Diesel turbos on gas cars?

I have found some stupidly cheap '03 Cobra blower cams and thinking of using them in my 4.6 DOHC Lincoln motor I'm putting in my Challenge car. Superchargers within the GRM budget that will work with the "B" head compatible intakes are not apparently available.

But I can find diesel truck turbos within budget all day long.

Add to this that I've got 2 motors that I can use to spool it (a 2.0 Zetec in front, and 4.6 in back), and I've got some reasonable turbine turning power. I also don't want to run but 8lbs of boost or so, as I have no budget for forged motor internals, or really any 'actual' racing parts inside the 4.6.

Is there any reason diesel turbos couldn't be used? Is the diesel boost pressure too high? Is there a reasonable way to modify the waste gate to make more reasonable boost numbers? Seeing a lot of CL ads for F250 & F350 diesel turbos in reasonable shape for less than a couple hundred.

It's relatively safe... if you have a boost controller. Still, the horses you will get from that setup will be great. The torque will be astronomical. just don't mount them to the Zetec, Please.

you are having 2 engines in your car?

At first I thought you'd never get the things to spool, since the displacement of those diesels is way greater, but they also don't turn those things very fast. Interesting thought and I hope someone has some real answers.

In reply to icaneat50eggs:

Yep, Zetec in front, 4.6 Lincoln Continental Automatic in the back, all in an '86 Ford Escort: www.littlelamborghini.com

it depends on what truck he gets the turbo from. Things like box trucks have relatively small engines with low redlines.. a small 12 or 14 mitsu boxtruck might have a 4 cylinder turbo diesel.. it can;t be too large of that small engine would never get it to spool up before the engine hit it's redline at 3K rpms

Honda guys put holsets on cars all the time - it's fine

OP, what's your budget for turbo?

I've seen a few FD RX-7s make 350 whp with stock cummins turbos with full bar of boost available by ~3500rpm. So if one of the inline 6 cummins turbo's can spool a 2.6L, you should be fine.

AutoXR wrote: Honda guys put holsets on cars all the time - it's fine

This. I ran one on a Ford 2.3L Lima for awhile. Just get the right sized one (think Dodge diesel pickups).

The 7.3L Powerstroke turbos apparently spool a 302 nicely. They're reverse rotation, IIRC, so changing housings is limited.

In reply to 92CelicaHalfTrac: what's your budget for turbo? $200 and a case of beer.

Does this answer your question?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAliENe3GcA

If you're not worried about long term reliability (100,000+ miles) you'll be fine. The big difference between a turbo designed for diesels and one designed for gas engines is the metallurgy of the turbine stage. Gas engines typically have much higher EGTs so the turbine wheels and housings have fancier (more expensive) metals mixed into the cast iron to make them survive longer with higher temperature swings.

Bob

sporqster wrote: In reply to 92CelicaHalfTrac: what's your budget for turbo? $200 and a case of beer.

Yeah you're looking at used Holsets more than likely, then.

For a 4.6, i wouldn't look any smaller than an HX40.

sporqster wrote: I have found some stupidly cheap '03 Cobra blower cams and thinking of using them in my 4.6 DOHC Lincoln motor I'm putting in my Challenge car. Superchargers within the GRM budget that will work with the "B" head compatible intakes are not apparently available.

You might have the budget, the roll cage tubing you bought, its on your site, is considered "safety" right and not part of the budget which gives you another 317$ to play with.

Yeah Holsets are REAL common in the import industry. I suspect my mx6 will end up with one eventually, likely post-challenge.

wearymicrobe wrote: You might have the budget, the roll cage tubing you bought, its on your site, is considered "safety" right and not part of the budget which gives you another 317$ to play with.

I wish, and maybe I'll make that argument if I get into a tight spot budget wise (I have no decent tires in budget so far)

But the cage is welded to the car (not bolt in) and the back half of the cage also serves to hold the V8 subframe in place, so it clearly has performance enhancing function.

In some respects the bigger turbos are safer (in terms of bent rods) than smaller turbos as they do not make boost until the motor is spinning. People on turbobricks and volvospeed, particularly the Swedish people, use the Holsets to great effect on stock internals.

I have messed with a powerstroke turbo on my 2010 Challenge car. I was running a 350 and it would spool up fine, (accidentaly made 22psi buring a long burnout) but the thing would run out of steam before the engine reached 6000 rpm. I did have the turbo from a van which will spool up much better than the truck version so you may want to look for one of those (I don't recall the A/R ratio but it was favorable to the pickup version)

Shaun wrote: In some respects the bigger turbos are safer (in terms of bent rods) than smaller turbos as they do not make boost until the motor is spinning. People on turbobricks and volvospeed, particularly the Swedish people, use the Holsets to great effect on stock internals.

Same reason that a 3076 is actually safer on an ms3 than the stock k04.

I believe the powerstrokes use a variant of a GT37 turbo, and a lot of diesel turbo's are variable vain with no wastegates.

The HX series seem to come with wastegates though. I know on most gasoline turbos, if ran with no boost controller, the wastegate will limit boost to 8lbs. With performance turbos getting an optional 14lbs wastegate spring.

Not sure what the wastegate springs of a diesel turbo would be, but I imagine a lot more. Experiment with spring swaps, or find a wastegate actuator off of a gasoline car. You could also loosen the actuator rod so that it is longer and therefor opens sooner to limit your boost.

since ya'll are much more familiar with specific turbo specs than I am, can anyone recommend a turbo that spins at the lowest compressor RPM that would be effective for a 3.0? I understand it might not spool till pretty far up the rev range, but if that's a lower priority issue, what do you think? looking for potential for 400-450hp with a 6-6.5k redline if that helps.

bluej wrote: since ya'll are much more familiar with specific turbo specs than I am, can anyone recommend a turbo that spins at the lowest compressor RPM that would be effective for a 3.0? I understand it might not spool till pretty far up the rev range, but if that's a lower priority issue, what do you think? looking for potential for 400-450hp with a 6-6.5k redline if that helps.

I would look into a holset hy35, he341, or he351. All of them should make your power goal and spool fairly quickly.

Hou 'bout this then? ;-)

http://louisville.craigslist.org/pts/2861776236.html

Ask the guys with the Condor Speed Shop team. http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/condor-speed-shop-2010-challenge-car-build/27209/page1/

We ran a story on their challenge in last year's October issue. https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/issues/details/184/?KeepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=480&width=700

They mounted a Holset turbo to it. Ran 20-something psi, no problem. From the story:

A couple of T3 flanges and some scrap square tubing did the job. "Because the Holset was a twin scroll, I kept the exhaust gasses divided in the adapter piece using a steel plate welded inside," Carlos adds. "That's why it spools so quickly for such a big turbo."