Well, the stage II TurboXS is fully in. I have to thank Mike a ton for his help, and it was great that he had done the uppipe before and told me how to do it. I read and read about it but I think I would have been awfully nervous about jacking the engine up without someone else telling me it wasn't that big of a deal, it really wasn't.
The install went pretty smoothly actually albeit LONG. We actually started working at 3PM and finished at 2:40AM this morning. Geez, thats a LONG day under a car on jack stands. Ripping the stock exhaust from the Turbo back was really easy. Started at the mid section with the spring bolts and the back half was off in minutes. Then I just progressed to the down pipe one piece at a time. The intercooler and it's bracket came off no problem really, then it was on to many, many heat sheild bolts.
The absolute pain in the ass of this whole install was getting all the heat shields off. I didn't have any siezed bolts, though several were damn tight. I WD40'd everything as I went. The heat shield around the up pipe is the mother of headaches. Luckily Mike had some metal shears but even with them it took a good while. You have to snip it, bend, and then bang the hell out of it to rip it apart enough to get it around the stock EGT sensor. It has to come off this way from what I can tell, I guess if you had the special tool to get the egt off first it may have been easier, I somehow doubt it :roll: .
After the uppipe shield was off it was on to removing the splash gaurd under the front of the car. Three 12mm bolts and 4 or so plastic clips, no big deal. Then I sat and stared for a while thinking my car would NEVER run again and said screw it, and removed the headers
. I've read to "loosen" them but it REALLY is easier just to remove the pipes. I check out my exhaust valves while the RH header was off (technically the LH header stayed on, just the pipe that leads and connects to the other one came off). You have to get the RH header off to get the uppipe down through the bottom of the car. This method is not the one that removes the turbo completely and I'm glad
. So, the 5 uppipe bolts to the turbo are removed and it SEEMS like it wants to come out, but it won't so don't waste the time trying. Just let it hang and make sure the EGT wire is disconnected from up top and is not hanging on anything, also go ahead and remove the 2 plastic freaking factory zip ties you can barely see, I used a flathead screw driver and a love tap behind the wire to break them open. Be careful not to cut the wires!
Now was the next scary part for me, I removed the engine mount bolts, two bolts and washers. That was easy, then I stood up, got dizzy, and put the jack under the oil pan. Mike used cardboard folded up to make it real thick to spread the weight out and protect the oil pan on his install, I went with a stack of lawn bags
, if you have a 2x6x6 piece of wood that wood probably be even better. Mike jacked it up while I layed in horror under my ~3100 pound car sitting 2 feet off the ground on jack stands just KNOWING I was gonna become a greasy spot on my garage floor. Up Up and away the engine went. We only had to lift it 1-2 inchs or so to get the damn up pipe out. I twisted and got it out fairly easily at that point. Before we let the jack down we took the EGT sensor and put it on the M2 uppipe and went ahead and put it up through the bottom of the car to it's resting place. I finger tightend the bolts from the M2 to the Turbo just to hold it until we were ready to tie it all back together.
Mike dropped the motor and of course the bolts didn't line back up to the frame. So, we went at the bolts with screw drivers and hammers until the motor dropped back into the holes. Strapped the motor mount bolts and washers back on and that was that. Not near as bad as I thought.
Next was tieing the headers back together. I loosely bolted the LH header, RH header, collector, and up pipe together, making sure the gaskets were on right and everthing looked good. Then I started from the LH side and tighted everything up. LH, then LH to collecter pipe to RH, to Up pipe. I cranked them down good and then put the LH header heat sheilds back on, then the RH heat shields. Going back on is WAY faster. Next I put the plastic splash gaurd back in place properly, that took 5 minutes maybe.
Now on to the up pipe to Turbo. We tighted the 5 nuts holding the M2 and Turbo together. Then it was the down pipe. We put it in place and tightend the bolts. I stared in AWE at how big the down pipe is compared to stock, it is HUGE. Then we tried to figure out about a gotcha TurboXS made me aware of about the setup I bought. See I bought a "first run" of the Turbo back kit, these had a "slight" fitment problem in the begining (This is NO LONGER the case for thier kits). Really this was not a big deal at ALL. Bottom line we either had to chew a VERY SMALL chunk out of the transmision bracket OR the exhaust. Mike did the honors and chewed no more than an 1/8" half moon shape out of the tranny bracket, took 5-10 minutes and was really not a big deal. This made for a VERY good fit with no rubbing problems apperent or heard. Next was the TurboXS cat, you can see through the cat, straight through the honeycomb. Bolted it on and it looked like it grew there, of course I put it on bass akwards first but I flipped it around and it really did look like it grew there
. Then was the back pipe, this went on no problem and fit perfectly. Then on to the muffler, again, no problem. Fit was PERFECT, to the stock hangers.
