Turbo V6 Camaro

[Jon Early]

Question... if someone (me) was working on a 1996 one of these for a young enthusiast in my squadron, and was debating starting upgrades (either 3800 turbo or LS-swap) while the underbody looks just as crusty... is there a standard approach to reviving/protecting the unibody structure? It seems like surface rust more than the structural cancer my GTP chassis died of after 15yrs of NY/MI/WI/MN winter fun.

This car was and still is a lost cause IMO. I made it good enough so that it won't kill me in a minor accident, but I still won't have the piece of mind until this shell is scrapped or fitted with a roll cage. I don't really have a strong method. It's just will power to keep this thing going.

For the most part, my approach has been dealing with the worst parts first. If there's rot, there's no way around cutting it out until you find clean metal and welding a patch in. I've even cut pieces of the frame channels out and rebuilt them. Since my welding skills are meh and I had to cut almost the entire floor out of the car, I reinforced everything with weld in subframe connectors. In theory, it's not necessary but these cars are flimsy from the factory and these bars made me feel a lot better. I would not recommend anybody doing this sort of restoration though. Rust free V6 F-bodies are cheap. I only did all this work to prove to myself that I could and because I have an odd love for reviving unloved cars. There's also a lot of sentimental value in this particular car.

Other than that, it's really just staying on top of it as best as I can. Rusty bolt-on parts like suspension links are just fun opportunities to upgrade. However, I refuse to bolt a nice new part to rust. The suspension brackets are in good shape and easily cleaned up with a wire wheel and some chassis paint or Eastwood rust converter. Don't use rubber undercoating. Naval jelly also works well for cleaning stuff up and I don't use it as much as I should. Eventually everything that bolts to the shell will be replaced so that I don't have to worry about them. If I at least give each part of the shell that the parts bolt to a good repair then I shouldn't have to worry too much about the shell either.

Once I start creeping up to about 450hp, this shell is going to start giving me the creeps regardless. I have a plan for stiffening things up, but I may eventually move to a nicer chassis and tune this car back down.

 

[dezldave961]

Gotcha. This guy is kinda excited to do some mods, but I'll be looking hard at the integrity underneath before we decide to get too invested. I've seen some cherry V6 F-bodies for $3-6k floating around that are probably going to end up in my shop within a year, as a customer project or my own.

 

[Jon Early]

Gotcha. This guy is kinda excited to do some mods, but I'll be looking hard at the integrity underneath before we decide to get too invested. I've seen some cherry V6 F-bodies for $3-6k floating around that are probably going to end up in my shop within a year, as a customer project or my own.

I'd say the places to check are the rear wheel wells, where the frame channels end under the driver and passenger feet, all floor pans, and the "butt cheeks" which are directly under the rear seats. Those seem to be the most common rust spots on 4th gens.

 

[Jon Early]

I might as well update I guess. I pulled the cheap reed regulator manual boost controller by Turbonetics, and did some backwoods testing. It didn't seem to be doing anything. I was able to blow through both ports without much effort regardless of where the dial was set. To the trash it goes. Luckily using this type means that hooking up my MAC valve is exactly the same in terms of plumbing. I just need to wire it up to the gauge which has been patiently waiting for this moment.

Here's a very old picture of the old setup since I forgot to take a picture of it before removal.

I bought the AEM boost controller used really just because I wanted a boost gauge that matched my wideband. Finding the MAC valve that came with this thing in my mountain of "some day" parts was not easy.

I started by making a nice little aluminum bracket to mount the MAC valve in the same spot as the MBC. I hated how floppy the MBC was with its supplied bracket. I had this aluminum angle sitting around which worked perfectly.

Those rusty screws were going to make my eyes hurt, so I blasted them.

And shot them with chassis paint.

Then I just needed to make the wires look nicer. The wiring from the gauge was already ran when I installed it.

I haven't tried to program it yet. The car needs plugs and the GN still stakes priority. The Camaro will not be making it to the Nats because my wife had an unexpected surgery which ate up all her PTO. She's in no shape to be driving, walking around, or even sitting upright for long periods of time anyway. I look forward to getting this thing going though. Maybe for 2024, I'll bring this car with some slick boost control settings and a mini spool. These weak launches are killing my soul and I don't really want to shell out for a rear end yet. We'll see.

 

[Jon Early]

I haven't been able to figure out what's wrong with this car. The fancy solenoid didn't help. In fact, the issue has gotten impossibly worse. I can only achieve 5 psi now. How do I have less than wastegate pressure?

I checked the mac valve. I can blow through port two and out port three without issue. I can't blow through port one. If I energize the valve I can blow through port one. I'd say it's fine. I turned to the wastegate, pulled it off, and found no issues there either. The diaphragm looks and works great.

I threw a 16 psi spring in there just for fun (or destruction) and it didn't really make any difference. I was paying more attention to my gauges this time though. I noticed that my wideband is showing 16-17:1 at cruise and idle. It also takes forever to boost to actually come in. My response used to be really good, but now there's no chance of having boost around town. Even on a long stretch of road, the boost gauge sits at 0 for a while before slowly going positive. I'm going to guess that I have a bad boost/vacuum leak. I'm just surprised that my idle rpm isn't higher. Maybe it's an exhaust leak? I think one bad enough to make this much of a difference would be a lot more audible though. I guess we'll do some more diagnosis when I find time.

 

[Chuck Leeper]

I see what looks to be a BOV under the turbo.
If so, could it be leaking?
Intercooler core leak?
Data logs?

 

[Jon Early]

I see what looks to be a BOV under the turbo.
If so, could it be leaking?
Intercooler core leak?
Data logs?

No BOV. Data would be a good thing to collect. I just wish I was better at reading it.

I can't imagine that anything upstream of the throttle could be causing it due to the fact that the MAF is integrated into the throttle. If there was a leak causing lean conditions it would have to be somewhere between the throttle and o2 sensors. This car is also locked into open loop so the o2 sensors should really have nothing to do with it either.

Then again, this car does like to give me problems in pairs so anything is possible!

 

[dezldave961]

I'd do a hunt for escape routes... exhaust end-to-end, charge pipes, manifold, etc. The MAF isn't going to account for things escaping at most locations, it just sees what it sees and commands fuel accordingly. When you piss air or an air/fuel mixture out somewhere in the process before/after it, the reading isn't going to provide significant value until it's buttoned up.

Just watched the YT channel BoostedBoiz and PFI (somewhat hacks, but they have their corner of the market) chase down a cracked weld after turbo after boost wasn't building on the dyno. Louder exhausts make this harder to trace, sometimes. I didn't know my GSX's 1st wastegate pipe and log manifolds had cracks until I removed them to upgrade the turbo setup 10yrs after the initial build.

 

[Jon Early]

The problem ended up being exactly what I thought it should be given that the wide band displayed very lean and the narrow bands displayed normal. How I didn't find or notice this hole sooner is the bigger mystery! I have a big leak between the sensors.

It appears that hanging the turbo so far away from the engine unsupported finally got the best of my crappy welds. I haven't had the time to pull anything apart and try to fix it. My skills and tools have improved a lot since then so I'm confident that I can make it stronger than it ever was. I just wish I could find a nice way to brace it.

 

[dezldave961]

Good find. I've been watching how many race builders utilize a crossbrace for support when centering the turbo behind the radiator.

Get in a good couple hours of staring at it with a beverage in-hand, and you'll come up with something.

 

[Chuck Leeper]

These are on an engine with all 8 cylinders.
It is in an 86 Regal, tho.
Obviously won't fit your system. Just an idea.