Twin turbo LSX swapped Is300 built by Dedicated-Matt
#19
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I was sick all last week and really lost a good amount of build time. I have however been working. I'll update with pics asap
Now does that make me a GM fan? No I've owned a handful of MKiv supras and have a deep love for the 2jzgte. Does swapping a cheap readily available engine into an affordable tasteful sedan make a good business model? YES!
#20
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Seems I'm a bit past due for an update.
Normally for these swaps I modify a stock GM pan to clear the subframe. This is fine and all but with this being a high HP engine I'd like to keep as much oil in the sump as possible. To do so I was forced to section the front cross-member. Nothing a 4.5 inch grinder and a tig welder cant fix.
Knowing the camber/toe sweep of the IS300 was a bit on the aggressive side I decided to make my own lower control arms with the idea of minimizing the steep camber/toe curve. While I didn't take any good pictures of it; I actually performed a few tests with the car sitting on our Hunter alignment machine. With the strut removed I could raise and lower the car simulating a bump or drag launch scenario. By doing so I calculated my lower control arm length reducing my camber/toe rate. Here's the modified top hat and tubular lower control arm.
They look cool and all but what I failed to notice is that with the strut mounting location above the center line of the the LCA upon weight transfer the strut would tend to rotate the lca. I learned something...awesome that's the idea of this project. Learning and evolving as I go
So on to the new design. Still unfinished in these pics I built some LCA's with a shock mounting point below the hub/subframe center line.
Its nice to work in a shop with all the right tools and the absolute best backdrop.
I decided to invert the double adjustable coil overs in favor of some extra sprung weight. (still with the old LCA's)
The money shot (wide angle lens) Lower LCA's installed and fuctional. More updates to come soon.
Normally for these swaps I modify a stock GM pan to clear the subframe. This is fine and all but with this being a high HP engine I'd like to keep as much oil in the sump as possible. To do so I was forced to section the front cross-member. Nothing a 4.5 inch grinder and a tig welder cant fix.
Knowing the camber/toe sweep of the IS300 was a bit on the aggressive side I decided to make my own lower control arms with the idea of minimizing the steep camber/toe curve. While I didn't take any good pictures of it; I actually performed a few tests with the car sitting on our Hunter alignment machine. With the strut removed I could raise and lower the car simulating a bump or drag launch scenario. By doing so I calculated my lower control arm length reducing my camber/toe rate. Here's the modified top hat and tubular lower control arm.
They look cool and all but what I failed to notice is that with the strut mounting location above the center line of the the LCA upon weight transfer the strut would tend to rotate the lca. I learned something...awesome that's the idea of this project. Learning and evolving as I go
So on to the new design. Still unfinished in these pics I built some LCA's with a shock mounting point below the hub/subframe center line.
Its nice to work in a shop with all the right tools and the absolute best backdrop.
I decided to invert the double adjustable coil overs in favor of some extra sprung weight. (still with the old LCA's)
The money shot (wide angle lens) Lower LCA's installed and fuctional. More updates to come soon.
#21
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Where do I start? The last couple months has been a sick and twisted time warp. Between working full time at T1 Race Development and living 50 miles from the shop I found myself pressed for time. A build of this caliber isn't meant to come together in a matter of weeks; most would take a better part of a year to complete. Just to give some background the short block hit my hands on Tuesday March 4th, we fired the car for the first time on Sunday the 9th, this is were I noticed the O-rings didn't crush completely, so now the heads come off Monday March 10th back on with some LS9 gaskets the same day and onto the dyno. With Tony Palo in control of the Motec M150 we finished on the Mainline dyno around 4am Tuesday morning making 700hp @11 psi and spinning with any additional boost.
From here I proceeded to grab a 4 hour nap, wake up, assemble the interior including the dash board, made a custom carbon bezel for the Motec dash, install bumpers, install the hood with the tedious Areo latches, among many other things. By now its Tuesday March the 11th around 6pm we have all the GTR's loaded and ready so I make a test pass down our street for a brake test and load it on the trailer. Now we're headed to college station for the roll races while I'm falling asleep behind the wheel towing 3 months of my life on the trailer lol.
So in the massive amount of spare time I had we never made time to up the boost. It made 16 psi on the Hennessey dynojet and laid down an un-optimized 861whp. Honestly I was just happy the ***** moved under its own power. In the time crunch I only installed the essentials while leaving out knock sensors, wheel speed, emap, brake pressure and a number of other items that would help this thing down the track.
Where do we go from here? We turn the damn boost up and dial in the motorsports side of the Motec, thats what we do! I have at least 10psi left on the table along with hours of tuning. I set the suspension up to be stiff so I could make some shake down passes with a lot of vehicle feed back. First pass ever was a 10.88 @134 with a embarrassing 2.2 60 ft lifting around the 1000 ft mark. This car will be very fast in the near future. I consider this to be my master project and I wont stop until the beast is completed.
For everyone who supported me through the build I thank you. And to everyone who shook my hand and introduced themselves hopefully we'll meet again.
Here's the Revvolution artical written by Stuart Leiby
http://www.revvolution.com/blog/2014...-swapped-is300
First hit hazing the tires
#26
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No offense to ISaL3x, but how jaded have we become in the car world when 1000bhp and a 10.8 "shakedown" pass is a "let down" lol. Quite honestly if it were my car I would dial back the boost and get used to the car, get the 60' down and just enjoy racing and driving that beast. I guess as I've gotten older numbers mean less and overall car experience means more, and good god would I love that car experience. Definitely jealous!