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bang for the buck 2000

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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 05:51 AM
  #1  
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bang for the buck 2000

after everythign else is done, COMPLETE tune up, fluids, suspension bushings, etc etc etc. What is the best route for squeezing power out of a non ported 13b na with a 2000 budget?
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 05:52 AM
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sell and add that money to your 2,000 and get a tII
just kidding
well sort of
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 07:05 AM
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Drop a email to Kevin Landers at rotary resurrection. He might have a t2 swap he can sell you. You really want to turbo your vert. Its the best 2nd gen you can get.
Attached Thumbnails bang for the buck 2000-vert4.jpg  
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:09 AM
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Like Bukwild said, ultimately your best bet is a TII swap or to turbo your N/A engine. If you keep your N/A drivetrain (for the time being...and go easy on it), you may be able to find a decent, complete longblock TII engine within your budget. I was lucky and found an entire TII donor car for ~$2500 with a Mazda reman engine with about 10k miles on it. If you look hard enough, maybe you'll get lucky. Another option is the N/A turbo kit being offered by www.1300cc.com . Here is a link to the thread: https://www.rx7club.com/2nd-generation-specific-1986-1992-17/interest-6port-n-turbo-kits-414875/

If you'd rather stay N/A, your best bet is a full exhaust (headers, midpipe/presilencer, and a good catback), K&N air filter, an S-AFC, and a dyno tune to lean out the a/f ratio. But ultimately all that money and all that work will only net you maybe 20-30 whp. The only way to really get any decent power out of an N/A is with porting which requires you to tear your engine apart and rebuild it. As I said, your best bet is a TII swap or to turbo your N/A engine. If you can't afford it now, save for a little while...I promise you won't regret it.

Last edited by ultradef; Jun 8, 2005 at 11:13 AM.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:13 AM
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Originally Posted by ultradef
If you'd rather stay N/A, your best bet is a full exhaust (headers, midpipe/presilencer, and a good catback), K&N air filter, an S-AFC, and a dyno tune to lean out the a/f ratio. But ultimately all that money and all that work will only net you maybe 20-30 whp.
Damn you think 20-30.... lol i guess you've never tried the mazdatrix true duals eh? those are at least 20-30 easy to the wheels. with an s'afc tuned correctly and advancing your ignition timing a very small bit a friend of mine gained 14 horsepower with just the APEX'i unit.

cheers,
matt
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:16 AM
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engine rebuild with serious porting, intake, and exhaust.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:30 AM
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You can do many things to sqeeze power and make your car faster... Me personally, I am in the process of doing intake, full exhaust, s-afc, clutch, lightweight flywheel (will improve acceleration like a *****), and a NA-turbo setup... As of right now, I have done the intake and exhaust ( both custom piping w/ a greddy filter).Rebuilt the engine 2,500 miles ago, but did not streetport b/c I didnt know how and I am on a limited budgetl; so I am doing it all myself... I have received the clutch, an ACT 4 puck, but I am waiting until I save enough money for the flywheel, Exedy 12lb; that way I only have to do it once... I am currently bidding on a garrett t3/ t4 hybrid on ebay--pretty good price... next comes the intercooler, bov, boost controller, etc... you see man, I am being patient... hopefully when my car is finished w/i the next 3-6 months it'll be really nice... I am taking my time to locate my parts so I can get the best prices because I am not rich--you should do the same if you are on a budget... My budget for the project as of now is 2,800 and if I keep up the way I am, I will fall well within it.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:42 AM
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Originally Posted by Apathy
You can do many things to sqeeze power and make your car faster... Me personally, I am in the process of doing intake, full exhaust, s-afc, clutch, lightweight flywheel (will improve acceleration like a *****), and a NA-turbo setup... As of right now, I have done the intake and exhaust ( both custom piping w/ a greddy filter).Rebuilt the engine 2,500 miles ago, but did not streetport b/c I didnt know how and I am on a limited budgetl; so I am doing it all myself... I have received the clutch, an ACT 4 puck, but I am waiting until I save enough money for the flywheel, Exedy 12lb; that way I only have to do it once... I am currently bidding on a garrett t3/ t4 hybrid on ebay--pretty good price... next comes the intercooler, bov, boost controller, etc... you see man, I am being patient... hopefully when my car is finished w/i the next 3-6 months it'll be really nice... I am taking my time to locate my parts so I can get the best prices because I am not rich--you should do the same if you are on a budget... My budget for the project as of now is 2,800 and if I keep up the way I am, I will fall well within it.
Right...

