Benny's Super 90
Hi All,
Thought it was time to finally do a write up of my 90.
After owning both a petrol 120 Grande and a 150 Update Kakadu I got sick of dicky electronics and gizmos and went old school, bought my 98 V6 Grande with no mods back in Dec 2018. 235,000km and it great condition for its age.
The Day I bought it:
Next was to fix the usual oil leaks from the rockers and install a set of tough dog adjustable shocks,40mm lift and Alpine Carplay headunit with reverse camera.![]
Comments
I pretty much left it like this for 12 months until I wanted more power and better/bigger tyres. Spent a few months looking for a supercharger when I came across a 2001 GXL in my suburb kitted out with Supercharger conversion, Dual lockers, pacemakers and Recaro seats for $7k.
I tossed up keeping it but I like the white more than the green so decided to get all of the goodies out and on sell it on to get some of my cash back. I swapped out both diff centers, extractors and the Supercharger setup with 7th injector and Exede ECU.
Took about 3 weeks the get the green one up and running with stock gear, sold it in 2 days for $7500 after putting in new LBJ's so I broke even.
Being left with my White 90 on blocks in the garage the decision was made to go hard and do some other upgrades.
New Pacemaker stainless exhaust system
Installed Supercharger and wired in 7th Injector and Exede ECU
Installed headlights and grill from 2001 Grande with Stedi LED conversion
Next was to get the breathers installed and start working on a drawer system and sorting the electrics.
Installed a Titan drawer system for a 120 series and made a custom enclosure to mount a Redarc 25A DC-DC charger, AGM battery, 160w solar panel and 12V Oven / Fridge.
The Finished Product:
Finally got around to getting it dyno tuned (DEC 2019), results were not as good as I hoped but it was a very hot day and intake temps were very high. Producing 100kw and 245NM at the wheels. The tuner was pretty conservative so there is more left in it. I have since compression tested it and the figures were low across the board.
Not sure why the compression is down as it only has 248,000km on it and should be getting better figures. Will know more after a leak down test. Still starts and drives fine, getting 15L/100 mixed driving and really notice the torque around 2200 - 3100rpm, after that it starts to drop off.
Future Projects:
Currently working on a intake manifold for the M90 Supercharger with intercooler
Fixing the low compression, ARP head studs for higher boost
After market ECU with individual coils
Rock Sliders
Upgraded sway bars with disconnects
1.5" body lift
Awesome build up mate, very neat. Good choice on models, the finished white one looks great.
Bit of an update.
Now fitted a Wideband o2 sensor and running E40 fuel (mix of E85 and 98), got the fuel running great with 15% added to injector values and increased the 7th injector by 20%. Pulls way harder now and seems to be running cooler with the booze mix. Left the timing as is for the moment but technically could add at least 5 degrees to get some more power.
The M90 supercharger with intercooler project is going well, first prototype is on its way to test on my spare engine then onto getting charger placement right and any changes before it goes through to build. Sent my M90 off a VY Commodore off for rebuild, full tear down and new coating on rotors, upgraded bearings to handle higher RPM and full porting job.
Bought a spare Engine/Auto/transfer case to do all the fitting up in my garage, supposedly the engine was running but after cleaning it up it looks like its had a hit in the front and cracked the cam wheels / cam sensor. Pulled the rockers and doesn't look it has run in years, completely dry top end and half of the valves are stuck open. I actually helped take it out of the vehicle and the front end looked really clean, I suspect the front hit had been repaired and they could not get it running. I have since stripped the auto which was in decent shape, full rebuild, new seal kit, kevlar clutches and bands HD2 shift kit with accumulator springs, rebuilt valve body with genuine parts and got the torque converter rebuilt. The new auto is waiting to go but my current box decided it will work fine now so will leave it in till it dies.
Just ordered a Haltech E2500 to run it all, this week they released transmission management which supports the A340 series boxes so the plan is to run a 90mm LS electronic throttle body, ditch all of the cable operated stuff and convert the Auto valve body to electronic line control from the Lexus LS400 and run everything through the new ECU including cruise control.