Originally Posted by davidbuschur
(Post 7242628)
Hi guys,
I've got a lot to put into this post. Hope it doesn't get boring.
We have been very busy building parts for the EVOX, thankfully. We have also been too quiet with the car and the project.
We came out strong with the car, built a lot of our parts very quickly when the car hit the market and we had great results. We did a lot of testing and found what, at the time, was the perfect combination. Last year on the stock turbo, full weight, stock tires, stock clutch the car ran 12.2 at 113 mph, this was on straight 93 octane.
We then did more testing to try to find more power. What we found was that while the stock cat is an excellent part there was some small gains at the 300 whp level (our dyno, reads low) that could justify an offroad pipe. We also found that at 300 whp levels the STOCK downpipe was more than efficient enough and it was pointless to build a new larger downpipe for the car.
We added an Exedy Twin disc as soon as they were released and just never ran the car again. Then we got a chance to try the Blouch Dominator 2 turbo, this was an impressive part as it easily raised the HP levels about 40 whp.
I worked on our tunes, built tunes for the RC 750 injectors, DW 800's and the DW 1,000's.
We also decided to try the Cosworth cams, this was the smallest grind they offer, again this was good for about 40 more whp over the stock cams.
At that point in time we were at 407 whp. Our car had run a best of 12.2 at 113 with only 290'ish whp on our dyno.
I drove the car, enjoyed the car and got to test other parts on customers cars.
What I learned through the last 8 months or so is just what I had found in the first place. The stock downpipe is an excellent part along with the stock 02 housing.
This left us in a dilemna, to build those two parts like everyone else was offering or just pass on the sales. I decided to pass on the sales as I found no gains in the parts I had tested.
We did build a 3" downpipe for the EVO X and it is on my car. However when the car was under 350 whp there were no gains in going from the stock 2.5" pipe to the 3" pipe. At the power level I am at now (400+) there may start to be some slight gains that will show up. More testing will come on that eventually.
I also noticed something else about the EVOX. The car is not geared to go very fast in the 1/4 mile. You simply run out of gear/rpm before you run out of power.
I thought to myself long and hard what to do next and I have been stuck on this for a long time.
The stock engine/head has proven itself to be just awesome but I know it can only take so much.
This brings me to today. Yesterday Trent built a completely new exhaust for our EVOX. Tucked it way up under the car so it's high off the ground, we used a cross flow muffler in the rear and made the car QUIET! Today I dyno'd it and did a lot of driving in it and I can't be happier with the outcome. Tonight my wife told me we she go to the track, I had nobody to drive the car but figured I could make a few passes in it, no matter how bad a driver I am.
Here is exactly everything we have done to the car:
BR 3" downpipe (prototype part, simple stock replacement)
BR 3" offroad pipe
BR new exhaust with cross flow muffler
BR ported stock 02 housing
BR ported stock exhaust manifold
Blouch Dominator 2, stock appearing turbo
BR upper and lower i/c pipe
BR MAF pipe, filter and carbon fiber shield
BR FMIC
BR Manual boost controller
Exedy Twin disc clutch
KW suspension
Cosworth cams
BR opensource tune on 93 octane ONLY.
Other than this the car is stock. Engine/head are untouched and have never been apart. The front strut tower bar is off the car, the spare tire and jack are out of it, other than that it is FULL WEIGHT.
Tonight I ran the car with about 5/8 of a tank of 93 Shell fuel and a bunch of misc stuff in the car. I want to be clear this is on only pump gas, the car has never had any race gas in it.
The runs from tonight looked like this:
1. 12.34 at 122.28
2. 12.07 at 122.33
3. 11.97 at 122.96
4. 12.04 at 122.24
The car is up nearly 10 mph from when we ran it last but the ET's because I am quite handicapped have only dropped about 3 tenths. My best 60 foot of the night was a sorry 1.85. I lifted to shift each gear. I'm still happy as hell that it ran 11's and ran all 122+ mph.
Now back to my thoughts on the car. In order for the car to cross the finish line it has to run at over 8500 rpm. Needless to say that is way past the redline and I'm just not real sure how long or how many times the stock engine can do this, especially at this power level.
What I have concentrated on in building this car was the fact it is limited on how fast it can go in 4th gear and giving it the best power curve I could without just focusing on peak power numbers and laggy POS to drive.
This car is a BLAST to drive. The close gear ratio's keep it in boost contantly and the turbo spools up as fast as I can remember the stock one spooling.
I just have to ask myself, "What do we do next? The car can't safely run anymore RPM in 4th gear."
I truly feel that focusing on the power band of the car, keeping a quick spooling powerful combination was the way to go and I'm glad we didn't just start making big laggy turbo kits and selling parts I knew weren't going to increase the power.
I've got what I think is the perfect EVOX, responsive, fun to drive and I haven't broken the bank building it. It's also VERY-VERY Quiet. The KW suspension is killer, rides great, corners amazing. This car can be used for road racing, autocross, daily driving, trip taking and it is maxed out on gear ratio in the 1/4 mile.
I do want to build a 35r kit for the car but everytime I start to think about it I again ask myself, "Why add the lag when it's out of gear?" Makes no sense and I guess that's why it's not done yet.
I have not searched yet but I do need to see if we can find or make a new final drive for the car. It would be nice to drop the cruise RPM about 600 rpm, which would also drop 600 rpm off the finish line RPM. That would open up some room for more power.
I would think given this is a full weight (minus the strut bar and spare) on just 93 octane it has to be one of the highest trap speeds recorded, given those factors.
I'm quite happy with the results.
I rarely post in the EVOX sections, so please excuse my long post. Just wanted to get some information out there and let you all know why we have been doing what we are doing.
Thank you.
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