Help me with a turbo swap/upgrade if you have time

Car is a '91 745 B230FT with AW71. The stock TD04 (mitsu) decided to toss the exhaust turbine into the O2 sensor, so I figure I might as well throw a 15g on there.

Parts list:
15g from a 97+ 850 for the flat flange and the vband connector along with a few inches of DP to weld onto existing DP (still not 100% sure on how those dimensions will work out)

AC bracket to use for the WG bracket

Planning on using the 15g WG actuator with a MBC rather than the 13c actuator, unless I can find a T3 actuator...

new copper washers for oil, gaskets for water

O2 sensor

Turbo-manifold bolts/nuts



Need to:

Heat and bend the return line to clear WG actuator - holding off until I get a better picture.

Dismantle and reclock the 15g to fit, fabricate bracket for WG actuator

Cut a few inches off stock DP, weld on flat flange


Could it really be that simple?

Sounds like a plan

No objections from me, doesnt always have to be complicated.

While you are at it, install a new WG hose.

Have fun

It should be that simple, it's not rocket science. But we all know about that Irish bastard Murphy.

You don't need to bend any of the lines. You clock both sections of the turbo relative to the waste gate housing and the 13C oil water and oil drain will bolt straight on. After that all you need to make is a bracket for the waste gate actuator. This is a 13C actuator on a 15G turbo but the principle is the same if you use another actuator. The bracket is actually part of the adjusting/tensioning setup for the 940s airco compressor. I think I moved the ear a bit.

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All the lines bolt straight on.

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Sweet. Searched JYs yesterday no luck. Called V&S and they have a 15g but it will cost me $125 vs. $70 at PNP, but I don't have to remove it myself.

I wish I could afford one of those $600 rebuilt ones from what's-his-name on TB but it's going into a $200 car...

Complication: 15g has two studs where there should be two holes. Studs proved to be impossible to extract even with heat and impact. Tried to drill them out, ended up making swiss cheese out of the material around the studs.

I think it will still work, but it looks atrocious so I'm going to see if I can weld up the holes and have them drilled proper. Might just farm it out to a machine shop - I don't really have the expertise to know how to weld cast iron properly. Henry said something about using a nickel filler...

Anyway they should be able to do it in under an hour and I don't mind dropping a couple more bucks to cover up my mistakes.

Okay the holdup now is the exhaust snail on the 15g is just barely two small to fit on the exhaust mani. I mean it's soooo close, but it won't hammer in (although it is close) so I'm thinking it's time to go thermal.

Tomorrow the manifold goes in the freezer, and the exhaust snail goes in the oven. Hopefully I can worm some time in to pick up the studs I need, else it all gets pushed back yet another day.

Of course if this works, it's really going to piss off the next person to try to undo all this... but it will never develop any exhaust leaks!

Done. Shower time before startup procedures commence, but the mechanical is all in line.

BTW if you use the old turbo as a model for clocking the exhaust snail, it doesn't come out right. Either that or I messed it up. I used an angle measure and a level and installed the new one in the exact same orientation (within a degree, maybe two) and the oil return line did not match up.

It was close though, just required some 'persuasion' or 'malletization' to coerce it into the right shape - I wasn't about to remove everything again, reclock it , redo the WG actuator, etc. It was good that I went this route, as a ton of coked up oil busted loose out of the pipe when I hit it.

Oh, and apparently I drained a good quart of coolant into the oilpan - it dripped out of the turbo coolant hose (thought I had it clamped pretty well) and managed to drip down the turbo and into the oil return line and straight into the pan. Almost overflowed my oil container - that would have been quite a mess.

I like your bracket, if my old 13c wasn't filled with 8K+ old oil (sludge) I would have used that one. Fortunately I now have a 13c bracket minus the actuator if I ever need to do this again. I'll post pics up later I'm too tired and too eager to test it out.

Oh and baking the exhaust snail and freezing the manifold worked perfectly! 1 hour at 500F/23F and they matched right up.

I would not recommend this for average do-it-yourself-ers. I consider myself rather experienced (clutch changes, trans swaps in the rain, engine swaps, head gaskets all no problem) and this was really pushing it for me.

Nothing was really that difficult, but the frustration level was way up there. I must have spent a good 5-6 hours making runs to the parts stores for a part here, a part there, another drill bit, etc. and getting those lines to meet up - ugh. I thought my method would work perfectly for clocking it, guess not. It was close though.

Although you don't have to bend any of the lines, a few of them got a slight bend put into them just so everything clears my bracket without rubbing.

[QUOTE=BrickBaller;3222804]As promised,

before
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after:
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manifold before:
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after: (it's a little ugly I forgot to take one more photo after I cleaned it up a little)
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bling bling!
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Flip the steering/brakes/ac and we're twins (nearly), nice job!

Clean all the way to the inside.

If that's a wagon, if you ever sell it let me know, I love that color!

It's for sale - check your PM