Project: SuperHatch's Drag VH powered S14

[SuperHatch]

Got the intake done and some of the exhaust...

Exhaust is 3" mandrel bent mild steel...









Intake is 3.5" mandrel bent mild steel...

[Carl H]

looking good man, from what it looks like your engine sits about where mine does...but yet i dont think i'll be able to close the hood without cutting a huge hole in the hood.it appears that the s14 chassis places the engine lower in the bay, even comparing my s13 to my s14 it appears that the assumption is correct.

[SuperHatch]

looking good man, from what it looks like your engine sits about where mine does...but yet i dont think i'll be able to close the hood without cutting a huge hole in the hood.it appears that the s14 chassis places the engine lower in the bay, even comparing my s13 to my s14 it appears that the assumption is correct.

Thanks Carl,

The hood barely closes in my car, and all of the supports under the hood are gutted for clearance. I also lowered my front crossmember by 3/16" with some aluminum bar stock as spacers. I know it kills the front end gometry, but as this car will only ever go in a straight line, that didn't bother me much.

Judging from the clearances in my old S13s compared to this car, I believe you're right....

[SuperHatch]

She Lives!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnjbNA17M8s


Modified by SuperHatch at 7:23 PM 9/3/2008

[gs14racer]

Congrats, i remember the feeling. Headers look great very similar to how mine looked. The headers are a ***** to get in and out, the ones mazworx has coming out can be gotten in and out with the engine in the car, although you have to switch from studs to bolts.

[npez]

She Lives!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnjbNA17M8s

Steve,

Congratulations! Car sounds great - all your hard work paid off!

Awesome I'm really happy for you

Nick.

[SuperHatch]

Congrats, i remember the feeling. Headers look great very similar to how mine looked. The headers are a ***** to get in and out, the ones mazworx has coming out can be gotten in and out with the engine in the car, although you have to switch from studs to bolts.

Thanks!

Yeah they were a pain to get in and out, it's now the hardest engine to pull that I've ever worked on... haha

Mazworx' headers look great, but I'm 95% sure they wouldn't work for me. I think they hug the Z32 trans too tightly and wouldn't clear the much larger TH400 that I'm running... oh well!

[SuperHatch]

Steve,

Congratulations! Car sounds great - all your hard work paid off!

Awesome I'm really happy for you

Nick.

Thanks Nick!

The video doesn't even do the sound justice... with the open & true dual 3" exhaust it just sounds amazing, and it revs so fast! I was really happy with how drama-free the first start was (with the exception of the oil sender wire coming off of the back of the gauge, that's what I get for "rigging" it temporarily)

Can't wait til you get your bling machine running!

[SuperHatch]

Well, had some converter fitment issues, so I sent that back out this week. JW said it should be a quick turnaround and I should have it back by next weekend.

[Carl H]

is that 3" intake tubing or 3.5", if 3.5" where did you get it?

[ThoraldShib]

Looks and sounds great man!

[SuperHatch]

is that 3" intake tubing or 3.5", if 3.5" where did you get it?

3.5", and they're actually mandrel exhaust bends that I got from summit.

[SuperHatch]

Finally got my exhaust setup complete... I was going to post pictures, but then I just decided to put a video together instead:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKRl3rJJR2w

It's a true dual setup. I needed to modify the spare tire well to clear the passenger side muffler and add a hangar. I also created a template for the drivers side exhaust cutout on the bumper and duplicated it on the passenger side. The tow hook also needed to be removed... I think it came out pretty decent. Not sure how much I like the sound since it's pretty raspy, but we'll see if it grows on me. I might add a pair of resonators in the straight sections after the x-pipe to tone it down a bit. Even though it's a dedicated track car it still needs to pass a 92db test at e-town to run mean-street.

[Carl H]

exhaust looks good man but it might be me or might be youtube's crappy video sound quality but it doesnt sound like its firing on all 8.

[SuperHatch]

It's not you or youtube... it has an intermittent miss. I'm betting on an injector about to say goodnight, but I'm not positive yet. When I first fired the car it had one completely dead cylinder. After a short time it came to life, and now from time to time it has a slight miss. Considering the motor hasn't been run in quite a while I'm going to let it run for a bit and see if things free up. If it doesn't get any better I'll dig into it more. Time will tell...

[SuperHatch]

Well, made it out to Atco last night... had a great time for her maiden voyage. This car draws lots of attention, no one expects that sound from this car.

Keep in mind the night was completely a shakedown night. The linelock, transbrake, and 2-step were not hook up yet. I was launching the car softly at 2k RPM using the footbrake.

Best two passes of the night....

12.80 @ 105.5 w/ 1.80 60'

12.89 @ 106.9 w/ 1.89 60'

The used slicks I got at the local swap meet are shot, so I'm not really sure I can get them to hook once all the launch enhancers are working, but we'll see. Unfortunately the scales were not working since it was a street night, so I still don't have a weight. All in all, I'm happy with the time. If I can manage a 1.5x short time, the ET should drop to the mid-low 12 second range which is exactly what I expected.

