Turbo or SR20DE?

[CMF_jaxx]

Turbo or SR20DE?

Well, Im in serious doubt at the moment. Do I do this, do I do that, which order, when, cost aaahhhh! Im sure most fanatics have been down this route before. Im literally stuck with 2 options. But which one do I go down:

Option 1:

Do I turbo my micra? Bearing in mind I have Cisco’s custom HPC coated turbo exhaust manifold and down pipe. Plus Cisco’s old T25 turbo on its way. The idea with this option is;

a)
Get above fitted with GReddy E-manage ECU. Few months later (hopefully engine in good condition) install intercooler and pipe work. Then up the boost. Around 9 or 10psi I would be happy with. But realistically this engine will not last forever with a turbo on even lower psi let alone 9 or 10psi. So forged pistons and rods then come into the scenario. Then I will be making more boost, then gearbox mods……….you see were im going don’t you. Don’t get me wrong im well up for going to the dark side with my micra. But im more leaning to option 2 at the moment.

b)
Source a 1.3 engine (again, mine did used to me a 1.0L, but carried out the 1.3L conversion), GET A REBUILD, forged pistons and rods. Bored out to suit pistons; 1mm overbore. Then add the turbo, intercooler, pipe work, Greddy E-manage, larger injectors, better radiator (datrats one), 1.5/2mm metal head gasket, lightened flywheel (either Jun or datrats) heavy-duty clutch (datrats). Might consider high lift cams from datrats, might not work well with this set up though. Finished! Apart from brake and suspension upgrades obviously!

Option 2:

This is the option im more leaning to at the moment, its bin done before in the UK as far as I know so it’s nothing new. And the video in the other post on this site is aaww inspiring. TO CARRY OUT ANOTHER ENGINE SWAP WITH AN SR20DE. Possibly SR20DET, but that personally is a bit to mad.

The disadvantages I can gather is the weight in the front of such a small car like the micra. But to be honest I aint I mad flying maniac around corners so as far as “you wont be able to do 100mph around a 90 degree corner” speech. It doesn’t bother me. Another a personal downer is that even though it’s a micra ‘car’ it wont be using the cg13de engine in which I was out to prove everyone (mates etc) wrong and show that it could make and take big power using a turbo.

Although the up side to all this…….bloody hell it’s a 2.0L micra wow!

‘Nice looking car mate….1.0L is it?’

*I SMILE, SHOULDERS BACK, HEAD UP*

‘No mate it’s a 2.0L’

You know what im getting at! And after researching a bit I gather the following hassles in swapping to such a larger engine:

• Present Engine mounts will need to be removed completely
• New engine mounts welded to chassis
• As far as ‘what to buy’: engine, gearbox, intake manifold, drive shafts, wiring loom. Might be easier to buy a written off pulsar or something.

If I was going down option 2 I would obviously do a lot more info searching on ‘WHAT I WOULD NEED’ and costs of the whole job. But as far as costs are concerned option 2 I think would be the cheapest. Plus I would be able to sell my engine/gearbox…the full lot and not forgetting the custom manifold, down pipe and T25 turbo.

So people, sorry about the long read but I really need your opinions and advice.

Turbo or SR20DE?

 

[CMF_Brendon]

why dont you go for a 1.6L motor cause i think with the 2L might be hard to get engineered coz you have to do some cutting of the body to fit the sr20 in. i thought my engine bay is tight in the gtir but man that is gonna be so squishy to work on.
find a good 1.6L then work on that.

 

[CMF_evade]

b)
Source a 1.3 engine (again, mine did used to me a 1.0L, but carried out the 1.3L conversion), GET A REBUILD, forged pistons and rods. Bored out to suit pistons; 1mm overbore. Then add the turbo, intercooler, pipe work, Greddy E-manage, larger injectors, better radiator (datrats one), 1.5/2mm metal head gasket, lightened flywheel (either Jun or datrats) heavy-duty clutch (datrats). Might consider high lift cams from datrats, might not work well with this set up though. Finished! Apart from brake and suspension upgrades obviously!

Why would you do all that and use an emanage?

You're obviously going to be outlaying a load of cash already...You'd be silly to skimp out on management.

Microtech, EMS Stinger, Hawk are all affordable and have all been used with turbo setups on micra's before and can be had for about $1000 ex tuning/install.

