Well mixed results on the turbo swap. Prick of a job if I'm to be honest but one of those things where you'd do it in half the time if you have to do it again ........... which I will soon. Everything was going great until I went to tighten the water inlet banjo tower fitting. New bolt, new washers, I'd cleaned out the thread at work with some brake cleaner and running a bolt through it. All looked good and no reason to suspect there'd be a problem. When I tighten critical bolts I've learnt from work to always step up bit by bit with the torque wrench just in case its been dropped or whatever so that you don't accidentally overtighten. The spec on the bolt is 35Nm and I was only 25Nm when I just felt the first smidge of the thread letting go. Before anyone says I threaded it (and if you do I will punch you through your screen) I didn't - there is no way you could cross thread that sucker with the tall banjo fitting and it was free as anything before it started to tighten. I remember when I pulled it out of my old engine that the washers used either side of the banjo were really thick. I think what might have happened is that when I first got the turbo done (paid for due to babies etc) these washers meant that too few threads were engaged and it was probably overtightened. So because there was still plenty of torque on there and new washers and the water line is braced to the block I went ahead and left it in there. Its not leaking but f&^*k me - all that effort and I cant feel excited about it because I'll just have no trust that its going to hold together. If it hasn't started to leak before Bathurst then I'll still take it but if it does I'll double drive my mates Clio. So I'm driving around in my ported K03s on a ported manifold with turbosmart wastegate actuator and the de-silencer compressor inlet. All that put together properly kicks the standard K03s by a long shot and has a real compressor surge flutter without the silencer on lift off and is generally a bit louder on the induction side of things. But now I immediately have to be thinking about the next step so that I'm ready to go when the first coolant drips appear.
So these are my options:
1. get the CHRA of the standard K03s I pulled out refurbed so that its ready to swap in when the time comes
2. buy a genuine K04-001 that will be plug and play and work with a straight flash or better yet a flash/pump/MAF/injectors. A K04-001 with no other hardware and a flash wouldn't beat what I have in there now but with injectors etc it still would I think.
3. go for a K03s/K04 hybrid with the above hardware but would then definitely have to sort a custom tune.
3. I've been told a GT2554 is mine to have if I choose so I could organise manifold, lines, exhaust adapter, TIP and induction pipes for that.
That's all ascending order of difficulty and $ but if anyone has applicable parts available that may help a decision to be made I'm keen to hear about it.
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Originally Posted by sambb
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