Registered: 07/29/02
Posts: 7796
Loc: Bellingham, WA
You will end up ruining an auto technician's day.
(This is a long story written by an extremely tired, disgruntled, pissed off tech who wants to sit down and ramble and bitch with lots of story and pictures that has nothing to do with the title and the main point of this thread so if you aren't in for a non-turbo-honda read, just hit the "back" button")
On the 24th we had a customer come in with a pretty heavily abused, SR20 swapped S13 240sx that he had just put a topmount turbo setup on with a pretty nice looking turbo and a great looking manifold. He needed to have a downpipe fabricated because his setup was really jerry-rigged - just enough to get to the shop. Turns out the manifold was some SS autochrome/XS power deal he had picked up from some guy for 80 bucks. We made some comment about how they look great but aren't actually built well. Anyways so I put the car up on the four post and we checked everything out, and my co worker that does almost all our exhaust work built the downpipe and it turned out great, except we didn't have a wastegate flange to make a dump tube (he wanted to have it dump out the side of the car) and after a failed attempt to trace a flange and cut it freehand with the plamsa cutter, we said we'd order in a new flange and that he could come by next Saturday and we'd do the dumptube.
So the next day I went down to the Nissan meet at Golden Gardens and had a great time for the most part. Got to drive down in a brand new G35 coupe and back up i drove a single turbo FD. All of the Japanese prosti-tots wanted to model all of our groups cars including my roommate's GT-R...
They were all over the G35 i drove down also, but those pictures turned out super fucking blurry god dammit.
So that was fun except for some of the super badass drift kids doing burnouts and popping off the revlimiter and shit. Then the whole work week showed up and it was five times as busy as it's ever been this year and I was really super stressed all week, just absolute hell at the shop, and finally Saturday comes which is either a day off or an easy day. We do shop breakfasts every Saturday morning and then I was going to just come in and clean up for about two hours and take off and go to the local Honda-Tech meet down in seattle (2hr drive). So last night I stayed at the shop until midnight trying to get all the little shit done and finish up a bunch of work, went home got to sleep at 2AM, came into breakfast and went to the shop, and was getting ready to leave as the 240 came in.
The customer pulled up and the car sounded pretty different, louder. Customer gets out and says his car started sounding different last night and he had no idea what was going on, anyways he's here for the dump tube and could you check that sound out for me?
We pop the hood.
The wastegate is lying on the crossmember.
Of course the POS manifold cracked in the worst place and the weld broke 360 degrees around the pipe going to the wastegate so it fell and took the weld with it, but warping the manifold and putting a bunch of cracks in the 'tube' barely attached to the flange. Of course, this is an emergency, I should have said fuck this and left, but I'm too nice of a guy so I figure if i bust ass and then Blake can get it welded up quick I can still get out of here by noon or noon-thirty and make the meet, so I have to put the car on the lift and pull all this ghetto rigged shit off - i'm talking a four piece ghetto rigged water line - stock hose goes into a 90 degree piece of brake line into another soft line into the stainless braided line into the AN fitting. All the lines were the wrong sizes/lengths. The oil drain was a piece of fuel line held with lockwire in 2 places to keep it off the manifold. I mean absolute fucking terrible shit. So I got everything tore down in about an hour and then I cleaned the crap out of the mating surfaces with brake clean and then sandblasted all the carbon buildup off. The pipe from the manifold to the flange is literally half an inch or less so it had to be TIG welded from inside the collector which i'm sure was a huge PITA for my fellow worker. Got everything done and when it cooled, put it back together in about an hour and got the car off the rack and then the car went to the other rack for the dumptube and shit and by then the meet was already going and i was two hours away and now I Get to go into work tomorrow and god damn the piece of shit SS autochrome shit, don't buy it, or you will drive your mechanic to fucking jump off a building.
oh by the way i snapped some pictures with my cell phone - check out that thick wall tubing!
