e30 m20i turbo finished project

[marco88]

Engine:
m20 2.5litre 6cyl 12v sohc

Exhaust:
3inch with gutted cat and cannon, 38mm external wastegate, turbo charging dynamics cast iron log manifold, ebay spec to4e

Suspension:
40mm drop king springs

odometer:
400,000 original k's and still feels like a very solid car

brakes:
stk

Wheels:
stk

Modifications:
to4e,38mm external gate, 2.5 inch piping, front mount(all cheap ebay stuff total cost $900),walbro 255lph intank pump, ford 19lb injectors, drift fuel reg, ems stinger with vy commodore coil packs and sensors,6 puck clutch, vac motorsports mild grind turbo cam, .120 mls head gasket, arp head studs, intercooler and piping painted black and almost completly hidden, ported head and manifold, full head service including new valve guides stem seals and valve springs set up for turbo cam, original diff and gearbox, bog stk bottom end with 7-10pound boost.

future plans:
bigger 60lb injectors so i can rev it passed 5300rpm without it running out of fuel lol, garrett gt30 or 35, 15 pound boost, get rid of cannon and get 2 small pipes like from factory and maybe lift it to standard height so it looks bone stock.

[davey]

Very "sleeper".. I like it!

What have you done to get fresh air to that pod filter? Pics of the intercooler mounting would be good as well..
Additionally... Might be an idea to upgrade the brakes before you go for any more power

I assume you've had it tuned and dyno'd... How much power is it putting out?

Also,

[GazM3]

nice work.

home brew turbo without running mega $$ setup

it looks the factory m20b25 is ideal candiate for turbocharging, and people from the usa are getting like 400+rwhp out of them with stock internal engines. shit even 300rwhp would be a weapon in an e30 esp with good rubber and an lsd.

im planning something similar for the e34, but only in planning stages now but it looks like for reasonably low investment you could get a pretty decent result

[MillRat]

Out of interest, with those bolt on style turbo manifolds, how does mounting the turbo above, and very close to all the spark leads effect the performance and life of those leads? Looking at your pictures, it looks like one, if not two of the leads are actually contacting the turbo dump pipe. Now the turbo on my relatively pedistrian Audi A4 glows orange after a spirited drive, and that has been designed to disipate the turbo heat. How do you plan to keep the engine, and engine components cool (considering you need to cool M20 extractors, to stop them over heating everything on the RHS of the engine).

Apart from that, it is a very tidy install. Congrats

[cplagz]

Out of interest, with those bolt on style turbo manifolds, how does mounting the turbo above, and very close to all the spark leads effect the performance and life of those leads? Looking at your pictures, it looks like one, if not two of the leads are actually contacting the turbo dump pipe. Now the turbo on my relatively pedistrian Audi A4 glows orange after a spirited drive, and that has been designed to disipate the turbo heat. How do you plan to keep the engine, and engine components cool (considering you need to cool M20 extractors, to stop them over heating everything on the RHS of the engine).

Apart from that, it is a very tidy install. Congrats

[Nutzy]

Interesting, a TCD low mount manifold, flipped. I hope it got ported to match.

[MillRat]

There you go. A picture says a thousand words.....

[marco88]

Very "sleeper".. I like it!

What have you done to get fresh air to that pod filter? Pics of the intercooler mounting would be good as well..
Additionally... Might be an idea to upgrade the brakes before you go for any more power

I assume you've had it tuned and dyno'd... How much power is it putting out?

Also,

thanks mate. i havent done anything to the pod filter for cool air, but air temp at full load is about 20-30degrees c so i havent bothered with it. its never been on dyno i tune on the street myself with laptop and my mate driving so i have no idea on power figures but it beat a r33 skyline that ran 12.8 quarter mile and kept up with some ferrari so i was pretty happy with that. i have attached some pics of the front mount

[marco88]

Interesting, a TCD low mount manifold, flipped. I hope it got ported to match.

its actully a proper top mount manifold for rh drive cars not a lh drive thats been flipped

[marco88]

the picture doesn't really show the leads properly but they are about 2-3 inches from any part of the exhaust and the heat shield is bent around them were u cant see the only problem i have had with the whole conversion is the heat warped my clutch resivoir when i did a skid but its still ok lol apart from that i had not 1 problem no cooling issuses, or head gasket failure, never poped a cooler hose, doesnt ping at all can still run 91 octane on 10 psi it actully runs better beleive it or not and it goes a lot better but not game to run it all the time only when got no money it drives and acts like a factory bought car.
heres a pic of the leads and the dump its actuly further away from it than it looks couldnt get a good angle of them

[marco88]

nice work.

home brew turbo without running mega $$ setup

it looks the factory m20b25 is ideal candiate for turbocharging, and people from the usa are getting like 400+rwhp out of them with stock internal engines. shit even 300rwhp would be a weapon in an e30 esp with good rubber and an lsd.

im planning something similar for the e34, but only in planning stages now but it looks like for reasonably low investment you could get a pretty decent result

thanks mate. yer the old m20's are underated thats half the reason that i turbod it, every one was saying to put rb25 or sr20 in but i havent lost a race to any skline or silvia even with there big dollar forged set ups running expensive ballbearing turbos on higher boost than im running even if i got a full car load to make up for having a light car it still leaves them and thats changing gears a 5300rpm, and it only cost me 4500 for every thing from being bog stk to turbod doing everything except the exhaust myself opposed to 4k for a stk rb25 half cut that makes no power out of the box plus all the rest of money and fabrication u need, even if i bang the motor its half the price to replace and to buy parts for

[GazM3]

Yeah I reckon I can do it for 1.5-2k of parts

I have an m30 low comp 3.5ltr which would work well turbo charged well. Prob even better than the m20 but it's gotta remain p plate legal for quite some time where as the red car don't have such constraints

[marco88]

heres a video of it on 8-10psi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjniadhce2Y

[Varden]

I've always liked the idea of a turbo 2.5 M20.

But not so much on the signing of the blank cheque I'd need to do to make it happen at a speed shop.

Respect for such a well executed DIY job.

[marcuste]

Nice job. Sends my mind into overdrive now on potential projects for when I get back home. What engine management you running?