TIVGLH’s 1986 Dodge Omni America

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!

Well this page will start with the new block I'm putting in my GLH. It will no longer be a S60 TIV, but hopefully an 11 second sleeping monster. LOL The block is an 2.2L and has been hot tanked and coated with 1600 degree heat resistant material, bored out .020 and mated with some Venolia .020 forged pistons that are balanced within a gram of each other. Rods are also balanced within one gram of each other. Well, since my new engine is about 98% done, I thought I'd save some time and tear down my old engine to see the damage. Well, what do you know....... Looks like my engine couldn't stand the heat! LOL That number one piston took a beating, and all the other pistons are just fine. But you know what? The car STILL made it to work and back home (about 30 miles) so that's just one of the reasons why I love these little engines. They're really tough! Another update. Got my engine together and now it's just about done. I'll have to replace the red Magnacore wires with some blue Taylor wires, to match the rest of the car. I also have to use two 90 degree bends from the turbo to the intercooler because it sits so far back now. After that, I'll drop it in and hook everything up and see how she runs. Got the engine in and let me tell you, I'll probably never do the TBI header in an L-body again! LOL MAN, this things is TIGHT!!!!!! I know the picture is bad, but it's really tight. I'll post more later. Had to remove the steering rack heat sheild to make room for the downpipe, which is 2.5" in diameter. Unfortunately the downpipe was hitting the steering rack as well as being too close to the fuel lines. So I wrapped the DP with some wrap and put some heat shield on the rack and fuel lines. Well I got everything bolted together now. Tomorrow I'll take it for a test drive. Looking around the garage, I stumbled on a brand new, never used 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust sytem for a Daytona/Shadow that I bought back in 1997 for $200 shipped. It's a FULL system, from the downpipe all the way to the end of the car. Boy this'll come in handy as it'll take minor modification to fit on the GLH and free up some horsepower. After some frustrating delays (coolant return line leaking, blown fusible link, alternator alignment, battery not holding a charge, etc) I got everything bolted up and ready to go. Turned the key and she fired right up! Set the timing at 10 degrees and decided to give it a quick test drive. I have a manual boost controller in the cabin and didn't know what it would be set at so I took it easy. Well.....in my HASTE I had forgot that I had previously taken a caliper off so I needed to bleed my brakes. So when I approached the next intersection (than goodness it was 8:30 at night! LOL) I HAD NO BRAKES!!!!!! Talk about some fast thinking; I down shifted and lightly applied the emergency brake to come to a safe stop. After emptying the contents of my underwear, I noticed that the car has some serious power now. Even at 5 psi, the throttle response and low end power is impressive. This is partially due to the ported head, as well as the TBI header. I can't wait to break it in and get a custom cal to take advantage of it's potential! To be continued..... I got the 3" 304 stainless steel exhaust on there today. Turbo spools quicker and now the throttle response is better than before. The surprise with this exhaust is it's quieter than it was before. I think my last exhaust had some serious leaking issues as I didn't put it on properly with the clamps which may have lead to leaks. New 2.5" intercooler piping. I need to get some more t-bolt clamps as the ones I have are too small for the piping and I'm using the cheapo clamps. I should have my new BOV on there in a couple of days. Got my HKS knock-off BOV, just gotta wait 'til the JB Weld dries. Yeah, I know, but I don't know how to weld...yet. LOL The BOV sounds really sweet and adds a little bit of "bling" to the interior. Got around to switching out the old brake lines and the fairly new pads; they were not as grippy as I would like to have them be. So I got a set of 911 pads and I'll have to see how much of a difference it makes with them and the new lines. Ran into a bit of a problem..... I...uh...broke the stock line coming from the proportioning valve. LOL So I'm just gonna replace them with some nice stainless steel lines and nuts. Got some down time so I decided to change out my fog lights with some ones I had lying around. I also wired the car so they'll finally work. And I hooked up my Blitz boost controller. This thing is so tiny that it fits in