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My 1993 Gol GL 1846cc turbo intercooled 8 valves project! 350hp

27K views 43 replies 8 participants last post by  Jettaboy1884 
#1 · (Edited)
1993 Gol 1846cc turbo intercooled 8 valves 283whp w/fueltech FT450

Welcome to my project! My name is Leonardo, I live in Uruguay and this is my new project that I want to share with you guys! I'm the proud owner of this 1993 Gol GL 1.8 with a ea827 engine, just like alot of vw mk1/2/3 and some audis 80 100 5000 etc

Some pictures of the car before the new project. This ones are from 2016 from a VW meet



Some stuff that can't be seen easily



Here's the list of parts going into this project, I got a used stock block with documentation that didn't run in 17 years..

Proyect 1846cc

Block: Stock ea827 bored to 82.55 from 81mm
Pistons: Iasa Forjed 82.5mm
Rods: Scat 144mm (if you don't know this brand these are also forjed)
Pin: SPAturbo 20mm good for up to 1000hp
Crankshaft: Golf 1.8 Forjed with 8 counterweights (86,4mm)
Flywheel: Stock from a Gol 1.6 Diesel (these are a bit heavy but give great inertia)

Cylinder Head: Stock from Gol mk1
Springs: Double Springs from Ancona for solid lifters, good for 7500rpm
Camshaft: 049G Gol Gts (specs: adm 260º exhaust 266º / Lift adm 10,3 exhaust 10,8 / LC 110º / 44º crossover) Very used in turbo gols in Uruguay, Brasil and Argentina
Valves: adm/esc Stock Mahle adm 38mm exhaust 33mm
Conducts were polish and work to make them flow better (this was DIY there will be pics)

Wastegate MCS good for boost control
Boost Control from MS2 using the N75 selenoid
Turbine Housing .60 Master Power modified at home to fit a Garret Airresearch old turbo .63/.38, after the mods its .63/.60 with a 49mm rotor
Ebay Fuel pressure regulator (also have the stock one with the stock fuel ramp)
Aluminium fuel ramp
Bosch 044 Fuel pump, 200lph at 5bar (very nice)

SPA 60-2 Trigger wheel for EDIS
Bosch Coil for Vectra 3 cables (I think you guys may know it as the chevrolet vectra/astra or vauxhall)
Rotation sensor for Fiat Uno MTE Thompson
Headbolts Forjed from SPAturbo good for up to 600hp

Now to the pictures! Taking apart the old engine to clean up and allow me to work easier





The old engine was poorly build by a mechanic the first time I turbo charged the car, some of the problems I found was, the rods were hitting the pistons inside chewing material and making later force generating oil vent, bad compression and the space between cylinders and pistons became 0.9mm in some cylinders others 0.7, when 0.6 was the max allowed by piston manufacturer.. this is why I decided to build a new engine mostly by myself. Ended up buying an used engine to start from scratch
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Arriving of the "new" old engine







Golf Crank when bought


After a mild clean up to head to the shop


More and more arriving, blow off, rods, inox filter, forjed screws for the flywheel, aluminium fuel ramp


Edis "kit", I picked each part individualy thinking it could work out very well with ms2,wasted spark coil, tooth wheel 60-2, rotation sensor


Waste gate, forjed head bolts, waste gate to boost control line


Pistons and pins


Oil spacer for oil cooler (still need the cooler and lines, probably will be done in step 2 of the project)


Springs


Catch tank made by one of my wife's cousings, very helpful 1/2inc tubing or 12.5mm


Oil vapor catch tank


Injectores, fuel pump support


Installing the MS2 in the car


Fuse box caos, I will try to fix it or do my best (probably this summer Jan-March)


MS2 Almost working (first install now I will have to re do some of the wiring)


14 inch wheels from stock Saveiro mk2-3 4x100



Time for the blueprint of the head, lucky me I have 2 heads exactly the same thanks to the old engine that came complete, so I could make some mystakes on the process since I never did this before. Some tools for the jobs, thanks jegs! Eastwood carbide bids, and lots of sanding rolls










After sending it to the shop




Turbos, my garret on the left(.63/.38), my friends master power on the righ (.42/.60)


the making of frankestein




Back from the shop after balacing
 
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#34 ·
Great to see more progress on this! I've been considering going with a fueltech unit on my fox wagon and ditching the CIS injection. It looks like they make a really nice product.
 
