LLCooLM495

Hey everyone! I've been on the forums since mid 2017, when I bought my very first car: a 3.1L '92 Firebird! I"m a 19 year old collge student, and I love this car to death. My biggest gripe is that its a tad slow reliable as hell, so can't compain about that. I've been kicking around the idea of bolting up a TD04 or somethin to give it a lil more kick, and I've checked most of the other threads about similar V6 turbo conversions. My biggest issue, being young and not habing a huge income, is obviously budget. As it stands, the engine in the car was swapped around 2005 by the previous owners, and was used, so god only knows how many miles tbe engine currently has. It was swapped around 100k miles, and I bought it at 163k. Odometer stopped.working around 174k, and I assume it's nearing 180k now. As the title of the thread suggests, it's my daily car, which I drive 2 minutes to and from the local Food Lion now, since I am home from college and am working as a cashier. Recently had the 700R4 rebuilt (around 175k), and I am very interested in the turbo build. I don't really want to V8 swap it, as I've grown rather fond of the lil engine and it's magical reliability thus far (no check engine for almost a year now, since I put in a new idle sensor. The engine currently has a TINY oil leak from part of the intake (I assume lower intake), but it isn't horrible. Gotta add a lil more oil once a month or so). I've read a bit about 3x00 intake/ head swaps as well. My main question is: how viable would a turbo/ 3x00 intake swap be? Would I be able to put in, say, a 3100 intake without 3100 heads? Or would I need to go as far as swapping pistons? And assuming I could get away just ust the intake, or even just putting in another 3.1 intake, would I be able to turbo it with 5-8 psi of boost? Or am I looking at a more expensive, more involved swap here? Like, am I gonna need a new ECM? Will I need to consider new boltons (piston rjngs/ cams etc)? Or could I get away with a conservative boost without blowing the whole engine? I'd love to be able to jjst weld up some new exhaust headers and call it a day, since I'm not looking for a racecar here, but I don't want to find myself stuck on the side of the road because of it. Sorry for the long post, hope I said everytbing necessary for info on my current situation! Thanks, guys!

TL;DR; Should I wait until I have more saved up and can do a full rebuild before 7ish psi of boost? And is a 3100 intake swap more involved than just an intake? Or am I good to go as long as I dont reef on it?

3.4 grape

iTrader: (1)

If you want to go low budget, I would keep boost levels at 5-6 lbs. Replace the intake gasket and check overall engine condition. Compression check engine to see what condition rings and valves are in. No sense boosting a crankcase. If all is well,install a fuel management unit (FMU) in the fuel return line. This will add the extra fuel needed when under boost, you can keep stock injectors and fuel pump as long as they are in good condition. Flip your stock exhaust manifolds to face forward and then you will have to mount turbo and run pipes to turbo. An alternate and cheaper method would be to do a rear mount turbo. I have not seen any rear mounts on a v6 yet. The stock ecm should be able to deal with 5-6 lbs of boost but you would need to run higher octane fuel.

LLCooLM495

5-6psi sounds like enough to me 😁 I'm hoping the intake is as simple as changing the gasket, that would be ideal. Last time I got my car inspected, my mechanic mentioned that he saw a crack in the intake, but I haven't been able to see it. Maybe once I pull the intake off it'll be easy to spot. Once that's dealt with, I'll go about doing the compression tests. I'm not sure about a rear mount turbo, that would involve a lot of piping, plus I'd like to hear the wooshy noises at the front 😂 thanks for the tips!!!

Street Lethal

iTrader: (16)

Nineteen ehh? Don't get any older kiddo...

Sounds to me like you need a new mechanic...

Search Project89's old threads, he's pretty much done it all with those little engines, in every conceivable way. Wow, it's been ten freaking years since I filmed this video taken right outside of Raceway Park. Time freaking flies...

- Rob

LLCooLM495

Hahaha, maybe! I really only go to him for the yearly state inspections though
And I'll go check out Project89's posts! I remember going through a thread or two of his, or at least ones he participated on. I'll see if I can do some more digging!

Sierra6

something noone answered yet is no, you cannot put a 3100 intake on iron heads. and you can't (or shouldn't) put 3100 heads on with 3.1 iron head pistons because of the greatly added compression ratio that would result in. I also have a turbo build if you search my threads. good luck.

fasteddi

iTrader: (2)

I miss these v6s. Glad to see some still playing with them.


You can run some gen 1 pistons on a hybrid set up though.. just gotta run e85. I did for a year or so with a turbo too. Although I wouldn't reccomend it.