benro2

Hi guys, just an update, I tried resoldering and drilling a 0.6mm hole in the restrictor and it's *still* boosting over 10psi at some rpm! When I tested it, the outside temp was probably around 22-25C and it was definitely going into R&R pretty badly. I held it all the way to redline and it felt like less power than stock, even though it was indicating 11psi (down to maybe 9psi above 5500rpm), so I think R&R was occurring all the way to 7000rpm. I'm pretty sure I'll need a new boost map, however Sydneykid's base map that I'm using now has a solenoid injectory duty cycle of up to 90% so there's not a whole lot of room to move in regards to actually reducing boost. I'm not sure what will happen when I remove the R&R - will it produce even more boost? Or in other words, is the R&R limiting boost? The only thing I can think of is the air is escaping out the sides between the restrictor and the T-piece, but I've twisted some copper wire around the T-piece to act as a clamp and it's on there reasonably tightly. I can still pull it off with one hand and a bit of force, but it's not like it's going to fall off by itself. I also thought that possibly the solder could have come out, but after I pulled out the restrictor that I resoldered and redrilled last time, it wasn't that. Any ideas? I'm pretty stumped right about now... Oh yeah, one more thing, I've noticed that after fitting this Jaycar stuff, my car sort of seems to misfire when idling. It seems like it's when the A/C compressor cuts in, like just one cylinder that makes the car jolt a bit, but a couple of days ago when it was left idling for a long time it was doing it every 20 secs or so. After I started driving it seemed to mostly go away. Could this be some fouled spark plugs, maybe caused by my testing in R&R?

It feels like you're putting your foot on and off the accelerator really quickly, and you lose a fair bit of power. Sometimes it's worse than other times. I've gotten a loud pop from the exhaust on a relatively hot day, on cooler days nothing much happens.

Yep, I've been having the same problem. I don't think it's a problem with your boost controller, I think it's because the engine's going into R&R, which limits power, which limits exhaust, and thus boost. This is only a guess though. Can anyone verify this? I think once you have your engine's AFR tuned on the dyno, your problems should disappear. You will probably have to reset your boost controller to a safe boost level though. Again, this is all an assumption. I myself have been waiting for a cool enough day so I can test just how high my boost will go with my current settings, so that I know how small a hole to drill in the restrictor!

Hey, sorry about the delay, haven't had net access for a while That does sound like R&R. I may be able to notice it a bit more since I can hear it through the very loud pod filter Although with mine, boost was dead stable at 12.5psi all the way to 7000rpm but I suspect since the engine's natural torque curve would max out at around 4500rpm, that is why it is going into R&R at that point, and as the volumetric efficiency drops off from 5500rpm, the R&R stops and you can make max power again. One thing to check is, does your solenoid actually work properly? Although, thinking about it, that should mean that you can't run as much boost, not more than you should be! I'm actually interested in those Hybrid things. Obviously I don't need one now, but if I do ever buy another turbocharged car and I can get one for really cheap, I may look at one of those instead of a Jaycar kit, as long as they work the same way (ie: fastest possible boost build up, hold boost at max all the way to redline).

So does your engine go into R&R above 12-13psi? Like, does it sort of stutter and lose power intermittently? I've found that even slightly over 7-8 psi on a warm day (28C and over), it will go into R&R. And even on a fairly cool night (under 20C) it will do the same thing at around 10-12psi. Have you seen how high the boost will go? Possibly it won't go any higher than 15 psi or so? I'd suggest avoiding trying this too often though AFAIK, the stock wastegate spring is set for 4-5psi or so, so possibly if you disconnected the solenoid, you should be able to reduce the boost to that level? I'm a noob with this stuff, but I guess you'd directly connect the intercooler return pipe directly to the wastegate actuator? Possibly you didn't connect all the pipes up correctly and that's why the solenoid isn't working? Just another question, does anyone know if I can stop the R&R if I tune the DFA? Also, any ideas on why I'm running virtually unlimited boost? How many times can I run 15psi for a second or so while I'm testing before the turbo stuffs up?

