Bodge Budget turbo build - Saxperience

Tomthetopper · 6th July 2015, 18:09

I'm planning to turbocharge my VTS, but also have a teeny tiny budget for the conversion. Since owning my VTS i have read a lot on this forum and dare I say a turbo conversion seems pretty straightforward if low boost is the goal. Im interested to see just how cheaply i can build the car (if i can do it at all!). Building cars/mechanics isnt my area of expertise by any stretch of the imagination but hopefully it will make for some interesting reading as i progress through it and learn as much as i can along the way. My hope is to get the car built in 4 months and with only a £1500 budget! Below is just a test picture as i have just removed the front bumper and headlights.

Let the headscratching begin! Updates to follow in the next couple of days.
Any advice is welcomed.

Tomthetopper · 6th July 2015, 20:19

1.9mm head gasket and new cambelt kit are ordered and will be with me tomorrow so i can give that a go tomorrow, so in the meantime i fitted one of my cobra seats, look awesome. The interior i plan to strip out properly once most of the mechanical stuff is done.

iSlayeR · 7th July 2015, 19:56

boost is win

Tomthetopper · 7th July 2015, 20:37

Headgasket done today (turned out to be only 1.7mm thick, not sure how i got that wrong) but consdiering the mega low mileage of the car and all the paperwork, none of which mentions the head ever being off, i doubt e head has ever been skimmed, so with good mapping compression shouldnt be an issue.

I also got a chance to get the sump off, drilled out and had a 19mm bit of tube welded into position as the oil drain, just to the right of the oil filter. The sump holds 3.5l of oil, so it needs to be welded pretty close to the top of the sump!

I only used hylomar blue between sump and block as its all i had and as i said, im on a mega budget! Wonder if it will seal for long!

Tomthetopper · 7th July 2015, 20:52

Next on my to do list is to sort a turbo manifold, cos im quite sure i will need one of those. Ive ordered a c2 vts manifold with downpipe cat which i hope to cut n shut whith a t25 turbo flange. Hopefully my piss poor welding and angle grinding skills will be up to the job. Heres a pic of the type of manifold i will use, courtersy of the interweb.

Nimix · 7th July 2015, 21:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tomthetopper

Next on my to do list is to sort a turbo manifold, cos im quite sure i will need one of those. Ive ordered a c2 vts manifold with downpipe cat which i hope to cut n shut whith a t25 turbo flange. Hopefully my piss poor welding and angle grinding skills will be up to the job. Heres a pic of the type of manifold i will use, courtersy of the interweb.

I'm really looking forward to seeing you make these

Tomthetopper · 7th July 2015, 21:24

ISlayeR, i just read your thread and i hope and pray i dont have the luck you have had with your build! The soltuions to all your problems is simple however, run more BOOOOOST!

Tomthetopper · 7th July 2015, 21:25

I am also slightly concerned about how it will turn out nimix, but i bet it will be alright. On that note im going to change the name of build thread.

iSlayeR · 7th July 2015, 21:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tomthetopper

ISlayeR, i just read your thread and i hope and pray i dont have the luck you have had with your build! The soltuions to all your problems is simple however, run more BOOOOOST!

There was times I wanted to set it on fire lol! it's 100% worth it in the end though

it pains me everyday not driving it atm, but it's going to look the tits once it's done and with all the issues ironed out

Tomthetopper · 7th July 2015, 21:41

Did you run the car on the car on the stock ecu with no mapping for a while before mapping? Or fit the pred straight away?

jbrady72 · 8th July 2015, 08:02

I'm interested too as if all goes well I might do something similar, not so it looks pretty or is the quickest thing on the road but so it goes bwarrrrm pssshhh and I can say I've done it

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iSlayeR · 8th July 2015, 10:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tomthetopper

Did you run the car on the car on the stock ecu with no mapping for a while before mapping? Or fit the pred straight away?

I took it down the road with no doors or tailgate on with the standard ecu, it was misfiring and drove pretty shit, then I got it trailered to my mapper

my advice is don't drive it properly until it's mapped, be fine to start it up to see if everythings ok though

Gandi699 · 8th July 2015, 10:55

interesting reading and I am also an advocate of hylomar lol, will keep tabs on this thread

tman · 8th July 2015, 15:34

Good luck with the build, I will follow with interest

Duffy Xsi · 8th July 2015, 15:35

Tagged in for this one. Doing the same but over a very long time as lost job and new kid. Best of luck mate.

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Ross^p · 8th July 2015, 19:18

subscribed.

Anything you need to ask, ask away. Plenty of guys here know what's what.

Tomthetopper · 8th July 2015, 21:08

Manifold came out really well, really happy with it. Couple hours angle grinding and half hour welding, £40 and i have a fully functional t25 turbo manifold. Basically i cut the big c2 cat flange off, and used a t25/t3 turbo adaptor which i modified by cutting the bigger t3 flange off, leaving a t25 flange with an enlarging bit of box section which mated up to the hole left by the cat flange. It turns out to be a really nice easy way to may a DIY turbo manifold for a saxo. My welds were meant to be more reliable than good looking, hence ive covered it up with exhaust wrap off ebay!

Tomthetopper · 8th July 2015, 21:10

Iv got a reasonable condition t25 turbo off a rover 220 turbo coupe that im rebuilding, should be good for my 180ish bhp goal. so that is likely to be the next update, although im going on holiday on friday so no work will get done on the car for a week, which bums me out a bit!

Tomthetopper · 8th July 2015, 21:13

You can also see in the second picture that ive hammered a pound coin into the egr flange in the side of the head! I think i saw that orignally on this forum. This represents the style of this build; bodge the fuck out if it and get it done! Tis great fun!

iSlayeR · 8th July 2015, 21:18

nice to see your making quick progress

manifold looks good, 180hp is easily achievable, I made 160hp from a vtr on a mere 8 psi