Sure guys. I'll install it in the next day or two and confirm that it bolts up OK...can't imagine why it wouldn't...

It's been 4 mo's since your last post. You don't write, you don't call. Do I need to dig up my "Slackers" thread again. Any hang ups or just the weather? Hope everything on the home front is good. Kent

Relentless, huh?

Yeah lot going on at work but thanks for checking in Kent. Supposed to be a nice weekend. Maybe I'll twist some wrenches. I just got a big package from Bruce Stone. Pretty front suspension bits. I should at least open the box tomorrow!

Don't stay away from it too long, Chris.

Yeah, give us your driving impressions! This might have to be the new 914-6 since porsche motors are becoming unobtainium these days!

C'mon Chris. We're dying for some Subie chat. 2yr's ago there were 4 of us posting conversion stuff everyday. I miss those days. Working on your conversion awhile and that evening reading about what others had done that day. I'm going to be doing some "major changes" with my cooling system. I anticipate my current system will not handle AC sitting in traffic and 100F. Worst that could happen is overkill. I'm leaning on waiting until after RT66 so I don't feel rushed. Kent

Yeah those were fun days. Where is Doug?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpLQ0wtQ0R0


Let's get back on track! I'm in a slight funk. Just need to put it up in the air and get started. Phase 1 was really "can I actually DO THIS?" Now I need to route the wiring right, make it look nice overall, secure the radiator better, etc.

You ever decide whether you want to swap out your radiator hoses ? 1.25 gates #28445 is the way to go I think. We can split 50 feet for about $100 each. Not quite ready for that but keep it in mind. You might want to do it before the RT66 deal. Remember you whipped that engine like a mule and it got hot last time? Why do you think you're AC system won't work well when it's hot? It's a pretty small area to cool.

I'm fine with cooling the engine as long as I keep the rpm reasonable. IOW, not in 2nd when I should be in 4th. And I'm pretty sure that is due in part to the hose size causing the pump to cavitate at high RPM. It's whether it will cool the engine with the AC on in extreme conditions. The frigging AC is big enough for a Fairlane. I have a dual core sitting in the garage that will handle the added load of the AC. I'll see if the higher RPM still brings the temp up with the new radiator. If it does then we split a roll.
So how many days to tidy up your wiring?

Next step is to pull the engine. Wish I didn't have to but I have a few things to do to it and it's much easier with it out. Will try to get that done this weekend. Really want to drive the car more this year.

I see what you're saying about the AC...you're worried about keeping the engine cool not the car's interior. I'm pretty set on going to wider hoses just to be sure it never gets hot on one of those long drives with the hammer down. What radiator did you pick up?

Kent/Chris,
I have done some research on this phenomenon. There is a website where a few guys who have raced these motors documented their issues and solutions. I'll work on finding that for you in my links when I get home. Essentially the cavitation issue is caused by low volume entering the thermostat housing during sustained high RPMs, which is partially solved by welding a larger diameter inlet on the thermostat housing neck and using a larger hose (1.5 would probably work, but some suggested even as large as 1.75). The other solution is to move the thermostat to the outlet side, prior to entering the radiator. That hose can remain 1.25. I'm planning to do both of these on my build.

The only issue I've thought of is how low the larger hose will fit when run underneath the car. And of course, the Celica radiator outlet would have to be cutoff and the appropriate sized one welded back on.

Thanks George. No rush but I'd like to see what you found. That will be especially applicable in your case. I expect you'll be running at high RPMs a LOT. Can't wait for you to get it in the car. The EG33 is quite an engine.

The Celica GTS one. For $167 shipped with fans. Just like a sore Peter; ya can't beat it! Let me know when you want to order that hose and I'll get you some $$$. I'll probably run the hoses just for comparison purposes. That and to get some "hard" numbers. IOW, what works for the EZ30 using the cooling configuration that "I" have. I've found that what works on someone else car may not be the ticket for yours or mine given slight variations between each vehicle. Should come up with some "hard" numbers for my setup. I'd really like to come up with a proven "package" for guy's that want to convert but not experiment like we do.
Pull the engine. I know it's grunt work but in a couple of hours it is out and your back in the "work groove". I'd bet you could be finished in a month with full on weekend attacks. Let's get this thing on the road and "out of your hair". Oh, I forgot to add; don't know what happened to Doug's project. Poor guy. Life jumped up and Bitch slapped the poor dude. He went thru a lot with the divorce and selling his business. I emailed him a few month's back and he did not respond so I left it at that. I'd like to see him get back in the pool. I even entertained the idea of finishing his project. Kent

Sounds correct. Find that article and post it, Jorge. Nothing like new info!