OK, I have another question... I took out the restrictor, resoldered it, and redrilled a 1.0mm hole. At first, it appeared to be holding about 10.5 psi (is this safe?), but it was going R&R because it was about 32C outside. That night, it was about 18C outside, so I floored it and it went straight up to 15 psi, maybe higher, but I immediately took my foot off. Why could this be? My line of thinking is that it held 10.5 psi during the day because the R&R was restricting the power so much that no more boost could be made. So at night, when it was cooler, the R&R wasn't as savage, and thus I could build more boost. Now, in order to get the restrictor out, I had to cut it out and buy some more piping which was a slightly larger inner diameter than the original, so the fitting over the T-piece is a little looser than before. Not so loose that it will just fall off, but even with my dodgy effort at clamping it on with some copper wire, you can still pull it off easily with your hand. The other end is even looser because the plastic fitting appears to be even smaller than the T-piece. So, could it be that air is getting out from the sides of the T-piece, in between it and the restrictor? That would essentially mean that I have no wastegate control! I am still using Sydneykid's original map, ie: a max. solenoid duty cycle of 90%. Anyone know if and where I can buy the little clamps that came over the pipes of the T-piece?

Well I've seen a SII GTS-T with everything the same except the speedo, which was 300km/h. I can only assume this is a Nismo item. But would this mean that the whole dash is purchased that way (ie: the tacho is the same as the original, not different as in the GTR's), or just the speedo was replaced? I guess what I'm asking is, if you wanted to option up a GTS-T with a Nismo dash, what gauges are changed? Just the speedo? So it looks like I'm gonna have to buy two different dashes - a GTS-T one for the speedo (assuming these even exist - I've never seen one anywhere for sale), and an original GTR one for the tacho? That may be a bit expensive... And if someone does have a 300km/h speedo, why on earth would they want to sell it anyway?

Wow, that's not too bad. Any problems with the installation? And you still had the GTR's 180km/h speedo? See, what I'd ultimately want is either a 300 or 320km/h speedo with the original GTR tacho. Sorta impossible Also, I have an auto, so if I replace the whole dash, I'll lose the PRND2L lights... not a real big deal, but I'm wondering if it'll cause additional problems?

Hmmm... I have no idea how much they cost. I've seen the entire Nismo dash for the R33 GTR go for a few hundred $$$ but I would have thought the regular GTR dash would be fairly cheap, since I can't imagine too many people would want one - surely they'd all be upgrading to the Nismo ones? But I was mainly wondering whether or not just the tacho and/or speedo are interchangeable. Sounds like they are!

xRHETTx, thanks for the reply, I'm gonna start looking now!

Hey guys, just wondering, I have an auto SII R33 GTS-T and I've recently put in an aftermarket boost gauge, so I don't need the stock one. I've always been a fan of the R33 GTR's tacho, you know how the needle points downwards at 0 rpm? Is it possible to replace just my tacho with one of these, or do I need to replace the whole thing? Anyone know if there would be complications with using either just the tacho or the whole GTR dashboard? Also, I've seen a Nismo (?) 300km/h speedo which appears to be GTS-T specific (the Nismo GTR ones go to 320km/h I believe?). Assuming the speedo and tacho aren't fixed to the whole dashboard, can I fit either a GTR 320km/h one or just this 300km/h one? So, if it's possible to do what I'm asking, does anyone have a GTR tacho for sale? I'm just after the stock GTR one, not the Nismo 9,000rpm redline one. Anyone have either a 300km/h or 320km/h speedo?