Porting is labor intensive, really doesn't cost a thing.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:42 AM
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If your engine you have now runs good, no problems, doesn't have high miles, (past 120k)don't touch it. Do simple mods, full exhaust, port your manifolds, CAI. Then I'd just build a nice ported 13bt while your dirving your n/a. So then you can just pop out the old one and in with the new. If you have all the parts at hand a complete TII drivetrain swap won't take longer than a week once you have the right knowledge/ approach at doing it.

Bukwild is that your convertible, that is the nicest paint/top schemes I've seen.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 11:50 AM
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Eh and about the entire turbo na or swapping it. Going turbo can get you big *** gains, but requires you to either put down your car for the swap. Or hiring a shop or someone else to do it. So I hope you're mechanically inclined for the swap.

If you want to go for that, more power to you. But if you would rather perfer to stay the NA route go with a full exhaust, intake, safc, and then save the rest up for a big port. Just my .02.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 12:00 PM
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"Bukwild is that your convertible, that is the nicest paint/top schemes I've seen."

yeah its my money pit. The paint is GM torch red (99 vette) and the top is a custom german cloth ruby/ black stiching weave. Similar to carbon fiber. The ruby in it really stands out. Its my third top so I decided to go with something different.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 01:48 PM
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Originally Posted by marlaman
Damn you think 20-30.... lol i guess you've never tried the mazdatrix true duals eh? those are at least 20-30 easy to the wheels. with an s'afc tuned correctly and advancing your ignition timing a very small bit a friend of mine gained 14 horsepower with just the APEX'i unit.

cheers,
matt
I've yet to see a dyno sheet that backs up Mazdatrix's claims of a "28% increase" in rwhp from the true duals. I think its a great system, but I have a hard time believing those claims. I think they used to have the dyno sheet on their site, but I couldn't seem to find it anymore. I'd love for someone to prove me wrong though, it would be awesome if just an exhaust could give you 35 rwhp!

Anyway, 14 rwhp from an S-AFC is about right. There is a lot of power to be found with tuning since the N/As run so pig rich stock. I think the 14 rwhp from a good tune plus another 16 or so rwhp from full exhaust/intake (for a total of 30 rwhp, as I stated) is pretty fair.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 01:55 PM
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Monkey, KNowing what I know now. I would look up that guy in MD that has 2 TII front clips for sale for 2K. I would buy that and PIIMV (put it in my vert)
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 01:57 PM
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Here we go again with a bunch of people jumping on the "TII swap" or "sell your car and get a TII" bandwagon

Why doesn't anyone say turbo your n/a? Enough people have proved it to not be very hard now and that it makes good power (better than a stock TII that you'd end up with by doing a swap), and that it works, so why not do that? Or why not just build up your n/a? Is anything really wrong with that? No... That's what I've been doing and it gets old reading how 90% of this board think turbo is the only way to go.

If you're staying n/a do the basics first.
- Cone filter but build it to be a TRUE cold air intake
- Full exhaust, header to test/midpipe to catback
- Weight reduction (this is free most of the time!!)
- Wideband and an s-afc, lean it out to ~13 afr's
- Good clutch/light flywheel
- Etc

The list goes on, but those are some good starts.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 02:11 PM
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for those of us who prefer to stay NA...

exhaust!! IMO racing beat full exhaust system(headers, presilencer, all the way down)is the way to go. the system was designed specifically for rotary, so it can withstand the high exhaust temps.
if you go with exhaust, youll want to go with a less restrictive air filter, as dDuB has pointed out. air/fuel tuning is also a good idea.
above all, make sure you keep you rotary running happy! theres nothing worse than spending time and money and then finding out something is broken/worn out. just keep ontop of maintainance and fix anything thats broken b4 you start to upgrade.
and above all, HAVE FUN!!
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 02:18 PM
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Originally Posted by dDuB
Here we go again with a bunch of people jumping on the "TII swap" or "sell your car and get a TII" bandwagon

Why doesn't anyone say turbo your n/a?
I did explain that turboing his n/a is an option...look at the 4th post in the thread.

Originally Posted by dDuB
Or why not just build up your n/a? Is anything really wrong with that? No... That's what I've been doing and it gets old reading how 90% of this board think turbo is the only way to go.