the vent hole on my dash. I liked this one because it'll allow me to basically use 6 boost settings; 4 that you can preset into the contoller, plus scramble mode, and then I can turn it off and let the computer do the work. My computer will have 2 settings; 18psi and "Oh $hit mode" 29psi setting. Finally got my Shelby steering wheel in. No more bus driver steering wheel for me! LOL I have a Coolingmist alky system that's been sitting on the shelf for over a year. This is just a single stage system to give me a little bit of insurance. Decided this would be a good time to finish as I have the down time. Here's a pic of the nozzle in the elbow right after the intercooler. I moved the coil, horn, and old VNT soleniods to put the 100psi pump and water tank on the passenger side. I'll have an extra tank feeding the main tank in a couple of weeks. I'm still waiting for my billet fuel rail from FWDP. I can't really do any "high boosting" until that comes in. (frown) My current stock fuel rail is leaking just a tad bit and at higher boost, every drop of fuel is precious. Speaking of fuel.... To make use of the Autometer gauge I already have, I purchased an Innovate Motorsports wideband air/fuel monitor that uses the Autometer narrowband gauge and converts it to a wideband. Although it's been a while since I've toyed with my car (still waiting for my FWDP fuel rail-it's been a month), my car is about to be "exhausted." Get it? lol My fuel rail FINALLY came in, and i got it installed along with my 40% injectors to handle the higher boost. Decided to just use the Innovate wideband digital display guage. Tommorrow I'll finally tune with the wideband and she how she does. Here's a shot of the wideband O2 sensor. Got the wideband in. Holy smokes, this thing works like a dream! I cannot believe I fell for the "banana in the tail pipe" trick by wasting my money on a narrow band! Instant response to changes and at WOT I was at 9.1 ratio at 18psi just by reading my plugs BEFORE the install of the wideband. Time to lean it out a bit to 11.1, get a bit more power. Even mounted the calibration button and light for good measure. My electric cut-out will go on tomorrow. Ordered a premade pipe from Summit Racing. No exhaust shop around here had any flanges. This should free up some lost horsepower. Got it on and man, this thing rocks. Throttle response is better and the turbo spools noticably faster! It's not even that loud. lol I put the switch near under the wideband calibration switch. It even has a light to let me know when it's fully open.

This is my daily driver '86 Dodge Omni TIV GLH. Production for the 1986 year was 3,129 cars: 882 carburated and 2,247 GLH Turbos. Of these 3,129 cars, 824 were Santa Fe Blue. It currently has an engine/trans transplant from a '90 Shadow. That's an intercooled 2.2l VNT and a 568 trans. The car's pretty quick as it is now, but the small VNT, with the stock intercooler and head runs out of steam up top. I'll be taking care of all that though....heh, heh. First thing I wanted to do was get rid of that stock exhaust. It's still in pretty good shape for an 18 year old car, but I need something that's gonna flow a bit better. I'm leaning towards a 2.5" exhaust upgrade, as a 3" might be a bit too extreme for my needs. Here's the stock exhaust. Ooops, it 'fell' off! LOL Next up is the stock intercooler. The stock intercooler is good for a bit above stock boost levels, but not good enough for my application. Dodge Omni's are known for their tight front area for front mount intercoolers, but I found that this was not as hard as I'd heard. The new intercooler is from Extreme Turbo Systems in WA. It's a 20x12x3 bar and plate intercooler and is vertical flow rated at 520hp, far more than I'll ever need. Here's a side by side with the stock intercooler. Test fit. After making the markings for in the intercooler, I had to remove the front bumper and make a couple of "adjustments" with my angle grinder. After that, it was just a matter of seeing if it would fit behing the stock grill. What do you know, it works! Stock throttle body and 52mm throttle body. Here's the stock airbox and stock intercooler hoses. Nice try Dodge, but I think I'll do it my way. Getting all the pipes plumbed in was pretty easy. I bolted everything up and made some brackets to hold down the intercooler. I basically put rubber washers on the bracket bolts so no metal is touching. That way the vibration doesn't hurt it. It's very tight now and does not even move! Here's a pick of the upper/lower hoses. I know what you're thinking, but don't worry, I have a DSM BOV I'm gonna put on that pipe! And here's a top view of the hoses coming from the