One other issue, and maybe some of the more Q45 saavy can help me out. Every single run, at the top of 3rd gear the motor hit fuel cut, then came back to life. It was almost like it happened after the same amount of time at WOT, since it did not occur at the same RPM every time. I don't have a vehicle speed sensor, could that be my problem? It was a cut, then back, and it didn't cut again as I continued through the RPM range. Very odd...

[Carl H]

those are some great passes for an otherwise stock engine man.your fuel cut has to do with how the ecu is setup stock...email me and we can chat about specifics.

[konatown]

Thats an ECU issue with the fuel cut-off.

Very good times for a first run, congrats. I bet it was all worth it to hear that motor and see the surprise on the faces of the onlookers.

P.S. We've now installed 4 TRD superchargers on the 5.7 Tundras. 2 were sent to Saudi Arabia. We took one of the two CrewMax's to the local track (1/8th mile) and ran mid 8s in 4WD with stock 18inchers. Absolute demon of a truck and the system is very, very quiet.

[SuperHatch]

those are some great passes for an otherwise stock engine man.your fuel cut has to do with how the ecu is setup stock...email me and we can chat about specifics.

I'll send you an email tonight... I have a spare ECU I can send out to be flashed, so if that's the solution I'm ready to go.

[SuperHatch]

Thats an ECU issue with the fuel cut-off.

Very good times for a first run, congrats. I bet it was all worth it to hear that motor and see the surprise on the faces of the onlookers.

P.S. We've now installed 4 TRD superchargers on the 5.7 Tundras. 2 were sent to Saudi Arabia. We took one of the two CrewMax's to the local track (1/8th mile) and ran mid 8s in 4WD with stock 18inchers. Absolute demon of a truck and the system is very, very quiet.

I didn't get to see the looks on their faces, but my buddies in the stands did. I had a number of people approach me and say that they were expecting to see a SBC under the hood judging by the sound. To their suprise it wasn't...

I didn't even realize the SC kits for the tundras had been released. Ah well... I'm happy with the performance as it is.

[konatown]

I'm sure they are available nationally. But because of our location near the factory (10minute drive), we installed the first 4 available. Had a TRD technical engineer, Jason, come in to help with the installs. Was a very good experience for our younger technicians that got to install them. Also had a promotional chassis dyno on the lot that week to promote and give IS-F owners a chance to put the pedal down. We had a ton of fun that week!

Anyway, back on topic, keep up the awesome work

[SuperHatch]

Got some new meats... these should help any traction issues.

[USsil80]

wow .. i love the look of it from the rear... did you cut the secound cutout looks really good

[gs14racer]

looks awsome, remove your license plate from the pic

[SuperHatch]

wow .. i love the look of it from the rear... did you cut the secound cutout looks really good

Thanks. Yea I cut it out myself. I used tissue paper (the stuff you wrap presents with) and taped it on the left side of the bumper. Then I traced the left side of the license plate hole, the horizontal crease of the bumper, and the exhaust hole. I then flipped the tissue paper to the other side and lined up the horizontal line and the license plate marks. I heated the bumper up with a heat gun and used a razor knife to cut it. It cut like butter. Took me 10 minutes to do, tops. The real work was in notching the spare tire well to fit the muffler.

looks awsome, remove your license plate from the pic

Thanks, I'll do that when I get a chance.

[SuperHatch]

Some more recent pics... detailed the car. Unfortunately all the polishing in the world won't get rid of dings, but the paint did clean up well...

This is my rig for getting the car to the track...













This is how I installed my line lock, simple and effective...



Here's my 2-step installed, yes it works...



Anyway, leaving on my honeymoon tomorrow morning, see you all in a couple weeks.

[SuperHatch]

Well,

Just got back from my honeymoon, had an absolute blast in San Diego, LA, Cabo, Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta...

It's nice to be home, I'm heading to Atco Thursday. I tuned the car with an AFC on 109 and added some timing the old fashioned way two days before the wedding. Picked up 20 at the wheel on a mustang dyno... We'll see how she does.

[sijoko]

Your project came out very nice. Definitely, one of the cleanest VH swaps on the planet.

I noticed that the front of the car sits high. Is that because the VH is lighter than the original KA?

[SuperHatch]

Your project came out very nice. Definitely, one of the cleanest VH swaps on the planet.

I noticed that the front of the car sits high. Is that because the VH is lighter than the original KA?

Thanks for the kind words.

I don't think my car can be a good judge of ride height from the swap. There are no accesories in my car, and my car has undergone serious weight reduction. The only reason the rear appears to sit low is because the tires are huge and the urethane bushings are a bit tighter than the stock stuff, it actually high in the back too. Even if the VH is lighter than the KA, I know the TH400 is heavier than a stock automatic.

[Unnatural1]

EXTREMELY nice job! Everything looks top notch...especially for a track only car. Most importantly, it looks like you are satisfied with the end result of all your hard work. The VH45DE is a fantastic engine in my Q45 and I'm guessing it's an absolute beast in a chassis that is over a 1000 lbs. lighter.

I'd be interested in some more info on your dyno results. Can you post the graphs? Before and after the S-AFC/timing? Have you modified the ECU at all or just added the S-AFC?

Did you ever find and fix the misfire you were experiencing?