[Eleventeen]

Hey, I just wanted to show everyone a project I've been working on for a while. First off, I am not associated with any shops or fabricators, and I'm not a fabricator myself; this is just a personal project I wanted to do. This was all done in my garage / driveway at home (except for one aluminum piece that I was not equipped to weld). I basically built it all with my mig welder, miter saw, drill press, and angle grinder. Most of the photos were taken during the fabrication and mock-up process. I didn't take the time to get any photos of the manifold after finish welding, but with my welding skills, it's probably better that way! Oh well, the turbo hasn't fallen off yet, so...

My objective is not to run crazy HP with this turbo. Right now I am simply shooting for about 550 whp on meth and/or race gas with good spool up. However, the manifold was designed to support more than that. I probably could have shortened everything up a bit for faster spool, but I wanted to maintain good flow. Once I get everything dialed in, I will hit the local dyno to get some numbers. As of now, I have no dyno charts or time slips to show.
Construction:

The manifold assembly is actually 3 units consisting of 2 manifolds and an uppipe for a 6-2-1 configuration. The pieces are constructed of 1-1/4 and 1-1/2 schedule 10 304 stainless weld fittings (actual inner diameter of 1.44" and 1.68" respectively). The flanges are CNC cut 5/16" stainless steel purchased from www.sikky.com. The collectors are a flat 3 into 1 configuration merged at a gentle 44* overall angle. The O2 sensors are placed in their respective banks after the collectors, in the uppipe, several inches before the final merge into the turbo. The uppipe mounts a 44mm Tial wastegate (dumped to atmosphere).

The ******** is 3" 16ga 304 stainless. I incorporated a flex section to reduce stress on the system. Since it's a single DP into a dual exhaust, a short Y-pipe was necessary. I made that a modular piece so that the DP can be removed by simply decoupling a V-band without having to remove the flange bolts, gaskets, and rear O2 sensors. This also allows the DP to be pulled out though the top, rather than having to put the car several feet in the air to remove from underneath.

Turbo Specs:

Garrett GT3582R with Tial .82 A/R v-band exhaust housing. Compressor side is the large T04Z housing with 4" inlet / 2.5" outlet. This turbo is rated at about 600hp max, but will be a bit less with the mid-sized exhaust housing.

Tuning:

Currently running a flat 12psi from about 3200-7000 rpm. JB4 G5 is active, but not controlling boost at the moment. I will integrate that eventually. I already did a little experimenting (without the guidance of Terry) and the JB4 was controlling boost within about 1 psi of target. However, boost was spiking pretty high during shifts. That was WITHOUT any firmaware changes to the JB4, so some adjustments will go a long way. The principle is pretty simple: Instead of using vacuum to pull the wastegate shut, you just use boost to push the wastegate shut (using the top port on the external WG). Plenty of time to mess with that later, but first I need to get the BMS flash to straighten out my fuel trims.

Pictures:

[dfjaws]

AMAZING!

Impressive initiative to just take on a project like this on your own! Excited to see more updates.

[Vroom]

Pretty obvious this is not your first Rodeo!

[GetSomeE92]

Pretty cool that you were able to do all of this in your garage. You have some talent, man.

How long did the project take you?

[Terry @ BMS]

Looks very promising.

[lecsoman]

Cant wait to see some numbers! Nice work!

[G.I.Joe]

Very nice work. I wish I could do stuff like that. I'm impressed. Looking forward to updates on performance.

[temperamental]

Impressive...!

[spectacula]

you sir are amazing

[lfelunden]

Very nice work !!! Keep it up

[drm916]

I like this idea a lot. Makes it easy for turbo inspection, installation and removal.

But what about melting the paint on the hood? And does the additional manifold piping lenth add any issues?

I can tell if there is any in the pictures.... but I would def recommend some sort of brace to support the turbo weight instead of letting the manifold piping support its weight. I know on other applications the turbo weight has caused problems with no bracing.

[Eleventeen]

Originally Posted by GetSomeE92

Pretty cool that you were able to do all of this in your garage. You have some talent, man.

How long did the project take you?

Thank you. I took basic measurements and started fabbing up the manifolds before I took the car apart, so the car was only down about a month and a half. It started as a couple hours here and there, but then went full steam ahead once the car was taken apart. The engine stayed in the car the whole time, I simply removed the passenger's side motor mount and raised that side up a few inches.

[Eleventeen]

Originally Posted by drm916

I like this idea a lot. Makes it easy for turbo inspection, installation and removal.

But what about melting the paint on the hood? And does the additional manifold piping lenth add any issues?

I can tell if there is any in the pictures.... but I would def recommend some sort of brace to support the turbo weight instead of letting the manifold piping support its weight. I know on other applications the turbo weight has caused problems with no bracing.

