My Puma Plaything

[EvilDonut]

Thought I'd start a thread to cover my attempted puma modifications, including a cheapo turbo

What I have:
-Puma 1.7, Black, V reg (99), ~70k miles
-17" alloys (in black)
-Superchips Bluefin
-K&N 57i Induction Kit

What I want:
-300mm brake conversion
-Turbo for around 5-8psi boost
-DIY iPhone app for data logging / custom gauges

The turbo idea went through some initial development in this thread: http://www.projectpuma.com/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=8605&start=0

Some Photos:

Engine bay, not much to see yet! Just a K&N really.

Intercooler - its a Focus one. 620x200x95mm (including side bits). Integrated temp sensor.

Intended turbo layout:

Bluetooth OBDii dongle for iPhone interface:

Prototype iPhone interface (keeping it simple at first!):

Am currently working on getting the iPhone to communicate with the bluetooth dongle. I intend to have some pretty gauges and data logging capability on this app. The most useful feature will be the data logging I think, as I can analyse it on my PC offline to help tuning. An air-fuel gauge will help if I get the turbo working too!

 

[clarkie]

i think you might struggle to fit that intercooler behind the bumper tho as it seems really deep and might push your fan too far back to fit. pumanoob has gone for a thin one and it fits nicely in front of the radiator and he has just enough room so if your doing a similar build then you might have to do a bit of moving around.. looking good apart from that. i intend on doing the turbo conversion myself and i too am looking for a intercooler for mine

 

[EvilDonut]

Yep as soon as I unwrapped the intercooler today I realised it would be too big...I got it for 99p though! ;-) I measured the main fan, it's 110mm deep which is quite big, a slimline fan could be refitted to gain maybe 50mm or so. Then I might be able to move the radiator back just enough to fit it. If not, could look into fitting it at the bottom grille where there may be more space. Failing that, I just sell this one for a profit and get a slimmer one

 

[clarkie]

personally id do the latter anyway. im going to be looking for slim as possible i think and as you say ill be looking to fit directly in front of the lower grill to maximise air flow to it. you got a bargain thats for sure. buy another one then sell this one for a similat buy it now price to your new one becomes freeeeeeeeee

 

[TyeBoi]

i love the iphone app! how are you managing to get a fuel pressure reading as I am sure the ecu does not log this.

 

[EvilDonut]

Ah in that case there won't be a fuel pressure reading lol...those fields are just some of the 'standard' ones supported by OBD2, I have not yet got to a stage where I can check what fields are actually being reported by the puma ECU.

I suspect a couple of the others won't be reported either, like maybe timing advance and intake pressure. Anyone used a scantool or similar before on the puma? If so do you remember what fields the puma reports?

If I had a laptop it would be so much easier to develop this, as my PC won't pick up the bluetooth signal from the car because its too far away So my only way to test/debug this is to use the iPhone.

 

[TyeBoi]

set the pc up downstairs for a little bit?

and yes I have a scan guage. will report on what it ses asap.

 

[EvilDonut]

No need, I managed to get a signal earlier by putting my PC in the window with a clear line of sight to the car...Theres no fuel rail pressure or intake manifold pressure, but theres timing advance and air/fuel mix stuff and other useful things to log

 

[EvilDonut]

My turbo came today, great! Its a Garrett T25 from a Saab 9000 - I got the same one as Pumanoob so I would know it fits without too much hassle. I bought it at the bargain price of £25 because it has some play in the shaft and so might need a rebuild.

I measured the axial play (up/down, along the shaft) and it is around 1mm.
The radial play (side to side) was too small for me to measure, but the blades weren't contacting the sides of the turbo.

Then I tried turning the turbine whilst pushing/pulling the whole turbine assembly through its full range of axial play, and noticed there were a couple of minor scraping sounds where the turbine fins were scraping against the housing at the exhaust-end of the turbo. Oh dear!

So my question is, does this turbo actually need rebuilding? It was working when it came off the Saab and the radial play feels within limits, but that 1mm of axial play seems like quite a bit so I'm guessing the answer to my question is Yes, but wanted to check anyway!

The rebuild kits are £55 and I don't want to spend that unnecessarily

 

[clarkie]

personally id just rebuild it anyway and fit it knowing its not going to fail on you when you far away from home and have bellowing smoke pouring from the car lol 55 is not a bad rebuild cost really and is worth doing especially if your not using an oil catch tank as that could cause more problems. and where you get that for 25 from. if there is another going please grab it for me and ill pay you the money lol

 

[EvilDonut]

Yep good point, when I'm pushing the puma hard I'm usually on remote country roads at dawn on Sunday mornings...not a great time for a major fault like the turbo destroying itself!

I got it off ebay, and sorry...its the only one It was £25 but £12 postage so I exaggerated really, total cost was £37. Add to that the cost of the rebuild and its £92. Still - £92 for a turbo with brand new bearings/seals is pretty unbeatable!