 

[CMF_Snoopy]

dibs on the manifold, pipe & turbo if you sell it

 

[CMF_Yom]

Forget the GA16....

jaxx - i think you should talk to the relevant authorities in your area regarding insurance, engineering and the legalities of what you're attempting to do.

Also consider reliability. I for one would hint that if you didnt cut any corners an SR20DE in a K11 would be more reliable on a day to day basis than a turbocharged CG13.

Oh yeh - your idea of putting a Pulsar/Almera loom into the k11 isnt such a bad idea. Strip out everything relating to the original CG and bring in the SR loom. You might have a bit of exess wiring length but that can be taken care of - but more importantly there will be minimal wire cutting.

Goodluck with whatever you choose - and don't forget to weigh up the costs of doing the modifications versus buying a car which is already faster (like Pulsar SSS/Almera/Sunny GTi/Primera, etc)

 

[CMF_Yom]

PS: what i mean by more reliable is that you will be using second hand components and it is a known fact that second hand turbo components arent always in fantastic condition.

Take into consideration the car's age as well.

The only person on this forum who's had their turbo k11 long enough to talk about reliability is White Knight with his Family Hack and that car is a lovely low KM example.

simply mighty didnt keep his for long enough (but all is now forgiven), cisco is always doing something to make more power , evade has killed the original drivetrain of his car (headgasket, gearbox) and the other fella, Gareth i think his name was hasnt been online to tell us what he has broken.

Thats just what I've seen, and it is the same sort of stuff on the pulsar forums with their turbo conversions.

You do have less chance of issues arising with a naturally aspirated setup, IMO.

 

[CMF_White Knight]

Gareth has not broken anything as far as I know and his is also a low boost option ie Family Hack. If you are happy with 6/7 psi boost the CG13DE on stock standard internals is fine. Hack around 20,000 kl and 2 years since turbo and running like a dream. ONLY thing you have to be very sure of is fuel/air ratio as after 4psi you are running lean. Bigger injectors or a 5th.one.
IF you want big boost well its a whole new ball game.The CG13de will handle it if you do the internal mods,new management system, plus gearbox.
As far as getting it registered from what I can see from other states less hassels if its the original motor. They seem to get excited if you have shoved something bigger in the front as then they pay a lot more attention to suspension, brakes etc.
I am biased and overall the CG13DE is a fine motor but with any motor if you are going to extract massive amounts out of it, it will need attention.Still cars like Hack, Brendon are churning out double the original KWs on stock internals.
Still be nice to see someone do an engine transplant.
In the end its how much money/time you are prepared to commit and even after doing all the sums add another 20% to the money factor.

 

[CMF_kneival]

Stick with the 1.3.

Fitting the 2.0 is mega bucks even if you do it yourself!.

 

[CMF_jamm'n]

For me, the whole idea is>>>What can be achieved from the existing motor?
i mean can't any idiot bolt a 5 litre V8 to a mini.
ok ok, a micra with a sr20de would be quick, but its too far removed from a real micra to really be considered a micra in my eyes, sure i'll look at it and i wouldn't say no to a drive but i feel as if the original micra has almost been disrespected. Anyway...
keep the cg13de and blow it :-D

 

[CMF_jaxx]

hi guys. i will do more research for the moment on engine transplant option, will try to get in contact with the
guy(s) that have done it them selfs. who as actuall done it? who from Uk? and find out how much effort is involved in the conversion.

at the mo tho. option a) might be a good idea until i decide what to do. at the end of the day i only need to install what i have now and get a tunner to finish off the job to have a low boosted micra.

as far as a lower cc engine like the 1.6L is concerned, good idea mate, wil think of that approach as well. think 1.6 is as low as i would go though.

i think what is making me lean to option 2 is the fact that i have done an engine swap before...the hasttle and overall cost is not what i had in mind....but the results were instantley noticable and worth the blood and tears of the conversion.

might phone a few insurance companies this week, have a laugh with them eh?

 

[CMF_evade]

Haha you can't compare white knigh to family hack to evade to cisco to gareth to reverb etc etc.

a car's reliability is pretty much relative to how you drive it, how much money you spend and how much research you've done....and being some of the pioneers of turbo micra's here in oz if we hadn't been the ones breaking things and actually spending money trying this stuff out..then the rest of you wouldn't have a clue about whats reliable and whats not.

Don't insult the rest of us by saying that that dave is the only person people can talk to about reliability...in the end we're all the ones that spent the real cash in actually finding out WHAT is reliable

..for the better of the community.

