FR-S Turbo Build
 

Current Build Information



Engine
IAG Stage 1 w/ 10.5:1 Compression ratio. Using stock heads with Kelford 68lb springs, ARP2000 headstuds and stock headgasket. Stock coilpacks and stock sparkplugs
Boostlab BL58x w/ T51r Mod ( Basically a GTX3076r Gen2). Tial vband hotside. Protected by a PTP turbo blanket
Cam driven oil scavenging for turbo oil drain, uses WRX oil scavenge pump w/ AVO bracket

JDL Equal length turbo manifold and downpipe, all Vband. Turbosmart 38mm Ultragate wastegate recirculates into downpipe
JDL Catted and resonated 3" front pipe/overpipe combo
FT86speedfactory x Remark 3" catback w/ quad tip
Garrett bar and plate core intercooler w/ Treadstone piping and Turbosmart raceport BOV.
Mishimoto slim fan shroud w/ fans
CSR coolant connector w/ Mishimoto coolant hoses.
Radium passenger side catch can, venting crankcase side to atmosphere w/ filter
ID1050x injectors
Walbro 450LPH fuel pump w/ custom return style fuel circuit
Radium fuel rails
JDM OEM AC delete
Verus DI ECU bracket and driver's side injector cover


Tuning
Tuned by VEMS using Ecutek w/ Racerom
Currently running about 26PSI, 93 octane. About 500WHP
Using a 3 port MAC solenoid for boost control through Ecutek


Drivetrain
Stock transmission :popcorn:
Stock axles
STI transmission mount
STI engine mounts
Southbend Stage 3 Daily clutch
Verus carbon fiber driveshaft
Upgraded shifter detent springs (best mod)
Removed clutch assist spring (DO THIS)
TRD brake pads
Centric blank rotors


Interior
Atoto A6 pro head unit (link here - https://www.amazon.com/ATOTO-Navigat.../dp/B075W9H5P3)
Tomei delrin shift knob
Suede wrapped center console
VEMS wideband gauge
Prosport boost gauge
Defi racer oil pressure gauge
JDM black panels anywhere that silver was in US trim
3DMaxpider floor mats (unexpectedly great)

Exterior
HKS IVGT coilovers
Whiteline front endlinks
ARC-8 wheels in 17x9+42
Nitto NT555R drag radials 245/45R17
Muteki SR48 Neochrome lug nuts
Verus slanted hood vents
TrueFocusFab front bash bar
Custom blacked out stock FRS headlights w/ 100mm halos
Toyota badges front and rear, removed all other lettering on the trunk
eBay black sidemarkers superglued in place

I typed all of this on my phone, please forgive typos, it's too hot right now to proofread.

Against my better judgment, I'm going FI on my only car, daily driver (even through Vermont winters) FR-S. I love so many things about this car. I love the seating position, I love rwd, I love the look, the steering feel, the stock ride quality and handling. Honestly though, I don't spend much time "carving canyons" or doing track days (go ahead, try to find a track in Vermont. Try it.) While the handling of the car is wonderful and I do push it sometimes, the car leaves me wanting a bit more in acceleration.

I don't want my tires cording at each chance, I don't want Teslas to fear me in a 1/4. I don't want to BUILD my motor if I can avoid it. Hell, I don't even have a whp goal, I don't have a benchmark I want to reach. Why? I'll let the car respond how it will and enjoy it as such. I plan to run 8-10psi on whatever turbo lasts on the cxracing manifold. It will be dyno tuned, it will have an oil cooler. It will be tuned to build boost higher in the revs, no low rpm nonsense here. It was have a pcv side catch can (already does) and crack case VTA. That's it.

Here is what I'm thinking:
Oil pressure builds by RPM. lower RPM torque means the rods are handling higher forces for longer, and preventing rod failure is one of my paramount concerns with every choice I'm making here (as it is with anyone who doesn't want to build a bomb). My turbo I've ordered is the generic journal bearing T3 T04E 60/63 cxracing makes. What I've found in my research, is that these are the best turbos they make for reliability. "Best" is subjective, so keep reading and hear me out.

Search "cxracing turbo" and no doubt, you'll get horror before praise. This is true of anything. ANYTHING. People are more apt to complain when something goes wrong, than to take time leaving a positive review when they could be out enjoying their product. This is a fact. I'm not going to dispute that the negative connotation associated with CXracing has not been earned; to a degree, it is low tier quality. However, when your goals are not in the clouds, the quality disparity is nothing like you may think with some parts.

