Project : Mid life Chrisis. Third time lucky .

I let the youtube vid run on and noticed one of the 7 dwarfs had his motor next in line for a tune up;
What boost did he achieve?

Mr B , you fine words of guidance and reading more into the problem first tells me to get a high flowing bov or even two regular ones and have them welded into the intercooler pipe run near the intake manifold . Would tee-ing the current bov into the boost controller source be an idea or not. 

As you said fine tuning the current set up would be the best idea . Again running her down the motorway early this morning I have been messing with the boost controller to try and get a good all round setting . Now it's running 1.5 bar and hits this very quickly and holds perfectly . 

So when you say fine tune I need little jobs to keep my mind active.

Well thanks to Bob and Mr B for giving me lots of things to look into and work on.

I have a quoted 1.2 bar spring for the waste gate coming from eBay so i will use this as my base doing away with the other springs in the waste gate. I feel this will not be as quoted but as long as it is near the 1 bar mark I can set up the controller up to hit the levels I am currently at.

Next "sort out" the vacuum lines with some 1 ply silicon hose and make the runs as short as possible. I will make up a 4 into one vacuum line for the new 50m BOV.
second get that mounted as close to the intake manifold as possible, i will leave the current HKS bov set up to be sure i am dumping as much air as possible. Hopefully this will help with the shudder that I get. if I’m lucky this might cure it?!?!

The exhaust manifold is an unknown and i will remove the waste gate and have a look and feel around to see if the divider has been drilled out.

Next purchase a wide-band sensor and have that fitted so I can monitor what is going on with the fuelling. ( this will be done in January)

I plan on looking into the throttle plates and there setup via the workshop manual to see that everything is working as it should be.

As for the gizmo boost controller i have to say that now i am used to working with it i like it . It’s simple and holds great boost up to the limit and fiddling with the gain makes a good improvement in how quickly the car gets into boost. But if the other options of sorting this little gremlin out don’t work then i will consider upgrading it.

As i use the car most days now i will not be doing any major mechanical work to it. if it does give up the ghost in a big way i will garage it until the summer and pick up a run around although i might be getting a company car in the future. As has been said i think fine tuning what i have is the best way forward, high 400's is plenty for a little hatchback that is 26 years old and as i am not going to strip the car out or attempt to save any weight I will have to learn to accept it as is . Or spend several thousand to get a little more out of it and I don’t think that is a feasible option at this time.

I would try new bov in current hks spot and on its own and see results and setup spring before adding other fitting for it, also by removing hks you eliminate that from issue. a decent 50mm tial tubosmart valve can vent really well due to vale size and amount of lift.
Having a look at exhaust manifold would be wise, if not been done well would be easy and cheap pick up another used one to mod and port well and swap over . you could look at locating wastegate on collector area which better if your space allows the layout and possibly tweak turbo outlet pipe better and to work with changed wastegate location.
If stick to high 400 goal and take time to smooth out these things and do some checks on part condition you should get good running and reliability and have some fun .  
A well setup proper 480hp pulsar is proper rapid and more than enough for a daily driver and bit of track or drag fun .

So today I got round to fitting the 50mm bov and sorting the vacuum hoses out with shorter reenforced line. I now have the 4 inlet port vacuum line  set up for for both Bovs. I have also fitted a single wastegate spring . I think I mentioned this earlier.  So I also fitted the HKS twin spark thing which was nice and easy to wire up in the end so thanks to the input from this site.  It seems to take the input feed to the coil and pump up the voltage . 

So with all these done to the car I had to go for a quick spin. It starts very quickly from cold need no gas pedal to catch it!  but time will tell if fitting the twin spark has helped at the high end of boost. I also indexed and side gapped some new plugs. The car boosts well and the HKS bov blows the air under 0.7bar over that they both open and it makes a great noise! I did some high boost driving and the waste gate shudder I had is much better but still there . But it is much less noticeable on high boost driving . I can live with it for now and maybe I'm just being to OTT but that's me. I will do a detailed right up in a few weeks . It runs 1.4 bar at the moment and I have not set the high level until I get a wideband but even at that level it shifts......... Anyway.

I'm in a rush as its time to put the xmas decorations up and start at the mulled wine.

Sounds like moving in right direction, I not seen the version 1 hks twin sparks in years, have had version 2 and does improve spark strength and duration, what I liked about them is no need cut wiring and if failed ignition still works as oem system.
Could be worth moving standard oem amplifier off engine to a cooler location and mount it on a alloy finned block as heat sink, standard position not great with vibration and heat, too much heat and they start break down.
Have you got different springs to try getting 50mm valve open bit earlier at around 0.5bar. I would guess exhaust manifold is playing a big part of it and wastegate flow not great so turbo driven a lot even when wastegate fully open, should be able improve further with more investigation tweaks and changes hopefully. have fun ...

Please feel free to have a look over this build of mine, I am considering selling this to the right owner. It is only a though at this time as I now have an Audi that does all my family needs.

This car R has been reliable ,fast and has been very well built whith no costs cut . Bob will no doubt give his professional opinion as he has tuning it twice and given it the once over . I will put a figure up when I have an idea. 


To some ,numbers sell : 473bhp at 1.7 with less ignition ( safe) and 530/550 if the boost and ignition is turned up?!?!
AND AT THIS TIME IM UNSURE WEATHER TO LET HER GO, so just a test of the water at this time.


I am tempted to take it to bob as see what we can get "...........

Took her out for a drive today and decided to push the car more than I normally would ( but still not to max boost ) and it really is a great car for its age and god it is loud. I'm now thinking of spending out on a full black re-spray but I don't know if that's a good idea.........I

MOT next week so fingers crossed !

Good to hear your enjoying it. Yes hopefully mot goes good

Glad you are enjoying it, so not thinking about selling now?

A little update , a couple of weeks ago I fitted some new front suspension shocks and bump stops . The car rides really well and soaks up all the bumps with ease. It feels very comfortable to drive now and to my suprise has really improved the ride quality.


So MOT day came and it failed on inefficient hand brake . The tester and most of the workshop staff had a good look over the car and all commented how solid the car was underneath . ( reassuring to know) so back home to crack on with the job. Removed the calipers wound them back, ditched the red stuff pads in favour of some soft o/e items . Took it for a nice motorway run to bed in and now the hand brake is better . MOT in the bag and a long spirited drive to celerbrate !
Last jobs : swap the entire dash as mine is split and cracked .
Move the dials around and have the boost controller somewhere more accessible .
Wire up and fit the new AEM wideband.
And if I keep it think about having the bodywork done.

Then .......... Leave in the garage for months as I don't have enough time to enjoy it or sell it if the right buyer comes looking.

Right i will be formally putting my beloved R up for sale over the next week when i get round to completing a detailed advert . I feel someone else will gain more enjoyment from her than me as she just sits in the garage and with more family on the horizon i doubt i will get full enjoyment from her. This is a very well spec'd and a great car that has been very well maintained.Anyway advert to follow soon.