The difference in price is huge - I've seen manual controllers for as little as £10 on ebay and £30 in Halfords. By contrast, most of the decent electronic controllers (Blitz/Apexi etc) are around the £500 mark. Is it really worth the extra money just to be able to change the boost levels from the drivers seat? Do the electronic ones do something extra??

 

I have boost jets at the moment and will need a bit more control over the performance once the turbo upgrade is complete, but I really don't know what to go for!

 

Any ideas guys?

 

Thanks

 

Ch:)

Charles,

 

I can supply you a GReddy Profec B for £275 so there is no need to be spending £500 ;)

 

Bleed valves and alike are a disaster waiting to happen and i'd stay well clear :)

Sounds good to me! Are they on the shelf/delivery time? Does that figure include VAT?

 

The car's been running very well for the past 6 months with 353bhp @ 1.5 bar. I'm due to get Smithy's hybrid turbo upgrade soon and want something to work well with that. I'm aiming to get her up to around the 400bhp mark. Would this be sufficient? As the engine is coming out for the upgrade, how much should I expect to pay to have the unit fitted?

 

By the way, what's wrong with bleed valves?

 

Cheers Chris

 

Ch

if you are running stock injectors which i assume you are as you have stock turbos then 1.5 bar or 21psi is far too much boost. You are not getting any benefit from this extra boost because your injectors are maxed out and turbos running well out of their efficiency range. I have seen Zeds make the same power as you on the rollers with about 1.1 bar, you are in danger of a total melt down at that boost.

boost jets and bleed valves are ok they do a job but can cause boost creep and spiking, once you have had a boost controller you really wont want to go back to them.

Paul

Be very careful chris i was running 1.33 bar or 19 ish psi and i blew a 2 inch piece out of my piston:cry:

 

The standard internals of a zed will not withstand that sort of boost so if your gonna run 1.5 bar then it wont last for long!!

 

Just speaking from experience

 

Kirbz

out of interest who set your car up running that sort of boost? or was it like that when you got it?

Paul

Oh my god. The car was standard spec when I bought it. I got the boost upgrade done at a well-known 300 service centre...Originally they had set it up with jets, but when I mentioned that I wanted a bit more power, he put in a large bleed valve. I had no idea that it was in such danger. What the hell was he thinking!!!??? Thanks for telling me guys - obviously I need to reconsider where I take the car to in future.

 

Will I have damaged the internals by driving it at that level of boost? (It hasn't gone bang yet - actually it feels great)

Are you sure you are running 1.5 bar and you havent got your units mixed up?

Standard injectors wont go anywhere near that high and stock turbos at that pressure would be a joke. Not for a second would i think its possible for a standard car to run at these lvls.

 

Standard boost is 9psi.

When increased to 14-15psi (1bar) people claim you'll be pushing about 350-380 bhp.

That is considered the maximum before some big upgrades.

 

Sure u didnt read 15 psi as 1.5 and think its bar or something? :p

Charles,

 

Give me a bell on Monday if you'd like a Profec :)

Originally posted by Robtor

Are you sure you are running 1.5 bar and you havent got your units mixed up?

Standard injectors wont go anywhere near that high and stock turbos at that pressure would be a joke. Not for a second would i think its possible for a standard car to run at these lvls.

 

Standard boost is 9psi.

When increased to 14-15psi (1bar) people claim you'll be pushing about 350-380 bhp.

That is considered the maximum before some big upgrades.

 

Sure u didnt read 15 psi as 1.5 and think its bar or something? :p

 

Definately not - I have an aftermarket gauge which measures in bar and have been told that it's accurate to 1 or 2 points. The car was tuned in Japan before it was imported and it had a lot of tuning equiptment removed before I bought it - I thought it was back to standard spec, but I now I have no idea what's going on! :confused:

Originally posted by Robtor

Are you sure you are running 1.5 bar and you havent got your units mixed up?

Standard injectors wont go anywhere near that high and stock turbos at that pressure would be a joke. Not for a second would i think its possible for a standard car to run at these lvls.

 

 

Stock injectors will go that high, am peaking at 19psi, though usualy run 17psi, it's not a case of won't, it's they max out and won't perform 100%. but yes it's too high without the fuelling air mixture being controlled. I know who did Charles's upgrade and i can't believe he would set it to around 22psi.

Charles as i've said before mate, bleed valves/boost jets are quite crude on a car where boost really needs to be correct for the set up of the car, the one Chris quoted is quite good mate and worthy of the cash, when yer engines out, remove the bleed valves, or you can do it yer self it's just a bit more akward. You run the risk of blown rings if it remains to high with out the correct fuelling.

smithy

if yer need any help on removing the valves, let me know and i'll explain it to you.