Let's talk intercoolers. What is an intercooler? It's a heatsink, essentially. It holds an air charge the turbo forces into your intake and attempts to cool it as much as possible before it reaches the intake. Other than that purpose, it's ONLY JOB is holding the air. To me, quality may be the finish of the piping, it's choice of a BOV flange location, the fitment, blah blah. If you go for BEST OF THE Best and need that, you'll be concerned with pressure drop, with the effectiveness of the intercooler core, the diameter piping. This is where I plant my feet and get ready to meet criticism. The route CXRACING takes for their piping isn't the longest, but it's pretty long compared to other kits. The BOV flange is on a bend, which sucks. The fitment hopefully is good, and I'm assuming it won't leak. My goal is not whp driven, so pressure drop, and cooling effectiveness is really not going to concern me. So long as it cools the charge air, I'm happy.

The manifold. Equal length to me is a nice plus. The welds look decent, collector is OK, it has an EWG flange, and I can have the flanges milled flat if they're not great. I don't care about MAX POWER, I just need them to support the turbo and not leak, seems simple enough.

Word vomit is a skill of mine, if you're still reading you probably should look busy so your boss doesn't catch on.

Anyways, enough hard ass. I still want the car to be fun so it's not like I'll let it run like garbage or only make 210whp either. Let's get onto the other goodies!
Going to run a PTP Turbo blanket and either use header wrap, or get the manifold ceramic coated. Under hood circulation is terrible and I am not interested in venting my hood right now (rain/snow, I don't want the header wrap getting saturated) so minimizing radiant heat will be important.
I think I'll be getting a standard mishimoto oil cooler with a thermostatic adapter, and a stock radiator. Reflective gold tape/sleeving on anything close to the manifold and turbo should also minimize hazard. I still have far from everything and will likely be stagnant for a little while as new parts roll in.

As of today, I have the following:

Cxracing downpipe/manifold
Cxracing intercooler
Grimmspeed header gaskets
Prosport boost/oil temp gauge
OMNI 3bar map sensor
Radium Engineering PCV catch can
Brzedit for tuning

Tomorrow the turbo and oil lines show up!

https://i.imgur.com/9hHIptw.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/rGfalai.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/RUNCAZZ.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/pyDlW5F.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/UbTaA2h.jpg

Aside the collector being a bit grungy, things look great! It's nice that the intercooler piping is flared too. I'll update with more as time goes on! Let me know your thoughts/advice, I welcome all cisms and won't bite your head off if I disagree. Just be aware that bashing the kit in all likelihood won't elicit a response from me at all. Before I forget, I'm buying a new stock oil pan to weld a return into, and I'll get a clutch. Probably ACT with LWFW because chatter doesn't bother me, and I've had success with ACT on other platforms.

:barf: Here we go

Car currently is catless with stock catback, dynapack calls it 174whp 140wtq. UEL CNT headers, Megan racing frontpipe, stock overpipe.

https://i.imgur.com/p8zmRQ5.jpg

Turbo showed up, I got a new Turbosmart ultra gate 38mm from a specialty tuning and dyno shop called VEMS that is localled owned/operated very close to me. They put out amazing work, and I'm trusting them with my build. They had the wastegate in stock so I bought it.

I brought some of the kit there to have their opinion on it. Received a passing grade (not flying colors by any means) so there may be a couple additional things I'll need to budget for to make it right. The gasket for the downpipe is just expansive foil with only the exhaust port, the wastegate port is covered by the same gasket and may be a weakness in the design.

https://i.imgur.com/tVm7Gd5.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/HyFJlTl.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/sZuWmJe.jpg

See what I mean about the wastegate hole? We'll see what can been done to be sure it's sealed.

https://i.imgur.com/oWlfokZ.jpg

Prosport oil temp and boost gauges are here too!

https://i.imgur.com/HrDxbsF.jpg

Had a 3 gauge single DIN bracket made, this isn't the final product (60% fill) but it's really weak and doesn't fit quite like I thought.

Being the incredibly malleable and accepting human being that I am, I still think it looks great! The fit is actually better since I can squish it a little and it's held tight by the poor fitment. Radio isn't wired in, so no powered on shots. I'm very much a fan of visibility, and did not want to be conventional with $100+ steering wheel column mounts, so I'm trying this!

It looks like you have a good solution. I've found that my A-pillar gauges don't restrict my view at all, though.

Thank you for the input, my experience having them I lost some a-pillar visibility and have been scared of them since. That was in a 3000GT VR4 though, not really apples to apples, but I had assumed the angles would be the same. You know what they say about assuming..

I've actually revised this setup again and mounted the radio in the cubby where the usb/aux ports were, along with the little space. Fits really nicely, now I have a double din hole to mount gauges in. Still working on figuring that out so I'm going to post pictures once I'm done planning, should be pretty good.

