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I sit here staring a a massive jumble of parts that came in like Christmas to me. I'm in Cookeville TN right now looking at my future motor and wandering what have i got myself into. Thank God I have a resident expert in all that is mechanical to assist me in my money spending endeavors. I came here yesterday and it was like Christmas to me. I opened 6 boxes containing almost everything you see and don't see under your hoods. And then with the help of some local racers and customers of my grandfather they sit in amazement as they go over each part in the disassembled motor. They see things that make them go nuts in a good way like finding forged rods, pistons, and valves along with a counter weighted crank in a stock motor, things they pay an arm and a leg for in the street and track cars. Then they look on with amazement as the Japanese engineering goes down the toilet. Cracked retainers due to using a poor, ferrous alloy; poorly designed pistons and banjo bolts that inhibit proper lubrication of the wristpin; improper clearances due to aluminum on aluminum contact between the piston and cylinder wall and piston ring design; valve spring specs; and the list goes on. But still for a bunch of pushrod fanatics they were inpressed by this little marvel of engineering (an oversized motorcycle engine they called it) and dumbfounded by the failure Japanese know how.
We all sat around milling over the engine to improve on factory design which my grandfather has been researching for the past 2 months. In fact there is a european recall due to the banjo bolts and varios other lubrication issues in AP1's. He has worked his way up the chain of command and is now having a Honda rep from Nashville coming to his shop in a few weeks to share the various flaws in motor design so that he may take it back to Honda and share it with our friends overseas. (This is no lie nor joke he really has gone through all of this trouble and I may end up getting a little bit of money to help fund my motor project from Honda, no lie, no bull, no joke) So i may end up going down in Honda history as the guy who, by blowing his motor, saved many other s2000 owners heartache over factory flaws. But enough of that...
We have started a list of machining procedures that will be done fairly cheap and use the stock components. ALL casting lines on every component will be removed.
Stock rods will be shot peened and cryo treated.
Head will be slightly ported (and I mean slightly) and polished.
Titanium retainers and stronger valve springs.
Polished stock valves with custom valve job. (my grandfathers specialty and the exact same as the SPOON valves that cost $650+)
Custom, oversized pistons designed to work with aluminum cylinder walls and promote lubrication. (We don't want to sleeve an NA motor)
Bored out to accomidate oversized pistons.
AP2 Banjo bolts for better lubrication.
Custom oil cooler using a cooler off of a Winston Cup car. (heavy duty)
Oil filter relocation kit that will allow a much larger oil filter.
Custom oil pan baffle (just like the J's, Spoon and SPL oil pan)
Bored throttle body.
And more to come.
This is no small task but financially this is only going to cost me around $2000 if that. Everything should be ready in around a month and a half so. My car is on it's way up here right now to begin having the old motor removed and autopsied. This will provide info on the failure since the motor failed on me while driving home from work at about 30 mph. I will begin putting bi-weekly progress reports on here and posting this where others can see. A lot of the custom fabrication will be done to provide that exact same product you will find on Bulletproofautomotive.com since most of these companies take stock products and improve on them and the add 50-75% to the price.
Stay tuned for more on this ground breaking (well to me it is) and historical build of the Guardian Performance F20C "race" motor.
Also after the first motor is complete a twin motor will be up for sale in a months time and my grandfather may begin servicing these motors and building them to spec. We'll also see what Honda has to say about all of this.
Holy cow Brandon! I cannot wait to see how the car drives with everything new and improved and *finally* fixed. It must be killing you to be this close to having your car back, Im sure youve missed it. How much power are you looking at to the wheels? Id LOVE LOVE LOVE to have a nasty n/a set up with about 260whp. Thatd be so fun and Id much prefer it over turbo.
Ive always wondered how much power a GREAT tuner could get out of a stock s2000 engine. I know its VERY well tuned from the factory, but Im sure theres another 15-20 at the crank that could be snuck out.
