Chasing Torque

[mettersl]

Hi Darren,
Charge coolers are heavier and more complex but can provide more cooling, especially in badly ventilated locations like the GTA engine bay, are they worth the weight? good question.
A610 intercooler is a better design than GTA too, but I agree more cc should improve the low end, but Custard is moving from an tuned Atmo engine where the gap is smaller. If he's retaining the original box, he will have shorter gearing than a GTA Turbo/A610, so that will help the 4th gear urge.
Second son is my resident turbo/supercharger encyclopaedia. He has retrofitted two VVT turbos onto LR Discoveries one with vacuum control and one with a controller...the latter works better as you can program the boost curve more accurately.
VVT are easy to find for diesels and almost unknown on petrol's - VW used them on a few cars (TT?) but there isn't much choice (I'm told).
His latest mod is a charge cooler in the inlet manifold - he started with a Jag V8 manifold and grafted it in (his welding skills are way beyond mine now) .
Before under load he was getting 120 degree inlet temperatures (at least- in a Chernobyl style, that was as far as the gauge went) and now its 40 degrees. Pick up is greatly improved too so I think his next plan is to make a run of them.
He's trying to persuade me to fit a charge cooled supercharger to my 610 using a supercharger from a VW v6 from an S4. He has one in stock...
This is a pub conversation!! cheers

I might have an answer to controlling the VVT turbo your son could hopefully confirm this, the R56 Mini Cooper is a pretty addictive drive so I had Jo’s clubman mapped with the next stage above my Cooper and I am waiting for a new high torque clutch to arrive as the old one just slips torque is the killer but gives the best car driving thrills.
I am going to fit the last generation VVT turbo that was fitted to the 1.6 HDI engine which is an easy upgrade which is supposed spool up much faster.
This has the vacuum control but also a electrical connection at the bottom of the vacuum diaphragm which must move up and down restricting the diaphragm movement, this was used on the Citroen and Peugeot engines but the mini has an electrical vacuum control at the back of the engine which the ecu controls supplying the vacuum to the turbo, so could one of these units be used to control other VVT on different engines with after market ecu.

Also I think a super charger on a 610 engine would give you a new world of pain.
The torque would come in so low down you would need a very good clutch and the the gear box would probably just give up, you would probably get over 300nm under 2000 and over 400 at 2800 and you would just start putting your foot down in very high gears which were never ment for that amount.
I can’t find a VVT for a 3lt Petrol engine probably because they get so much power out of small engines because of VVT technology.

So the pictures below are of the second hand last generation VVT turbo 5000miles with the electrical actuator at the bottom of the vacuum turbo actuator and the new larger inter cooler this will then achieve about 340nm.
So I no this is not Petrol but I think the inter cooler size in a different shape is what I think I should be looking at getting in the back off the Alpine.

So the above has now been fitted along with a new high torque clutch as the standard one just could not take the torque started slipping as soon as it was over 2000rpm, not a job I wanted to do but it’s what I think will happen with the 610 engine when it goes in the GTA so lesson learnt.
The outcome not short off amazing first thing there is no difference in pickup even though the inter cooler is 3x the size, 2nd that’s plenty off torque pulls like mad in any gear no more required, I don’t think it could take much more you can almost feel the shafts twisting. And most amazing thing is the fuel economy has jumped up 11mpg it has always been consistent at about 54 mpg it has now doing 65mpg.
So I now no what I going to do with the 610 engine build and the numbers I would like to achieve 300nm is not enough but 330/350 is absolutely plenty, over that apart from probably destroying the gearbox the car will just start spinning up all over the place in the lower gears.