Sigmafour Sleeper (Build number 2)

Build number one which can be seen here ended in complete carnage and can be seen here

There wasn't a lot left but this is the story of what was and what became of it all; And now because I do not want to do this again I have built a (fairly) reliable daily driver 500hp monster. Only I don't drive it every day because it won't always let me and it's just not that much fun in traffic. I'll get to that.

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Even the case halves were shot. Almost everything was junk so it was time to start again.

Here's what I ended up with. A 1200hp block with a 500hp Turbo so the engine is a honey badger.

Engine:

(Long Story) JMP Customized AMR CXR500 20G Turbo

AEM Methanol system with mostly now replaced fittings and nozzles from Devils Own Injection

AEM intake (Meth nozzle one super fine)

Spearco Turbonetics TMIC (Meth nozzle two something bigger don't remember)

Forge BPV

DW300 fuel pump

Agency Power Fuel Rails

Aeromotive FPR

DW 850cc side feed injectors

TGV deletes

Perrin Equal Length Header

Perrin 1.75" Uppipe

Invidia Downpipe

Borla Exhaust

Stage 4+ Motor

Wiseco K598M995AP 99.5 pistons

Cometic head gaskets

AEBS T sleeves with o-ring

Main journal pinned and Line honed

Custom water jackets

Custom/Enlarged oil passages

OEM 12200AA330 Forged Induction Hardenened crankshaft

Crankshaft modified for oil flow and balanced

Manley 4340 Turbo Tuff I Beam rods

Killer B oil pick up

Killer B windage tray

260-5401 ARP Case bolts

260-4704 ARP CA625+ head studs

King MB5382 XPG main bearings and CR4125 XPG rod bearings

Brian Crower BC3600/BC3601 intake and exhaust valves

Brian Crower BC3960/BC3961 intake and exhaust valve guides

Brian Crower BC1600 valve springs

Brian Crower BC2300-16 titanium retainers

Brian Crower BC2960 Billet Keepers

Brian Crower BC0621 camshafts 272/272

Gates racing timing belt

STI 11mm oil pump

NGK iridium 1 step colder plugs

Tarmac 1 Coilovers

AVO Front and Rear Braces

GroupN mounts

RalliTEK sways/Cobb endlinks

AVO rear stabilizer mount brace

JDM imported 5MT and rebuilt and refreshed locally

Moore Performance Blast Plates

ACT 6 puck extreme clutch

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Initially I just wanted to find a way out and didn't know where to start so the heads and damaged cams were boxed up and sent out to the machine shop.

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The cams were polished and could have been reused, in fact they were in another engine but just came back in the head for ease of shipping.

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The decisions were being made and while at the machine shop the heads were worked over on their CNC machine and sorted with lots of Brian Crower valvetrain parts.

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This part was done relatively quickly and then the heads sat and sat and waited and waited.

Meanwhile. The car too sat motionless, without an engine.

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Where it would sit for just over a year until I could come and get it and finally get it back on the road. Even then, that wasn't going to be the end of the story.

My existing block was too damaged to use so a salvageable block was located by the machine shop for $500 and then these parts were sent along.

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And then what was salvageable was sent to a local machine shop for cleaning.

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But sadly... after cleaning this part was also found to be destroyed.

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It is surprising to see just how much force the piece of the block came out, with enough to imprint it's shape in the water crossover pipe and cracked it. Could have been fixed? Didn't want to...

After another couple of months I was able to go back and pick up a finished short block.

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A close up of the O-Ring which I understand they don't do anymore because the protrusion of the T sleeves is apparently enough to clamp the head gasket but the beauty of the machining on this part astounds me and I am pleased I have it.

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ARP Goodness...

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Looks a lot better than my last short block... There is hope in sight but it was again many more months before I could even think about putting the heads and the block together.

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I will post some more pictures soon but if you want to learn, see build number 1 and then what happened when it went wrong if you haven't already clicked those links up at the first post.

