Well after much consideration and thought I have pulled the plug on my 20B N/A dreams....at least for the time being. Yea, I know another one bites the dust. I just can't justify $25k with the current downturn in the economy and I am restructuring my business. I mean that is really a lot of cash. But I will be moving forward with a nice RE Cosmo, Haltech, and some turbo. Damn I wanted to stay away from a turbo. I will look for about 375rwhp so hopefully lag wont be much of an issue. But my thought is to get everything perfect on the car and maybe someday in the future I will move forward with the 20B. I am quite let down but also relieved. I feel like I just gave myself a $15k bonus.

Good luck with you guys who are charging on. In my situation ego says do it but wisdom says chill out.

 

Good luck to you too You have stronger self control than I did. Although I dont regret a single penny. (and I could have used those pennies sometimes!)

 

25K, holy ****. I don't see how you could spend that much on a NA setup.

I'd bet I could do it for 10. I did an re swap for about 4 including many extras and mistakes

 

im going through till the end i can see the light no point in quiting now, it really does help when you can do 90% of the work yourself though

good luck with your cheaper mods

cheers dave

 

Do it for 10 i dare you to try

 

NA 20'bs are very cool.. Well any 20b is very cool, but realistically speaking My 13bre with stock FD twins is capable of making more power and torque than the NA 20B would ever be likely do with a moderate build, and if I blow an engine a whole new core is 1200 and a 2 hour drive away.

But lets explore this, when I bought a 13bre I was offered a 20b for 2500 with no compression on 2 rotors.

I bought an E8 and am still kicking myself for not buying an E11, but the E11 was $250 more so 2000 for all including a wideband (I paid @1750)

I can buy new oem parts from mazdaperformance, enough to rebuild a 20B for under 2500 combined with used parts (there is no shortage of S5 NA cars at the local junkyards for rotors) providing the Eshaft and irons are good.

I made my own engine mounts for 13B-re for <20 dollars worth in metal (after I didn't like the mounts I bought on ebay) 20B mounts would be the same, I'm sure I could deal with the sway bar issue cheaply enough.

Thats under 7500 dollars, add in another 1050 for dual stock FC oil coolers and braided lines(350), a koyo radiator (300) a decent clutch (400) that leaves me with almost 1500 for incidental parts...

 

I was going to work with Defined Autoworks in Ohio. Logan and I had spoken a couple of times. I have no desire to do it on the cheap. If you start adding up turning a low compression engine into a high compression it isn't cheap and I am not going to do it myself. That is where Logan was to come in. I was going with ITBs, Tec3r. The custom header is almost 1900 dollars itself. The **** adds up quick especially if someone else is doing it. I know my strengths and weakness in messing with cars. I sure as hell am not going to learn to build a engine on a 20b. Plus I have zero desire to know how to build an engine. I do my job others do their's. I am building this car with the complete idea that a 20B N/A is going in. It is just not going in now and I want to drive this car by spring. I am not going to have this sitting in a garage for the next 5 years because I have to have the 20B. I still have a lot of work to do. I am doing stuff like Lizardskin on the firewall, undercarriage and interior, big brakes, replacing every bushing even though it only has 49k miles. Plus Recaros and much more. By the time I am comfortable to invest, well not invest, that would be a stupid investment but spend the money on a 20B N/A the car will be perfect.

By the way the 20B N/A is not about power, it is about simplicity and reliability. I think the n/a in a GTUs , especially as clean as mine is freakin sex. Although, 350rwhp in a 2700 lbs car is quite tasty plus zero turbo lag. I don't have to have massive numbers to dig the **** out my car. But you pop the hood and see a 20B N/A with ITBs, custom header and cleaned up engine bay and nobody is going to give a **** about 350 or 550hp. I am building a street car, not a race car.

God, I am driving myself crazy with this. I just have to know there will be 3 rotors and no turbo in my GTUs one day.

 

That would be nice. Don't give up on it, just work slower on it, some people on here work 3-4 years on their car before it runs again.

 

Thats the key right there I like tinkering and actually doing the work.

A 13b-re with a moderate turbo ala gt35r will easily make 350-400 whp with many of the stock components still in place and spool with very little turbo lag.

 

fixed!

 

i love the way you think but sometimes what you think and reality are miles apart.
You said in your post yourself "providing the Eshaft and irons are good." lets just say the crank is slightly bent and your centre iron has to much wear then what. I will bet my life that 1500 dollars for incidental parts just aint gonna cut it. But on the flipside who am i to say you wont get lucky.

And on a second note about you 13bre with factory twin makeing more torque than a NA 20b i beg to differ and i am pretty keen to take that challenge on.

And on a final note hopefully pictures will speak for themselves


I know what i would rather have

cheers dave

 

I have been rolling around on an un-rebuilt 13b-re for 10K plus miles, it has more compression now than the day I first put it in, moral of the story, I could also get lucky and find one of the 20B's out there that is internally in good shape and roll around on in NA for possibly 50K miles or more without taking the engine apart and come out even cheaper than what I wrote up. Yeah if you buy a 20B and the E shaft is crap your pretty much fucked

I'm rolling stock FD twins, not stock RE twins, when I had RE twins I made 260 WHP and 239 WTQ at 9 PSI boost (all that would hold at the power peak, so there was 15 or so at the TQ peak.) This was at 4500FT in hesperia tuned by guitarjunkie28 (RIP).

