Lets think about boost. For autocross and road racing you need smooth power, not sudden transitions. The last thing you need coming out of a corner is another 100 hp. You are busy setting up for the next corner! That's why dirt track cars use 2 BBL carbs. They don't want the kick a 4 BBL gives you when the secondaries open. Sean is right, boost is fun, but it has its place. And don't tell me about the F1 turbo cars. They idle at 5000 rpms. They have million dollar engine control systems. They have 8 fwd gears and shift between 8000 and 13,000 (15,000 max) rpms, so they are always in the boost.
This is good insight. I'm not going to be sure how the engine really responds until it's together, however my general thinking was that on track I'd be aiming the keep the engine between 3000 and 5500 rpms, and hopefully would be in boost the whole time (not accounting for shifting ect). I'll try and optimize my setup to not have a sudden burst of power but I imagine throttle skill will be a large part of controlling the car effectively (rolling on gently instead of stomping it coming out of turns). I know that turbo track cars are fairly common though, my roommate tracked a turbo Porsche Cayman and it was a blast! Another of my friends tracks a BMW M2 Competition that is turboed. Granted these are both modern cars with advanced boost control, but hopefully I can have a similar amount of fun in my boat!
Yes there are lots of ways to control the power with a boosted setup. I know a guy with a carbed turbo v8 who runs a boost controller that senses wheel spin abs adjusts as needed. My car builds boost by 2500.
There is a big difference in the "handling" of a small volume high revving engine with lots of gears, vs a large torque producing engine with a few gears and then throwing in boost. Sort of like walking in a room with a chi-hooah-hooah on the couch getting all wound up at the sight of you and a snoozing Pitbull that you awakened after breaking in its home and stepping on its favorite skweeky toy... One is giving it all its got all the time, the other goes from nothing to insane in an instant, and you, looking for a way out. Yeah, the kid in the Honda vs you in a Buick. "Whoa! Nelly!!!"
One of the great things about turbos vs a supercharger is it’s so easy to control boost levels. Use a bit larger wastegates and you can’t easily lower boost to 2 or 3 psi, or dial it back up. This summer I will be running a 12:1 race 355 in my turbo car, and I will simply leave the charge pipe off so it’s not ingesting boost. The turbos will still make boost but the engine won’t see it. Then when I swap the engine setup for boost I won’t have to change anything except the engine itself.
Well the cars I normally drive on track or for drifting are 80s Toyota. My 87 Corolla in particular is what I'd consider a pinnacle of the small NA motor, high revving, driving 10/10 all the time mentality. It's been a great way for me to learn, and continue doing so every time I'm in the car. The 4AGE engine redlines around 7400 rpm and loves the high revs, makes about 120hp (mine probably makes more like 90 being old and tired ). I'm trying to build and track the Buick as an exercise to learn from the opposite spectrum; V8 engine, boosted, heavy old car. Fighting crap suspension design with modern engineering. I betting both paths can be enlightening and a ton of fun! But really, when's the last time you saw a Buick on a road course? I've certainly never seen one at a track day, much less anything pre 1980! Closest I've seen is a Shelby Daytona coupe, but of course it was a reproduction. Here's hoping I get the damn thing out there before I'm too old to drive it!
Some Inspiration - The Gray Ghost: a fan favorite in the 1971 Trans Am series was the "Grey Ghost", a '64 Pontiac Tempest, prepared by Pontiac Special Projects Engineering Manager Herb Adams. The boxy six-year-old Tempest had once been Adams' wife's daily driver, with over 80,000 miles (130,000 km) on the odometer when it was turned into an A Sedan racer. It proved to be surprisingly fast, at a time when even a one-year-old car was considered out of step with the competition. Using his own money, Herb Adams set about converting Mrs. Adams grocery getter into a competitive race car. Using a 389 destroked to a Trans-Am regulation friendly 303 cubic inches (producing a whopping 475hp), Adams and his skeleton crew added larger tires on the front, a few degrees negative camber on the rear to make the big Tempest hook up a little better in the corners, and a fresh coat of dull silver paint. To drive their beast, Adams convinced the hard charging Bob Tullius. It was entered in the opening round of the 1971 Trans-Am Championship. Unable to qualify, the car was allowed to start from the back of the pack. With Bob Tullius behind the wheel, it mowed through the field, and was running second behind eventual winner Mark Donohue's factory-supported Penske Racing AMC Javelin when the engine expired.
I do want to see your car doing the twisties. And am a believer in your learning no matter how it goes. Have fun while you can, cuz the opposition, the changing of times, age and so much more make the struggle all more real. I have never met anyone driving a rocking chair, complaining of having spent too much time enjoying the things in life they experienced.
This is awesome! It's funny you mention Herb Adams, my mom dated one of his sons in college (IIRC) and became friends with his Wife, Sandy! Since I'm seeing my parents for the Holidays I'm going to ask her about how they met ect. I do remember when I was a kid once we went to their house, it was an A-frame house with three levels. The top was a small living quarters, the middle was a man cave with a pool table and kitchen, and the bottom was a huge garage!
