Matt's billet HX40 Super URS4: Dusting off Cobwebs

[lucidmatt]

Hey guys, long time lurker, small time poster, friends with a few of y'all "IRL". Figured as parts start trickling in, I'd get a build thread going...
How she sat when I got her:


How she sits today:


The basics:
1993 URS4, black/black/CF (silver hood is thanks to OB's old girl Silvia...)
bought 6/2010 at 230,000 mi. now she sits at 267,000 mi.

Current mods:
Bilstein Sport struts, Eibach 350# springs, custom front coilover setup thanks to Edigreg and Thuppu (S2forum)
034MS motor mounts, trans mounts, snub mount, aluminum intake, 3" catless exhaust with custom Borla mufflers
Thuppu's Aluminum Front Subframe Mounts
Centerforce "dual friction" clutch that The Magellan and his lovely girlfriend helped me put in
Apikol 2.0t coil conversion currently sporting 5.2 red coil packs
MTM1+ ecu, 1.9bar wastegate spring
Tommi's Billet Cam Gear
Tommi's Billet crank gear
7A cams
relay'd Deatschwerks DW300 fuel pump
custom vent mounted Stack boost gauge
euro S4 headlights, euro S6 taillights
euro S4 bumpers front and rear
BIRA BBK, 996 Carrera 4 piston front calipers, drilled 314x30 euro A8 rotors (fits under 16" winter wheels with MM to spare)
Ferodo DS2500 pads
18" x 8" Ronal LZ-VT 2 piece wheels, Dunlop Direzza Z2 tires (summer mode) 16" X 7.5" BBS Moda Sport Mesh wheels, Nokian Hakka R2 tires (winter mode)

Her last dyno session on ESP's mustang dyno netted me 230 WHP/245 WTQ with a large PCV boost leak, now fixed, awaiting more dyno time.

The plan:
I knew I wanted more as soon as I went MTM1+, and I had gone through numerous phases including Garrett/KKK hybrids, then played with the idea of a k26 housing PTE, but finally settled on an HX35, its cheap, there are plenty of t3 manifold options out there for it, and it would put me right at the limit of the stock internals. I found a good used hx35 CHRA on ebay out of a 1995 cummins dodge for cheap money. (casting marks from USA, no Chinese junk) I picked it up, with a rebuild kit, and intended to find the proper non wastegate housings after rebuilding the CHRA. When it arrived, I was heartbroken. the seller packed the part poorly, and the USPS played kickball with the box, leading to a destroyed turbine. At this point, and after consulting some big turbo Audi dudes, my direction changed and I have converted theHX35 to a 10 blade super40 turbine wheel with a 60x86mm 7+7 blade billet compressor wheel...it really is a work of art...

destroyed HX35 Turbine

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The destroyed HX35 turbine

The new Super40 10 blade turbine

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new Super40 Turbine

Billety goodness

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Billet 60x86mm work of art

needs a little machining

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The backing plate needs a little bit of machining before she'll fit the former HX35 donor

[my2000apb]

welcome!

and welcome to the hx40 club

[lucidmatt]

Thanks! I look forward to seeing what this turbo can do! planning on running the Bullseye Performance .70 A/R T3 housing. Im in no rush to drain my funds, so I'm looking forward to plenty of discussion about what the best way forward is...

[chaloux]

Rods and bearings, hone, new rings, Hank manifold and downpipe, VEMS, 044, big injectors from Chris, head studs. GO!

[themagellan]

Awww yeah! Cpt. Matt up in here. This was the first 20v car that popped my cherry, love this car so much

Paint your feken hood!

Also here is cpt matt doing a full clutch swap, all while doing a procon delete 'mod'

[lorge1989]

Cool build. How was your expierience of BAE turbo systems? I've having trouble finding many people that run their stuff.

[vt10vt]

Always in for more Holset action

[mushasho]

Paint your feken hood!

he won't... it's a reminder of where it came from...

[themagellan]

Where did it come from, never heard the whole story on that lol

[lucidmatt]

In a strange way, i actually find the silvia hood very endearing... im reluctant to paint it because it, for inexplicable reasons, has really grown on me. the story behind it is the same story behind the full euro conversion, fender bender in the snow circa 2011 left me with 1 headlight, 3/4 of the already haggard factory bumper, and a hood that was bent just slightly enough to be a PITA whenever I tried to close it. so I left the stock bumper ziptied together until a deal came along, and until I received the euro lights from germany, obie let me borrow some headlights, and i bought silvia's hood off him since it was one of the rare s4's without front end damage... found the euro bumpers just over a year ago off the S2 forums, and they now reside on my vehicle.

In regards to BAE, the experience wasn't bad, but not what I'm used to. Did the entire transaction through their online storefront, I received an email confirmation of the order immediately, my card got processed a couple days later, then radio silence until one day a box arrived at my door (about a week and a half after initially ordering it) the turbine looks high quality, fitment is identical to the hx35 that I replaced, but there is a lot of material removed for balancing. perhaps its nit-picky to be complaining about a component being balanced, i dont know... regarding their rebuild kit, the fit and finish was satisfactory except for the 360* thrust bearing. The thrust bearing I removed from the factory turbo is machined, while the thrust bearing I received from BAE is cast, its notably less smooth than the factory one I removed, and it's missing two holes at the bottom of the bearing that are present on the factory one I removed. Discoloration and scoring on the factory was virtually nonexistent, so I re-used it because I just wasn't comfortable with their supplied thrust bearing. Though if anyone has used their rebuild kit (which wasnt cheap), and had success with the BAE thrust bearing, please let me know. id rather be told i'm paranoid than told i bought sub par materials.

