost cut but is really nice to have.

Oil pressure has definitely saved me. I really wish I had oil temp too and that will probably be my next gauge.

Aaron, I dont think your argument about factory boosted cars is quite valid. You're comparing apples to oranges, especially when you consider they have well calibrated knock sensors.

Edit: one more thing is that i've found having closed loop enabled helps a lot with fuel mileage. Also, if you're changing altitude which happens pretty often for me, you NEED closed loop enabled or shit WILL break. 4-5000 feet seems to make my AFRs about 1 full point leaner. No way I would have known that without my wideband gauge.

I can see that point...

An interesting case for wideband gauges:

Due to where I have my LC-1 in the cockpit, the wires run near the shifter. One time after pulling a bunch of shit apart on my car, one of the crimps came loose. When I was driving, the gauge would start reading very lean under certain conditions, most notably when I was in third, and 5th gear. Pushing the shift lever up would sever my wideband connection to the megasquirt but not the gauge. Looking at datalogs, the wideband input would drop to 7.4:1 afr every time I shifted into 5th, so the car would pull fuel when I was cruising.

I would have been cruising at 18-19:1 for quite a while if I didn't have a guage to alert me to the problem. Also, I use much better crimpers now :D.

Very good. We would all like to think we're infallible, but shit does happen no matter how solid you think your setup is. By the way, this is why I only use (or try to use) un-insulated crimp connectors, solder after the crimp and shrink tube the connections. As solid as if there wasn't a join there at all.

Another point i'd like to bring up for Aaron is that you shouldn't forget that you tuned your setup with a leak between the manifold and turbine flange. This leak isn't just hurting your spool by letting exhaust out, air is getting in and that ruins wideband readings. I've been battling exhaust leaks a lot this past 6 months and having a wideband gauge has helped me correct them because even a small leak shows a big difference on the gauge.

About once per shift personally. I sweep the boost guage, the WB02, then the tach, shift, and repeat in 2nd-4th when drag racing.

OEM cars also run crappy intercoolers, IHI turbos that fail at stock power levels, time-bomb diffs, ECUS that cant really do jack to richen the mix below 4K, etc. That was just off the top of my head. But I do see your point there to an extent. The engineers for OEMs do usually have a great handle on making a car last on the street at stock power levels. Beyond that some extra info is very good though.

There is no way I would be able to look at 3 gauges before I hit the rev limiter rowing through gears... lol

I'm getting the leak fixed and putting a new head on. Along with the cat coming out and proper boost control, I hope the re-tune can net at least 225wtq at 14PSI especially with that new head.

You'll hit 225 no problem. People have done much better than that with the greddy turbo.

My plan is to build a bottom end up, throw that FM head on it, get the 19t wheel and run it up to 20+PSI on water. Can anyone say 300whp? :D

Ya, but I want it to last this season without causing me any issues. Keep it "reliable"... so to speak.

Wanna assemble my bottom end for me?

Any legal issues w/ removing odometer?

I don't see why not. We don't have rules in Canada. It's a free for all....


That being said... I'll most likely keep the ODO hidden in the back somwhere ticking away just for my own records of what the car is at. Don't plan to sell it anytime soon.

The legal issues would only matter if the car was a street car, or you were trying to sell the car and didn't say that the odometer was off.

Sure! I still have plenty of plastigauge from my build too (not that its terribly expensive or anything). Are you having your cat removed locally or shall I help you with that, too?

I'm going to get my block bored out to my new pistons. Going to run the cat power rods Jeff has. What else do I need other than main studs? I can always leave it with you and you can order the bearings you will need and just let me know when it's done. I'm thinking of going with the boundary oil pump gears as well.

So you're just doing a bore and hone? Are you going to have the crank ground and/or balanced or anything like that?

I'll just need your:
Pistons
Rings
Rods
Crank
Main Studs
OPGs and an oil pump if you decide to go that route. You can probably handle the OPGs yourself though if you wanted.

I can figure out the bearings and order oversized if necessary. If you're not getting any crank work done then it probably wont be though. I didn't have to for mine.

I love engine building. Probably my favorite thing to do.

DO get boundary oil gears.

Give a lot of thought to main studs. I've never heard of anyone overpowering stock bolts, and once you go with studs, you really need to align bore the caps.

I remember having this discussion with you at Jason's house. While I agree with you that studs may be overkill, i've never heard of anyone having to bore the caps but I've never used them personally.

To be honest, I've never used them personally for this very reason. I was going to on my last DSM, but I was talked out of it by my machine shop since I had already bought bearings and whatnot.

It seems to be a 50/50 split. I agree with you that it doesn't necessarily make sense 100%, but if it is absolutely overkill, and 50% of engine builders say that a bearing failure could end up being the result, those aren't good enough odds for me.

If I had unlimited cash flow, I'd do it anyway since I've never seen definitive results, just opinions.

Good logic. I'm going to continue to skip out on them in my builds til I hear of someone failing the stock bolts.