Will do on the hoses. And the engine . Supposed to be 50ish here this weekend. I think the last post I saw from Doug he had gotten a really good CFO gig somewhere. Dream job. I hope he's just making so much money he can't be bothered with us (kidding...if you know Doug it's hilarious). He'll be back. They always come back.

George when is your engine gonna be ready?

Found it! The impetus for all of this is that the Suby water pumps are actually too efficient at higher RPMs, perhaps 6000+. The restriction of the thermostat and pump inlet cause a backup of water that at a certain point can't keep up with the pump. On a street car, under 6k, no problem. But on a car seeing extended RPMs, the VE of the pump and the previous restriction causes cavitation (bubbles), which then boils the coolant in the motor and eventually a large air mass in the engine - not good. So a 50mm, or 1.75 in+ inlet and a relocation of the thermostat to the engine outlet/radiator inlet is the solution.

Well documented here:
http://www.mrtperformance.com.au/resources...-boiling-theirs

Other supporting articles:

http://www.subaru-svx.net/forum/archive/in...hp/t-61824.html

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/showthread....ms-when-tracked

http://www.dirally.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-12965.html


Not sure when the engine will be ready. Still fighting through deaths in the family, low pay and lots of diapers to buy/change. I live vicariously through YOU GUYS!

That's a good read, George. Thx for the post. After reading those it seems I am on the right track. The thermo relo / upsizing the "old thermostat housing" looks to be key. For those reading these links: skim down about 4/5's of the way down the last link. Doesn't touch on cooling till the end of the article. Thx again. Kent

I thought this was a know issue, and you guys had read this stuff. Sorry.

In reality, if your planning lots of high RPM stuff, I would suggest 2" in, and move the thermostat for good measure.

Sorry again for not clueing you all in on this.

Not a problem Kent. Chris - sorry we're hijacking your thread.

Stephen - my question still is, will I still be able to reliably run a 2" hose underneath the car without the danger of it rubbing/getting caught on stuff? Also, on the Celica radiator, is there enough room to weld on a new 2" outlet?

With the added volume of a 2" hose I would think the (potential) restriction issue of running through the longs would be resolved and eliminate your under car issues. So dumping the stock thermostat location and relocating to the upper engine bay is a viable solution? Or would another location be even more effective? My EG33 is still out of the car and I'm looking around for a solution to getting the car where I can weld in my floors and other strong bits - that's when I want to install the coolant hoses in the longs where I can get to them easier.

Didn't one of those articles speak to keeping the newly located thermostat housing close to the engine? It's not a high jack if it's informative.

2" would be hard to get through the logs. But that being said let us do a little math.

2" hose has an area of 3.14", that is pretty large area. You can get close with a square 3"x1" AL. Rectangular Tube. That reduces your ground clearance issues going along the bottom. Rick did something similar with the Alien. I think Rick used tube, we talked about it last week.

Most people would say I'll run 2 1" tubes but that give you an area of 1.58", so you would need to run 4 of them to get resemble close. You can not fit 4 1" tubes down the logs. You can do two per side.

Boxster Rads again.

So the lowest profile method would be rectangular box.

Now if you have the logs wide open, then running a 2" Tube through there would be about perfect.

If you where not worried about rust, a 2.25" "piece of DOM would also work And I have thought about this also, as I need a raised section to bring the shifter up etc. If built correctly it could provide extra support for the chassis also. Same idea as the Early Lotus Elan chassis, that had a box section, that provided the strength of the chassis. Herb Adams also did a kit car "JackRabbit" in the 80s with this same idea, stiff as all git out.

Click to view attachment]

BTW, do not follow this builders lead and use thin wall tubing for a roll cage. See the small dents in the upper bar, and how he swaged the petty bar and bolted it into the chassis in a single shear. Not the proper way to do that

Yes it is right off the cross over pipe right in front of the engine. The upper one, You can not block off the heater tubes, I am sure none of you have. But that is just a reminder not to cap them, engine would get hot very fast, block would be pressurized, and could help cause a leak. Suction hose would also go into a vacuum state, and maybe collapse.

This engine pumps ton of water or would like to. I think if you had a flooded basement, it might be better to hookup a long 2" hose, fire up your 914 and let it run until you pumped the basement close to dry.

