URBAN WARFARE – POR440
> ARBY INCHES EVER-CLOSER TO GETTING HIS TURBO LS BARN-FIND VALIANT ON THE STRIP
Arby gets his turbo Ls-powered barn-find Val onto the dyno at last
IT COMES as no surprise that the build on POR440 blew out; it seems to be par for the course when it comes to piecing any new ride together. My original plan of strapping a junkyard 5.3L LS and a turbo in an old Valiant sounded like a two-month job, but the reality was more like a total build minus body and paint, and has taken a year so far.
Since my last POR440 update (SM, May ’16), all the body wiring was overhauled by Custom Auto Electrics & Air in Wagga. Full credit to Brett Piltz for basically rewiring the whole car and fitting the Haltech loom and relay board/fuse panel, starting late Friday night and finishing at 3am Sunday morning. What a huge job!
Then it was back to Autotech in Canberra for the finishing touches. With the help from the lads at Haltech and Ed from Autotech, all the Haltech (non-plugged) wiring was finished. While the car did have the latest plug-and-play LS1 loom, there was still a seemingly endless amount of extra inputs, almost exhausting the ECU channels. There was the flex fuel sensor; the speed sensor on the diff for power management; the temperature sensor on the transmission to turn the trans cooler fan on; and the dual boost controllers for the twin 40mm wastegates.
Other data inputs include a turbo backpressure sensor, radiator coolant and pressure sensors, as well as all the other factory sensors such as air temp and oil pressure. One of the best additions was a full set of exhaust gas temperature pyros to individually tune the temp of each cylinder.
Add all this hardware to individually staged fuel pumps, an internal bump box on the Elite computer, and anti-lag, and you are looking at more combined technology than in every Valiant ever built.
They say that the last 10 per cent of a build costs 90 per cent of the time, and nothing could be truer in this case, with a checklist that went on forever. This included a big 3½in tailshaft by Daniel Engineering in Wollongong; mounting the rear Calvert shocks; and getting a big four-inch mandrel-bent exhaust system made by Autotech fabricator Richard Wallace.
The exhaust has been fashioned with a sidepipe, with a removable cap for racing, while the rest of the system is V-banded at multiple stages along the vehicle.
Given POR440’S certain future in racing, the interior was gutted, and Richard and fellow fabricator Ben Doble from Phillip Radiator Services got stuck into fitting a full eightpoint chrome-moly ’cage with removable intrusion bars.
A venetian will hide the rear ’cage bars from view to try and keep the car a bit more undercover, and there’s some period-correct Torq Thrust-style wheels with M&H 235 drag radials from VPW tucked nicely under the rear.
Scotty from Duffy Automotive buzzed the roof down and got rid of all the old glue and rust, and squirted the top after we pulled the windows to repair a couple of speed holes (rust).
Mounting the alternator ended up being quite a challenge, and none of the expensive aftermarket units available were really suitable. In the end we used a bunch of factory pulleys, a few fabricated brackets and an Alfa Romeo serpentine belt (guaranteed to fail) with a modified WRX belt tensioner.
After we flushed the fuel system to ensure any fine debris didn’t get fed straight into the injectors, it didn’t take much for Haltech’s Mitch
A TOUCH MORE TIMING AND A NEW SET OF PLUGS WITH A 4.5MM GAP SHOULD SEE AROUND 680HP AT THE WHEELS, MAKING IT ROUGHLY 880 AT THE FLYWHEEL; NOT BAD FOR AN OLD DUNGER
Smith to get the old girl fired up. A bunch of other jobs ticked off the list had the car ready to hit the rollers, and after spending some time getting all the sensors tuned into the ECU, it was time for the lads at Autotech to give it a couple of power runs.
There has been a bunch of stuff written about what these motors can cop, but the plan was to get it roughly dialled in on pump gas before leaning on it a little harder on E85. There are lots of cars running over 30lb of boost in the States, but we’d like to have a bit of fun with this before driving over the crank.
With that in mind, we decided to go easy on it to start with, though it didn’t take much to crank out 500rwhp on 14lb of boost on 98-octane. On E85 the car showed immediate gains, and when we started to crank the boost up with just 12 degrees of time, the little 5.3 knocked out 610rwhp with ease on 20lb.
A top-end miss on 20lb caused by too much plug gap put a stop to tuning; it was just too hot to get the plugs out and re-gap. A touch more timing and a new set of plugs with a 4.5mm gap should see the power hit the 680 mark at the wheels, making it roughly 880 at the flywheel; not bad for an old dunger.
Anti-lag and a bunch of other bits and pieces still need to get sorted by the whizkids at Haltech, and then it’ll be ANDRA techinspected before it’s off to the track, hopefully in time for Grudge Kings. So what’s it going to run? With a bit of luck the old girl will weigh in at around 3300lb (with driver), which should put it in the mid-nines if all the planets align. With some suspension tuning and power management through the Haltech, a 9.2 should be on the cards, and then we’ll start to lean on the tune, with the eight-second barrier the ultimate goal.
Having said all that, it may kick the rods out first pass!
Stay tuned for more.
WITH SOME SUSPENSION TUNING AND POWER MANAGEMENT THROUGH THE HALTECH, A 9.2 SHOULD BE ON THE CARDS, WITH THE EIGHTSECOND BARRIER THE ULTIMATE GOAL