BMW M5x is a fun choice. The bavarian 2JZ. And the factory transmissions are really good.
BMW M5x is a fun choice. The bavarian 2JZ. And the factory transmissions are really good.
Well since you're considering other engines, why not the Jaguar V12? In my personal experience, you can get 300 horsepower out of one very easily, they have an 8000 rpm limit, and they only weigh about nine pounds. I remember when Tom Walkinshaw Racing won at LeMans with an XJS, running for 24 hours on a thimbleful of corn oil. The team then immediately drove from Le Mans to Waterloo, Belgium, where just the very sight of those 12 big bad British cylinders convinced Napoleon to surrender to the hated British.
ProDarwin said:Different bellhousing, but a 2JZ is similar in size/weight and bolts to several of the same transmissions as the Jeep motor, with potential to make wayyyyyyyyy more power.
Whats the vehicle in question you need propulsion for? Whats your power target?
Its for a challenge build im planning, with a specific motorsports life after the challenge. Its essentially a self propelled cage in a 3k lb package, rwd. I want simple, reliable, cheap consumables, broad torque, high-ish rpm potential (6-7k?). Will be manual transmission, rwd with 3.73 gears and 26-28 inch tall tires.
Id like 250-350 hp/tq out of the box on crap gas and no heat management issues to overcome.
Which pretty much says ls i think, or mopar magnum 5.2 with an ax15. Im just trying to find other options.
In reply to Dusterbd13-michael :
Maybe the larger Toyota and Nissan V8s? UZ and VK series engines? They at least SOUND good, although adapters are needed for a manual transmission.
VQ?
VG30DE? Might be able to get one of these cheap if you can find and part a wrecked Z32. Slightly under your power target, but lots of headroom for more if you ever want to add boost.
Finding that kind of power in a challenge budget attached to a manual rwd transmission is pretty difficult for sure.
In reply to Dusterbd13-michael :
Depending on who you talk to about reliability, the LH2 northstar out of a RWD Cadillac STS marks your boxes.
Would just have to figure out the flywheel situation and I think you could either use a T5 or with the right bellhousing a AR5.
***My only experience so far has been buying a salvage sts and driving it to and home from the inspection.
Stampie said:Quick research shows they drop off a lot after 4500 rpm. If you want a straight six go with something that'll scream.
With all of the rotational inertia they have, I would want to gear it to pull instead of zing.
Dusterbd13-michael said:Which pretty much says ls i think, or mopar magnum 5.2 with an ax15. Im just trying to find other options.
The 5.2/5.9 Magnum is a decent option. Throw better (cheap iron) heads on it, cam it and add a better intake manifold and headers and 350 - 400 hp is very possible. 300 is easy with pretty minor mods (IIRC, just intake and headers will get you close on a 5.9 with good tuning).
The 5.9 in my Jeep happily revs to a bit past 6k (on stock guts) with the first group of mods mentioned. In stock form, they make basically no power beyond 5k (the 5.2 is a little better there), but a slightly bigger cam and good heads opens things up a lot and gives a nice, wide powerband.
A stock one revs better than a 4.0, but not by a whole lot. And even though it's only 30 - 50 hp more than most years of the 4.0, it feels like a whole lot more. Mostly because the Magnums have a much fatter torque curve. IIRC, the chart I saw once from Chrysler shows the stock 5.9 as making more at 1000 rpm than the 4.0 does at peak.
If you start building, for the 5.9, the stock bottom end is good to somewhere around 6200 - 6500 rpm reliably, depending on who you ask. Some have gone a bit higher and gotten away with it. Power-wise, you won't break it NA unless you rev it too high. Under boost, the pistons go first, but you'll still get 500+ if the tune is good.
How would a Pentastar 3.6L V6 be for this situation? Millions out there from Dodge Chargers and minivans but in the Wrangler, it was offered with a manual trans.
300-ish hp as stock. I'm not sure what can be done to them to make more. I'd think the Jeep guys have figured out how to make more hps.