I applied reflective heat foil on the underside of the hood, but that probaly isn't even necessary with the turbo blanket. You can literally rest your hand on it without getting burned.

You are right about supporting it. You can't see it in the photos, but I do have a brace just below the turbo. It incorporates a high pressure spring to clamp the brakets tightly together, while still allowing for lateral movement for heat expansion.

EDIT: If you look closely at the third picture from the bottom, you can see the spring.

[joro2077]

Impressive job!!!! subscribed..

[drm916]

Originally Posted by Eleventeen

I applied reflective heat foil on the underside of the hood, but that probaly isn't even necessary with the turbo blanket. You can literally rest your hand on it without getting burned.

You are right about supporting it. You can't see it in the photos, but I do have a brace just below the turbo. It incorporates a high pressure spring to clamp the brakets tightly together, while still allowing for lateral movement for heat expansion.

EDIT: If you look closely at the third picture from the bottom, you can see the spring.

I see it now. Very impressive! On my old platform of VWs we had issues with tubular manifolds and unsupported turbos.

Looking good and I am excited about following your progress. I plan on a turbo upgrade in early 2013. I will probably go RBs since it so easy. But would LOVE to go the route you did. Maybe a vendor will make available the parts ala carte. ATP does it for the VW/Audi crowd. I have pieced together a few kits over the years with just parts.

[forza1976]

Wow, now that is a solid setup! Nice work.

[e46m3to335i]

Sent you PM last night.

I can only hope that you made jigs for these or are able to reproduce the kit in some way or fasion. If so, there is a good chance you could quit your day job or at a minimum make some damn good money on the side producing this kit to the public.

Im sure its a little too early to reccommend this but it looks pretty solid to me.

Love the way it sits in the engine bay and the simplicity of the manifold. The seperated ******** flange is a super nice touch too. I can see from the pics that the coolant resovoir and a couple other thing had to be relocated to the drivers side to make room. What other parts had to be relocated?

Also is this setup internally or externally gated? From the first couple pics showing the turbo mounted on the manifold, I dont see any piping divorcing for the DP but in the last couple pics I see a Tial WG??(EDIT: Nevermind, just re-read your first post)

I bet it sounds like pure sex when it starts spooling

-Nick

[cupertinosteve]

@Eleventeen - well done. I was curious for a top mounted turbo, why wouldn't you have the exhaust manifold angled upwards (instead of downwards and then into a 180 degree bend)? Is there not enough room for a merge in the upward direction?

[Eleventeen]

Originally Posted by e46m3to335i

Sent you PM last night.

I can only hope that you made jigs for these or are able to reproduce the kit in some way or fasion. If so, there is a good chance you could quit your day job or at a minimum make some damn good money on the side producing this kit to the public.

Im sure its a little too early to reccommend this but it looks pretty solid to me.

Love the way it sits in the engine bay and the simplicity of the manifold. The seperated ******** flange is a super nice touch too. I can see from the pics that the coolant resovoir and a couple other thing had to be relocated to the drivers side to make room. What other parts had to be relocated?

Also is this setup internally or externally gated? From the first couple pics showing the turbo mounted on the manifold, I dont see any piping divorcing for the DP but in the last couple pics I see a Tial WG??(EDIT: Nevermind, just re-read your first post)

I bet it sounds like pure sex when it starts spooling

-Nick

PM sent!

It is externally gated and dumped to atmosphere. In the pictures I posted, the wastegate flange and O2 bungs were not yet fabbed up, but the WG is mounted right before the turbo inlet.

[08n54]

Did your car have anything on that side of the engine bay? Us 5 series guys have out abs pump sitting there

[vereak82]

badass work man!

[08n54]

Also having a single ******** must be awesome

[mnst3r]

Great work.. subscribed

[Eleventeen]

Originally Posted by cupertinosteve

@Eleventeen - well done. I was curious for a top mounted turbo, why wouldn't you have the exhaust manifold angled upwards (instead of downwards and then into a 180 degree bend)? Is there not enough room for a merge in the upward direction?

Yeah, I don't think a smooth merge would have been possible at an upward angle. You could definitely do a log style manifold and eliminate a bunch of piping, but I wanted to have longer runners and smooth merges. I'm probably giving up a little spool with all of that tubing though.

[Eleventeen]

Originally Posted by 08n54

Did your car have anything on that side of the engine bay? Us 5 series guys have out abs pump sitting there

The 335 has vacuum canisters for the wastegates (no longer needed), and the coolant reservoir, which was moved over to the driver's side. Once you move that stuff, there is just enough room for a nice turbo. The WW filler neck also has to be moved to keep it from melting. I haven't reinstalled that yet.