Next was trimming the top turbo heat shield and putting it on. Then reconnecting the EGT and 1st o2 sensor. Making sure the wires were run ok and safe from heat. Oh, yeah we also had to move the AC condesation pipe "clip" over 5 inches to a hole that was already there another piece of cake. We put the intercooler bracket back on then we strapped the intercooler back in, this was a little tricky because of the hose on the passenger side is a pain to get connected right but it only took a few minutes. I bolted the intercooler in place, put the vacumme hoses and what not back on the intercooler. Reconnected the battery.
I put the tire back on and we lowered the car back down to the ground. Of course this was after I got all the damn stuff I had under the car back out from under it! And next we fired it up and let it warm a little while we washed up. We went for a short test drive and I heard an exhaust leak. I was too tired to care, I knew worst case I needed to tighten some stuff up.
I had a dream about the exhaust leak :roll: and in it the cause was that the rear O2 sensor wasn't on. Funny but true, I woke up and went outside and there was the O2 sensor sitting on my workbench
, whoops... Soo, down the street I went to a local shop that was dead today for some reason and gave the guy $10 bucks to let me use the lift. Car went up, put the O2 sensor on, then found that the center hanger bolt wasn't on good, used thier airgun and all was fixed. No mo leaks, and after a reset my CEL no longer comes on :wink: .
Last night it was hard to tell the true sound of the exhaust, it was louder than Mikes up pipe and cat-back TurboXS but after getting the sensor back in place I "think" it sounds about the same. That boxer growl ROCKS. It really sounds good. I drove around for about 65 miles trying to get the computer back up to speed and also to get that god awful wd40 and new exhaust smell to burn off.
I can't give numbers yet but the damn car is a rocket now. I mean it gets up and truly hauls ass. Not to mention the exhaust sounds AWSOME. The type H blowoff valve is too damn loud for me but it does what it's supposed too, I shift and get back on the throttle and it is INSTANT boost, straight to ~16PSI.
For those that missed it, I installed the electronics to the StageII kit on Wednesday. That took like 2 hours to get the Unichip, BlowOff valve, the intake modification, and the MBC, done. This was really easy.
In my opinion, TurboXS has their stuff together with this kit. Every single nut, bolt, zip tie, and detail was included. There wasn't any piece they didn't give me that I needed, other than tools and time. I was really impressed that I ordered this last Saturday and got it Wednesday. I was told it would be 3-4 weeks due to a back order on the exhausts but then they mentioned the First run batch they still had a few off, they explained the issue and what was involved and were COMPLETELY straight up with me. I ended up saving over $300 bucks and all that had to be done was cut/grind a "slight" nick out of either the transmision mount or the exhaust, and I had the kit installed less than a week after ordering. I was expecting some nightmare hack job but thats not what it was at all. I think a lot of companies would have just sold all there "First Run" batches as regular runs to people, without letting them know. Not only did they let me know, they made it sound worse than it was, knocked off cash for it, shipped it ASAP, and told me exactly what needed to be done to correct it. I wish all companies were this first class.
Mike snapped a few shots of the old exhaust versus the new one laying side by side on the ground. I'll post a link to them once I get them. The quality of the TXS kit is awsome, the fit is perfect and it sounds/perfoms great. The down pipe on this puppy is HUGE. The really cool part about it is that with the top being so damn big it should accomidate most any Turbo you could want to put on I would think.
The install as I said above was about 12 hours for the exhaust, another 2 or so for the rest of the stuff. I am SOSOSO glad I went ahead and did the up pipe now instead of waiting for another day (I almost did). I wouldn't want to do it again anytime soon thats for damn sure. There wasn't anything that was "hard" just very time consuming and slow, and there isn't really a way to speed it up that I see. Maybe with a lift but I still honestly think it would take 8 hours.
My only advice for anyone doing this is to make sure you have a good set of 3/8's AND 1/2" sockets and wrench's, ALL SIZE EXTENTIONS (no joke), screwdrivers, a small mallet, a pry bar of some sort, wd40, O2/EGT sensor tool if you got one, metal shears, dremal might help, GOOD LIGHTING (mine was lacking), 4 3Ton Jack Stands, and 2 HIGH floorjacks. Give yourself PLENTY of time, a Friday is great in my book because you get the whole weekend if you get stuck. Don't rush it or you'll just cut yourself or screw up something or both. It's not rocket science just very time consuming and tedious. It helps to have an extra ride in case you need to get something from the store. If I was doing it again I would layout my tools and organize things much better than I did this time, I made a big damn mess and tools were everywhere. That just makes it frustrating and isn't really good shop practice anyway.
I gotta give a huge THANK YOU to Mike for his help. That was more than anyone could ask for and I owe you 1, actually I owe you 12 :wink: .
Shawn
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