Well, like I mentioned in the original post, I just used Sydneykid's boost map as a base to start with. I'm going to try this same map with a 1.0mm hole (there will be a large difference in what boost I run just going from a 1.2mm to 1.0mm hole), and I'll let you know how that goes. I have a sneaking suspicion that it will hold the boost nice and flat like it does now, just at a lower boost level. Possibly this map could be used as a base map for all RB25's, and the hole size could be used as the boost adjustment? This is probably the hardest way to tune it to the boost level you desire, but you would normally have two people in the car to tune it. The Performance Electronics for Cars mag, available from Jaycar (highly recommended if you're going to build these kits) details how you should tune the boost map, and it's really not that hard. I just haven't had a whole lot of time, or an available assistant, to help me tune it Hopefully I'll get something done this Sunday... I've never used any other form of boost control, but from what I've read on these forums, bleed valves are nice and cheap but they can spike (and thus blow your turbo), and other electronic boost controllers that work in a similar way are up in the multiple hundreds of $$$. From the few days I've used mine, although I'm running too much boost, it is held dead flat at 12.5psi from maybe 3000rpm all the way to 7000rpm (too busy watching the road to see where the boost threshold is ). But the main thing is, keeping in mind that I've never built any electronic kits in my life before these, if you can read and follow instructions, and have 10-15 hrs to spare building the hand controller, IEBC and DFA, and have a friend around to help you install it, it's definitely excellent bang for your bucks. In an attempt to answer the question directed at Sydneykid, I don't think the actual use of the hand controller itself is difficult at all. You basically have a high and low boost map, and each map has 64 load points. Each load point equates to your injector duty cycle, which is roughly equivalent to how far your foot is down on the accelerator pedal You then have an output figure, which is the duty cycle (as a percentage) of the boost control solenoid. The higher the number, the more it restricts boost, ie: you want higher boost, you lower the duty cycle. If you were asking about how hard the actual kit is to build, it is the easiest out of the three, and looks the most impressive also Regarding the installation, I didn't have a hope of doing it myself as I've never modded a car before. Looking back, I probably could have worked it out all myself, but I was too scared to attempt it as I didn't want to break anything. The hardest part was splicing the wires into the ECU, and once I understood the reasoning behind the pipes that need to be rerouted from the boost solenoid, that was all pretty easy. It's definitely worth a look! Just my 2.2c...

OK OK, I get the message, the exhaust is the next mod I should do! However, I now have some questions about this as I remember researching exhausts a while ago and decided I should avoid it because it appears that it will cost me at least $1-1.5k for something decent that's not too loud. So, can I actually get a worthy exhaust upgrade for $500, and how much of it should I replace? Obviously, the more I can replace the better, but is there a point where, for $500, I should only replace a portion with really high quality parts rather than the whole thing with sub-standard quality parts? The other thing I gathered was that high flowing exhaust systems that are not much louder than stock are really expensive. People were saying that a 3" seemed to provide a good compromise between ground clearance, power potential and driveability. I went to an exhaust place and asked about a dual 2.25" system (stainless?) and they said around $1.5k, waaaay over my budget. I think they said about $1k for a single 3" system, and I have no idea how good it would have been. So, I guess I'm asking, for $500, what parts of the exhaust should I replace, will it be much louder than stock, how much extra power will I get, and are there any brands that are particularly cheap yet are of a high quality construction? And I should probably also ask how much power it would be good for, ie: if I were to go for a new turbo or intercooler afterwards, would the $500 worth of exhaust mods be good enough or would I need to spend more on it? I know this whole thing is OT from the original question, but it's still specific to my situation so I don't really think I need to start a whole new thread? Thanks for the help!

I've just installed one of these myself, and if you hide the actual kits say, under or in the glovebox, no one can tell if you have them installed. The only way someone could tell by looking under the bonnet is if they happened to notice the small rerouted pipes coming from the boost solenoid - very unlikely if it's a cop

