WizardBlack

Ah, my friend, I am horrible with Photoshop. Many quickie jobs could be referred to as a photochop but mine would be a photohack.

What is your comp ratio? I think the thing you need to fully appreciate is that a "paper" gasket will hold LOTS of power; it is simply a "fuse" if you get some detonation. Having a MLS gasket will make your bearings or ringlands the fuse. It would be "rated higher", but still fail. And fail quite expensively. The only realistic application where a (hard to acquire) MLS gasket is better is if you think you WILL detonate while tuning, but you are SURE that it won't detonate badly. That narrow range would make an MLS gasket more convenient since you won't pop the HG and not damage the bearings.

Oh, I can do that. I have a tier 1 OEM auto company. Our specialty is paint, so I have tons of high quality sand paper. What grit? 1000? Mine seem pretty smooth, but yeah, cheap insurance. I'll give one a go and if it seems like there are grooves, I'll send them to Delta Cams. I'll be sure to use some permanent marker or somesuch and check all the wipe patterns.

Oh, I totally missed that you said RX-8, not the 13B. Those are too small for any but the smallest turbo setups. IMHO, 550 is sort of a basic entry point for turbo.

I am sure I don't have the tools or skills to do that. :-/ Should I somehow tag the rockers so they go back with the same lifters when I get them back? Also, what do you guys recommend for breakin. Let it idle high (2k rpm) for ten minutes, then don't go crazy for thirty minutes run time (<3500 rpm), then let it rip?

You'd probably want a resonator if you used the XR-1, then. I think you're on the right track; GReddy usually makes nice burbly mufflers. The only one I felt was better on the Subaru's and Evo's was a Blitz, but it was a tad loud. Not bad, though.

Are those the big injectors or the really f'ing big ones? You need engine management, etc. etc. I idle 560 cc injectors pretty easily, but some say that much beyond that is rough. I suspect ignition and engine management play a big role. I've gotten 1200 cc injectors to idle like stock on a 2.0L 4 cylinder car @800 rpm with a standalone easily enough. Depends on how small of a pulsewidth you can get with your EFI and how repeatable the injectors are.

f@*! More money and delay. My poor VH's are crying out for the funding. Any place to get the rockers surfaced decent & cheap & quick? (Yeah, I know, the impossible trifecta)

I'm a bit concerned about what I was told (or not) by the fellas at Isky. I sent my original (Jap manufacture) cam in to be reground to 490/480 specs; typical turbo regrind. They didn't say anything about machining the spring seats down in the head (like a thread I searched for mentioned), nor did they mention any special break-in (gonna be using Rotella-T oil for ZDDP content, but wasn't going to keep revs down or anything after the first 10 minutes running), nor did they say I needed to have my rockers resurfaced. I specifically asked them if I needed new rockers. What gives? Are they off? I know I need to talk to Ron for the best info, but he is evidently coming into work somewhere "around 2:30" on left coast time. I did measure installed height (1.700") and it came in dead on, so... Any ideas?

Plenty of exhaust shops to buy them from. 2" is easy to find. Looks up some mandrel bend shops, they usually have a lot of the various other pieces necessary to make an exhaust in stock. Burns Stainless is close to you; heck you live in California. Go outside, I am sure you can probably hit a store that has them with a rock from your back yard.

Well, the interesting thing about cars is the "all around" ultimate car is very subjective. Some might value road race capability more and make different choices concerning weight of the engine, brakes, suspension, etc. I guess the best thing is listing percentages of which aspects have which importance for you. What are you planning as far as chassis work, suspension, brakes, etc.?

Unless you want perfect manners in very cold weather when it first starts up, just remove them if you are so inclined. My own car is nowhere near that, but I've done the same thing on modern turbo cars that were a daily driver (WRX, EVO, STi, etc.) and never had an issue firing up in freezing weather.

On my N47 head '77 car, I mounted the 240SX throttle directly to the intake manifold. A universal (adjustable) Lokar throttle cable worked quite well. I did NOT need a spacer to make it work, but I used the 240SX TPS with my Megasquirt. The 240SX throttle position sensor is a standard ~0.5V to 5.0V rheostat setup. As an aside, the pictures listed above show the incorrect bit for the job. That is a steel bit, whereas you need an aluminum bit. They have bigger, but fewer flutes. A steady shot of WD40 onto the bit and the work area will make VERY short work of it. Make sure you have a stainless bristle brush. Stop very frequently and run the bristles across the flutes to knock any built up aluminum off (this also works for files). This will keep the grinding bit (which is quite expensive, ~$35) cool and in good condition. Otherwise, you will pack the flutes with aluminum, it doesn't cut and therefore gets hot and blunts the flutes or breaks pieces of them off. Likewise, regarding the bumps on the inside of the runners, I knocked them down and only went through on one. A good set of screws and some teflon thread sealant (or equivalent) will work just fine to keep it from leaking. The other threaded holes in the intake manifold seal well enough with the same thing. As the above poster said, finding good screws that aren't loose makes all the difference.