Small update! A lot more parts are in. I ended up buying a dual gauge pod, only want two gauges: boost and oil temp. I wrapped the intake pipe with dei reflective tape and bought silicon spray for the header wrap! Oil cooler just got here, I think I have about everything I need to get the installation process moving forward. Eventually a new clutch will come in with a couple other little goodies too!! Oh, and I have a new oem oil pan. Buying an oem serpentine belt because I may as well.
Imgur isn't working so I'll update later with images!

Long overdue update. I've changed to ECUTEK with the RaceRom patch for tuning. Since my car has been blown up multiple times due to the valve recall, I finally have it back and am ready to proceed. I settled on my gauge design too. Moved the radio to the bottom. Also bought an oil cooler, heatwrapped and sprayed everything with DEI silicon spray. I had to remove my windshield washer fluid res, and trim the tab on both headlights to fit the intercooler piping at all. I also bought $20 vented fog light housings and ditched my LED strips.

https://i.imgur.com/BdGrWla.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/kFtRclK.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/lv3ugCI.jpg

https://imgur.com/gallery/D4WpJ7Z

https://i.imgur.com/pI1gjR9.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/zQn7nl7.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/nDgIJdt.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/13ZDpir.jpg

Not impressed with fitment on this intercooler at all. I had to trim the ear off of the right side so that a pipe wasn't againt it. Not sure if I just really am bad at lining up the pipes , but it's still going to need work to fit when everything goes in.

Hey I’m looking into getting the cx kit, did you have any more pics of the ic piping and hour you routed it, and how you mounted the intercooler. Just hoping to get a rough game plan for how to tackle the install.

Have you been to Palmer Motorsports Park? I liked that track even though i got black flagged. It wasn't completed and they said i kicked up a piece of gravel even though i never dropped a wheel. That was couple years ago it must be completed by now.

I don't envy you driving a turbo twin on those rock and ice covered VT roads. Good luck.

Once I do the full install I will be posting everything I had to do. You will need a few bolts from the hardware store, but I was able to mount it to the stock crash bar - it doesn't sit perfectly in the middle, it's offset to the right a little. In this configuration, you're also going to need to trim either the pipe leading to the throttlebody or the pipe that leads to that. As I said, when I get to the whole thing, I'll outline everything as best I can. I also removed my windshield washer fluid reservoir for now, it was in the way. I will list the exact specs of the bolts/nuts/washers I purchased to make it easier. I'm willing to bet that there's a level of variance between each kit produced, so yours may be worse than mine, or better.

I haven't, I'd like to go at some point. It seems incredible, I just bomb around the Appalachian gap mostly ( Route 17 here in Huntington, knows as "Buels gore" ). I actually really enjoy the driving dynamic of the roads here. You're always being challenged to be observant and aware. This may be because I grew up driving snowmobiles without studs, so you needed to be crazy if you wanted to be fast. The worst part of the roads is the inevitable damage from kicking stuff up. I may put mudflaps on this year, I'm not used to a car that has such thin paint, my doors and are speckled white :)

Any updates?

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Love this build![emoji7]

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Same. Need updates. He did post in the FI section but still...

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Hey guys, I forgot that I had a build thread!

The car makes 317whp at 16psi. Settles at 298 at 15psi. Still running great, no issues . Did have to heat up the flanges a lot when bolting them to the block to get them to seal perfectly.
The angle of the downpipe was messed up on my kit so we actually had to make a custom downpipe from the turbo to the cxracing frontpipe. No biggie, but definitely a demerit to the kit. If I had to do it again, I'd buy the MAP manifold, get the same $190 turbo and have someone build the exhaust. The intercooler is perfect!



https://www.instagram.com/p/B43TtC8H...=1v4oyucvd3g59

Here's a link to the little Instagram video I posted.

How did you route the lines and stuff? I'm thinking about doing same? Also what about the external wastegate ect...

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Shit, you had to ask on a Sunday! I'll try to remember to put something together. Bug me on Instagram (I followed you to remind myself) and I'll try to get stuff together. It's not pretty but it functions and should be pretty reliable. It's too bad I didn't get Thanksgiving off; my in-laws are in Fairfield CT and we usually visit them, I could have just shown you

I might need to take a ride to come see it in person. I followed you back. I'm just gonna go ahead and buy the IC kit and a Maperformance or JDL manifold.

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Yeah the manifold is the best starting place. Honestly the whole MAperformance hot parts kit is sweet, but your choice in turbo could make it not fit perfectly; it's really stressful. That's why I had a custom downpipe made, no fitment worries.

