L28S - Supercharged 78 280Z: engine build pics

[boardkid280z]

ya know... I've got a polished thermostat housing outlet (the part that the hose connects to) laying around that I could let go of cheap...

 

Thanks, but I'm trying to keep the number of polished/fancy parts on my engine to a minumum. I had a chromed mech fuel pump cover and stripped it and painted it because it was too shiny .

 

Big Update (sorry it took so long)

First some pictures.

Thermostat:

 

 

Engine Install

 

 

 

This was about 3 weeks ago on Saturday. The day before, Friday I got real sick, but it was so nice out and it had been so cold that we just had to drop the motor in. Then I got even more sick and layed in bed for 6 days.

The next week we installed the radiator, electric fan, fuel lines, throttle cable, oil lines (I had to buy a special fitting; metric M12 to FIC -6 or something). Friday night (Feb 8) we got the thing running. Saturday I made a Y adapter to fit the two 2" header outlets to my 3" exhaust, reinstalled my Innovate wideband, did the wiring for the fan. I was trying to get it all done so I could drive it to our local Porsche club autocross on Sunday, just to show everyone. I was up till 6:30 Friday, and didn't sleep at all Saturday night. At the end of the night, she wouldn't turn over and we replaced the starter 15 mins before we were supposed to leave Sun AM at 8:15. As it turns out I think the battery was just low.

But we drove to the autocross, smokin' the whole way. It was our first drive and I thought maybe it was the int/exh gasket burning a bit, but the smoke definitely didn't go away. Didn't have a hood because the thing doesn't fit. I think I'm gonna go get one from a junkyard, cut some holes in it and paint it black. We showed up at the AutoX and a bunch of people came over to check it out, they seemed impressed . Then 10 mins later a Ford GT showed up and everyone went to go look at that . It was cold though, and I didn't want to wait around, so we left after about 45 mins. The car was completely untuned and smoked all the way.

Monday night we put some thicker oil in it and it seemed to smoke less. Then we took it out and tried to tune it (Megasquirt). There was a pretty bad exhaust leak, making things from the motor really loud, so we had a hard time discerning detonation/knocking from just noise, we had the timing set below 20 across the board anywhere in boost, and slowly turned it up, I think we were around when 25 at 6psi when something happened and lots of smoke started coming out of the valve cover and crankcase breather holes. The engine also sounded weird. A compression test yielded these results, 1-6: 90-140-140-140-140-90. As it turned out, after pulling the head Wednesday, we had blown the head gasket. At least on #6 there was evidence of it. At #1 it wasn't clear if there was a place where the gasket had blown.

I should have had the head surfaced, because the surface is pretty torn up. So I'll have that done next week before I put it back on with a new gasket.

Also I will be welding up the connection for the exhaust and adding a pre-muffler to quiet things down so we can listen for knockage.

Sorry for the long post, I will download the rest of the install pics off my camera and post them up soon. And will let you know how things go once it's all put back together.

Oh before I forget, here is a short vid of it running Sunday night with the exhaust:

 

Mr.Insane - No internal bypass on the SC, I got a pretty good deal on the used SC kit, it was missing some parts, so a lot of it has been figure it out as I go.

 

rztmartini and jesus - The JCR Supercharger kit is not for sale new at the moment as far as I know, I talked to Sandy Cook a while ago, but the kit production was on the shelf and it sounded like they were busy with other stuff. There is another company that has the manifold molds or something, but they also are not doing anything with the project from the last time I talked to them (6 months ago or more).

 

More pics coming soon.

[Jesussalvdr]

Is the supercharger a one off unit too? or can it be peice together?

[Rustyfriend]

i am interested in seeing pictures of the intake manifold. i have an eaton m62 kit for a chevy malibu/grand am/alero and if i am still unable to sell the kit i will try to modify it to fit on the l28. any input?

[Jesussalvdr]

Seriously though, what do we have to do to get a hold of this kit?

 

could it also be adapted to use a carburetor?

[Bluto]

I liked see'n the svo in the backround, most fun in a mustang ive had(owned 4 foxbodies).

 

Good luck with the project.

 

Sam

[Jesussalvdr]

update?

[boardkid280z]

Sorry for not updating with the rest of the story. We blew another head gasket not too long later, and it wouldn't stop smoking. I finally figured that I probably had bad rings. Everything combined made it really hard to tune and it was pretty frustrating and the car sat for almost a year after I had to move and lost interest.

 

I had always dreamed of a supercharged car, but I guess I decided the turbo setup had worked so well, and the supercharger setup was giving me so much trouble, I just wanted to go back to the turbo. So around in the spring of 2009 I found a '83 280ZXT and bought it for $300 or so and swapped in the motor and junked the car. (i'll try to find some pics of the car sometime). The motor was stock at first, and then I slowly added all the upgrades I had done to my turbo motor before: intercooler, Megasquirt, injectors, upgraded compressor, etc. Had some trouble with that at first too because I now had the 280ZXT distributor supplying my timing signal (I was using a locked N/A dizzy before). It seemed the timing was jumping around and I couldn't figure out what the deal was. Anytime we tried to tune it and turn up the boost past 10psi, we would blow a head gasket or something else would happen. Then I lost my AFR.

So I ended up running it without a boost controller on the stock wastegate for quite a while - running 6-7 psi. One problem I found was that my plugs were gapped too large when we were trying to turn up the boost, I think they were all between 35 and 40 thou - I hadn't checked em in a while .

It was fast enough most of the time, and it was nice not wondering if it was going to blow up any day. I got my wideband fixed this past weekend and turned the boost up to 10psi, it seems to be fine so far, I think I'll drive it like this for a while to make sure everything's ok, and then slowly turn the boost up.

Anyway, part of the reason I'm posting here, is to post a video I made last week (the day before we turned up the boost actually).

 

I don't know if there's much more to say about the supercharger setup, it was fun to build and put together, and then frustrating when it was running, so it sat for a long time, and then I sold it. Oh well, time to move on I guess.

 

Here's the video, I guess I should probably start a new build thread, since the supercharger has been removed from the equation.

[lgb240]

I have a Jim Cook supercharger kit (used) that's been sitting in my basement for years. I'm contemplating building an engine for it, but have heard about drivability / tuning issues - your post confirms this. I have a 3.0 stroker with 3X webbers that's getting tired, but I'm not sure that the supercharger is the way I want to go anymore. I'm just curious as to what you sold your kit for. You can PM me if you want to be descrete.

 

Thanks,

lgb240

[boardkid280z]

No where else to post this yet, so I'll just put it here for now. The Banks Turbo is in and running great.

First autocross after the upgrade - still only running 7psi or so, the wastegate is opening from manifold pressure with no boost controller interfering or delaying the signal (I think it's also the first autocross I've had without ANY issues with the Z).