Build number one which can be seen here ended in complete carnage and can be seen here

o-rings are SS and the HG must be an MLS but I must admit I am not sure exactly what goes into a Cometic brand HG. I do remember we needed an 030 because of that piston with 0 deck and it was advised we use the Cometic brand by the machine shop (who build a LOT of these engines) so that's what we did. At this time the engine has well over 20K miles on it so far with no issues (with the engine). So far so good.

This was the same machine shop who built the Subacabra engine and there are a lot of similarities with that build and mine. When my first engine blew up the Subacabra was the current talk of the forums and friends were all oooohing and ahhhing over youtube videos of that 700hp monster - It was an EFI built car but EFI don't have a machine shop, I soon found out where it really came from. The AEBS T sleeves were key for me in finding who machines those in this area. Rottler machines, big money and the guy who does it, very skilled and knows his stuff.

The Subacabra has since vanished... I don't know where it is today. It was sold I guess but I wonder how many miles it has on it? The machine shop said to the engine can run 1000hp for about 15K miles but put just 500hp into it and the engine would see 100,000 miles. So that's what I did.

I lost track of time but months and months passed. The block had sat in the garage and the heads were sat at Motive. In the back of the dead car the intercooler had been stored but now it was time to start getting things done.

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This came out and went to a machine shop for some bungs to be welded in.

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One on the front for methanol injection and the first one in the exit elbow was plugged and welded over. One more added in the top for the IAT sensor.

The block was dusted off and taken down to Motive for assembly in the shop. Seeing these parts put together definitely made me feel better but this was still a very slow process the plan was only bring the car down once the engine was ready to go in. It was still going to be a couple more months until that happened.

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The Cometic head gasket

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The timing belt was reused from the first build because there was not very many miles on it. At all... because the BOOM happened about 2000 miles after the install of the forged pistons.

And that nice red AMR Turbo. Well - I have been wondering about how to do this but that AMR almost needs it's own thread but I am just going to put it in with this thread, because there are so many twists and turns so try and keep up.

The AMR story... where do I start with this one?

Well... When the last engine went boom I took the turbo off and I actually ended up in person down to AMR to their old place in Center Ave, Mamaroneck. I explained the situation with the failure and while I was very confident the FP filter had caught any debris I wanted the turbo to be clean and safe. I met with Rob (He and his father own AMR) and we discussed what was to be done. It would get an inspection and we discussed a new larger compressor wheel, depending on what size he could fit in the housing. I was seriously excited about what AMR could do after being told how they do all the work in house.

It went in looking like this:

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and came back THREE months later looking like this:

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Looks good right? Better be... It cost $700 and AMR were careful not to include a receipt but I was told there would be a surprise and BOY they were right. I thought it was the red housing but I think they fitted that out of guilt.

I would call Rob from time to time to find out how the turbo was getting on. I was always told he would be in touch but it was always me having to chase him. There was always a story about why it wasn't ready. Rob had told me they would be making me a custom compressor wheel and it had been flowed in CAD and it would be terrific. I was excited and believed him. I called again and there had been issues with the first billet material from the foundry and so they ordered another, there was some story about the type of material they were using and the billet cost $300 alone! I felt I was in good hands and there was always a story, a new cutting tip for their 5 axis CNC machine and how they would be extruding the material deeper than before and, well I was a sucker. I have at this point forgotten most of it and I wouldn't make too much fuss about them because at this point I don't think AMR make their own turbos anymore so who cares?

I was proud though, I had high hopes for the AMR turbo - even when Alberto at Motive pointed out the side to side play in the freshly built turbo. Even when Josh at Motive who is a master Subaru tech and avid Subaru engine builder told me the dire stories about AMR - I thought and hoped it would be fine. Everyone warned me and I even rang Rob about the concerns and he told me that as soon as the oil comes on, the turbo would center and there would be no problems. I liked Rob at AMR - I believed him and I wanted to be proud of AMR - I felt good about it. I was warned to abandon the AMR and get something else but it was my choice to continue and Alberto said OK!