Well, I guess I have a few bits of info to add for these seals. When using them with Isky springs and retainers, the retainer bumps the stem seals at .690" valve lift. Likewise, I found that a very light touch of Permatex Assembly Lube (snotty blood red stuff; great for valvetrain assembly) helps them slide right on. I pressed them on with a socked sized right to push on the metal ring. With the lube, you just press them on by hand, so you can feel them bottom pretty easily.

Someone should do a photochop to mirror the straight-on rear shot and clean up the view through the hatch, etc. See what the finished thing will look like.

Ha, I think you're right! Disregard that. I'll go look them up. Are you looking for a moderately quiet exhaust? Borla makes some good stuff and the new XR-1 is getting a lot of good reviews. Mine isn't terribly loud, but I have a Holset muffler on it too.

The reason is to simply let the hard parts dictate the pipe sizes and keep it with as few of changes in size as you can. Bend minimization is important but this is 20 psi air (with no fuel in it), not (comparatively) ultra dense fluids like water. Bends in a head are critical, but you are talking about all that air in a much smaller cross section with fuel vapor and you have about a 1.5" turn radius.

IIRC... Yes, I looked at the VH45DE cam actuation. It's a simple on-off setup. On at low rpm and off after a certain point, IIRC. To be honest, an inverted signal from a programmable shift light would probably operate it. www.vh45de.org has the info. I have FSM's for early and late models if you need something looked up.

IIRC, that muffler is simply a stainless can with a carbon fibre finishing film riveted to the outside and a "titanium" tip on it. They sound about the same as the regular stainless muffler on the STi and Evo motors I heard comparable systems on. They aren't terribly loud. Now the GReddy Titanium exhaust... I had one of those on my Evo 8 for a while. It was a one piece catback. It was so light I could swing the 7 ft lenght from the flange end like a baseball bat. On my car (race motor) it would thump your chest at idle.

Love the color to death, by the way. I painted one of my old cars (CT9A Evo) a similar color with just a hint of a purple cast at an angle. Drove up to a circuit car show and won best paint.

Bingo. In that situation (a very common one), you can either go the smaller size (2" pipe from turbo to IC with the step-up coupler on the IC) or the larger size (2.5" pipe from turbo to IC with the step-up coupler on the turbo outlet). That's about it. Your parts dictate your pipe size to a great degree. The power rating on your turbo and intercooler will dictate the typical acceptable pipe size they need.

There isn't anything wrong with your setup, just your tune. Get that squared away, as no matter how tough you make the weakest link (headgasket) it will simply break the next link (bearings) if (or rather WHEN) you detonate with pump gas and no proper tune. Anyone building a turbo car needs to know how they are supposed to be tuned and have proper equipment to monitor it. It only takes a tenth of a second on a bad tune to pop a headgasket or kill your bearings. I am not exaggerating. Copper gaskets work fine; they may be a little more difficult to install versus MLS, but they are cheaper and easier to manufacture when dealing with a very custom or low volume application. SIDE NOTE: I've seen foolish guys put a full twin-turbo system on a car such as a brand new G35. They can't wait for the dyno tuning scheduled the next day so they go out and "let 'er rip". Forty-five minutes later they are calling a tow truck to come get their new $30k+ car with $15k+ in mods that has a shattered motor spread over the last 1/8th mile they made down the back road. Detonation will kill any motor no matter how strong the internals. They all rely on a thin film of oil over a limited bearing surface area. I would recommend you just build it for E85 to reduce your chances of detonation. You can raise the boost levels dramatically versus Kali pump crap, too. With all the money you spent, it only makes sense. Make sure you are watching your wideband! Most people's eyes are half glued to the wideband in boost to avoid a blown motor. With all new parts like that, your tuner should have told you to break your motor in first before placing a final full boost tune on it. It is undoubtedly going to change as it breaks in, loosens up and seals up.

It has a flange on it. It isn't the standard thickness V-band flange, but you can use the clamp specifically made for it with a standard V-band flange on the downpipe. My Holset HE351 is the same way. It's basically the cast version of V-band; it's thicker. As I said, it will work with a standard V-band on the downpipe along with the specific clamp that came with it.

Copper gasket, maybe? The vendor above sells them in lots of thicknesses.

What is your engine management situation like? What kind of fuel are you using?