Turbo on a NA

[CypherMax]

I currently have a 1991 Legacy L Non turbo. Is it possible for me to put a oem legacy turbo on it or do i have to get a whole new engine? like are all the fittings there and ready to be used?

[THAWA]

if by fittings you mean oil and coolant, no. But it's pretty easy to set it up. You can use the line from the iac valve or throttle body for the coolant, and for the oil you can feed from one of the oil galley plugs at the top of the block, and return to the valve cover or oil pan.

As for whatever eles you will need you'll need new headers for sure unless you want to get into some super elaborate piping setup. You can use newer impreza/legacy/forester(i assume theses are the same) headers, the ones that have a flange near the differential plug and before the cat and have a custom up and downpipe. Otherwise you can get a new crossmember, sway bar, waterpump and swap that in and just use stock legacyturbo or wrx piping. You could also just cut your stock crossmember and use turbo/wrx piping with a new water pump but I dont know how safe that'd be. Other things you'd need would be new intake piping, a bov/bpv a check valve between the cpv valve and charcol canister, a turbo of course, and some sort of timing control. I believe you could use a rrfpr and no timing control for quite a few psi, but after too much boost you'll run way too rich.

[CypherMax]

has this procedure ever been successfully done?

[THAWA]

I was about to, then tranny said, "hi pay attention to me, I'm diein' here"

I think what's his name subie_do did this, but I'm not sure how he did the exhaust routing? He was pushing 12psi with just very minor mods I think injection, water or alch i dont remember which.

[CypherMax]

yea i have 90k miles on my car and an auto tranny that slips just a little in 3rd but its ok. I just wanted to know what was involved in this project so if i ever decided on doing i had an idea of what was ahead of me. if anyone can tell me about that the exhaust routing id appreciate it. it seems that there is a hell of a lot of room right under where a turbo should be on my car. enough room for a downpipe but then again thats just guessing. i can look right down and see my headers and flanges.

[BAC5.2]

Hardy - Are you thinking of Subie_Kid? I think he swapped an EJ22T into his 95, not just the turbo.

[THAWA]

naa subie_do. He posted a lot of good info about it, i just dont feel like searching for it

but about your car cypher. I'd get an auxillary cooler and change the external filter ASAP. and start getting quotes on either a rebuilt tranny or rebuilding yours. I also wouldn't do an ATF fluid flush if I were you. But about the exhaust routing, our headers feed directly into a cat and have flange after it as I'm sure you've noticed. Trying to have a pipe coming off there then up to the turbo and back down to the exhaust would just be too much work IMO. If you don't feel like swaping the crossmember the easiest way would be the newer headers. The ones with a flang before the cat. It's right under the differential area, so you can have it go to the turbo and back down to where your midpipe is. Looking at the space where the stock downpipe is It iddnt look like you could just do custom uppipe work, you'd have to do both up and down. The other way is new waterpump, cross member and swaybar. Swap those in and you can use stock piping. But my feelings on that is, if you're going to remove the engine anyway why not put the 22t in? At anyrate, do a search for "turboing na" and it should come up.

[evolutionmovement]

Check out what 2.5RS turbo guys have done as it will basically be the same but with smaller displacement. In the end, though, getting a package EJ22T will be a much cheaper, quicker, and more durable option with more room for power upgrades.

Steve

[LegacyPunk]

I agree with evolutionmovement. The EJ22T is deffinetly a stronger block than the N/A.

[THAWA]

stronger yes no doubt, but at what point? From the sounds of it noone here is running more than 12-14 psi. and like was said before subie_do did that with a walbro, bigger injectors, and alcohal injection. If you add an intercooler, and timing control I dont doubt you could hit 16 psi and still be safe. How much power will that be? I couldn't tell ya, but with the right shit I'm sure you could break 300 on the ej22e. and with the higher compression you wouldn't have to worry as much about turbo lag and would have more tq. After that though, I'd go with an ej22t/g. But how many people here are even above 200-250?

[evolutionmovement]

HGs are a much bigger issue and engine mgt is more critical with the HC N/A application. The Ej22 N/A wasn't designed to take half the power of the closed deck block and the less stress on anything the better for durability and reliability (unless you're using something below its optimal operating range, but that's something else). 250 to 300 on an turbo block is nothing for it while the N/A would be operating at or beyond its designed limitations. I'm not saying it couldn't be done, but it would be more money for less reliability. Even putting HC pistons in a closed deck block would be better. Hell, I'd use the closed deck for a HO, high rpm N/A application even.

Steve

[THAWA]

umm, 160/2=80 and 181/2=90.5 I'm pretty sure my car makes more than that. I do agree with you on the turbo being more reliable, cheaper and all around better, but I don't think you can discount the ej22e so easily. Do we need another person pushing 12psi to prove it?

[evolutionmovement]

How many people here have HG problems with the N/A motor no-turbo? Not as bad as the 2.5s, but still common by Subaru standards. The cylinders walk. If I still had my old HGs I could show you the stretched fire rings (albeit from a 180k engine, which is still good). I like to think of it like this: if you were putting either engine in an aircraft, which would you rather trust? Not to paint the N/A as a terrible engine - it isn't. And it could work if you don't mind having to mess with it every so often, it's just that there's a much better alternative for probably less money and definitely less labor.

Steve

[THAWA]

:\ Re read the second sentence of what I just posted. As for the aircraft thing, what do most of them put in?

[evolutionmovement]

I don't care what most people would do - most people are so dumb I can't understand how they feed themselves - I would choose the stronger engine unless the price difference is rediculous. The same reason I don't like to run with bad tires and little gas - you never know what might happen where you'll need that extra little bit and what's the difference in price or problem? Even the old N/A block could be sold for hundred or so and make a little back.

I don't mean to imply that anyone here is stupid - I'm still in a pissed mood from a discussion I had with a friend about how the Secret Service questioned a 15 yr old kid for drawing bad pictures of Bush in school and I'm starting to seriously question the value of a lot of the population.

If you don't mind a little extra work and don't necessarily have to count on the car a turbo N/A would probably work fine.

Steve

[eastbaysubaru]

and I'm starting to seriously question the value of a lot of the population.

Me too, although I've been questioning their value for years.

-Brian

[THAWA]

I wasn't trying to be a smartass or proove a point or anything, I was being serious. What do most the airplane swaps put in there?

[evolutionmovement]

I didn't think you were being a smartass, I was just in a foul mood and needed to vent a little.

From what I've seen, aircraft guys use whatever they can get. A friend of mine works for a carbon fiber aerospace component manfacturer and all the guys there are experimental aircraft types. From what he says, they use EA series and EJ alike. The SVX is popular when they can find it, but he didn't seem to know anything about the turbo Legacy, though they use the N/As a lot.

Thing is though, they use engines differently than cars. They gear it to cruise in the power band at relatively low rpm and just more or less hold that engine speed so now that I think of it, the closed deck would probably be less important as the engine would be less stressed than in a car with engine speed always going up and down. Cooling is not as much of a consideration either. I imagine the open deck would be better in this regard anyway with less mass and better coolant circulation. Plus they use higher octane fuel than us.

I'm thinking of keeping my N/A engine when I go turbo and putting it in a small boat with my brother-in-law, so I don't hate the N/A's. Not sure what I'll do about the cooling system, yet but its only an idea at this point.

Steve

[THAWA]

Create a water-tight seal on everything important and just run the engine submerged

[STi_GUY]

I was toying with the idea of installing the Forced Air Tech stage 1 system on my N/A. Later upgrading to the stage 2 (intercooler). Its only 5-6 psi and the 2.5 guys seem to like em. Why not on my 2.4 right?