full port/polish on the heads, custom 10.5:1 pistons at 1mm overbore, fully balanced rotating assembly, ARP studs in the important locations....

too bad nobody makes cams for this thing. :\

machinst said the bottom end should be ready in about a month. hopefully she'll be running and broken in by Maxus.. if I get enough time off, I might even shoot for building a set of headers for it.

 

Urbotay!

 

Definately do headers while you're at it.

 

niiiiice. i want a VE for my beater. just don't tell anyone i said that.

 

ooo i wanna see the numbers on this thing is gonna put on the dyno... has ne one else done this before to a ve? sorry im a nooB for 3rd gens

 

Selling the Se-R.......

 

The SR20VE is a bomb diggity motor. N/A powaa!!


Good luck with the engine work, can't wait to see it when it's done. Pics and dyno, please

 

No VQ swap, no care
Dyno before/after?
Are you the first to do any internal work on a VE?

 

VQ swap would help the car handle better, but would cause so many other issues with the car that I wouldn't want to drive it daily.

building this engine for NA use (and with forged pistons if I ever want to go with 6-10 psi boost ) will yield me the same as stock reliability, assuming I keep 93 octane in it, as well as a good bump in power. With all the work I'm doing to it, I plan to easily clear 200FWHP on it. (It was running 175hp, 192 tq with bone stock internals and no nead work, and that was with a manifold that I FUBARd the airflow going into it and lost about 15hp on the high end.).

I'm hoping for about 225whp, but I dunno if I'll get that far. I think it should be doable, as the higher compression will yield about 15-20hp itself, and the headwork will likely yield that much too.

now if I can fab up some headers on it as well............... "Hello, Burns Stainless? yeah.. send me three of everything you have in 1.75, 2, and 2.5"

and yes, this has been done before to a VE, just nobody on the org other than Grace_Imports who dropped in a set of factory VG30DE pistons and put it back together... the shop I took the engine to said he did a few of these back in the day, but nothing in the last 10 years or so. he still said he could work over the heads on it and get some good gains, so we'll see what happens.

 

VE powah! what's the stock CR? what's the tuning plan?

 

stock is 10:1.. I'm going to 10.5:1, which is just using some forged VG30DE N/A pistons from Polydyn.
if he's got some 11:1 sitting on the shelf for the same price, I might go that high, but I'm going to make a few phone calls before I do that.. I doubt running 11:1 would be a good idea for a daily driver on pump gas.

tuning will be done by JWT since I already have an ECU from them... possibly ash-spec later.. just depends on what happens down the road.

 

What's the resulting displacement going to be? Neat project.

 

How much is all the work going to run you, Matt?

 

Should be 3052cc...(up from 2988). Atleast according to a calculator I used.

 

I would seriously consider going with 11:1. 93 Octane and you'll be fine. The 3.5 runs 10.3:1 stock and runs easily on 91 octane. Better do it once and do it right. Plus you'll love the throttle response.

 

S2000s run 11.1:1, JDM ITR runs 10.8:1, etc and you can run all those engines on 91, let alone 92,93,94 if you get that where you are. Without tuning, 11.5:1 is the usual accepted CR limit, you can run 12.5:1 on pump if you know how to tune it.

General rule as you probably know is about 4% power increase per compression point increase.

 

the other issue there is I plan on possibly doing low boost later... so leaving it at 10.5:1 will be easier on that...

plus I talked to Polydyn the other day and I can get the 10.5 pistons 'cheap' through a mutual friend.

 

Will be interesting to see how this motor rebuild turns out. It should haul that old beast around a little easier!

 

An interesting thread.

Mike

 

I know MadMax024 did this a couple years ago with decent results. He did a lot of work to it so he couldn't comment on the gain the raised compression gave him alone. But if you are going into the motor anyway, it's a good thing to do if you don't have plans to run 20+psi.

I know he got it dyno'd once too. And it wasn't bad at all. I wonder if I can dig up some numbers.

 

still waiting on the machine shop.
looks like the ridges at the top of the cylinders were just a bit too big to keep 88mm pistons, so I'm going to go with 89mm ones. dunno if I'll be able to find them or not so if I can't, I'm going to just go with 89mm turbo pistons and drop comprssion to 8.5:1 and go with a bigger turbo. I was wanting to keep it NA for better reliability and less things to worry about at the track, but if that's all I can get, then that's all I can get.

 

Best idea I've heard thus far today

Good luck on the project.

 

I know Pat (Madmax024) did 10.5 pistons. I know it's possible. But I don't know any details on it. If you want his contact information, hit me up on AIM at "adogg18". I don't know what kind of piston rings he installed, but it worked just fine and his car ran GREAT. I think he even got it dyno'd to somewhat prove a power increase.