intercooler to the engine bay. So here's the finished engine bay (for now). I installed a factory TII air hose on the turbo, and from there a straight pipe with a 5 1/2" K&N cone filter right at the grill. Here's a pic of my strut tower bar. Only cost $14.50 for front and rear bars! LOL Gotta love E-bay! It's originally for a Neon, but I just turned it upside down because the hood vent got in the way. I kind of got lucky and the headgasket is starting to go, so now I have an excuse to upgrade a bit. Below are (in order) stock VNT (25), VNT 28 (larger wheel), and stock Mitubishi turbo. If you look closely, the VNT 28 differences are noticable. Here is a stock exhaust manifold compared to a TBI manifold. I'm gonna attempt to put this on with the VNT 28 turbo. Don't know if it's possible, but there's only one way to find out! LOL Close to the flange on the left side in the pic is a hole for my EGT probe. My shifter felt like I was shifting in a bucket of oatmeal! LOL Just by installing these two Booger bushings under the hood on the linkage, it made a BIG difference. I can only imagine how it'll feel when I change the ones at the shifter. I completely forgot that I had these goodies in my garage! LOL Left; T2/T3 clutch combo and Phantom Grip LSD, Right; Fidanza aluminum 8lb flywheel and underdrive pulley kit. This should help out some, if I put them on. I also have some Mopar Performance lowering springs/struts/shocks that have about 5k miles on them that I bought for a REALLY good price! Left is stock, right is MP. Finally got around to doing some work on the 'Box'. I put on the Fidanza flywheel, new throw out bearing, new T2/T3 clutch/pressure plate, under drive pulley, new belts. Installed the Phantom Grip and also put in a drain plug for the trans. Phantom Grip install: Drain plug install I've decided to go ahead and remove the whole engine. Things in there are REALLY, REALLY dirty/oily, and I don't want to risk an engine fire, which is what'll happen if I leave all that crap in there. I'm also going to paint the block (black) and clean things up a bit in the engine bay. Yeah, it's a $hit Box, but it'll be a clean piece of $hit! LOL Update. I've decided to turn this engine into a race motor, so in the mean time I've found something to get me by until it's done. I manage to score a completely rebuilt 2.5l engine from an auto '89 LeBaron. I just put on everything from the 2.2 on there and added some 'extras'. I added a TEC S60 VNT, with some homemade braided oil/coolant lines, and tapped the #4 runner on the exhaust manifold with an EGT probe. I also added a K&N oil filter, Turbos' Unleashed thermostat housing with coolant mod on the thermostat. The 2.5 should help with spooling the S60 VNT. Well, looks as though the radiator won't clear the alternator! So I'll be using the stock rad for now. Finally got the engine in an put on the MP springs/struts. I also got me some new rotors and pads. The rotors are 10.25" (SLH Caravan package-same as the ones I took off) and are slotted, drilled and vented. These should put me through the windshield! LOL Here is a pic of the guages I installed. Left to right-boost, air/fuel, EGT. Yeah I know, they're a crooked, but I was tired when I put them in. LOL As long as they work. I didn't want to use a pillar pod for two reasons; 1)this is a sleeper car, so I don't want anyone seeing anything in the car. 2)I want to be able to cover them with a dash mat and hide them when not in use. Here are some goodies that I'll put on after I get the car straight. Well I've been extremely busy the last couple of months and have not been able to touch the car. I had everything together, had her fired up, but then the shifter housing broke on the trans, had to take out the trans, fix that, drop the engine back out because putting it back in was too tight! Now I've just got in my Steve Menegon ported head. This thing is a beauty! Okay, finally another update! I've got the 2.5 engine in (again) and I've bolted everything together. I'm running the 2.5 engine with 2.2 electronics, so I had to adjust the timing and fuel to quench the 2.5's thirst. I had a stumbling problem upon acceleration that turned out to be a bad TPS. I also changed out the old busted tie rod ends with new Moog ones. Now I just have to bleed the brakes and see what she's got! Here's a pick of the finished engine bay. It still needs a good cleaning, and the white container you see on the passenger side is my alcohol injection system tank (it's not hooked up yet). I finally took the ole $hit Box Express out yesterday (07-15-05)for a test drive. Here's what I got in her so far; -2.5l engine completely stock -FWDP 2.2 S3 cal -TEC S60 