I was watching ebay for about a month and this came up with nobody bidding as the description said it may need a rebuild...then I waited until the last 5 seconds of the auction and put a bid on....muhahahaha

 

[clarkie]

hahahaaa good man thats how you do it

id be interested in the link where you find the rebuild kit myself as i will prob have one to hand whether mine needs it or not when i buy one. gonna wait for a bargain like you got tho. i missed an intercooler in black the other day an i was gutted. it sold for 36 an i bid 35 an i didnt rebid in time

 

[yippeekiay]

Just had a quick scout about on Ebay and saw an intercooler for a Saab 9000 but not sure if that's the type your after Clarkie.....anyway, didn't see any turbo's for the Saab 9000 but went to the intercooler for sale and had a look at his other items for sale and he has a Turbo there for £40 which he has had up before but never sold, it's for a Saab 9-5 and is a Garrett GT17 so not sure if that's any good to you either...lol.. Also has a 'make offer' option so give it a try. It does need rebuilding from the ad but worth a shot

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120616215017" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The only T25 turbo's I saw were here (for a twin turbo conversion!!!!!....lol)
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Pair-Garrett-T25-Turbochargers-Escort-Cosworth-YB-/230522282660?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item35ac32e2a4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[clarkie]

cheers for that yip but that intercooler is way too big for the cats front end lol it would stick out the bottom of the bumper. the one we will be needing is the frontera 2.8td intercooler which the corsa/cavalier guys use in their turbo applications for the vauxhall turbo conversions which means they are sought after too. you can get them just dont come up often thats all. altho i know there is a breaker of fronteras in stafford so i may be taking a trip over at some point next month.

as for the turbos. id love to buy them but i have a sneaky feeling they will go for more than i have as a balance at the minute as my money is otherwise spent on a few other bits for the motor would be ideal to have one fitted and one in reserve

 

[EvilDonut]

Yep I was annoyed at myself for missing a frontera i/c the other day that went for £9+£10p/p. Just need to keep watch I guess...am not in a rush which will work in my favour I spoke to a local Vauxhall breaker who quoted anywhere between £40-£150 depending on the age of the intercooler - they didn't know the specific one I wanted but had a big pile of them which probably included the one I want.

For the turbo, I searched for 'Saab 9000 turbo', as there are many types of 'Garrett T25 turbo' and I think they have different fittings to the Saab 9000 version, so I didn't bid on them. I got the turbo from a Saab breaker with an ebay shop.

For the rebuild kit, just search for 'Garrett T25 repair' or 'Garrett T25 rebuild' and you get a few results, most around £55 but some uprated ones for £85. You don't need a special Saab 9000 one as the internals of the T25 are all the same (thats an assumption by the way, I don't know for sure...but I think its fairly safe).

 

[clarkie]

hmmm an uprated internal version might be of some use too. worth while doing imo if your rebuilding anyway. ill look into this and do you have the link for this saab breaker by any chance? might be worth me messaging him and asking him to let me know if he gets anymore in

 

[EvilDonut]

Sure, heres all their listings:
http://cgi6.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewSellersOtherItems&userid=o2ace

I've been working on the iPhone<->puma interface this weekend. I have the basic version working - it scans for the bluetooth dongle, connects to it then continually pulls some data over the link and draws it to screen. Heres a couple of screenshots of me idling then revving:

ComPuma whilst Idling:_____________________________________ ComPuma whilst revving:

Note: VCT, Intake and Coolant should have the ° sign after them, that is a bug!

The first interesting thing I've learned from this is that the puma VCT is continuous - not just two-phase ('on' or 'off') - I've seen the timing be advanced to several different values between 0 and 40 degrees.
EDIT: Actually on further examination all the values I've observed are around 20 and 40, give or take a few degrees...so maybe it is actually two phase and this is just inaccurate sensor readings. Need to investigate!

Next on the agenda is to make it log all those details to a file that I can transfer to my PC and plot graphs or do whatever with it. Then, I will make some pretty gauges for air/fuel and perhaps some of the other stuff.

Eventually I want it to plot the graphs on the iPhone itself on another tab of the main program, that would be pretty cool! Basically the iPhone would help you do tuning.

Also , I might be wrong as I've not looked into this yet, but I think its possible to calculate BHP/ton by differentiating the speed (i.e. working out the acceleration). From this you can get the BHP (if you know the exact mass of the car with yourself in it!). You could also make a very accurate 0-60 time measurer.

The possibilities are endless!

 

[clarkie]

i dont have an iphone so that software is useless to me lmao

and what turbo have you gone for as there are 2 types of t25. you have Garrett T25 (water-cooled) and Mitsubishi TD04 (water-cooled) which are both off the saab 9000. but im guessing you have the standard garret t25.

 

[EvilDonut]

Aye a lot of people who want this won't have iPhones, thats the main weakness of this...otherwise I could probably sell it lol. And laptops already have plenty of free software that can do all mine can and more. I also don't fancy porting the ComPuma to any other phones either

Yep its the Garrett T25, but its not water cooled unless I'm very mistaken! I'm looking at it now and it only has inlet/outlets for oil. Take a look: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220659025297&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT

Looks like there are some version of the T25 that are water cooled, and some that are just oil...the Saab 9000 is just oil.

 

[clarkie]

yea there seems to be at least 4 variants of the t25 turbo used on the saab 9000 which is why im tryin to get to the bottom of exactly which one ill need and possibly a part number or something to verify it with.