#35 ·
Thank for enjoying the build. If you are only looking to switch injections, I believe the FT250 can handle distributor without problems and its the cheapest. If you want the best for you buck, go for a FT300 that allows you in a future to go to EDIS with wasted spark.

The powerFT models are for really expensive builds, I would throw a 2500$ bucks ECU on a stock car unless you are looking to modify it on the future. Besides there's ton of parts for your car in the US

Some updates. upp with the boost from 0.7bar to 0.9bar just to keep rolling until the details are done, then I can seek the dyno. I recently installed a new starter from the 1.6 gol diesel, and had to switch to the engine mount of the german turbo diesel in aluminium due to the difference in size. Also found a used old gol diesel radiator, its not aluminiun is actually copper. Can be fixed, cools faster due to the big difference in size.







I spect soon to have enough money to buy a tig ac/dc welder so I can start building my new intake. Until then the crossflow is going to seat aside.

Also doug, if you do buy a Fueltech ECU I can tune it for you remotly with no charge, its not something I usually do but to help another volksjunkie why not
 
#36 ·
Before starting with the new part of my project, I want to say, I'm kinda tired of checking the forum from time to time and see tons of golf, and other stuff missplaced in this section. Is it soooooooo freaking hard to just READ UP the name of the section before posting?? Geez, wish I was the moderator of this section to erase all the misplaced posts

So took the engine apart to check all the internals before swaping for a new head. And decided to do a couple of additional things, like orings, new exhaust manifold, new pie cuts DP, same with the cold side, modified my IC, and made all new intercooler piping. All done at home with a lincoln electric 201AC/DC tig





Always do the math, even if you don't like it, you can't just close an engine without knowing the RC.


Old clutch new pads, always plain the flywheel for a new clutch


Since the crossflow head wasn't desing for my car, I had to fabricate some new parts, like water manifolds, I did some from scratch and others just modified the original, it was most important to keep the heater core working OEM since in winter on the road you can freezy



Almost look good, added to the end the original part


OEM modified


Before putting the engine back into the car, I decided to change the direction bar on the passenger side, since my car was desing only to align on one side, it always ended up with 1-2° off, not anymore. Screw you tech guy from the place I align, I did fix it:cool:


Going in!


Once in the car, it was time to build an intake manifold, since I'm not going to throw away 950 bucks on a new one that requieres me to change the alternator to the other side of the engine, AND change the radiator for one half as tall. Stupidest thing ever to cut your cooling in half, just to get a nice manifold in. Solution? Purchase the lower part of the OEM intake, cut it, and use it as base for a new unique intake.







Getting the cardboard to aluminium, I made myself a plying tool with some angle iron I purchase as scrap, works pretty good.





Yes I build myself the smallest welding table every going on 80x60cms


Welded inside and outside just in case.


not too bad, thanks to thatoldtony, weldingtipsandtricks, weld.com, weldtube, 6061.com, and so many others that make tig welding videos, I learned alot watching them, and after getting the hand of it, I got certified as a sanitary stainless tig welder for the industry, just for fun.

Let's get into the piecuts




New exhaust manifold, longer runners and its pulsative, meaning 1-4 and 2-3 are connected, unlike the previous one that was monoflow as we call it here in the deep south


Now to the downpipe, more pie cuts



Some nice colors, remember I'm not a pro, I only weld when I need to


Now the wastegate




Time to modify the IC, pipping and more









Time to connect the intake to the IC



Checking the blowoff position



Sent the rear drums to be modified to look like a toothed wheel, added a hall sensor for rear wheel speed. Now that I have both traction wheel and rear wheel speed, I can start tunning the active traction control to avoid slipping on WOT acceleration.



