[RONIN]

This motor building thing is damn expensive!

[HAHAV8]

and the culprit was a cracked ringland I surpose? Piston 4?

[RONIN]

So the plan is pay a visit to the machine shop that messed up my block Tuesday the 14th... See where that leads me.

Then I will be starting the process of stripping the engine bay of attached componets to the longblock. Hopefully I can have it all bare and ready to pull by Wed. and get it on the stand.

www.larryspower.com will be doing the machine work and balancing the new rotating assembly*.

*400 series Ion Nitrided crankshaft
* Manley H-beam rods
*ACL Race bearings
* CP 99.75mm Pistons or maybe Wiseco 99.75mm if they can make them for me?
*New gasket set
*P&L 11mm Modded Oil Pump
*New Subaru water pump
*New Subaru oil cooler
*Killer-B Oil Pickup
Not sure if I am going to do any head work and cams or go bigger on the turbo...

Will be snapping many pics as I progress...stay tuned.

This is a tentative plan and could explode into a completely different setup...More time and lots more $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

[Bishop]

I know you have a kid coming, and thats great... However, the car isn't your DD. So why not slow down and wait a little bit, accumulate some more $$, then do head, cams, and a bigger turbo all in one go?

[Turbopilot 2.5]

It will be interesting to see how the stock pick up faired, seems like that is usually a hit or miss when it come to failures.

[Cop magnet]

Originally Posted by Bishop

I know you have a kid coming, and thats great... However, the car isn't your DD. So why not slow down and wait a little bit, accumulate some more $$, then do head, cams, and a bigger turbo all in one go?

Your too late..he is all ready married.

I have recently had a baby and I would say, DO IT NOW!! Because after baby life only gets more hectic and money more scarce. You have to resign yourself to the fact that you will have NO free time for a few months. You can always make more money, but you can't make more time. The poor guy all ready works like 80 hours a week and sleeps every two days for a few hours, then goes back in.

Besides having a car that is broken sitting in the garage would drive me insane, DD or not.

Regaurdless I am sure Ronin will build a sick car, after all he does have a reputation to up hold around here.

[RONIN]

Originally Posted by Bishop

I know you have a kid coming, and thats great... However, the car isn't your DD. So why not slow down and wait a little bit, accumulate some more $$, then do head, cams, and a bigger turbo all in one go?

I am at a fork in the road... I would love to make this thing a BEAST but it would take a good year to do. It could be back on the road in a few months if I go the smaller, shorter, easier route...?

I do have a DD and have no need for it to be running anytime soon... I need to do some calculating and see if I can get some "deals" to help with this project.

I have two plans...The small one laid out above or a dramatically more involved one that will require many knowledgable people and a lot more time and $$$.

Do I take the easy and quick road to get the car running and make 400 or so WHP or do I take the longer, rougher road and go all out for 500-600whp and a nutty set-up?

Maybe a poll.....

[Cop magnet]

My unsolicited opinion is......

Ok I am no STi masteer mechanic, but it seems to me that after the 400 whp mark the lag due to a huge turbo starts to get pretty annoying for the type of roads here in RI. Which for those of you in other places who have never driven here....they are all pretty much narrow and twisty. So if your turbo doesn't start making power until 5500 rpm then its kind of pointless. Now I know you can get some power sooner with meth and such, but I just don't see the point of having a 700 whp car that you can only enjoy when you have a runway in your back yard. I am pretty satisfied with the power my little 20G puts down and still have some decent spool. Granted I am not beating a z06's, but thats ok because it does pretty good against just about anything else I encounter on a day to day basis.

With a consetvitivly built motor and all the mods you currently have the car will still be insanely fast considering the roads.

I think there comes a point when the power to pain in the azz and money ratio starts to tip in the wrong direction and 400+ Whp in a little STi is no joke. Yeah 700 whp is cool, but its like owning a 50 cal rifle, its awsomely cool but there are so few places where you can shoot it that its spends most of its time in the safe, where as the more practical AR-15 gets used all the time. Both are fun, but the AR-15 is much cheaper to shoot and therefore gets used more often.

My .02

[STMwRSti]

honestly, id have to agree with cop magnet, but thats only because in my personal opinion, I oculdnt have a car that i can only run once a month if that at a track day.

[fourseasonsandles]

Originally Posted by Cop magnet

My unsolicited opinion is......

Ok I am no STi masteer mechanic, but it seems to me that after the 400 whp mark the lag due to a huge turbo starts to get pretty annoying for the type of roads here in RI. Which for those of you in other places who have never driven here....they are all pretty much narrow and twisty. So if your turbo doesn't start making power until 5500 rpm then its kind of pointless. Now I know you can get some power sooner with meth and such, but I just don't see the point of having a 700 whp car that you can only enjoy when you have a runway in your back yard. I am pretty satisfied with the power my little 20G puts down and still have some decent spool. Granted I am not beating a z06's, but thats ok because it does pretty good against just about anything else I encounter on a day to day basis.

With a consetvitivly built motor and all the mods you currently have the car will still be insanely fast considering the roads.

I think there comes a point when the power to pain in the azz and money ratio starts to tip in the wrong direction and 400+ Whp in a little STi is no joke. Yeah 700 whp is cool, but its like owning a 50 cal rifle, its awsomely cool but there are so few places where you can shoot it that its spends most of its time in the safe, where as the more practical AR-15 gets used all the time. Both are fun, but the AR-15 is much cheaper to shoot and therefore gets used more often.

My .02

This is my logic 100%. FWIW, I follow your journal pretty close. It wont happen anytime soon, but I am looking to do a setup very similar to yours. I have been comparing your Dyno run with my current set up and MuffnBluff's old 2.5r set up as well.

I think for a street car, spool is one of the most important aspects and what I can see on those 3 dyno'd cars as mentioned above, they all seem to reach full spool around 3500rpm. Yours is a bit quicker than Muff's was, I think due to the meth and you went a bit further with TGV deletes etc, but close enough.

If you were going to track the car, I would say go big and dont look back, but what is the point of monster power on a street car if you can only tap into it occasionally?

Im not trying to convince you either way, but spool and quickness is much more important to me than top end.