I ported a 4.0 head for a customer doing a stroker years back. I was impressed with how much the head picked up. I don't recall the flow numbers but it was a respectable cylinder head after porting.
On the Magnum front I have to say the small block mopar in general is a well designed package from the factory and with a few changes like cam, porting, intake and headers becomes an impressive little power plant. Downsides are the timing chains almost always require an add on tensioner to take up slack and even with aftermarket heads like Edelbrock are limited to around 600-650hp after porting because of port size. Just can't get any bigger without going to a "race" casting head. Ported factory iron is capable of 500hp+ with supporting mods.
If you want a straight 6 that is cheap, commonly available in junkyards, and good for racing - go directly to a 92-95 BMW 325i or 525i and take the M50 out of it (and pretty much any BMW manual transmission will work with it....G240, G260, ZF, G245, etc). There are always a couple early 90s 525s sitting around yars when I go, usually with the engine still in them.
92-94 (IIRC) are OBD1 so no messing with OBD2. Later years (M52, M54) require more electrical fun but are pretty much the same size-wize and transmission-wise.
There is a guy local that has a turbo 4.0 in a sn95 that drag races and does general hooligan stuff in it.
In reply to Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) :
That is a weird and wild swap choice. Any photos?
In reply to buzzboy :
I'll grab some next time I see him out.
Turbo Jeep 4.0? Or Mustang 4.0?
On a related note, the 3.7 Ford/Mazda powerplant makes good power. Not sure about trans availability, but its available in some pretty appliance level cars so might be attainable for not too much $$
In Colorado there's a guy running a turbo 4.0 Jeep in his gremlin. This is a hill climb car running in the CHCA series. Keith might know more details on the car, he runs his V8 Miata in the same series.
Turismo Carretera, anybody?
Inline sixes tuned to the moon. As far as I can tell, the "Dodge" teams use an AMC-based engine that may or may not be the same family as the Jeep motor.
ProDarwin said:Turbo Jeep 4.0? Or Mustang 4.0?
Oh, yeah, Mustang 4.0 in a Mustang is not what my mind went to. That would be sensible. Jeep 4.0 in a Mustang would be amazing but dumb.
Ahhh, the AMC Straight-6, one of my favorite motors. They're stupid easy to work on, reliable if you don't overheat them, and parts are plentiful due to the popularity over the years. My first megasquirt conversion was putting a 4.0 intake manifold and MS-I box onto a 258 in an old CJ7. A long time back was looking at how to de-stroke down to a 199ci, for the then-new "Open Light" rules for rally racing with an Eagle SX4. I hit too many roadblocks to continue that project, but I've still got a crankshaft sitting around.
It's a good motor with a great torque curve for off-roading. or its time. But the 4.0HO was really the last gasp of a lineage traced back to the early 60's. The 'hot ticket' for a long time on a budget build was to use a 258 short block with a 4.0 head. But remember that the performance trends for this motor in the USA was predominantly done by the off-road guys who were looking for low-end power. The main modification trends were always to increase stroke in order to increase torque. I've rarely seen a torque curve on this motor that peaks past 5,000rpm. Still a great motor choice for guys running CJ's, TJ's and XJ's.
For motorsports I don't see it being viable unless some quirk in the rules make it advantageous, or you REALLY want to run a chassis that supports it easily. In any of its guises it's not a motor that likes to rev. It's a pushrod motor with a lot of reciprocating mass, and it really shows in the valvetrain. Valves get floaty pretty easy. They CAN be built to make power, but it's a lot of work, and the dollars add up fast when you start looking at roller rockers, head work, pistons and all the fancy goodies you need for a pushrod motor. Factory transmission options are limited to mainly truck boxes with the wrong ratios or old generation T4's and T5's, though there are T56 adapter sets out there (more $$$$). That and for the power you get, it's big and heavy.
Just for inspiration. The current 4.0 record from what I can find
881ft*lbs at 4800rpm
861hp at 5700rpm
Ford Barra engine..... No wait, you guys didn't get those, scratch that.
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