If you're staying n/a do the basics first.
- Cone filter but build it to be a TRUE cold air intake
- Full exhaust, header to test/midpipe to catback
- Weight reduction (this is free most of the time!!)
- Wideband and an s-afc, lean it out to ~13 afr's
- Good clutch/light flywheel
- Etc

The list goes on, but those are some good starts.
I think the reason that most people suggest doing a TII swap in this case is because even with full exhaust/intake/s-afc you're still only looking at ~170 rwhp tops unless you get into extensive porting. A TII will get close to that bone stock, will have much more torque, and responds much better to mods than an n/a. I've read a few of frigidmonkey's other posts...seems to me like he's looking for a quick street car to run stoplight to stoplight or on the highway. In my personal opinion, a turbo is his best bet especially on a vert since its carrying a few extra pounds than a coupe. The only way you're going to match the power of a modded 13BT with an n/a is with a bridgeport/p-port/etc. which brings to the table the question of streetablility. Some people don't mind driving around a b-port/p-port car daily, others might. Of course their are other options, but IMO a TII swap or turboing his n/a is the best bang for the buck. To each their own.

Last edited by ultradef; Jun 8, 2005 at 02:31 PM.
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 03:34 PM
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Originally Posted by ultradef
I did explain that turboing his n/a is an option...look at the 4th post in the thread.



I think the reason that most people suggest doing a TII swap in this case is because even with full exhaust/intake/s-afc you're still only looking at ~170 rwhp tops unless you get into extensive porting. A TII will get close to that bone stock, will have much more torque, and responds much better to mods than an n/a. I've read a few of frigidmonkey's other posts...seems to me like he's looking for a quick street car to run stoplight to stoplight or on the highway. In my personal opinion, a turbo is his best bet especially on a vert since its carrying a few extra pounds than a coupe. The only way you're going to match the power of a modded 13BT with an n/a is with a bridgeport/p-port/etc. which brings to the table the question of streetablility. Some people don't mind driving around a b-port/p-port car daily, others might. Of course their are other options, but IMO a TII swap or turboing his n/a is the best bang for the buck. To each their own.
sorry if I was misleading, not worried about stoplight to stoplight, I'm not looking for something that is a straight line monster, I dont want something that is only good in the straights, corners are the most important part to me, I've got that covered, but I'm looking at highway on ramps and lane changes, and such. A lot of the highway on ramps here come off of intersections with stop signs, so its dead stop, and need to get up to decent speed by the top of the ramp. And people around here do NOT let you change lanes, it always turns into a "race" they see your signal, they speed up, if you slow down to get behind them, either they slow down, or someone behind them speeds up. Bastards. At least my car is nimble, right now my only chance is speed up until they speed up, jack the brake hard and swerve over, lol.
Turbo-ing my car is not out of the question. Selling it however is. I LOVE my car, especially after the twisty road I found yesterday. Swapping a TII is out, so is porting, I dont have the place to pull an engine and wont for quite some time. I'm limited to bolt ons for at least the next couple years.
Sorry for being stupid but what exactly is an s-afc? So, since it cost so much to get even close to 200 rwhp, its no wonder torquecentral.com is so popular
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 03:39 PM
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Originally Posted by ultradef
I did explain that turboing his n/a is an option...look at the 4th post in the thread.



I think the reason that most people suggest doing a TII swap in this case is because even with full exhaust/intake/s-afc you're still only looking at ~170 rwhp tops unless you get into extensive porting. A TII will get close to that bone stock, will have much more torque, and responds much better to mods than an n/a. I've read a few of frigidmonkey's other posts...seems to me like he's looking for a quick street car to run stoplight to stoplight or on the highway. In my personal opinion, a turbo is his best bet especially on a vert since its carrying a few extra pounds than a coupe. The only way you're going to match the power of a modded 13BT with an n/a is with a bridgeport/p-port/etc. which brings to the table the question of streetablility. Some people don't mind driving around a b-port/p-port car daily, others might. Of course their are other options, but IMO a TII swap or turboing his n/a is the best bang for the buck. To each their own.
Also remember with a TII swap you will be heavier and thus less agile...

And who said you have to get bport or pport to match a modded 13BT? How modded? Are we talking 14's? 13's? 12's? What? For sake of argument lets say in the high 13's range. I have a streetported, MILD, n/a and I could dip into 13's if I could just launch better. Low 14's is easy with my current mods/setup, high 13's (read ~13.9) are in the realm of possibility. Do I have a bport or pport? No not at all, not even a very extensive streetport and I'm still running stock ECU. Oh yah and this is with s4 engine/rotors.