:edit: But I vouch for the turbo! With 8.5:1 CR, detonation will be the least of your worries on up to 500hp! The only thing you'll be worried about is your tranny. Many z32 TT guys are doing over 500 without built internals. Do IT!

 

WORD Matt...when u gonna drop the 3.5 in that biyatch

 

the problem with the 8.5 is that it's just not "track friendly". there's LOTS more heat and stress involved with a turbo setup than with an NA setup. that makes for more maintenance issues and things that can go wrong at the track. Not to mention the considerable extra cost of the turbo and piping. that's an extra $3k right there to do it right.

I took one of my other blocks in yesterday and he's going to check it out. Nobody has 89mm VG30DE pistons in stock, and the other engine I took him is still at factory bore-- BUT it's been overheated pretty bad and I'm afraid of block warpage... thus the reason I didn't try to use it in the first place. they're going to hot tank it and clean it up, then magnaflux and mic it up. if it's useable, then I'm going to line bore it and clean up the deck and bore it to 87.5mm.. Which Nissan, JE, and Wiseco all keep in stock.

 

second block cleaned up at 87.5mm..

JE has pistons in stock for them in 10.5:1, so they're ordered.
ARP rod bolts ordered as well. will be here thurs.
stock rods are being shotpeened and will be plenty strong enough for what I'm doing. (they'll hold about 400 crank hp.)

Heads are supposed to be done this week or next week as well. I'll drop by the machine shop later this week and see how things are coming on the rest of the block.

I have a Q for you guys tho.... there's been talk of "shimming the oil pump" on these things for a bit more pressure. is this something I should think about doing, or just leave it stock?

 

I figured that our oil pressure is VERY high to begin with.

When I first installed my OP guage, I see the correct amount of oil pressure according to the FSM at idle. But at WOT, I see close to about 100psi. I talked to one other VE guy that has an OP gauge installed and he said he saw over 90psi also.

According to every other stock production import motor I've seen, the VE has the highest OP. The 'NA SR guys gone turbo' see somewhat high OP,... over 75psi at WOT. They all have to use restrictors before allowing the oil to go in their turbo. You don't want oil slipping by the seals.

But, before I get my turbo working, I will definitely have to reduce my oil pressure. As far as NA purposes, I don't have any info on raising the OP.

 

10.5:1 shouldn't yeild any real issues. And more agressive cams will also downplay any it could cause. Some street engines on street gas can be run as high as 14.0:1 with the right chamber & piston design and cams. My brother got away with 12.5:1 on his GM 3100 on street gas.

 

Thanks for the input. I'll just have the one(s)I have hot tanked so they're nice and pretty and then mic them up and make sure nothing is too ugly on them.

I've also got to get one decent set of VTCs out of my 3 engines somewhere... I think one of the engines already had them stripped tho.

 

only two months later and I'm finally getting it back from the machine shop tomorrow!

 

Bout friggen time...

 

That's about how long these things usually take. Got to be nice to get it back though.

 

Dyno time?

 

There better be pics... lotsa pics

 

dyno time? at Maxus.
It's only the short block and I still need a LOT of parts for it.. I have head gaskets, but I need new head bolts, timing chain tensioners, and the other little stuff like that. no point in spending $3k having the block worked up and killing it by cheaping out on a $50 tensioner or reusing head bolts.. I've just been too damn busy to pick the stuff up!

I'm hoping to get the stuff either today or tomorrow, but we'll see how that goes. I'm going to pick up the engine this afternoon, assuming all the bearings have proper clearance. the machinist just ordered a set of stock-size bearings for it and hadn't had time to check clearances yet when I was in there yesterday morning.. assuming it goes together good, then I'll be taking it home today.

nonetheless, I'm going to be working on it this week.. going to try to pull the dead one out of the car tomorrow and have the new one ready to go in by next weekend.

 

Ahh the excitement

 

So the guy calls at 4pm today (I'm supposed to be there at 5)

"Hey.. I finished up the porting job yesterday and was doing the valves on it just a minute ago.. It looks like a couple of the axhaust valve guides are loose. I'm going to have to get new ones, and it will be Monday before the heads are finished. Also, do these things need to be surfaced? I remember Jeff (owner) telling me these had been slightly overheated. What else do I need to do with them?


Ummmm WTF?! Shouldn't you check the straightness and valve guides BEFORE you do $1000 in port work on them?! ESPECIALLY when I tell you they were overheated and might be warped or possibly even cracked?!

 

Cylinder head warpage and valve-to-guide clearance are some of the preliminary items that should be checked when a motor is being rebuilt. Their bad...

 

Well, I made some progress today..

 

You're still planning on keeping it NA at first and then turbo later down the road correct?