No need to apologize. Chat away everyone! It's very motivating. Gives me great ideas.

2" hose is HUGE man!

15k miles on my Subaru conversion with no cooling problems what so ever. It ran at the thermostat180 on 100 degree summer days in Atlanta freeway traffic. I was using 3/4 and 7/8 size hoses to a 10 x 26 radiator.
.

I'm at 1.25" and 1.5" and also no issues, though through a big honkin' Renegade V8 radiator.

I'm running the same Bob but if I maintain a high RPM uphill in 97F+ I will overheat. Bob, did you ever get the AC finished in that car?

Bob, I think the main concern, at least on my part, is how it will cool at extended 6k+ driving. I for one would like to get it right the first time as I don't have the expendable income to redo the system over. However, when I'm done, if it stays cool on my car, on the track, it should be a good baseline for everyone else.

That being said, Bob's car was a work of art - truly beautiful engineering. I am tempted by his own results, but because my car will see very different driving, I am at least a little concerned about getting the hose size right.

The square tubing is a good idea, except for the bending required to get it to follow the contours under the car. I'm interested to try fitting the hose in the longs, but that's also just one problem to overcome. After that, one would still have to figure out how to route it past the gas tank and to the radiator.

And yes, the inline thermostat should be located as close to the water outlet from the engine as possible. That hose inner diameter (stock) is 1.5 inches, or 39.5 ish mm for those keeping track at home.

Finally, I'm usually not one to try to re-engineer something that the factory guys spent so much time on. However, it's clear that Subaru never intended these engines to see that many rpms for that length of time. So I'm glad I have you guys to help sort through this one.

By the way, Chris, have you ever heard of this one regarding the hesitation you were talking about before? I wonder if this is somehow linked to the lack of a VSS, or masking it somehow?

http://svx-iw.com/svxiw/article/?article=31

fwiw, I've been running a celica radiator with my chevy v8 for 2 months now. I have a 190 degree thermostat on the engine and a 190 thermoswitch for the fans. engine temp go to about 210 before fans kick in. i'm thinking I need to drop to a 180 degree thermostat and thermoswitch before summer rolls around.

I have George. Interestingly enough that only applies to one or two years. 92 definitely, maybe 93. They removed that suppressor eventually due to the complaints. The SVX guys call that " resistor crush mod". Thanks for the info though.

I finally did hook up the VSS and it's even more finicky now. I think I have a loose wire somewhere, or the temp sensor is bad, or the MAF is acting up, or the IAC valve is sticking. I'll check all of those things soon.

Chris.......I've been out of the country for 3 weeks. Hope to get home Sunday. Keep a eye out for the big brown truck next week.

This thread got me motivated to start getting down to really figuring out the wiring harness.... which also gets me more depressed. Anyone want to make a few bucks de-tangling it for me? Did I mention how much I hate wiring?

Mega squirt you will be happy you did. The 33 works great with all the stock sensors . It's easy to set this up full sequential with the Subaru trigger wheel and cam sensor. I would not go any other way.

That doesn't make sense to me. It totally improved mine. Oh there is one thing. Once the car moves more than 2 mph the idle goes to 2000 rpm. Come to a complete stop and it drops back to normal. It only does this the first 2 blocks then it stops and doesn't return until cold again. Sure it had something to do with the automatic trans & behemoth station wagon it came from. Anyway, glad your back in the spiirt and your thread will prove a valuable resource for future EGr's.

Awesome! Thanks Bob! I'll send you another label.

Hey George I drove Bob's car with Megasquirt. It was SO SWEET. I want to go that way soon. Consider this for your gift registry:

DIY SVX

We could do a workshop someday. Everyone could chip in a few bucks and retain Bob to supervise us. Octeenerfest or something.

Kent, I know the VSS thing is weird. Bob is sending me some stuff which will really help troubleshoot. I'll post pics when I get everything. I expect it will be just like the trans...one little tweak and it's fine again.

So whats the retainer fee Bob?

And I am down with that, it would be nice to do it in a facility with a rolling dyno, but that is more dollars.

As far as the DIYPNP kit, Desno plug and $430 with some time soldering away, looks like a deal to me for EFI.

An internal 2.5 bar sensor I am starting to lean words putting a snail on mine

Get that idea out of your head and continue on fabrication

You all are very dangerous proud to be hanging with.