BTW my car was fine. It's only when I decided to up the boost and change ECU that I started breaking things. My gearbox didn't break due to power. It broke due to me ignoring the oil leak it had...

Cisco is the one who found out he limits of the gearbox..remember he stripped 2nd gear..if you were here back then.

 

[cisco]

Yeah I would add a couple of things.

- GA16DE's AREN'T a bolt-in. They require cutting and hacking of the chassis/body so the pulleys clear. I saw this being done at Mulholland in Japan. But apart from that, I believe its a bolt-in. Where as an SR might be heaps more work.

Now to totally support the points evade is making.
Yes if you went from nothing to my car and were the first to do it, the thing is NEVER on the road - its a long road a long path of lots of downtime, but that was all to learn and develop all the things that you can mostly just go out and buy now. Over the last couple of years, I haven't made a single micra meet etc. BUT, that's from pioneering a lot of annoying things. I have learnt so much, if I had all the cash in the bank in one hit now I could do everything in EXACTLY the correct order and have everything made EXACTLY to my specs and I could build my setup rock solid and 100% reliable with minimal downtime. Its just really taken so long to learn what works, what doesn't. But that's all been done now. My car really is totally reliable now. It drives like a champion and all the gear is rock solid.

Just don't get any of the work done by idiots, and really be specific about them making everything 100% to your specs.

The CG13DE is a brilliant flexibile engine (they use them in forklifts damnit - haha see other thread).

Personally, I would do it all again and set the CG13DE up perfectly and man you are so rewarded when you drive it.
Driving my engine now is just f*cking fantastic, and it pulls past ANYTHING, burns little fuel when you're cruising off boost, and oh how I love to say to people "yeah man its just a little one point three" - you can't beat that. Noone can believe the tiny capacity of the engine for the power and g-force you get out of it.

SR would be wild for drag strip and street monster agree, but I even hated the feel of my car when it had the ABS, battery and intercooler/turbo all in the front, I couldn't imagine it with an SR.

SR videos of micras look so awesome, but to drive and feel the car in real life, I guarantee you would lose a fair bit of practical cornering fun factor and it feels pretty top heavy.

 

[cisco]

AND just to add..

There's a maximum limit to the amount of usable torque/power in a front wheel drive micra. An SR is going to reach that limit pretty quickly. You can reach that same limit with a strong CG turbo setup.. So would you rather reach that same power limit with a much heavier engine, or with a smaller/factory/lighter/original engine, that still cruises and has consumption like a 1.3 when off boost (providing you have good ECU and tuning setup).

 

[CMF_jaxx]

if i would go down 1 of the paths it will be all the way.

cg13de:

turbo set up, piston, rods etc, full job eventually.

sr20det:

again all the way. and to 'top' what (i think) no one has done before, is instead of speading money on above setup (pistons and roads set you back way over a £1000) i would put that money to the FWD set up.

so either option i go down i will eventually go all the way.

.........just it seems that the 2.0L will be cheaper and see more power than a turboed micra in a hell of a shorter space of time.

questions:

sr20de and sr20det. the t is the turboed engine correct?
who has done it in the UK, wish to contact them for some advice?
which car is the 2.0L out of. trying to sort out insurance quotes. want to get a quote first for the car its coming out of.

just so i can see what the difference is from insuring the original car and the 2.0L mod of the engine in a micra. cheers

 

[cisco]

One beauty of a big turbo'd CG.

You can use boost control really accurately to bleed boost away when you don't need it. I.e. to control wheelspin.

My car will continuously wheel spin through 1st and 2nd gears if you drive it hard with your foot to the floor - 3rd is close to breaking traction and I fear that it will in the middle winter when temps drop and oxygen gets denser. In the wet 4th gear will probably break traction.

Its not like there's a lack of power. But the ideal thing would be to run like 6psi in 1st gear, 12psi in 2nd gear, then 18-20psi in the other gears. Right now I have a 9psi/18psi high/low button, so its almost as good. About halfway through 2nd gear, hit the afterburner.

 

[CMF_Yom]

I would like to make a small admission and point out that I'm a damn scatterbrain.

I don't know whats come over me lately but I shouldnt have made such personal comments comparing cisco/aaron and aaron/evade, white knight's family hack and gareth's car.

I should clarify that I formed that post directly around what was available on these forums (and what i've observed in the past watching people). I didnt intend for it to be so personal and I apologise for my mistake.