It can be done, but like you said, to each their own..
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 04:43 PM
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Originally Posted by frigidmonkey
sorry if I was misleading, not worried about stoplight to stoplight, I'm not looking for something that is a straight line monster, I dont want something that is only good in the straights, corners are the most important part to me, I've got that covered, but I'm looking at highway on ramps and lane changes, and such. A lot of the highway on ramps here come off of intersections with stop signs, so its dead stop, and need to get up to decent speed by the top of the ramp. And people around here do NOT let you change lanes, it always turns into a "race" they see your signal, they speed up, if you slow down to get behind them, either they slow down, or someone behind them speeds up. Bastards. At least my car is nimble, right now my only chance is speed up until they speed up, jack the brake hard and swerve over, lol.
Turbo-ing my car is not out of the question. Selling it however is. I LOVE my car, especially after the twisty road I found yesterday. Swapping a TII is out, so is porting, I dont have the place to pull an engine and wont for quite some time. I'm limited to bolt ons for at least the next couple years.
Sorry for being stupid but what exactly is an s-afc? So, since it cost so much to get even close to 200 rwhp, its no wonder torquecentral.com is so popular
Based on your parameters and $2,000 budget, perhaps,

$63 Drop in K&N Air Fliter and mod the stock air as discussed in link

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...0&page=2&pp=15

$270 Racing Beat Down Pipe and Presilencer

$390 Lighten Steel Flywheel

$144 HD Pressure Plate - Pick an appropriate clutch for your driving style $?

$240 Racing Beat 'Vert Springs

$576 (4) KYB AGX Adjustable Struts

Total $1,683

Also, switch out the open dif for a LSD.

It won't be a stoplight racer, but it will be fun to drive.

JP
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 05:53 PM
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Holy jesus. Where did you find AGX's for $576? That's over $200 more than eBay.. . .
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Old Jun 8, 2005 | 06:12 PM
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Originally Posted by End3r
Holy jesus. Where did you find AGX's for $576? That's over $200 more than eBay.. . .
Thanks. I stand corrected. Actually, $506 from Tire Rack $144 front $109 Rear (each). Prices are list prices from reputable dealers and used to illustrate options that try to answer the question posed. Obviously, one could shop for better deals.

JP
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Old Jun 9, 2005 | 12:24 AM
  #22  
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Or hop on the bottle. A new fuel pump, fuel pressure regular, and a wet NOS kit would easily get you into the 200HP range with basic bolt ons. So do it.
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Old Jun 9, 2005 | 01:09 AM
  #23  
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just sell the car and get a bridgeported fb with full suspension
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Old Jun 9, 2005 | 11:19 AM
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Originally Posted by dDuB
Also remember with a TII swap you will be heavier and thus less agile...

And who said you have to get bport or pport to match a modded 13BT? How modded? Are we talking 14's? 13's? 12's? What? For sake of argument lets say in the high 13's range. I have a streetported, MILD, n/a and I could dip into 13's if I could just launch better. Low 14's is easy with my current mods/setup, high 13's (read ~13.9) are in the realm of possibility. Do I have a bport or pport? No not at all, not even a very extensive streetport and I'm still running stock ECU. Oh yah and this is with s4 engine/rotors.

It can be done, but like you said, to each their own..
My responses were specific to the threadstarter and his situation - and frigidmonkey has a vert. Good luck getting a vert into the 13s on a mild streetport (and frigidmonkey made it clear that he does not want to rebuild/port his motor). Even low 14s on your setup is a great number...you must be a good driver. But keep in mind that you drive a coupe, correct? And a lighter S4 at that. "Almost 13s" on your setup would be at least mid-14s on a vert (given the same driver, etc.) due to the weight difference.

I don't want this to turn into a "Turbo vs. N/A" pissing contest. All I'm going to say is that its common knowledge that its easier to make more power (for less money) out of a 13BT than an N/A. A turbo vert can easily be in the 13s for an additional ~$500 in mods...an N/A vert will take considerably more $$$.

As I said, to each his own...turbo's aren't for everybody. But he's looking to do this on a budget of $2000, without doing a swap or pulling the engine. To me its a no-brainer...turbo your N/A or run a 100 shot of nitrous.

frigidmonkey: To answer your question - an SAFC is a device used to tune your car's air/fuel ratio made by Apex'i. Other companies offer similar devices, such as Greddy e-manage, etc. Do a search and you'll come up with tons of threads that will explain it better.

Last edited by ultradef; Jun 9, 2005 at 11:27 AM.
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Old Jun 9, 2005 | 12:49 PM
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ultradef their will always be people that think you can make your NA fast with non forced induction bolt ons. I don't call a high 13 second car fast by any strech of the amagination. With that being said the Rx7 was not made to be a quarter mile machine. It was made to out handle aother cars with the same horsepower in the corners. So your decision should be based on what type of racing you want to do. If you want to join scca and race around a tight track where you don't brake 50mph than a NA will suit your needs and their is no reason to dump money into a turbo when you can spend the money on the suspension. But if you want to have fun at the lights and have a fast street car you must go forced induction or get another car. So choose what you need on what type of racing you are doing. 95% of the people on this forum are never going to do any type of racing besides street.
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