I've spent a lot of time talking to him about this and he told me to put a small bio on here to show that he is not some hick from bum-fu**, TN getting ready to hack away at the motor. He is the real deal. Decades working for and racing in Winston Cup, NHRA, IHRA; various companies such as Lunati, Edlebrock and a few others as an R&D guru. He was about to take a job in Argentina a few years ago working with Ferrea but that was when they had the government issues and he was in the process of getting back with my grandmother (another story) so he stayed here. He has held many world records with NHRA and IHRA. Been the only person in Car Craft magazine to make their Top 10 list in both the Drivers and Innovators categotries. He has written for several magazines, although he hates it. His work is still covetted by people all over the country and some parts of the world.
I can get on here and anywhere on the internet and find where people have taken their cars to local tuning shops opened up by some 22 year old who got his Associate Arts degree in buisness at the local community college, decided to open up a "Tuner" shop because he knows how to put on a cold air intake and then been laid before him an auto with an owner asking for just a fraction of what I am having done. When that happens, someone ends up with a huge bill, high hopes of the work that was supposed to be done (and probably didn't get done) and a worthless piece of junk after 100 miles (if that) because of Tommy Tuner getting in over his head and all because the owner signed a sheet of paper saying the work wasn't guaranteed and they can't sue.
I am lucky to be having this much experience thrown into my little 2000cc motor. The overhead cam motor may not be his favorite to work on but he has built many 2300s and OHC motors for NASCAR/Winston cup. He figures this could be a little fun and is already making my panties wet telling me everything he is having done to my motor. Normally I am not to fond of having other people play with my money but in this case I am more than happy to hand over an entire, signed checkbook and tell him to have at it. Heck, we already started on polishing the crank this afternoon just to give me an idea of what I'm looking at.
This is going to be a huge learning experience for me and depending on how well my future goes I may just join the ranks of Billman and others as a resident S2K expert. The wheels of progress have begun to turn in my little hamster-wheel-head.
Also he has showed me some of the "extra" parts going into my car and assured me that I will have to most advanced and effective engine and oil cooling system of any S2000 out there and will rival if not descimate those found on every modern track car out there short of F1, Formula Nippon, Grand-Am and GT series cars.
Technology is great, but experience is better. I get both because I'm selfish.
I'm hoping that this post gets spread around enough to where I have a ton of exposure and insight (hopefully no flamers; which there will be nothing to flame only criticize). All I have to do is see this through and tell my grandfather not to die on me until this is complete.
I think I am going to try to send a link to this and see if my writing prowess is good enough to land a job if not just one feature in Sport Compact Car Magazine.
I'm trying to keep these articles as small as possible so that people will actually be incllined to read them and not get bored half way through.
As for asthetics the block and head will be powder coated black, the valve cover and oil pan will be powder coated Silverstone, and the DC Sports headers which I will probably replace are going to be jet coated.
I am going to start writing my feature for my prototype oil cooling, filtering, and lubrication system in a week or 2. This will definately be something to pay attention to as cost vs. performance will be a mind blowing.
This is going to show people that ordering all your JDM bolt-ons and accessories is not the best way to go. It's not bad I like it, but for those who are serious about racing you might want to start taking notes and writing down the things going on behind the doors or what will be a 300hp+ (not a typo) 2.1L build. I may then start getting serious into my chassis and suspension and actually drop a little bit of coin into that since the term "race car" keeps coming up in his description of my car. But it will still be civil and streetable.
Originally Posted by mattfeet,Sep 30 2007, 04:40 PM
Ive always wondered how much power a GREAT tuner could get out of a stock s2000 engine. I know its VERY well tuned from the factory, but Im sure theres another 15-20 at the crank that could be snuck out.
-Matt
I used to believe that too. Along with Santa and the Easter Bunny. Any gains I've ever heard of going that route seem to depend on how the dyno was feeling that day. But I could be FOS - often times I am.
It has begun. Street/ Race Motor Build
