So I have been enjoying the car with the swapped motor. I have been driving it almost everyday. It is like having a new toy. My daily driver is definitely getting neglected. I sent a question to PrimeMR2 about how much boost I should run since I am only able to get a hold of 91 octane. Every dyno chart I have seen with a 4th gen running 17 psi has been on 93 octane or higher. They responded with the following:

"You can run 14 psi on 91 octane. You can run 17 psi if you add some octane booster to each tank."

Good to know because if I ever went up to 17 psi on 91 octane, I could have caused some damage to the motor. For now I will stick with 12-13 psi, that is more than enough for now.

This post has been edited by HardHead93: Mar 7, 2017 - 10:58 PM

Check the Sunoco Fuel site for any Sunoco stations near you since they'd have higher octane fuels available. Personally I'd stay around 14 psi then as well if you only have 91 readily available, I don't trust off the shelf octane boosters.

After spending last weekend on the track losing traction all over the place, especially in the curves I decided to order some wheels. I went with a 17x8 with a +35 offset. I am looking to put some 245/40/r17 wheels on the car. After seeing all you guys input, I am looking to put some BFG Comp 2s on the car. I am just wondering if I should go with the all-seasons or the sports. The sports look like they put more rubber to the pavement but I am worried about what will happen driving in the wet. I plan to track this car once a month through out the spring, summer, and fall, but I also drive it 1 to 2 times a week on the streets. What do you guys think about my tire selections?

With 275/40-17 Sport COMP-2's on 9.5" wide rims all around I have no problems in the rain and that's in a RWD car with a solid axle, of course I also adjust to the driving conditions as well. The only thing on the tire selection is I'm trying to remember how wide you can go on the Celica without rubbing, all else fails 215/45-17 would be a safe option. You only put down as much rubber as there is rim to push it down anyway, honestly the only reason I have 275 is they came with the rims but when I go to replace them I'll probably do 255/45-17 to remove some of the sidewall bulge.

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I am worried about the Comp 2 Sports because it has that constant contact patch down the center of the tread and no mileage warranty. That screams track only tire to me. I track my car for fun not to win any competitions. It is good to hear you are having no problems with that tire in the wet. As far as size, the tire shop I go through is going to test fit a 235/40-17 and a 245/40-17 on one of my wheels when the come in. I know a 235 will fit with no rub but those are on back order. We will try out the 245s on a test fit and if it will work.

It's a summer performance tire, and really it's fine with the mild Alabama winters even. The Firebird is a daily driver rain or shine and the Sport COMP-2's are the best tires I've used personally. They don't have a stated mileage warranty but from what I found most people get at least 20,000 miles out of them if rotated. Most summer performance tires regardless of brand don't have a stated mileage warranty for whatever reason, but I suspect it's because they expect most will abuse them and then try to claim a refund when they don't last the stated amount. The only summer performance tire I've seen with a mileage warranty is the Cooper Zeon RS3-S and Michelin Pilot Super Sport.

Don't get all-season tires for track - you'll be disappointed very soon. They won't hold up very well once you start getting a little quicker around the corners and putting some heat in them.
I put a set of brand new Goodyear Eagle F1 all-seasons, and wiped off nearly a third of the thread - and that was my first track weekend.

I then upgraded to GoodYear Eagle F1 summer tires, 300 thread iirc, and they lasted me good 5-6 track weekends with some street driving in between. I remember that I went for these specifically because they were rated well in the rain, which was a concern of mine.

I now have to purchase new tires, and I'm not sure if I want to go for 200 threadwear set. I think I'll end up getting something similar to the Eagle F1's I had - I am very pleased with what I got out of them.

Also, don't get a tire wider than what's intended for the rims you have - I have 225 tires (rec 7.5 rim) on 7" rims, and they suck when it comes to changing direction. I can literally feel as the rims roll over to the other side of the tire. No such issue with 215's.

Finally, you may not be thinking of this yet, but with stickier tires soon you'll have to address your brakes. I overheated HAWK HPS pads on about my 3rd track weekend (I'd like to believe due to me getting faster). Then switched to EBC yellows and by my 8th track weekend they no longer hold up to my driving skill (or maybe lack thereof is the real problem here, but I digress). This is with stock-ish 5SFE, 275mm rotor, dual piston calipers. Now I'm looking into brake cooling solutions and bigger bbk.