LoL. Thanks for replying anyway Sydneykid. At least now others can see what you wrote! Yep, I think I'm gonna try and reduce the boost to 10psi. However, as you can see by your own map, the solenoid is already at a 90% max duty cycle, so I doubt I can run much less. I have a 1.2mm vent hole, so I guess the increased boost is due to my pod filter? And the only solution is to go to a smaller hole? Would you suggest, say, a 1.0mm? About the A/C problem, the load point goes straight to 64, not just slightly higher than 5-7 which is the typical idle load point. Could I have hooked something up to the wrong wire in the ECU or is it totally unrelated? Like I said before, once there's a bit of load (say over 20), if the A/C compressor is on, it doesn't really seem to affect the input readout, so I assume it should be OK to leave it as it is? About the throttle kickdown, is the trick to press down on the accelerator more than usual, and quickly, to make it kick down a gear, then ease off a bit to reduce boost? So is more boost or more revs more fuel efficient, assuming I've got the DFA tuned properly? And finally, what is the single most cost effective mod I can do to get more power? I'm talking less than $500 here, at least initially up front. I'd like to try and avoid an exhaust since I don't like big exhausts with autos (it's just a thing I have). What about an R34 GT-T intercooler? I'd like to have something that's a straight bolt on, ie: minimise labour, since I'd have to pay someone to install it. Is that a worthy upgrade, and is it worth doing if I'm going to stick to 10psi? What about a rebuilt turbo? Someone mentioned a T3/T4 for $500 shipped from Japan, rebuilt by Garrett. I've heard that the stock auto box is good for about 200rwkw, so I definitely won't be aiming for more than that. So I'm aiming for 180-200 rwkw. I don't think this is possible for $500, but what will get me the closest for that amount of money?

Well, personally I believe you should use a bypass valve or BOV, as according to a couple of books I've read (one being Turbocharged by Corky Bell, can't remember the name of the other one but it was first published this year), compressor surge will eventually cause damage to the turbo. I believe they said it could damage the bearings, not sure about the compressor wheel itself. Although, having said that, there are two factory cars that I've seen videos of that have a flutter sound when the throttle is closed. The first one was the Porsche GT1, driven by Tiff Needel in 5th Gear (the show). That's a full on road car for the race track, I assume with a warranty and everything, ie: not just for the one racing season or whatever. The second one was a turbo diesel 4wd, an Audi something on an Aussie car review website. It wasn't very loud, but it was definitely a fluttering sound. I was quite surprised to hear a diesel 4wd making that sound! I personally have a GTS-T with an Apexi pod filter which I scored off Ebay brand new for $105 shipped. Really good price for what seems like a nice filter, and on stock boost I thought it was pretty loud (if that's what you want). Not as loud as an atmospheric BOV, but I reckon much louder and the cops would be all over you. Now that I'm running higher than stock boost, it is quite loud. There is no flutter sound, but for me, that's good I like the fluttering sound, but now that I know what it is, I think I'll avoid it... One more thing, slightly OT, there is a guy around Penrith who has a dark blue S14 with an atmospheric BOV that sounds like a low whistle. Like the kind of pitch you could whistle normally with your mouth, gradually decreasing in pitch. Not like the HKS SSQ which is a really high pitched sound. Anyone happen to know what BOV it is? There is no flutter in his sound either. My 2.2c

Well I'm an absolute noob when it comes to car mods, and I've never used any other boost controller before, but I purchased and built the Jaycar hand controller, boost controller and digital fuel adjuster for under $200 total. I'm incapable of installing it myself, so I found a friend willing to help me and ended up paying him $150 to install it and a couple of other things over a couple of days. I'd imagine anyone who's familiar with hooking wires into the ECU and capable of following instructions (to build the kits) could do it all themselves. Although I'm sure my ECU is going into R&R (running 12.5 psi - too much I think), the boost is dead flat all the way to 7000 rpm. I had an aftermarket boost gauge installed to check this BTW. I'm hoping the DFA will help get rid of the R&R (not sure if it will help at all though) and hopefully make a bit more power whilst improving fuel economy. I had absolutely no experience in building electronic kits prior to these. If you buy the performance electronics for cars mag from Jaycar you shouldn't have any trouble at all. So overall, I'm very happy with the Jaycar kit. Sure, it takes a while to build and install, but from what I understand, any EBC is gonna take a while to install anyway, it's just that you don't have to build it. But you're gonna be up for a lot of $$$ as a tradeoff. I'd say timewise you'd be looking at 12-15 hrs to build the kits (if you're an absolute beginner) and about 5 hrs to install the two kits, allowing for the inevitable problem(s) Sounds like it's worth it to me!

