31-05-10, 20:17 GMT+10#1
Yellow VL commodore's run through Jason's veins. His first car was a yellow VL Commodore which never missed a beat and kept up to date with regular wheel and stereo upgrades. It went well for a non turbo but there was a point where it had to move on to a new owner and Jason had to search for something a little quicker to satisfy his need for speed.
After having a look at a few this example turned up. With 200 odd rear wheel kilowatt it was a pretty quick car back in the day. This was when 185kw HSV's were the fastest thing around!
Keeping with all things automotive it wasn't long before there were drama's with the car. Among various parts breaking I recall one time when an eager Jason was showing off for some mates and did a huge burnout. It ended with the flywheel exiting the vehicle and leaving a trail of destruction. It was ugly and expensive.
From there the car went off to AVO for some tweaking and new turbo. With a Garrett 35/40 huffing it's breath into the RB30ET the car was making around 320rwkw, quite a stout power figure. Jason turned his sights to drag racing and seeing how strong the clutch and MX7 5-speed was. The car ran well with a best of 11.2 @ 125mph.
The bad luck returned and with another engine rebuild and some more boost the car was seeing 386rwkw - now we're talkin'!
Jason moved away from drag racing and got interested in circuit racing. Sandown Raceway didn't treat him well however. Things just kept going wrong with the car and a frustrated Jason took the engine to James Race Engines for a rework.
With the engine out the car was treated to the works. Stripped interior, rollcage, race seats, race pedal box, lexcan windows, modified boot, detailed engine bay and boot. All of this work was carried out by Tim at Warragul Panels.
Now back to the powerhouse. The engine is an RB30 3 litre bottom end with lightened, knife edged and hardened crankshaft. A set of Carillo rods swing themselves around with a set of CP Pistons on the ends. The lid on the engine is an RB26 twin-cam head filled with the best Tomei gear from the land of the rising sun.
Jason supplied the engine shop with a spare '26 head to disect to allow for optimal porting of his brand new head without wrecking the good one. Half inch studs keep the whole she-bang clamped together.
Exterior engine design consists of an ATI balancer, Moroso external belt driven oil pump and Hypertune inlet manifold with 90mm throttle body.
Jason decided to hire the knowledge of Kyle at 6boost.com to help with the hot side of things. Kyle made a high mound exhaust manifold which sits the jewel in the crown. The turbo is a Garrett GT42. Kyle also helped out considerably in camshaft decisions and other parts of the build to optimise the spool and power of the turbo. The turbo pushes that forced air through a custom 4 inch thick AVO intercooler, through the engine and rearwards through a 4 inch AVO exhaust.
The result of 25psi is 566rwkw on AVO's dyno.
The faithful old MX7 can now stop worrying about ending up in the MX7 graveyard with all of it's predecessors as there's a new box on the way. It's a full house PAR Engineering dog box 1-4 with a synchro 5th gear, billet shafts in an R33 5-speed housing.
The diff is also copping an upgrade with a 9-inch being installed. It'll have 35 spline billet axles, Mark Williams full spool, adjustable upper and lower trailing arms, rear coil overs and watt's linkage.
Other future plans are rear tubs, possibly front tubs, and an upgrade in suspension as well as a lot of track use.
Jason would like to thank Rowse Racing, AVO turboworld and Tim @ Warragul Panels.
I'll keep you updated with times and power changes in the future.
Owner: Jason
Model: VL turbo BT1
Engine: RB30/26 - GT42
Trans: MX7 5-speed
Diff: VL turbo
Power: 566rwkw @ 25psi
Some original photos have not been recovered yet.
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