My engine blew on me about 2 1/2 years ago, I tore it down to do a rebuild and as I started getting into what it would cost for replacement parts I realized I couldn't afford it at the time since I had recently bought a house and was busy remodeling (still am). But in that time I have slowly accumulated more parts, and finally find myself in a spot I can finally look at rebuilding again.

My goal is to have a nice streetable car. It won't be a daily driver, I want it to be fun and capable on a track should I choose to take it there in the future. I plan to stay NA and would like to gain 60-80hp over stock, I still don't have a huge budget, but I already have some goodies as mentioned above.

I have most of 2 S5 NA engines and 2 S5 TII engines so I hopefully have enough for one complete block of either (I haven't broken into one of the turbo engines yet to see what is actually good still though). I have racing beat exhaust from headers back, a corksport radiator, TII drivetrain, and a few other goodies.

I plan to go with a streetport and turbo housings. I've been researching porting and it seems 4 port irons are the way to go, let me know if I'm wrong there, but since I probably already have the parts I can go either way. I am also going back to mechanic school right now which makes some of the work easier with such a large neat work space.

For the rebuild I was planning on going with Atkins rotary, they seem to be a well tested, preferred by many, and commonly used for engines with my hp goals, as well as they seem to be the cheapest out there.

I'm pretty sure the suspension needed some love, even before the engine went. I am thinking of going with the mazdatrix full urethane kit, but worry that might be a little rougher than I expect as I don't really have any experience riding in a car with them. I want good handling but I don't want to be rattled around tooooo much either. The shocks on it are kyb adjustables, and eibach springs I think, which lowered about 2 inches. A parts car I have has to kick blues on it, not sure what springs, but would these be better? I may someday want coil overs, but money will prohibit that for a while.

Any ideas on improvements and any experience and direction is helpful, I still seem have like 50 other projects going on at the 'homestead' at any given time so I research what I can, but your knowledge is invaluable to me

Major questions I am still trying to research are:

Which irons are better?

Is the stock intake adequate once it has been 'smoothed over' or will I need carbs or a TBs?

What streetport template (if any) would be best for my goals?

Thx

 

most people on the forums agree that 4 port engines seem to make more power over 6 port, I would recommend doing your research before chosing which irons you use. The biggest bottleneck on running these engines NA are the stock intake manifolds, to break the 200hp barier you might have to consider ITB's or custom shorter intake setups. The stock throttle body itself is pretty good and can support good power, but the serpentine cast intake becomes a problem.

My only advice for porting is do your research. if you use the 6 port irons dont close the aux ports any later, and be aware of the oil and corner seal running areas.

If you do a search for a member called kahren you will come across a few interesting threads if your looking to stay NA

good luck

 

Thx, I've been doing a lot of research, including reading your whole 'resurrection' thread, if you need any stock parts for your vehicle let me know, I may have some laying about as I've had 3 parts vehicles come through my hands in the past few years and have a garage full of parts still, though all engine stuff is on hold till I rebuild

 

Upon further review of transmissions I think I will stick with the NA as the turbo trans appears to steal a lot more hp, if the na trans can't handle I whatever power I actually end up with I can try the turbo trans then. I may even try the miata gears at some point, but for now money dictates I use as much of what I already have for now.

I will use the TII diff when I get ahold of the proper drive shaft, so will just run the current na till then

I will likely use the 4 port block and TII intake manifolds for now......though itbs would be fun when I can afford them.

I also have an aluminum TII hood and I am going to try to fab up a sort of cold air intake utilizing the hood scoop, I've read up on people trying to make ram air intakes from it, but they seem next to pointless, especially with my goals, but it have a sort of idea in my head for how to get a decent flow of fresh air while keeping any water from making it to the actual intake

I am hoping all this can start happening before holiday season, but if not I can start early next year for sure when I get a full time job and not trying to live on a basically single income

 

what computer are you going to use to run this thing? Looking forward to see some progress

 

That is actually one of the things I keep meaning to research and overlooking as I fiddle with the parts in my garage..........

 

It looks like for cost reasons I will find a used rtek, it should work fine for me, a the haltech a looks nice, but a little more pricey :/

Things like that are easier change than the internals later internals a little more important for now I think.

 

Getting parts lined out. Working on what I will need to order from Atkins right now

Planning on going with the turbo block unless any can give me a good reason to stick with the 6 port na for surpassing 200hp

 

Dont use atkins. Not going to name names but ive spoke with alot of elite builder and those seals are junk. The motor i bought had them and my housings were trashed.

 

Half the stock engines I've pulled apart have had trashed housings on the good rotor, but I will do a little more research, appreciate the input

 

Oh, I am also trying to follow SonicRat's project on creating a realtime tunable interface with the stock ecu, most of it is over my head at this point, but it sounds very interesting and a lot more affordable than chips and standalone setups! So if possible and he has the project far enough along, I will try that route.

 

Ok, I think I will leave the primaries alone for the most part, maybe some light touches, I've read that earlier opening helps with torque. I will pull a bit more material off the secondaries but not sure I want to go too large there either and still looking at how I want to shape it. I've seen some people pulling close to 180hp without any porting and proper exhaust/ intake and some really good tuning. If I can get anywhere near 200 it sounds like I may be pretty happy, but half the fun is going to be trying my ideas.......I don't think I will be anywhere near the bigs on here, but will be fun nonetheless