Tooths were so fragile because of the wrong way they were machined, that when I took the wheel off, I touched them and basically took 1 off, and almost broke off another 3, so epoxy glued




Short video, taking the car into the garage on its own power, testing all is good, no leaks, nothing wierd.

Will be back after university courses are over about december with more, maybe even I'm lucky enought to get around to the dyno
 
#39 ·
Woah, that toothed rear drum is an awesome idea, very cool!

Your welds look great as well. Very nice progr[SUB][/SUB]ess. :thumbup:
Jettaboy thanks for stopping by, its working great too so far, I will post more videos soon, I'm having issues with the turbo so I'm already searching for a new one. Welds are ok, I hope with time I keep getting better at it. If I have to switch turbos then I will have to remake part of the downpipe and the conection to the IC.
 
#41 ·
Thanks for stopping by, indeed I do love this old gen1 gol hehe

Some more updates, the copper radiator was giving me issues leaking, so I bought a new aluminium, wich didn't fit the bolts like its supposed to, after checking with the shop 3 diferente radiators I picked the one that fitted the bolts in place but was too high to create any vacuum, so I had to cut and re weld the supports. Some pics




After that, I checked everything after a letting the car warm up, and figured that the valves were leaking oil into the intake. Change the seals on the valves with the head still on the block




The turbo is back from the service, already back in the car, went out yesterday to enjoy a joy ride, barely did a pull just to check boost is on its minimun, with 0.45bar at the moment, once I get to the dyno I will go back to 1.7bar or whatever is needed for the horsepower I'm looking for


Everything in place
 
#42 ·
to the dyno back n forth

some updates, went to the dyno, did some pulls with 1bar, boostcontroller wasn't giving the extra boost needed so I settleled for 1bar on friday, on pump gas 93 RON I manage to squizee 253,5whp and 36kgm torque.


First and last pull on friday

Do you see the step in the graph? Tunning in the street you would never fix that, you must use a dyno to polish the tune to get that 1% that's missing.


Went back on saturday to see if the boostcontrol was going to work and nothing same results, here's a log of the pull

Switched the spring load on the wastegate and went back on tuesday for more, with 1,4bar the return power was 286,6whp and 42kgm, then when I tried to put some more psi, power dropped 4whp with and additional 6psi, so I went back and took the 6psi back, turbo reached its limit at 286,6whp and 42kgm, here's some pics of the pull with 1.6bar and the lost hp



Now its time to start saving some money up to get a new turbo :screwy: cheers
 
#43 ·
with about 19,5k views the feedback is almost null, tbh I have seen tons of people running 1.8-2.0 ea827 engines, most with OEM or basic prep, this is basicaly a guide for all of you out there with these engines to get in that nice horse power. Aren't you all tired of seeing people swaping old ea827 engines with ea888 engines? Are there any proud owners of mk1-mk2-mk3 8v engines here?

Besides that, we did some calculations and arrived to the result that the whp to bhp convertion number of the dyno is way too low. The dyno gave back a 6.6% loss of power between the engine and the wheel, meaning a 6,6% efficiency loss in transmition, this is way off. After some calculations the right loss for these transmitions are between 13-18% loss from crank to wheel. Taking this into account, the whp converted to bhp using a 15% loss is about 325bhp wich is pretty much what I was looking for at 350bhp, I still want to make some more power, but its good enough for now for a daily driver.

cheers to all the ghosts that lurk around but don't post
 
#44 ·
I've been quietly watching and admiring your progress!

I'm a long-time VW 8v guy and have done a few very mild NA builds over the years. Earlier this year I was itching to make a change and get into a B5 Audi. I dislike the 1.8t 20v and had a pretty serious plan to put a 2.0L 8v turbo on Megasquirt into a B5, but I ended up going with the old SOHC V6 engine instead. I think I spotted a C4 Audi in the background, so you may know that the Audi 12v is practically a V6 version of the VW ABA which is exciting to dig into. Unfortunately that steered me away from the 2.0L 8v turbo plan I was working on...

Keep the progress coming, it is definitely nice to follow and inspirational.
 
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