Hope this helps.

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Thanks for the info. It makes sense, after my first track day ever, my front tires looked like someone was chewing on the tread. Those were all-season tires that I ended up having to replace. I am leaning towards the BF Comp 2 Sports.

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I ordered a set of 8 inch wide wheels so I am guessing 225 or 235 will work best with my tire. I am glad there is a tire shop out here that is allowing me to do a test fit to ensure I order the proper tires.

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I have drilled/slotted Power Stop rotors and brakes up front. I also did the dual piston caliper upgrade from the Toyota Avalon. Next I will get the same brakes and rotors on the rear. Those should hold up for a while so I can improve my track skillz.

This post has been edited by HardHead93: Mar 28, 2017 - 9:50 PM

UPS just dropped off my wheels. They look sweet! I cannot wait to get them on the car.

I got the wheels and tires on the car and they look amazing. I went with a 17x8 +35 wheel and it fits perfect. As for the tires I went BF Comp 2 Sports 225/45/R17. Here is a shot with the wheels on the car.


Front wheel


Rear wheel


The car is riding a little high so I will need to adjust my springs to get a better look. I am glad the wheels fit with no rub.

Wooooo fitting! I bet it handles a lot better now.

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I sure does, I took it out for a drive today and the tires are not breaking free like they used to. I cannot wait until I get it on the track. Here is a shot with the adjustments I did to the springs. I went with a 1 inch drop in the rear and a 2 inch drop in the front. It got rid of the gap I had in the wheel well.

That's good, I noticed a big improvement in handling and acceleration as well after going to the Sport COMP-2's. Should be more fun on the track now too.

The next upgrade I am looking to do is with the turbo but it is still a few months down the road. I am tossing around some ideas. I love how quick the CT15 spools but I hear I can get more power out of an upgraded CT20 or CT26 but I may lose some of the low RPM spool. Here are the options I am looking at:
1. Get the CT15b turbo upgraded by PrimeMR2. They have a stage 2 turbo upgrade that will add quite a bit more power per pound of boost.
2. Get a CT26 and upgrade the compressor wheel
3. Get a CT20
If there is another option please let me know. I am not a big fan of the T3/4 turbo upgrade because I have tried one on my 5sfte build and I did not like the lag. Also, I have a 3sgte gen 3 exhaust manifold from my 5sfte build so I can use it if I switch to a different turbo.

Once I get that done would it be beneficial to go from my 2.5 exhaust up to a 3 inch exhaust? My current exhaust is a 3 inch cat-less down pipe to a 2.5 inch exhaust with a high flow Magnaflow cat, glass pack resonator, and Magnaflow muffler. Here is a shot of the rear of the car with the current muffler.


Exhaust from underneath the car.


Thanks for the help.

This post has been edited by HardHead93: Apr 4, 2017 - 10:07 PM

After doing some research, I found only one issue with my exhaust set up for my goals. My goal is to eventually get this car to around 300 horsepower, any more than that will be too much for a FWD car. The one issue is that I change need to change my offset to center magnaflow muffler to a straight center to center muffler. This will get rid of any obstructions in my 2.5 inch full exhaust. According to the following webpage a 2.5 inch exhaust is good for up to 300 hp before it becomes a problem.

http://www.koracing.net/viewarticle.php?article=7

I am thinking of going with an HKS muffler.

Since you have the cat and glasspack you could see how it sounds without another muffler first, if it's not too loud and sounds good consider it weight and money saved. Being it's also turbocharged I wouldn't think it'd be that loud.

There's a lot of ideas going around on 2.5 vs 3 in exhaust. I've read too much of it, and my opinion on it all comes down to this: the HP losses, whatever they may be, for 2.5in exhaust are not that great, and I wouldn't make it a priority to go with 3in exhaust, esp if you already have a functioning 2.5 in setup. If you're trying to squeeze every last bit of juice out of it, sure, but it looks like there are plenty of other upgrades to occupy yourself with before new exhaust is going to be worth your money.