I feel your pain man.I have had personal experience of this XSPOWER shit.That's why I'm not boosted at the moment.My turbo seals failed twice after getting it rebuilt and the shitty manifold,well,all I can say is I was about to fit that T3/T04E onto it,when I noticed a very small hairline crack around the bottom of the collector where the turbo flange is.If I'd have run it with the new turbo on,I would have ended up with my brand new Garrett scraping along the ground.This stuff is seriously junk!
Registered: 07/29/02
Posts: 7796
Loc: Bellingham, WA
I forgot to mention that when the guy installed the turbo onto the manifold he had to smack the fuck out of it with a BIG deadblow hammer to get it onto the studs. They were not square on the flange from the get-go and then the flange warped after use making pulling the turbo off the flange a fifteen minute ordeal (and another ten minutes to install using a punch and hammer on the turbine housing).....
Originally Posted By: SiR Steel
Looks like the meet was held at Spanish Banks. Did you end up going, Samurai?
What's Spanish Banks?
The first Nissan meet that I attended as well as the Honda-Tech meet that I didn't get to attend were both held at Golden Gardens park in Seattle. You head down I-5 and take a right on 45th street (IIRC) all the way until you hit the park.
Nope once the car was off the lift it was already 1PM then i gave Blake a hand fabbing the dumptube (which the customer wanted to exit out of the corner of his side skirt) and ended up working on various other cars until 6pm then went home. BTW thanks everyone.
Registered: 07/22/01
Posts: 14955
Loc: West By God Virginia
Here's how I see it.
Personally I would NEVER buy it, however if I wanted to play around w/something for super cheap I would get it..like my beater 90whp d15b7 hatch
I can weld it all day, brace/etc...so I think it would be a fun little project..but anyone that buys it for their "race" car, or something they have a nice chunk of $$ in is a Rtard.
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05 Berlina Black S2000 509whp / 357wtq
Personally I would NEVER buy it, however if I wanted to play around w/something for super cheap I would get it..like my beater 90whp d15b7 hatch
I can weld it all day, brace/etc...so I think it would be a fun little project..but anyone that buys it for their "race" car, or something they have a nice chunk of $$ in is a Rtard.
I wouldn't even bother with that.Those parts really are shite
Registered: 04/10/06
Posts: 2341
Loc: Murrieta, CA
this is a perfect story for all those people who are like, my friend has SS AUTOCROME AND ITS AWESOME! Finnaly picture proof that this shit is shitty. Thats a funny pic I think imma save that to show to people.
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b16a w/ CP 9:1 Pistons & Eagle Rods [] RLD FAB Custom Ramhorn & 3" Downpipe[] Blockguard [] JDM LSD [] T3/T4 .60/.63 Trim Garrett [] Spearco Intercooler [] Hondata S300 [] RC 550cc [] HKS SSQV BOV [] Walbro 255lph Fuel Pump [] Greddy Profec B Spec II [] Greddy Auto Timer [] Custom 2.5" Intercooler Piping [] 3" Custom Exhaust [] Skunk2 Pro Camber Kit and Springs [] Skunk2 Duel bend short shifter [] 12" Slim Fan []
Registered: 07/22/01
Posts: 14955
Loc: West By God Virginia
Originally Posted By: hondacivicnut
Originally Posted By: SiAdam
Here's how I see it.
Personally I would NEVER buy it, however if I wanted to play around w/something for super cheap I would get it..like my beater 90whp d15b7 hatch
I can weld it all day, brace/etc...so I think it would be a fun little project..but anyone that buys it for their "race" car, or something they have a nice chunk of $$ in is a Rtard.
I wouldn't even bother with that.Those parts really are shite
Maybe not a turbo, but a manifold..maybe..
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05 Berlina Black S2000 509whp / 357wtq
_________________________ wtf is wrong with your head? that's like asking "if i get shot in the heart with a .357, will i die any more than getting shot with a .44?" - jsmonet
Registered: 02/04/01
Posts: 16447
Loc: Red Deer, Alberta, Canada
there are plenty of cheap ass motherfuckers out there willing to take a chance to save a buck. and there are also some ssautocrap products that last quite a while and the owners are willing to chance it. *shrug*