[lucidmatt]

(sorry for the double post)

he won't... it's a reminder of where it came from...

no exaggeration, youre the reason she still runs, I'll never forget where it came from

[lucidmatt]

Quick update, the more eagle-eyed of you may have noticed the huge overlap of the billet wheel on the backing plate of the HX35, and ive been beating my head against a wall calling around looking for a machine shop willing to bore out the backing plate to fit the new 86mm HX40 compressor. Nobody wanted to touch it, so I took some time after work to play with the 60 year old lathe in the shop I work at. I hadn't ever done anything this precise before, ever... and I taught myself how to align the CHRA even though its a bizzarre shape. (I'm more used to working on black iron pipe...) An hour's worth of sweating and telling myself I ruined everything ensued... Here's how it turned out. (no pun intended)


At this point I was very much thinking "what have I gotten myself into????"


Though I am not disappointed with the finished product.

[PRY4SNO]

Well done!

[loxxrider]

Awesome! I have always wondered what would go into that machining operation. Did you use a 4 jaw chuck? I should do this.

[lucidmatt]

3 jaw chuck, navy surplus lathe, no idea what brand or builder it is, but it has to be at least 2 tons of machinery. its really a beautiful machine.

[loxxrider]

Those are the best lathes (WWII era). How exactly did you chuck it?

[lucidmatt]

hand tightened the chuck, disengaged the electric motor clutch, very delicately pressed the cutting tool against the backing plate while hand turning it until the face of the backing plate made even contact with the cutting head over a full rotation. Pulled cutting head away, tightened the chuck down all the way and engaged clutch, ran it to look for any play or wobble, reset it and repeated until it was perfectly level, then commenced to use the cutting tool to widen the dish. Im sure its not the "textbook" method, but it worked flawlessly.

[themagellan]

Captain this is just simply fucking awesome - Nice job man!

[ringbearer]

Glad to see a thread over here.

I like the eyeball run out lathe work too

[lucidmatt]

Long time no updates, but plenty to be had!
Not many photos due to my penchant for tackling a task until its done, but over the past couple months she has gotten quite a few supporting updates in prep for HX40 power levels. A sticky e brake laid waste to my year old rear brake setup, and in typical "enthusiast" fashion, I took the chance to revamp my brakes on all 4 corners. I ordered a pair of 314x30 drilled rotors off the magical land of German eBay, and had a set of rear rotors machined to match (Zimmermann drilled rears are NLA )...New e-brake cables, rebuilt rear calipers, RBF600 fluid and DS2500 pads finished off the update. I highly recommend sticking your head in a piranha tank prior to doing the e-brake cables...it will help with the agony you undoubtedly will experience... Here is the inevitable victory photo:

Finally, after bleeding a full liter of fluid through the system for a flush and bleed, my brakes are as good as theyve ever felt. The DS2500 pads are nothing short of confidence inspiring, even in the recent snow and rain we have been having. The finished work:


AFAIK, I'm now the only UR-S car in the states with drilled 314x30 mm rotors (on a related note... look for my 5000 mile young blank 314's coming to a classifieds ad near you)

After a good month or so of really enjoying the new brakes, I had a supremely close call when the front passenger's side LCA separated on me while parking in front of my house. Realized how bad that could have been, swore a lot. Ordered parts, began tearing down the busted front end, swore A LOT. Replaced the broken control arm. Started replacing the drivers side control arm. realized my subframe mounts are so shot that I can't back the grade 10 bolt out without destroying it. Called it a week, and put it back together. proceeded to:

After Mushasho turned me on to a little sumthin sumthin on the S2 forum, I decided once and for all to end the front end woes, and killed 2 birds with 1 stone (or international parcel shipping, if you will)

This arrived on my door step.


YESSSSS! a hand made tubular manifold with the appropriate t3 flange to suit my planned .70 AR BEP housing, and icing on the cake are Thuppu's works of art he sells as subframe mounts.

Tears of joy.


I will be posting more photos of the subframe bushing install in the coming weeks, since its actually going to be done at a leisurely pace in a cozy shop instead of on the ground outside my house in the middle of the street. (Ironically anecdotal reference to a song by Madness....how appropriate...)

[mushasho]

"On the ground outside"... Story of my life....

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

[lucidmatt]

ah the good old slippery slope... I have an 8cm^2, t3 flanged hot side housing coming, and ive started getting the parts together for a coilover conversion. The good ol holiday season has really dug into the car funds so ive been for a while. Although I got a sweet Christmas gift myself from an old friend...a Snap-On Solus Diagnostic computer. It has an amazing amount of functionality, I'd say easily 80% of what VagCom can do, but it is a universal tool, so anything built through 2012 is fair game for this beast. Thanks to this thing I also have found a repeatable issue with the Cam Position Sensor that nobody seems to have heard of before. I have replaced it once already due to an unknown failure which caused short to +12 andan intermittent CEL and limp mode under around town driving and highway driving. I had the same issues again, plugged in the Solus, and had the same exact CPS issue. short to +12v. This will not cause a no-start in my experience, but will cause a poorly running vehicle. I am ordering a completely new sensor assembly as clearly my soldiering skills cant take the abuse that sensor has to endure. Maybe I'll throw a Tommi's Billet cam gear on there while everything is apart!

[glibobbo21]

I machined a garret housing to accept the super 40 chra.

[lucidmatt]

I was thinking about that! did you go with the .84 P-trim housing? They pop up on eBay from time to time but finding a non-divided t3 housing is tough!

[my2000apb]

8cm daaaayum thats a lil lil guy

you sure you dont want somethign bigger?