Just my 2 cents.

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Sounds good, I think I will hold off on the exhaust for a while. For my horsepower goals 2.5 inch should be fine. I also don't want the drone of an exhaust that is too big. I had that problem when I went to a header on my 5sfe and my ears would be ringing after a long spirited drive.

So it has been a little bit since my last update. I was having problems getting my photos to upload but here is what is going on:

I was having some problems with keeping the engine temps down when the AC was running, you can find more details on the following thread.

http://www.6gc.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=97574

While I was in there doing work to the radiator and condenser, I thought to myself, I should fix the exhaust leak at the manifold, while I am in there (famous last words). I was having a slight ticking noise when the engine was cold that pointed directly to an exhaust leak. I took the turbo off and of course one of the studs snaps off inside the cylinder head right where the exhaust leak was. That explains my problem.



Hmmm! I wonder where the exhaust leak was coming from?

I attempted to drill out the stud and only made the problem worse when my bolt extractor broke off inside the stud. DOH! So I had to take the head off and take it to the machine shop. This also meant I would need a new head gasket, water neck gasket, exhaust manifold gasket, and intake manifold gasket.


I decided to pull a late night and get the cylinder head off the engine.

Luckily the machine shop I use was able to turn around and have the cylinder head back to me in a day. To make sure the head would reseal to the block, I had the bottom cleaned and skimmed to be flat.


The next problem I ran into is that I had to wait for 2 weeks for a head gasket because since it is a JDM only engine, there is no way to get them in the US and the only distributor was on back order. The head gasket just came in yesterday to so more updates to come.

Oh for ****s sake that sucks.


Why you no port and polish while waiting?

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It is too late for that I just put the head back onto the block this morning. ARP head studs are a pain in the butt! I had to get a special deep socket 12mm, 12 point because it is so tight where the head studs are.


Good news is I ordered some 3rd gen 3sgte BC 264/264 stage 2 camshafts that I am getting modified to hold the cam sensor tooth. I am combo'ing that with adjustable cam gears. That will definitely help with turbo spool and they work with the stock ECU. I have heard people adding 30-40 hp to a 3sgte without the need for turning up the boost. That will be great since I have piss water 91 octane for fuel where I live.

This post has been edited by HardHead93: May 14, 2017 - 3:23 PM

It's always something, hopefully between fixing the exhaust leak and everything else will have more stable operating temperatures.

My Brian Crower camshafts just came in today. I plan to drop them off at the machine shop tomorrow. I need the camshaft sensor tooth moved from the stock intake cam to the BC aftermarket one. These cams definitely have a little more lift and duration, I can tell by just comparing the lobes. Here are some pics of the stock intake cam next to the aftermarket one.

Any time I have to deal with any exhaust bolts, I dread the job long before it begins and spray everything with penetrating fluid for a few days before removal, use impact tools, go slowly. The only way I've tried where no bolts suffered. Go at them dry, or with hand tools, and there's about 20% chance of broken bolts.

I haven't had much luck with removing broken bolts from cast aluminum housings (head, transmission). Seems like once those steel bolts dig into aluminum, they aren't coming out - drill 'em out and put thread insets in. My collection of thread insert sets has grown over the years...

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Good to know if it ever happens again. I replaced all the exhaust studs and besides the one that snapped off they all came out without any penetrating oil. I think the one that snapped off was already broken before I took it off because it required very little force for it to snap off. I will use some kind of penetrating oil from now on.

I finished getting my car back together and on the road. I spent Saturday night breaking in the new BC camshafts. I started the car and rev'ed it to 2K rpm then moved it up and down between 2 and 3K rpm for 25 minutes. Then Sunday morning I did the exact same thing with the break-in again just to be safe. After that I changed the oil filter and put the rest of the car back together. Then Monday morning I did the break-in stuff one more time before taking it out for a drive.