Originally posted by Smithy

Stock injectors will go that high, am peaking at 19psi, though usualy run 17psi, it's not a case of won't, it's they max out and won't perform 100%. but yes it's too high without the fuelling air mixture being controlled. I know who did Charles's upgrade and i can't believe he would set it to around 22psi.

Charles as i've said before mate, bleed valves/boost jets are quite crude on a car where boost really needs to be correct for the set up of the car, the one Chris quoted is quite good mate and worthy of the cash, when yer engines out, remove the bleed valves, or you can do it yer self it's just a bit more akward. You run the risk of blown rings if it remains to high with out the correct fuelling.

smithy

if yer need any help on removing the valves, let me know and i'll explain it to you.

 

Thanks mate - I'll email you in a minute!

The trouble with running at that boost is this - you will get NO warning that anything is going to happen, it will just go bang! I don't need to ask who did this because its quite obvious - there's only one 300 (so called) "specialist" (special at what?) who would even contemplate such a thought... As Paul says, you will actually be running at decreased power levels - check my posts in the "how to achieve 400bhp" thread as to why. In fact, its possible you could even be running with les power than stock...

 

CheerZ,

 

Andy

Cheers Andy. I'll look at that thread again. Nothing has gone bang yet - but I've been told that I'v eprobably cracked a piston at that pressure - surely I'd have noticed, or felt that something's amiss? felt fine though until all the smoking started to happen (did the PCV's at the weekend and they seemed to have stopped the smoke - but had a nasty blue cloud behind me on the way to work this morning...)

Charles sorry to say but it does look like you have engine dammage:(Is your boost still set to 22psi?

Well, as I said before, when it was 'tuned', it was set to run at 1.6...(still can't believe it)...since I've found out about the risk of serious engine damage through you guys, I've hardly driven her, and when I do, I don't drive her with my foot to the floor. I hate it, but I'm not going to risk further damage. I'll get a profec from Chris if it turns out that I can afford to fix the problem. Question Mac, If it turns out that I have blown the turbo seals after all (she's going to SE for a thorough checkup this weekend)..is it essential to change the turbos, or can I just replace the seals (as it says I can on the FAQ's at the top of this forum).

 

Cheers

 

Ch

Smithy - I was asking a similar question on another thread about removing boost jets... Are they just 't' pieced into the wastegate actuator lines? Or is there more to removing them that that? My car also has jets and I want to fit an Apexi AVCR to it soon, cos I'm qorried about boost spikes and the like. Thanks!

Charles,YES you can just replace the seals,but for the labour involved to do that you may as well replace the turbos:(.

My piston was cracked and the car smoked real bad,If that's the case then It will cost a few thousand pound to put it right.

Charles,YES you can just replace the seals,but for the labour involved to do that you may as well replace the turbos:(.

My piston was cracked and the car smoked real bad,If that's the case then It will cost a few thousand pound to put it right.

 

Cheers Mac - at the moment I'm looking at just getting her back on the road in one piece! If I can get away with just replacing the seals it should cost me c.£800-900. If I'm changing the turbos too, it'll be more like 2k+ - big difference if I also have to replace the pistons! Will know more next week when she goes to SE. The Greddy pistons are a good buy eh?

 

Ch :)

What day you going Charles? I am there this Monday.

Charles, first things first, you need to do a compression test - followed by a leak down test if there's any cylinders down to see what is causing the bad compression. You can just start at the leak down test but IMO its much quicker to do a compression test as a quick check first ;)

 

Its possible either the turbos OR the pistons (possibly both :() have been damaged. Turbos will more than likely be due to massive heat build up (stock blowers turn into space heaters at around 17psi) or possibly massive wear to the thrust bearing. Engine damage could be anything from burnt valves (very high cylinder temperatures caused by insuficient fueling) to cracked rings/pistons.

 

Good luck m8! I think you may have some come back though on the trader if you haven't touched anything - although proving that could be difficult!

Thanks for the info guys. I'll be there on Saturday to drop her off for a week or two - She's a g-plate grey import with the zcentre's LED light conversion on the back - you can't miss her. She's not a shade on yours Mac, but I love her! :)

 

Andy, I'm not too technical (as you might have guessed by now!) so I was just going to let SE check it out and tell me where I stand. Sounds pretty bad though, given what you say. :cry:

 

I've had dealings with incompetent tradesmen in the past and I can tell you now - it's not worth it. I tried for two years to get some explanation (and compensation for a damaged car) out of them but got nowhere.

I've had dealings with incompetent tradesmen in the past and I can tell you now - it's not worth it. I tried for two years to get some explanation (and compensation for a damaged car) out of them but got nowhere.

 

Yeah tell me about it mate, my Bro had the same thing with a Renault Alpine but he won in the end! Nearly sent the so called reputable specialist sports car dealership out of business in the same stone throw! ;)