Budget upgrades for the DIY

[Mixalis 266]

Same here, cable wasn't opening carby completely, unfortunately happened at the drags and was leaning out, blew the head gasket. Had to bend the pedal to get it all working properly now, no adjustment in the cable allowed me to get full throttle without it tugging on the throttle at idle

[dizzy616 183]

$0 mod with autos toying with kickdown cable adjustment. can give you a bit of go. trick em to shift a bit how you want them to aswell;
little bit of timing doesn't go astray
yes i have flipped the aircleaner hat. for a bit more airflow in the past.
next thing i can suggest is t5 conversion. or why not go full hog buy a e series with a t5 and just swap the engine as well.
 

[Clevo120Y 815]

^^^ flipping the aircleaner lid I haven't flow tested yet, I would think that the bulge in the lid being closer to the carb top might be a problem but can't say until I test it.

[gerg 10,871]

That was an old cop trick to get a bit more grunt via cold air. So much for pinging people for doing mods to their cars...

[ando76 4,354]

Yep in the dark dark days when I had a H H Holden - I flipped the air cleaner on my HZ ute. 

[blu xe 825]

Been a very long time since I had anything xflow powered. But way back in the day I had an automatic xe esp with the efi motor. Was pathetic with the auto. Swapped to a single rail and better. Next was 2 1/2 zorst and extractors and better again. Blew the diff up and swapped to a 3.23 centre and that was probably the best seat of my pants mod by a mile. Being an efi motor and in the mid 90's no one had a clue on how to tune a modded one so crow recommended a cam for it that would run ok with the factory computer. I've got no idea on specs but it idled like a stocker but made crazy torque for the nothing motor that it was. Didn't rev at all but it didn't need to either. Drove like a stocker and blew the doors off plenty of heros in their v6 commies and 3.0 vl's and 253's Then it developed an appetite for distributor gears and I got the shits with it and went to a clevo! Was a fun car with the torquey lazy crossie though.

[Xelisty 366]

Yes any cam upgrade replace to a steel distributer drive from places like Aussie speed. Did the job on mine and zero issues since. Cheap at about $70

I went upgraded turbo and very budget unfriendly but I did over do the whole thing to future proof.

Another small power increase is rid the clutch fan and replace with electric fans. May need to Upgrade to a modern type 80amp alternators which you can get like for like and not a bad price and may give a few extra hp with modern electrics

[Clevo120Y 815]

I did some flow testing today with the aircleaner lid like talked about before, in my opinion DO NOT RUN THE LID UPSIDE DOWN.

First pic is the test with the lid the normal way with the rubber sealing ring removed.

 

 

Then with lid flipped upside down. This doesn't seal very well against the element anyway so that's another reason I wouldn't do it, also the bulge above the carb that's pressed into the lid is now facing down and takes height away between the top of the carb and lid.

 

[ando76 4,354]

ouch - that a massive negative there.  thanks for posting again champ. 

[wagoon 2,429]

Proves the principal about the volume above the carby real well. Question relating to that, is the gain you experienced with lifting the lid 6mm only to do with allowing more air in or would the fact that the volume above the carby has been increased help as well. So if your not allowed to raise the lid to comply with rules could the lid have a "dent" accidentally placed in it therefore increasing the volume above the carby

[Clevo120Y 815]

Probably both, mainly it opens up more surface area to draw air from. When I just removed the rubber sealing ring from the edge of lid it didn't sit any higher but flowed more air because it could pull air past were the sealing ring used to be, so that tells me that the housing in stock form is very restrictive, you can feel a lot of air being pulled through the small gap so raising it further was the next step. The best thing to do would be to find an aircleaner element that was slightly taller but the same circumference as the original, that way you would get the extra height and extra element surface area.

[Clevo120Y 815]

There is a GM truck element from K&N that was perfect but I can't find the details, it was 12mm taller than the stock XF element.

[wagoon 2,429]

So was there a point were the lid goes to high? Or would it just end up hitting the bonnet, thats if you could get a 5mm bolt long enough to reach the lid

[Clevo120Y 815]

The bonnet would be the limitation mate.

[wagoon 2,429]

Cool thanks might have a look around for a suitable filter

[bigpaulo 239]

say you have an aftermarket air filter, would a bigger diameter one make much difference over a smaller diameter one? assuming they are the same height

[Hofiveo 47]

say you have an aftermarket air filter, would a bigger diameter one make much difference over a smaller diameter one? assuming they are the same height

should do. More surface area of filter to draw through should mean less restriction.

Thats my theory anyway. Bigger is always better with air filters.

[ando76 4,354]

did someone say extreme top test coming up???? 

[wagoon 2,429]

Take out the rubber seal in the lid tonight. I can feel a definate improvment in both throttle response and torque. This is on a manual car with standard exhaust, standard air filter setup and a small cam, most likely a towing cam. Rolling along dodging roos in 3rd @ 60km/h put the foot down only a bit the car responded quite well and wanted to keep going.

As money permits I plan on replicating all the advice in this thread on my wagon, so thank you to everybody for the info.

[Butcha 111]

Interesting..I have had quite a few people tell me extreame tops are no good air comming from the top disrupts air comming from the sides causing turbulance reducing flow or messes with the booster something like that. True??

[ando76 4,354]

Yeah I've heard similar things as well butch but on my race car there was always just build up on the extreme top right above the venturi so that tells me it is sucking the hardest from there - in my own bush mechanic type way. 

Before the car got written off I went to a bigger drop down base which allowed a 3" R2C element with the extreme top and seat of the pants it was an improvement. 

 

wagon - I have some cheapy extractors here - I think you need them for the wagon.  I'll send them down. 

 

There is a budget upgrade - scan gumtree for extractors - usually can be picked up for $50-$100 if you search around.  Either that or become known as a crossflow nut - then people just seem to dump stuff off at your shed/place when they are cleaning up their own shed. 

[gerg 10,871]

Got my Clevo headers for $100 (advertised $150) cause the seller was a Ford nut and liked my car.

[wagoon 2,429]

Paid $50 for a new set of extractors the had been just sitting in a guys shed for a few years off gumtree, was going to use the on my roller but need modding for that anyway so might use them. Need to make an exhaust or find one if I can as it has standard size exhaust on the car at the moment.

[ando76 4,354]

I have a 2.5" exhaust sitting up here bud.  I could cut it into 1m sections and you could weld it back together.  lol.

[Clevo120Y 815]

Thanks for road testing the idea wagon, it's one thing to show improvement on the bench but a test on a road going car is awesome, we found on the race car it wanted to keep pulling higher in the rev range like you described, goes to show the stock housing is holding them back.