The car drives awesome! I really notice the difference with these new camshafts. First, I ran it on stock spring pressure (7 - 8 psi) for a little bit and it felt more like 10 psi on stock cams. When I finally turned the boost back up to 13 psi, OH MY GOD! The engine pulled really hard on boost. My butt dyno went through the roof on that pull. I need to get this car to a tuner so I can get some actual dyno numbers. I did notice the car is a little bit louder with the new cams, I am guessing it is because of the extra lift and duration.

Also, no more exhaust ticking and the heat issues have gone away so far. This came together just in time for the next local track day this Sunday. It will be a good time!

It's normal for a "bigger" cam to be louder with nothing else being changed. Good example being your domestic V8s where just a cam swap makes a huge difference in the exhaust tone and volume.

Look forward to the dyno numbers.

I retarded the exhaust cam by 3 degrees. I read on the MR2 forums that, that will add some more hp on the 3rd and 4th gen 3sgte's.

So I had a little bit of a scare today. I have set up a dyno session for my Celica a week from this Friday and I want to make sure everything is good for it since I will be busy until then. I also really beat on the car hard on the track day and I want to make sure everything is still in working order. During the track day over the weekend my car started to develop a lumpy idle. It must have come from me retarding the exhaust on my aftermarket camshafts.

First, rented a compression tester from AutoZone and did a test. The results were 85 to 90 psi across all cylinders. AHH CRAP! I started to do some research and found that aftermarket camshafts with more duration can cause low compression but not like I was seeing. Next, I decided to adjust the exhaust camshaft back to zero and take it out for a drive. It drove like a dream, no misfires or issues. I decided to do another compression test and the same result 85 to 90 psi across all cylinders. At this point I knew it was not the car but the compression tester because by advancing the timing back to zero I should have seen compression go up. Finally, I took the compression tester back to AutoZone and bought a brand new one (I needed one anyways). I ran the compression test again and 150 psi on all cylinders, now that is better!

When I got the engine a few months back I did a compression test to verify the engine was good even though the seller sent me a video compression testing the engine. It came in at 170 psi per cylinder, that got me wondering, why the drop in compression? The answer is the BC camshafts I just installed. This little scare got me reading more into camshafts and I found that the more the exhaust and intake camshafts overlap the lower the dynamic compression which leads to a lower compression test. This is because the combustion chamber is completely sealed for a shorter period of time. I decided too compare the specs of the stock cams vs the aftermarket ones.

The stock 3sgte camshafts have the following specs:
Adv Duration: 256/256 degrees
Duration @ .050": 204/204 degrees
Lift: 0.335"/.0335"

The Brian Crower stage 2 camshafts have the following specs:
Adv Duration: 264/264 degrees
Duration @ .050": 216/216 degrees
Lift: 0.344"/0.344"

I ran the calculations on the stock camshafts and there is almost no overlap in the .050" range if the cams are set to zero. Based on the camshaft card that comes with the BC cams there is 12 degrees of overlap in the .050" range if the cams are set to zero. This means that both the intake and exhaust cams are open at the same time for a lot longer. I also read that overlap in camshaft timing leads to more high RPM power in boosted engines so by me running the exhaust camshafts retarded by 3 degrees I was adding more overlap which was shifting my power curve more to the right. I definitely could feel it on the track, once I hit 5000+ rpm, the car got this crazy surge of power that really surprised me. I was kind of awesome when that happened and all those little Miatas that thought they could pass me, could not keep up with me in the straightaways.

The problem with high rpm power is that it is fun on the track but not for daily driving. Also, on boosted engines there comes a point where overlap is bad because there is no free flowing exhaust like a NA motor. Since the track days only occur every 2 months, I decided to advance my exhaust timing by 1-2 degrees to start with and see how that will affect my drivability. It will shrink the overlap and create more low end power for the street, plus get rid of my lumpy idle.

I did not expect this post to be so long but I just started typing and here we are. Please chime in with any thoughts or let me know if I am completely off track.

On naturally aspirated V8's it's common to go really high on the static compression 12:1+ and then bleed it off with a large cam so the dynamic compression is somewhere in the 10:1 range. Boost also increases your dynamic compression but you knew that. Also yes in general the more advance the more low end focus and vice versa. There are some nice calculators out there online that take in all the factors like cam specs, boost, static compression, etc... and can tell you your dynamic compression.