Only issue I see on the SVX is that you can not run the coil on plugs according the specs. It only supports 4 of them, so you would need to go wasted spark, not a huge deal, just something to keep in mind.

Am I correct on that observation?

The basic features are all pluses to me

Feature List – Here’s what you can do

OEM ECU Connector to plug right into the factory harness!
Speed Density, Alpha-N and Hybrid Alpha-N (both SD and A-N algorithms hybridized) Supported
2 fuel outputs standard, 2 additional outputs optional
2 Ignition Inputs (for dual wheel ignitions)
4 Spark Outputs (Up to 4 Cylinder Coil On Plug, up to 8 Cylinder Wasted Spark)
Enhanced Acceleration Enrichment (EAE)
Boost Control
Knock Control
Launch Control
A/C idle up
Flat Shift
Tachometer Output
Fully Adjustable Rev Limiter
Table Switching
4 General PurposeOutputs
4 General Purpose Inputs (2 analog, 2 digital)
Support for Flex Fuel E85 for race day
Optional Realtime Baro Correction
Closed Loop O2 Correction

So what is the downfall here except two items. You build it, and well you support it.

I see neither as a downfall, the you build you support thing is easier as you know everything about it.

One downfall I currently see is lack of being able to connect the sim board, I have at least two engine harness one could become a Sim test harness, make the build and testing easier.

Only other downfall I see is the location of the harness and Oh crap, I don't have any from the engine side to the ECU.

Yes you run wasted spark Steve. The best thing about the DIYPNP is you just plug the stock harness right in to it, no cutting. You don't have to install a different trigger wheel or anything. Bob swears it's not that hard to build. Maybe one of these days I'll get down there and have him supervise my build, then take a bunch of pics and stuff. Not sure he'd actually want to spend any Octeenerfest time watching us do ECUs but if we got one done correctly that's all we need. If you look at the instructions it IS pretty fiddly but patience is apparently the key.

Forums for Megasquirt. You could get lost in there for a day or two :

MSExtra

Just for grins (and me lacking in knowledge), why is the Megasquirt better than the stock ECU?

See that long list of features that is what makes it better, and tuneablility.

In reality you can do a lot to the stock ECU, but you are still limited to the basic ECU functions, while way better than D-jet or L-Jet it is still a dated ECU.

Right, tunability, and also there are some quirks associated with the fact that the ECU is for a different car.

For the EG33, stock ECU concerns are:

- Some experience a sudden stall issue because all US SVX's are automatic. When you convert to 5 speed there is not a constant "load" on the engine and it can stall.
- There is also sometimes an idle issue for the same reason
- Lot of extra wires going to things you won't use like the PS pump, etc
- EGR and old school atmospheric pressure sensor (eliminated with Megasquirt)
- The "learning mode" is eliminated with MS which is a pain when you unhook the battery
- The rev limit is 6500. With MS you can go to 7400ish

But the ability to tune it to your liking is the best part.

Don't forget the 2.5 bar sensor that lets you add one of them funky turbo things!! Oh wait you can't turbo a 914 or an eg33

Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment

As in bang for the buck (I'm a CSOB...) in cost comparison, remapped ECUs are supposed to be great for their upgrades, helping the engine to get up slightly over 300 hp without them there turbo thingies... they tend to shorten the fuse a bit. They're not exactly giving away the MS systems so I'm wondering if they're really worth the extra cash?

Can you remap a SVX ecu? They're pretty old and OBD1 (right?) which generally limits tuning options without going standalone.

I'm not sure if "remapped" is the correct term. SubieChips and a couple of others offer a revamped stock ECU that raises rpm limits and handles larger injectors, etc. They've been tested and reported as a good upgrade and you still can pass stringent IM tests in most regions where the Megasquirt says they're not legal for street use. Maybe some CA folks with the equipment can tell of their experiences with the EPA for clarification.

The Subiechips chip does remap the ECU but it's a static map. You can't adjust it. It also eliminates the EGR and raises the rev limiter. The issue is that the chip is $329 now. A new Megasquirt DIYPNP (unassembled) is $430. Back when the chip was sub $200 I would consider it but now it's a little much. You can get group discounts with the Subiechips guy but I doubt you'd get it back to where it used to be.

The SVX was OBD1 until 1996 when it switched to OBD2.

... If one were to spend the money for someone else's tune, I'd rather go with the MS and my own ability to dial in a tune. In fact, I'd rather dial the rev limit down with the water pump issues we discussed earlier.