Stock internals for FI track usage

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by GrandSport

This is what I was wondering. It's going to need a lot of cooling.

I have AC removed, vented hood, high pressure cooling system, aux coolers, etc and my EOC gets to about 240, 245 if it's really hot out. Now you're adding 30% more power, an FI system and intercoolers in front of the radiator/EOC.

I'd imagine you'll start needing coolers for the trans and diff at some point too.

FI and road racing don't mix well. There's a reason that even Porsche doesn't do it. They not only "dont" do it, they take a FI car and take the FI off of it for the track variants. Corvette tried and failed miserably with the C7 Z06 and is kinda sorta fine with the ZR1 (with a lot more frontal cooling area). I'm sure there are some, but I can't think of any true track worthy cars that are FI from the factory.

But it's definitely a problem money solves.

But they do. All the time. Essentially every LM car they make, actually.



If EOC is oil temp, you need more oil cooling. If EOC is coolant, something is VERY wrong with your cooling stack. For reference, my turbo car never hit more than 230F oil temp, with an oil cool cooled turbo, even with 115F ambient temps at mild elevation (~6000 DA). My tipping point for coolant temps spiraling was 117F (~6600DA that day), where my coolant temps would start slowly creeping, although a single straight was all I needed to get back down. This was on a stock radiator, with air conditioning.

[GrandSport]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

But they do. All the time. Essentially every LM car they make, actually.

I mean, that's kinda different lol

If EOC is oil temp, you need more oil cooling. If EOC is coolant, something is VERY wrong with your cooling stack. For reference, my turbo car never hit more than 230F oil temp, with an oil cool cooled turbo, even with 115F ambient temps at mild elevation (~6000 DA). My tipping point for coolant temps spiraling was 117F (~6600DA that day), where my coolant temps would start slowly creeping, although a single straight was all I needed to get back down. This was on a stock radiator, with air conditioning.

EOC= Engine oil cooler

Your coolant didn't top 117 on a 115 degree day? I assume that's a typo.

I'm at 240ish oil temp. I only have open spot on my Solo2, so I dont know my coolant temps.
Not topping 230 engine oil temps in with an oil cooled turbo is impressive.

[NoHaveMSG]

Originally Posted by GrandSport

I mean, that's kinda different lol




EOC= Engine oil cooler

Your coolant didn't top 117 on a 115 degree day? I assume that's a typo.

I'm at 240ish oil temp. I only have open spot on my Solo2, so I dont know my coolant temps.
Not topping 230 engine oil temps in with an oil cooled turbo is impressive.

He is saying at 117f ambient is where his cooling system can't keep up anymore even with the cooling mods on his FI car.

FWIW I didn't find much improvement in a larger rad for cooling NA, ducting made a much larger difference, especially for my oil cooler. All the bigger rad did is probably raise at what ambient temp I would hit the point the system couldn't keep up, which NA really isn't an issue.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by GrandSport

I mean, that's kinda different lol




EOC= Engine oil cooler

Your coolant didn't top 117 on a 115 degree day? I assume that's a typo.

I'm at 240ish oil temp. I only have open spot on my Solo2, so I dont know my coolant temps.
Not topping 230 engine oil temps in with an oil cooled turbo is impressive.

Porsche keeps their customer racing cars NA, because that's what the customer wants (and somewhat for BOP). I would challenge you to overheat any modern turbocharged porsche street car at the track, regardless of conditions. You might find it much more difficult than you think, whereas a C7 Z06 won't even survive a few laps in the desert. The price points are justified by the respective performances.

117F ambient was where I hit the tipping point, combined with the minor elevation of WSIR. WSIR also has a TON of WOT time, something like 70% of my lap is at WOT, even with a turbo.

As @NoHaveMSG mentions, directing the air is more important than just having a larger cooling system.

[RT-BRZ]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

Porsche keeps their customer racing cars NA, because that's what the customer wants (and somewhat for BOP). I would challenge you to overheat any modern turbocharged porsche street car at the track, regardless of conditions. You might find it much more difficult than you think, whereas a C7 Z06 won't even survive a few laps in the desert. The price points are justified by the respective performances.

117F ambient was where I hit the tipping point, combined with the minor elevation of WSIR. WSIR also has a TON of WOT time, something like 70% of my lap is at WOT, even with a turbo.

As @NoHaveMSG mentions, directing the air is more important than just having a larger cooling system.

A big point that is really being missed in this conversation of OEM engineering versus the aftermarket is that the OEM's spends millions of dollars in development for their respective FI platforms because they know they are going to sell 10's of millions or even more worth of product. The aftermarket is selling parts to bolt on to platforms that were not built to take what is being thrown at them.

Sure, you can "solve" the problem with money on cooling mods but that doesn't really address the fact that we're polishing the proverbial turd.

You can spend even more money on aftermarket blocks, pistons, cranks, etc. to build a FA20 that can handle boost over the long term but by the time you spend all of that you may as well just buy the OEM boosted platform that was built to do this in the first place.

Of course that wouldn't be any fun.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by RT-BRZ

A big point that is really being missed in this conversation of OEM engineering versus the aftermarket is that the OEM's spends millions of dollars in development for their respective FI platforms because they know they are going to sell 10's of millions or even more worth of product. The aftermarket is selling parts to bolt on to platforms that were not built to take what is being thrown at them.

Sure, you can "solve" the problem with money on cooling mods but that doesn't really address the fact that we're polishing the proverbial turd.

You can spend even more money on aftermarket blocks, pistons, cranks, etc. to build a FA20 that can handle boost over the long term but by the time you spend all of that you may as well just buy the OEM boosted platform that was built to do this in the first place.