We pressed on, the AMR was fitted and the intake was fetched from storage. Things were coming together quickly now.

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It was time to fetch the car. My boss helped me as I needed to rent a trailer to haul the car and so it was dragged out of it's resting place where it had sat for over a year.

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And put up onto the trailer.

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And finally it was outside of Motive Auto Works ready for the engine install

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What happened to the Turbo Dujo? What happened indeed... you will have to stay tuned to find out. Some of this is in chronological order or it will make much less sense than it already does! As a sneak preview... it doesn't end well.

So where are we now? Ah yes. Time to install the engine.

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The engine was ready to go in.

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Engine bay was prepped

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And then Alberto told me to put the camera down and get on with it. It was a late night and we got it done. Some of it was vague because of libations and because we were working as friends. No rush, no clock.

Woke up the next morning and it was at least in the car.

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Because of the damage to the previous engine. Anything suspicious where debris could hide was tossed. There was too much spent on this engine to risk anything. New AVCS components and new oil cooler.

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I am not one to paint things that don't need it (Shout out to JMP!) but it is nice to see a clean block under there. Such high hopes ahead!

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The car sat for a few more days until I was able to come back when the garage was not too busy and carry on. Car went back on the lift and I set about installing the rest of the engine parts.

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A mix of Devil's Own Methanol parts and the original AEM components. More on this later too!

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It's starting to look alright!

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Filling it with coolant next...

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And then it unfilled itself.

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Finally it was time! The engine started... After quite a few tries.

It worked a lot better when we remembered we had pulled the fuel injection fuse.

I have a video of it starting but it's not that exciting. I will stick that in here when I figure out how without putting it on youtube. It's an engine... starting... you know how that goes!

It started, it ran, we quickly drained the oil and we put in some special stuff.

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And then I was able to start driving it again. But since it had been over a year since it had been on the road - the first stop was to get a safety inspection so it had a current sticker. The previous one had LONG since expired!

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After some careful break in miles. The next stop was going to be the dyno!

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You are correct - some of these pictures are now 3 years or more old. I lost track of time.

I think I had pink or red on the bolts for the flywheel... None on the engine block.

Good question about the 850's - and yes it's 500 or so at the crank I have been dyno'd at 420whp and then 400whp and the car was faster and smoother and I was told that it's 450whp "on the street" by the tuner. I don't know what the number actually is it seems neither do they and so I have no idea what the actual number might be because all these dyno's are different. Bren's old place with the Dynapack would definitely give high numbers and the Mustangs are much lower - ~405 on the Dynapack was ~350 on the Mustang in one case... different dyno, different day. WTFK?!

And it is because I have meth I would not benefit from larger injectors. I just had a chat with Fahr_side about this and you can see some of his posts on the subject. Injectors need to be running at a certain duty cycle to be working properly, if you have too large of an injector then you aren't near that duty cycle, no efficiancy and you have more trouble low down too because of too much fuel. The 850's have not been a problem - except one time and it was actually during this dyno pictured above (which is ShopCT) and a part of the story I was getting to next, so read on when I next post!

Do I need meth? No. But it adds so much additional torque and it provides a safety blanket on detonation. It's so much fun!

At this point fuel is not my limitation. The limitation is exactly where it was planned to be - the Turbo. I built a 1000hp type engine with a 500hp turbo, that was always my plan and I stuck to it. I can assure you the car does not need to be faster and there would be a certain amount of I could make more with a bigger turbo to have a bigger bragging number but I would have a slower car. I have a good balance between power and lag and the car is an easy "daily driver" - reliable too, for the most part.

I have been told if I have an external wastegate we could get more out of the current turbo - but that's not happening, I can tell you that now. I am done with making large jumps in power but the car will probably get re-tuned each year for finessing and to make sure all is well.