I havn't had REW twins on the DYNO, but they have 10 PSI at 4500 RPM and build about 15 by redline NS, once I get BNR stage 3 twins operating sequentially, with a big street port, no intercooler and meth injection I would be willing to bet that I make more toque and power at anything above 3K RPM than anything but the most maxed out NA PP 20B, and in that case I would bet that I would have more torque and power anywhere under 7K rpm.

I would have put a 20B in my ride if legality wasn't an issue for me. Money was never the issue, though I do keep it as cheap as possible. I wanted something that I could drive on the street, and have plausible deniability of legality. Sure my 13b-re/rew FC isn't technicly legal, but with REW turbos manifolds and accessories it was enough to convince a California smog ref that it was legal. That is really the major driving force my decisions, I want something that will pass the visual for all but the best white glove inspector, and pass the tailpipe test with an hour of work, and I got it.

 

one more thing, you have a very nice car.

 

10k. No way. Period.

 

HA, i wish is was this cheap & easy..... It's very easy to say an approximate figure but when you actually start the project then you'll see how quick you spend that $10k and the thing isn't running yet... I started my 20b project 4years ago and I'm still not done with over $15k invested so far... I think I have another $20k to spend before it see's the road, because its not the actually 20b that cost the money, its all the other **** that completes the package.... Suspension, Brakes , Tranny and all the other stuff that will need to be upgraded to handle the 700-800hp that you're after, thats where the money goes...

Christopher as a small business owner myself , I know where you're coming from by putting this project on hold for the moment... Truth be told, I've actually put my car on hold for almost 1year because of other priorities & the uncertain economy we're facing right now in this country.... In the past when i spent $1000 on my car it would still be sitting there with no big progress, so i've decided to spend that same money on my other cars and you would be so supprise as to how fast those builds are progressing... The 20b is a freeking money pit!!!! and thats the first thing I tell anyone that's thinking about doing a similar swap... My car was always a long term project and I expect the total build to run close to $50k when everything is said and done.. Could you imagine spending $50k on a 1980 POS mazda, lol... These days im working on the small projects, and they're progressing very fast because most of the parts are widely available and its alot simpler to construct than the bloody 1st gen.... Its gets kind of depressing when someone comes over and they say "dem, you still haven't finish that POS yet", it makes me wanna punch them in the face but I know the reason why its not done yet... Its either I finish the car now and live on the streets with no family & job or I get that house and build that business so when the time comes and i pull out $10k cash with no issues and throw it at the 1st gen.... These days we need to be financially smart and really think about securing a stable financial future for ourselves & the family, the 20b's will just have to wait a bit longer... Think of like this, "the longer you wait, the sweeter it taste"..

Good luck to all the 20b owners out there, remember if it was as easy as most guys say then everyone would have one in their engine bay's so don't give up..

edit: tomorrow im going to pull the cover off the old girl and have a seat behind the wheel and dream :-(

 

Thanks for the kind support and understanding. And I did just buy a nib Electromotive TEC3R today off of this forum. It is the computer only but I only paid $1100.00 shipped.
Thanks BMike for the great deal. So the saga continues......

By the way, I waited six years to buy this particular car so I definitely understand patience.

 

Easily possible if you know how to do your own fabrication.

 

Sorry to say you will loose that challenge. When full boost hits (key word being FULL boost) on a stock 13brew (2,400rpm) it will be making more torque down low than the NA 20b. NA side port 20b's don't even hit above 200lbs until the upper part of the rpm range (5k and higher). Your PP will be no different. A simple test you can do. Find and fd with proper functioning seq turbos and go cruise down the freeway at 70mph in 5th gear. Floor it and feel the acceleration. Now do the same test with a NA 20b. The stock turbo car will be faster because at that particular rpm range, the 13brew will be making more torque. Now off boost is a different story as the 20b has much higher torque off idle which makes around town cruising more pleasurable.

 

I roadraced a guy with a tubeframe imsa car with a 3 rotor pp and off of one of the slower corners of the track I accidentaly hit him. Thats how much quicker and torquier the gt35r turbo 13b was. And his car was lighter. I was also quicker all the way down the straightaway with a 300 lb weight disadvantage. 13b turbos are plenty quick!

 

All that tells me dude is that you are a **** driver, i find it very had to believe that a 13b with a gt35r would pull out of a slow corner quicker that a 20bpp or maybe you just didn't have lag that day??? the straight i can believe but come on mate!!!!



cheers dave

 

lucky for me TVON i have a dyno and i have a 20bpp and i have an fd with sequential twins on it so i guess i will just test for my self i will let you know how i go!!!!




cheers dave

 

Instead of waiting, all you have to do is compare dyno charts of various set-ups. I have a whole bunch of them saved. In the upper rpm range your PP 20b will be making some good torque. Down low, there will be no comparison to a stock seq 13brew when boost hits. But really this is an apples to oranges comparison.

NA vs NA.... 20b is superior (displacement advantage)
boost vs boost ...... 20b is superior (displacement advantage)
20b NA vs 13brew boost..... 13b wins (boost increases displacement)
seq stock 20b vs seq stock 13b....20b easily wins (equal playing field)