Of course that wouldn't be any fun.

Which would you suggest, that approximately matches my turbo BRZ's performance level? I've not yet found one! The closest ones all cost FAR more than what's in the BRZ, and simultaneously manage to cost way more to run.

Then again, having a warranty is nice; that's definitely where the extra money spent goes.

[RT-BRZ]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

Which would you suggest, that approximately matches my turbo BRZ's performance level? I've not yet found one! The closest ones all cost FAR more than what's in the BRZ, and simultaneously manage to cost way more to run.

Then again, having a warranty is nice; that's definitely where the extra money spent goes.

I don't think there any easy answers. Honestly, I think you build the car to the best estimate and then replace the engine when it pops and, hopefully, take the opportunity to build it a little stronger to handle what you're doing going forward. Otherwise, just run what you have until it goes.

Warranty is nice but I didn't think that's what this conversation was really about. I thought we were talking about reliability of stock internals.

In the end, everyone has to work out their own budget tolerance.

Everything has a failure rate at a given duty cycle/load. In stock form and without adding things it appears that these engines seem to generally do OK despite the hyperbole of the internet and the spot failures. As you deviate from the stock configuration and/or increase the load/duty cycle the rates of failure seem like they logically go up.

I have a buddy that built his own turbo kit for his '13 BRZ and has made it a point to try and limit both temps and boost (under 10psi) to try and extend the engine's life. We'll see if that strategy works or not.

So, in the end, there probably isn't anything (looking forward) that will match your current turbo BRZ's performance level for the money. Obviously I'm not in the camp of the more expensive boosted car because it costs too much IMO. Of course I'm not boosted either. I'm responding in this thread because I'm hoping to learn something that will dispel what I already think. So far, I'm not seeing anything that changes my belief that boosting the engine with stock internals is a long term strategy. That doesn't make anyone else wrong for doing it. It just means that I need to find that point when it will make sense.

[autoracer86]

What does long term mean to you @RT-BRZ ?

Also @CSG Mike do you have a build thread or anything like that on your car

Thanks all

[RT-BRZ]

Originally Posted by autoracer86

What does long term mean to you @RT-BRZ ?

Also @CSG Mike do you have a build thread or anything like that on your car

Thanks all

Long term to me means running the car as long as I can. In more concise terms, I'm thinking 3-5 years using it as a HPDE type car. If I were using it for actual W2W then I would think a single season would be the goal.

If I'm using it as a daily driver with some fun to be had once or twice a year then I think long term means until I get rid of the car.

Honestly, I've never blown an engine in any car I've owned in the last 30+ years. Of course I haven't driven any of them into the ground so there's still time to do it.

[autoracer86]

3 years seems pretty possible for a turbo track car. I guess it all depends on how many events/laps you do. I keep saying I will keep the gt86 for a long time but in the past I haven’t kept a car over a year lol

[RedReplicant]

I had an aftermarket turbo car that a w2w spec series was built around - a S1 SuperMiata.

There was a lot of development behind that thing to get it to the point of running a season of half hour races reliably, and that was with the power turned down to 220whp from the ~375whp the hardware was more than willing to make unrestricted.

949 Emilio took one of the exact same spec build, turned the power up to 300whp, strapped on Hoosier A7s, a bigger splitter, and a bigger wing and won Global Time Attack Super Lap Battle Unlimited RWD with it by doing 1:44 at Buttonwillow in 2017. No power steering, no ABS, no traction control.

I would seriously not want to deal with the pain or development cost of running a non-OEM FI car for competitive purposes. Trackdays are fine, when you need the car to be reliable across a season while beating the shit out of it or lapping consistently at or close to competitive class track record pace is another thing entirely.

[autoracer86]

Yeah 100% doing a few hot laps then pitting is not the same as w2w racing and or driving 10/10th for wins. The open pit lane style they run in Europe is new to me but I really enjoy being able to control when I’m on track and for how long.

Makes it very easy to look after the car and still have fun.

[GrandSport]

Originally Posted by RT-BRZ

Long term to me means running the car as long as I can. In more concise terms, I'm thinking 3-5 years using it as a HPDE type car. If I were using it for actual W2W then I would think a single season would be the goal.

If I'm using it as a daily driver with some fun to be had once or twice a year then I think long term means until I get rid of the car.

Honestly, I've never blown an engine in any car I've owned in the last 30+ years. Of course I haven't driven any of them into the ground so there's still time to do it.

I think it depends on how hard you are on it and how many HPDE events you'll do a year. I probably get about ~8 hours of track time a month in my car. At that rate, every 2 years is pretty darn good (200 hours, roughly 15k miles). There's no way in hell it lasts 5 (500hours).

I think you'll go through a lot more reliability issues than complete engine failure. Leaks, misc parts, drivetrain, etc.

Honestly, the engine isn't even that big of a cost in the grand scheme of things. Turn key, installed, with a 1yr warranty from the dealer, I got a new engine for $6500. That's $32.50/hr. Obviously, a lot of that was labor. I was too busy with work at the time to mess with it.

My tires ($800) last, at most, 8 hours. That's $100/hr.

Heck, my fuel consumption (at $6/gal for track fuel prices) is probably about the same price.

[GrandSport]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

Which would you suggest, that approximately matches my turbo BRZ's performance level? I've not yet found one! The closest ones all cost FAR more than what's in the BRZ, and simultaneously manage to cost way more to run.

Then again, having a warranty is nice; that's definitely where the extra money spent goes.

Curious - what does your car run/have/put down and what would be the cost (for a customer) to duplicate the build?