Hi guys, I recently posted this message in the Stagea forums (found here), but didn't receive any replies, and I don't want to have to PM Sydneykid yet again So any help from anyone would be much appreciated! These questions are regarding the Jaycar Independent Electronic Boost Controller (IEBC) and Digital Fuel Adjuster (DFA) kits. I have finally managed to build and install both these kits, however I have only got the IEBC operating for the moment. I have an auto SII R33 GTS-T, the only power mod being an Apexi pod filter. I had to solder up the restrictor (standard was 1.5mm hole) and redrill it to 1.2mm. I used Sydneykid's boost map from page 8 of the Stagea thread (found here) as a base (haven't changed this yet, haven't had time). I've installed an aftermarket boost gauge that reads in psi - hope it's accurate! 1. Boost builds fairly rapidly to about 12.5 psi, and seems to hold there until redline. I want to run the highest boost possible that's safe for turbo longevity. I'd like to make it 10 psi, but would 11 or 12 be OK? Is 12.5 too high? I remember someone saying that the pressure drop across the stock intercooler could be as much as 3 psi above a certain boost pressure. Does anyone know what this pressure is? So in other words, if I'm showing 12.5 psi on my boost gauge, what is the turbo actually producing? And is it safe to leave it at that boost level? 2. Something I've noticed that's a bit weird is that when the A/C compressor turns on, the input load point goes straight to 64! If I start driving with a reasonable load, it seems to return to what it should be, and I haven't noticed any overboosting with the A/C on. Anyone else experienced this? What could it be caused by? 3. My high/low switch doesn't appear to be working (it was before), so I'm just using the low boost curve for the moment. Could this be causing the weird A/C compressor full load readings? 4. When I'm boosting hard, around 3-5000 rpms the power suddenly cuts momentarily, then comes back on, then cuts out, several times a second. Is this the rich & retard strategy of the ECU cutting in? What could this be caused by? I have a DFA installed but it hasn't been tuned yet. Could getting that setup at the dyno be able to fix this problem? Or could it be because I'm simply running too much boost? The turbo also seems to be making a sort of swirling or noise, like it's cutting in and out a bit, or what I'd imagine compressor surge would sound like, but only on high boost. What could this be? It sounds like the pod filter is shaking around, but possibly it's because of the rich & retard making the engine come on and off power, and thus boost? 5. Would it be more fuel efficient to have the car boost up when I want to overtake in top gear, or have it go down a gear? Is it possible to change this, and how? 6. The car doesn't seem all that much faster below about 5,500 rpm (although that may just be an illusion ) but above that, it absolutely flies. Why is this, and is it just my imagination? Watching the boost gauge, it is around 12.5 psi flat all the way through from about 3,000 rpm. Having thought about this for a while, I think it may just be the ECU rich & retard cutting power below 5,500 rpm. Any help is much appreciated! I'm an absolute noob when it comes to car mods so I can't really do much stuff myself, and I don't want to accidentally break anything trying to! It has taken me AGES to get this far...

Moved post to here due to no replies...and this thread needs to be kept as short as possible!

Thanks!

Anyone happen to have a pic of these wheels on an R33 GTS-T?