I run the turbo with no BOV and it's not developing and shaftplay or anything, so I can attest that at least the one I bought is holding up well and makes the power I expected.

next spring/summer lets meet up for 86club banter and appreciation. i look forward to making your acquaintance.

Definitely! Do you go to Wicked Big Meet? I'm there every year as well

https://youtu.be/NRAsPMR90p0

Here's a video of it running when it's real cold out! Still runs awesome! Even with no BOV the turbo has no shaft play.

Still running stock catback

Nice build, enjoy!

I'm still on this fence for this kit.

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I still think you're better off getting the MAPerformance or JDL kit! I would if I could go back. My kit works great but it was a headache to flatten the flanges

Interesting read for this build thread. I find it quite contradictory to have budget build and reliable in one sentence. Especially talking about turbos. But I like that you are opened minded about the kit and made do with the quirks. I've strongly considered going FI on my daily driver. However, the kits I like or want are either discontinued/ very rare (Cosworth), or batshit unreliable (HKS). Either way, good luck with your build!

Well, budget minded on parts where I felt the expense could be spared- like the turbo, intercooler, and manifold!

Tuning and boost management are really not something I'd ever advice cheaping out on. That's why I got a turbosmart wastegate and ECUTEK

Build pause- following months of an odd rattle at certain RPM and random VVT issues, my timing chain broke.

What tha heck man... Sorry to hear that

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It's life! I'll get over it it's because they gave me a used engine after they blew my original engine up twice for the recall

The money burning begins!
Purchased my first exhaust for the car after owning for 4 years- the FT86Speedfactory x Remark quad tip 3" catback. I wanted so badly to go single exit with the Greddy RS, but I just don't have the exterior swag to pull it off (I'm not even lowered)

With this, I bought torque solutions engine mounts, and new hangers for the exhaust.

I also purchased a new GT3076R with the .82ar housing in 4 bolt 3" outlet. I'll be having VEMS can a new downpipe for me. I still plan to use the cxracing intercooler and manifold.

Spent money on a used car so that I can build the FRS right-


https://i.imgur.com/M0MZ8Kw.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/BQL3oxA.jpg

2002 Civic LX in a 5 speed from out west, no rust! It has 190,000 miles and I plan to run it until the odometer runs out of numbers.

More updates when parts arrive, I know everyone loves pix.
Unsure what clutch I want. I plan to get DSS axles and bigger wheels/tires to support around 400whp. Trying not to resolve problems that aren't problems yet though.

Also updated thread title; this no longer could be considered budget by any stretch of the imagination

Do it!! Might as well go all in on that engine. Get all the goodies. Since the transmission is out get the verus carbon synchros.

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Update!

I had a GT3076R that I was going to use, but I changed my mind- a smaller turbo will help me capitalize on torque all around rather than betting on torque in the later power band.
I chose a Boostlab BL-5858 with a bullet wheel. Same turbo frame I had, much better CHRA and wheel designs.

Also cleaned up my pulleys and some other hardware.

Very inexpensive turbo. Why this over a gt2860rs?

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It would be a ton more work to fit the larger 3076r, and the 2860rs is smaller than I'd like. This turbo will have the top end I'd like without the fuss of changing my downpipe or intercooler location.
I've seen a lot of the Boostlab turbos, they're well built and reliable as anything else. Worst comes to worst I'm out $850 right?

A little late on this but just wanted to say love this gen civic as a backup car, I got the same one as my second daily to the BRZ. Reliable to death. Had an 04 LX manual that I bought for 1k, was indestructible at 260k mi until a 50 ft tree fell with the heaviest part of it right dead center on the hood (Funny enough, when i managed to pry the hood open, the engine was untouched with just a few things bent out of place and the air filter cracked). Bought an 02 LX manual a couple months back to replace it, drives like a champ!

My only gripe is the transmission input shaft bearing is going, which apparently is a common issue with these. Just makes loud scary noises, hasn't affected everything. And the clutch pedal squeak is nuts! Not even white lithium grease can silence this beast.

Lol! I had that issue on the 04, thought the shaft was definitely going soon after I bought it (as it already had the issue), but it lasted me a year and a half before the car was crushed and was still going strong. And yes hahaha, though my squeak has been fairly tame.

Thanks for documenting this. The big brand kits are beautiful and well crafted, but you're proving it doesn't have to be expensive big brand stuff to make good power.

It really doesn't. People over complicate turbo kits- it's not expensive to have exhaust that doesn't leak, but polishing turds can get old- you're paying for someone else to do the polishing before you get it when you spend big $ on a nice kit. Sometimes the luxury is nice- I just prefer the road less traveled, even at my own expense.

I am not getting the JDL manifold, I'm sticking with what I've got- it works well enough, though I am having the flex sections taken out and replaced