VNT with home made braided lines -TU turbo oil line filter -home made 2.5" exhaust with Catco cat and 3" Borla muffler -Autometer EGT, A/F, and boost gauges -Replaced ALL vac lines with silicone ones -Vac block -Aftermarket catch can -58mm TB -Adj. fpr - 20% injectors -Fuel pressure guage -DSM BOV -Front mount intercooler -Slim line radiator fan -Magnacore wires with NGK spark plugs -Poly Bushings all around (even alternator bushings lol) -New MP springs, struts and shocks -Booger shifter bushings -Phantom Grip LSD -Rebuilt axle (by me) -Drain plug on trans -New T2/T3 clutch/flywheel combo -Fidanza aluminum flywheel -New starter -K&N cone filter right at the front grill So I set the timing to 10 degrees and the fuel pressure to about 55psi w/ 20% injectors (just to be on the safe side-2.5's get a bit more thirsty up top than 2.2's), and I call up a friend and tell him I'm coming over (he lives about 5 minutes away from me). I get over there and we go for a ride. Well, let me tell you, this thing freakin' FLIES!!!! LOL The acceleration is just plain sick! I guess it's a combination of the torque from the 2.5, the weight of the aluminum flywheel, added with the spool of the S60 VNT and there is NO lag. In second gear, about 2000 rpm, the turbo is already spooled up pretty good and ready to go. I only did limited boost runs to about 10-13psi, but one time I gave her some gas and she climbed to 15lbs REAL quick with no signs of stopping! I had to let off a bit plus I kept on blowing off hoses and vac lines. I don't have it tuned or anything but on those runs, A/F and EGT seemed to be fine. Maybe after I get her tuned up a bit it'll be dyno time and then some track runs. I can say after owning 3 VNT cars (two of them '89 CSX's), this one is by far the quickest and fastest of them all! To anyone going the route of a S60 VNT or even a VNT28, I say "go for it!" I can only imagine how much of a difference it would make if I added my 202/160 cfm Steve Menegon head, TBI header, my alcohol injection kit, Findanza aluminum cam sprocket and opened the exhaust to 3" (which I have a 304 mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust in my garage...hmmm.....). And I may give Turbo's Unleashed a call for a special one-off 2.5 S60 VNT cal too. Well, so far, so good. I've been having problems blowing off intercooler hoses as well as vac lines. I've purchased some zip ties that I'll use on the vac lines as well as put t-bolt clamps on all the hose connections. It's funny to see the look on a person's face as the $BE blows by them in the street! LOL It's a fun car and I missed driving it. I've added some "CS" seats from a charger, as well as steam cleaning the whole interior. I would imagine this car has never been shampooed, as there was tons of crap in the shampooer from the car. Here's a before and after pic of the seats. And if you're ever in town and see this coming up in your rear view, just know that you may win the race, but it'll give you a run for your money! Plus you probably pay more in one year of insurance than my cars worth! LOL Went to pick up my Rampage in California that's been sitting for the last 21 months in storage. Remarkably it was in very good condition! And I drove it over 900 miles with just changing the spark plugs and topping off the coolant! Didn't even change the oil and averaged over 35mpg! LOL I bought this Rampage from Robert Kennedy several years ago. Now the siblings are finally together! I picked up an 2004 SRT-4 engine and ECU to drop in the Rampage. This'll be my 16V SRT-4 Rampage. With just the stock power of the engine and the weight of the Rampage, this'll be one fast beast. I'd imagine it'll easily be a 12 second truck. Guess I'll have to start another page soon. LOL I've managed to get my hands on a Turbonetics T3/T4 50 trim turbo that was practically brand new. I'm now thinking that I'm gonna throw it on the GLH for now. I'll put together the 2.2 block I bought with forged internals and put on the Steve Menegon head with the TBI header and this turbo. The swingvalve is specially designed to fit an L-body and is coated (along with the header) to reduce heat temps. This should give me close the the 300hp range I'm seeking. Had to adjust the compressor housing so it'll fit with my set up. Interior shots of the Rampage Update; while taking on a new BMW M3 convertible yesterday (yes, I actually held my own with him door to door up until about 95mph) my head gasket blew! LOL The manual boost controller was turned up to max and the boost gauge was pegged past 20psi. It was worth the look on his (and his girlfriend's) face! So the car will probably not be TIV anymore......muhahahahahah!