I already have the red and I'll go e85 once it's available around me.

i feel your pain. im finishing up the install of my new 2.3 and im wondering how my stock turbo and 272s will work.... this thread isnt helping me feel better about it!haha... subscribed

Almost 100% it was the 64.

I went from the 2.0 red to black. There was a huge difference in feel on the street not so much on the dyno. Now I have the 2.4 with the hta 3586 to me it feels only a little slower then the black on the street.
The part I like is this turbo seems to just keep going up top and the 2.4 down low is nice to just drive around on even out of boost.

To anyone who paid a shop to do a build (meaning the shop provided all parts and work required) how long was your car in the shop? Am I looking at 1 month, 2 months, 4 months, etc....? I don't know what to expect, still waiting to hear back from the shop. I may buy a new car this Saturday and instead of building up the Evo I'll throw a used engine in and sell it. It would really suck to do this, but sometimes dreams have to remain a dream.

well, mines been down a month. almost done with it now. i was told if they had to assemble the shortblock, figure about 3 weeks from order to delivery but they had one assembled in stock so the engine took about a week for delivery. As far as labor goes, alldata says it takes 25 labor hours for engine R&R. A shop with experience may charge alot less than what the book says, I was down at AWD a couple months ago for tuning and they quoted a little less than 2k to swap shortblocks. my guy here local thats doing the swap for me is charging me right at 1500 for labor...... hope that helps. keep your head up, it will be over soon and you will love your car again.

1 to 2 months of down time.

well my engine build was about 5 months total, but that was due to warranty issue with ACT clutch company which took a month by itself and delayed my setup cuz i didnt order all parts till that was done, and a 2 month back order with FP on there 64mm fp red, which sucks cuz 2 weeks after i ordered the 64mm red, they came out with the 80mm smh...haha id say as long as all internals that you want are available it shouldnt be more then a month so long as the shops not busy, i told my tuning shop take your time with it i want it done right.

Thanks for the replies on time frames.

Just an update. My stock head is fine. Not sure what I will do here, but I'm curious. What benefits would a built head give me? If it's simply more power, please give a guesstimate. Any other benefits? If I could have a 425-450whp (MD) DD, I'd be more than happy.

well its not simply gonna be more power, but airflow coming in and out of head will be increased, your revability for higher rpms will increase without the chance of the pistons and valves dancin together haha, you can run more aggressive cams, to make more power...if the head is fine throw some aggressive cams, either beehive springs/retainers, or some single springs/retainers, other then that, im personally running stock valves on my setup, 1mm over really isnt necessary for a dd, now for a full track car, itll help.

+1
listen to him, he knows!

yea thanks there wishr, spent a lot of money so far on my setup n not nearly completed yet....waitin on more parts to get max amoutn of hp on my setup

Started motor build in March. I believe machine shop said S3's were back ordered. They are trying to have everything done this week. Its going to be pretty tight. Got a lot of stuff going on in July.

Check out our customer's thread on his 2.3L FP Red setup that was tuned by us! Made killer power, 573WHP and 520WTQ on our Dynojet.

2.3L FP Red TopSpeed Tuned!

-Josh

Still waiting on S3 cams. Its been at least a month or 2. Pretty frustrating at this point. Its the only hold up.