Hi guys, This may seem like a stupid question, but I've searched all through this topic and the forums and can't seem to find the correct voltage range for a Skyline R33 GTS-T SII auto ECU. I *thought* I saw someone mention 0-5V. Is this correct? I may have the incorrect terminology here, but basically what I'm trying to do is set the voltage range for the DFA kit. So that's what I'm talking about I have just tested my kits, except for the potentiometer test with the DFA, and I am completely amazed to find that everything has worked perfectly so far, first go! I say this because I've never built any kits at all, ever. So if I can do it, anyone can! I just made sure I double checked everything before I soldered it in, and went through the parts list beforehand and ticked everything off. Also, if you want to look through extremely large threads like this one all in one page, a handy way to do it is to select Options > Print this topic (found at top RH corner of the page). I know a lot of people may already know this, but I just found it I would also like to thank Sydneykid very much for helping me via PM's along the way, so I don't blame him for asking people to do a search before PM'ing him. I can only imagine how many PM's he would get every day, and he actually takes the time to carefully respond to them all without ever getting annoyed. So please search as much as you can before PM'ing him (guilty myself )! Ben

I assume the gear ratios are the same for the S1 and S2 auto's, so I'd say you'd already have the overdrive on if you were doing around 3000 rpm at around 100 km/h. You'd be doing over 4000rpm if you had it off! Damn I wish they had a 5th gear so you could cruise at 2000 rpm down the motorway - would be quieter, save fuel, less wear and tear... I know you'd have almost no torque at that speed but the auto's kick down pretty fast on light throttle so that probably wouldn't matter. Oh well, I can only dream...

I think it's mostly due to the gear ratios. The Skyline auto does around 3000 rpm in top gear at an indicated 110km/h, while the Commodore is doing around 1800 rpm in top gear at the same speed. We've had a pile of Calais' over the years (company cars) and I swear, every gearbox has been programmed differently. There is a large hill near our place where you start out at about 90km/h and by the end in the Calais you will be doing around 115km/h, but in the Skyline you would probably only hit 100km/h if you're lucky. In the first Calais' the revs used to hold at whatever they would have been with the accelerator depressed in top gear, then a couple of cars after that used to drop revs to idle, then raise them back up, then drop, etc. Then another one would just drop them to about 1200rpm all the way down the hill. The one we have now (5 spd auto) seems to keep revs as if you are in top gear, like the first cars. Dunno why they keep on changing, but I suspect they're to do with how the transmission logic is programmed. Oh yeah, I had a point to all that... the cars that kept the revs equal to top gear (locked torque converter?) seem to roll the best. The Skyline seems to drop revs slightly when you lift your foot off, so I suspect the torque converter becomes unlocked, so possibly that puts extra drag on the engine, and combined with lower gearing (more engine braking because of increased revs), that may account for the extra rolling resistance? Also, just out of interest, the Calais has an instantaneous fuel consumption feature on the trip computer, and all cars except the ones that used to raise and drop the revs intermittently read 0.0L/100km all the way down the hill. Dunno if that's actually true or not, but it sure would be nice! Also, I just keep overdrive turned on all the time. That's certainly the way to go if you're trying to save fuel. I find the car's fine at all speeds like that - the transmission seems a lot more responsive than any of the Calais' we've had, even the newest one with the 5 spd auto!

I have an auto S2 R33 and I fill up when the gauge reads empty. If I drive another 30km or so the fuel warning light will come on. If I fill up somewhere between when the gauge reads empty and when the light comes on, I'll get around 52-54L or so (as Kennedy said). I will usually have done around 400-450km on this much fuel, and my average fuel consumption seems to be around 12.7L/100km, which involves both city/highway driving (guessing average speed around 45km/hr overall). If you want to figure out your fuel consumption, fill up the tank until the pump clicks (don't try to overfill it), zero the trip meter, then drive until the tank is empty, or until the warning light comes on. Fill up again (preferably with the same bowser), note the trip meter reading and amount of fuel bought. Divide fuel bought by km's travelled and multiply by 100. I use Caltex Vortex 98 (hehe Woolies discount card ) all the time, from the same bowser every time and my fuel consumption is fairly consistent. I drive fairly lightly most of the time, but I think I would get better fuel consumption in a manual. Just about to fit the Jaycar IEBC and DFA - that should bring me down to around 11L/100km. Hope that helps, Ben