But now you've posted up replying to the problems I pointed out you had experienced... Which is good. There is discussion of the problems encountered, but nothing relating to what actually caused them and what you were running prior to the failures (most of which happened on the old forum database).
Hopefully now jaxx will be able to form a better picture of how much he has to spend to achieve the sort of power/get up and go he is looking for.

 

[cisco]

yay

 

[CMF_kneival]

raceworx is the best bloke to talk too about the conversion, he is currently doing it. Nice bloke, im sure he will help you.

I do know its cost him a small fortune! You could buy a pulsar and tune it...

 

[CMF_jaxx]

insurance quotes:

basically its a joke. 2.0L from a GTIR i would pay an extra £1392/$3289 AUS which would last me up to the end of next Jan.

then i asked about a 1.6 from an almera. same as above but only an extra £372/$879 *ONLY ha ha*.

the turbo depends on what bhp increase. not spot on but it is more or less based on...10bhp increase your premium goes up 10% etc.

 

[CMF_evade]

hahah thats rediculous, odd how the insurance goes up there.

my insurance is about 720 a year full comp with everything declared..

fine line between what 'legal and roadworthy mods' though i think for just cars.

ehh it doesnt really bother me

 

[CMF_White Knight]

No worries Yom.All us forced guys have been down various paths and have learnt many things along the way. No one has exactly the same set up and well most of us have broken something along the line.
The great thing is we now have a pretty good idea of what can be achieved. As Cisco said if we knew all the answers before we started out we all would have done things differently and most likely saved a lot of time and money.
Luckily for the rest of us Cisco was the pioneer and at least we had some guidlines to follow.If Cisco had not started the site I bet many of us would not be here today fanging around in a Micra and ignorant of its potential.
The graet thing to me was starting a journey with many unknows as that what makes it exciting and when you get there the feeling of satisfaction is immense.
That we have this site to throw questions at and get some really good feed back is the greatest.
Thanks to all who take time to contribute.

 

[CMF_kneival]

Have you tried adrian flux?

With all the mods now declared and insured my insurance was actually less than when with Tesco insurance!

 

[CMF_jaxx]

knieval, what have you declared. that quote was with adrian flux, and am currentley with them now. ha. gonna give liverpool victoria a call tomorrow.

to insure the 2.0L gtir on its own would be around £1700, ridiculous really.

might make another thread on insurance.

 

[CMF_kneival]

All the mods in my profile, there is no turbo or 2.0 engine tho!

Deffo contact raceworx.... He has sorted insurance for his 2.0....

 

[CMF_K11SS]

i would like to add that doin the sr20det the bulkhead has to be moved back 4 inches so the gearbox lines up with wheels, i know this as dave bull(the man who made the ridiculous sr20det car and the vido) this conversion cost into 5 figures in pounds and countless number of days in garage changin clutch n gearboxes etc. this car wrecked a performance clutch from america in a few days.

i would also say cg13 turbocharged as i myself have already looked into sr20 and ga16 both turbo'd and came out with the result of charging the micra!

 

[CMF_jaxx]

just contacted raceworks.

will hopefully get some info back from him. gonna try get some costs today about the conversion or the turboed option

 

[CMF_kneival]

Apparently the bulkhead does not have to be moved, but i did hear the "little bandit" car the bulkhead was moved.

That £5k probably didnt include the price of the engine :-o

I would say between £7 and 10k for a garage to do a good conversion! The thing is you can tune up the micra engine until its stupidly powerfull and you cant get traction. So really whats the point in putting in a 2.0T in?

 

[CMF_jaxx]

7 to 10K seems a little to much estimating that. think people are getting to excited about the whole costing thing.

anyway my T25 turned up today. so i now got manifold, turbo, downpipe. the turbo needs a litle work. anyone know cheap places to get oil return lines etc and actuator.

as far as the fabrication side of things go; is it easier to just pay the garage to get them fabricated. or did you guys go out and get the bends, piping etc yourself and have a play with the welder.

 

[CMF_Polar]

would be a good thing if the bulkhead was modified to have the engine further back. would help with weight distribution. a very good rally micra i seen has a 2.0 engine fitted way back into a new bulkhead and its sits longitudinaly. and also to give great handling is rwd.

