Quote:
Originally Posted by bhazard
Which year tbird did the motor come out of? It looks like an 87-88 engine, with that particular valve cover and intake manifold. If so you should already have the big VAM, brown top injectors, and LA2 or LA3 ecu. The IHI turbo is good for 18 psi and the T3 is good for 20-22. A front mount intercooler should look quite interesting behind that big ol 50's grill.
Your gearing should be alright for a cruiser. The 4cyl T-5 has a 3.97 first gear which is really good at getting the ball rolling. One thing the 2.3 is NOT good at is lugging around though. Youll have to keep the RPMs above 2000.
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I would not recommend going over 17lb especially in heavy vehicle .
My 1985 XR4Ti was not stock but I never went over 18lb (kept max at 17-18lb) . I had borla exhaust, T3 with GN intake housing/impeller , intercooler up front , 86 SVO MAF/ECU .
When I went to install big valve head few pistons were down at TDC.
Ended up 3 rods were bent , these motors rods are weak so be careful . Also the ECU always felt like it maxed out around 4500 rpm@high boost , some say it was limiting TQ, not sure on that I think bad knock sensor programing is part of it as unpluging knock sensor helped here but i never leave it like that (maybe they fixed that in later yrs ) .