 

[CMF_jaxx]

THATS PURE MODIFICATION, WOULDNT GO THAT EXTREME LOL

 

[CMF_micrat]

I have VERY carefully studied photos posted by raceworx and Dave (you know the red k11 in uk). I spent many hours looking at these and measuring before I began my own SR engine coversion into a k11. I must say (in my opinion) that the conversion by raceworx is an engineering nightmare/disaster. The way they have just chopped of the factory body mounts and made those ugly/rough mounts is to be ashamed of, the motor is way to far forward in the engine bay and the drive shaft angle would be extreme. And the radiator sits lower than the head-what a disaster!! Aussies should remember the problems doing this caused with VL commodores fitted with a perfectly good Nissan 6 they were always cracking heads.
Uk Dave's conversion. It is not necessary to move the firewall/bulkhead back. It is not a GTIR engine as suggested is it? Where are the quad throttle bodies, a standard plenumn/single throttle body manifold will not directly bolt to a GTIR head and why would you??? I am doing the conversion (GTIR engine with quad throttle bodies) without butchering the body/mounts, I will later post more details on the progress. I hope this helps to clarify some of the myths of fitting an SR into a k11

 

[CMF_jaxx]

hello guys, my T25 turbo came yesturday so, ive got the main bits to go turbo but still show a little interest in the 2.0L converison.

i need oil return lines and an actuator as far as i can see. can anyone source these at the right price. what else would i need as far as the turbo goes.

if anyone to can also source the turbo compressor piping i would be very greatful. if i had the money a few weeks ago then i would of bought them of cisco.

aaron if you dont want it, i will defo buy it off you.

 

[cisco]

Jaxx do you need my oil feed fitting (see cisco's micra parts emporium thread), or did the turbo have one of those included?

 

[CMF_Urban]

Also, I thought the SR20DE Was from a Primera? Not a GTi-R?

I thought i remember reading it in a post on the UK forum... Maybe i'm off my chops. Who knows... Spent 10 hours 30 minutes today doing assignments - My head feels like it's about to explodeeeeeeeeeee.

 

[CMF_jaxx]

when i was after insurance quotes, alot did say the sr20de was the primera.

Cisco; all i got was the turbo it self, will take some pics today and show you exactley what i got. if i need that cisco i will get it. but more inportantley is that compressor piping. can you source one or get one made up, whats the cost cisco. or can you get similar 'off-shelf'. cheers.

 

[CMF_micrat]

I apologise if I am incorrect, but when I initially spotted a thread leading to a video of Uk Dave's SR turbo powered red k11 at the drags, I thought it was titled something like GTi-R is in k11? If I am wrong- sorry

 

[CMF_jaxx]

this is the turbo i got yesturday from white night, originaly yours cisco ha, its traveled a bit then eh lol

should i buy a kit off ebay to rebuild it, send it off to get rebuilt or leave it? what else do i need as far as pipes and oil lead etc do i need just for this side of things.

 

[CMF_jaxx]

2/6

 

[CMF_jaxx]

3/6

seems to be catching, does it not?

 

[CMF_jaxx]

4/6

actuator snapped

 

[CMF_jaxx]

5/6

actuator snapped

 

[CMF_jaxx]

5/6..sorry about that lol

 

[CMF_jaxx]

6/6

 

[CMF_jaxx]

everything i have got, turbo related is below.

 

[CMF_jaxx]

just bin comparing the pics to when it was on ciscos car. is it me or is the turbo in my manifold up-side-down. but this is the only way they seem to go together.

 

[cisco]

The compressor housing has just been rotated, if its not done up tightly, you will be able to rotate it back down..

Otherwise undo the nuts and rotate it to point straight downwards so you can hook your pipework up to iy.

The manifold is the correct way around in your photo.

 

[CMF_evade]

which nuts do you undo? i want to do mine as well

 

[CMF_jaxx]

its the bolts in pic 1 and 4. will have to take them completeley off ,rotate and screw back on.

anyone selling anything i will need, like oil lines, actuators etc?

 

[CMF_nz_aj]

Personally I'd choose the NA route. I can't see how an SR fits in the engine bay but 110kW would mean running quite a lot of boost if the CG was retained. The SR20VE is basically the same size & thats 150kW. I doubt anybody has made anywhere near that power with a CG & it probably wouldn't be reliable.
Front drive can use plenty of power. Rothery N14 Pulsar has 360kW at the front wheels. It's at Christchurch this weekend & should post some quick times down the strip. It's still a road legal car, i.e. it gets driven to work/town sometimes.

 

[CMF_jaxx]

i think i defo decided i will go turbo, after all i have most of the stuff now to run low boost. just need do something about this turbo.