AMMO Posted May 5, 2005 Author Share Posted May 5, 2005 Peter T I think to make a really good head for an XE would cost around a grand. Bigger valves, valve insert lots of porting (and you still couldn't get the ports big enough and in proportion to the valves). For £1,300.00 you can buy a Duratec that has a better head in standard form. Dave Walker is a big Duratec fan. No engine tuner I know has a bad word to say about it (and I know a lot of engine tuners). Dave said it makes everything else he has tested look stupid. He also mentioned spending a mint of modifying XE heads and the Duratec is so easy in comparison. The engine I built for Guy Evans cost £4,500.00 for the engine, rods, pistons, porting, cams and assembly. He supplied the rest. Dry sump, flywheel , clutch, throttle bodies etc. etc. etc. The problem of pricing a Duratec is where does the engine end and the ancillaries begin? I always quote in the region of 10 K for a complete installation. You can easily spend more. As quoted earlier the difference between horsepower for these engines is basically the cams. So a 250 bhp engine and a 280 bhp engine (using Emerald's rolling road as a comparator) vary only in cams (and injectors). I think an XE is more expensive but then apart from doing a few heads I don't know much about them. I strted looking forwards instead of backwards when I quit racing Moto Guzzis! I think the 2 litre Touring Cars were making around 280 bhp, maybe 290. Never heard of an XE that made 300 bhp. Maybe a bored one would. Dunno. So for comparitevly little money you have the same power as a Touering Car engine from a few years ago. OK, so a 2.3 litre engine is cheating a bit but Touring Car spec. engines are not exactly cheap and not made to last that long. I think the Duratec will prove itself to be a reliable, powerful lump. If something nasty happened to one as the majority of the cost is in the ancillaries I don't think it would be that expensive to fix. On the whole I cannot think of a reason not to own one. But then I am totally biased and blinkered! But not blinkered to the extent that if something better came along than a Duratec that I would not change allegiance and move on to something different. If there was something better available now I would be tuning something other than Duratecs. Does that sound a convincing enough argument? 😬 AMMO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Bees Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 FWIW ISTR that the XE (1998cc) in Paul Ransons Pilbeam came with a dyno sheet from Swindon showing 290+something bhp. That was running race fuel (i.e. high octane petrol, not methanol). Nice one Rob! Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter T Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Thank you for your swift reply. Several things that keep me wondering why people claim this is cheap/ achievable horsepower from stock parts though. I see your point in saying that the standard head is better by size compared to the XE head, but surely you are not saying that you spend no time in modifiying the standard head, and do you retain the fusion welded valves and springs and platforms then for a 280 BHP engine ? I think not, so the ball has started rolling in terms of reality costs then Yes labour might be cheaper due to less time taken to port to the required level, a small saving. Yes you correct in saying that the touring car engines built by Swindon were producing around 280 BHP, but they were only 2 litres in capacity, SPIESS on the other hand churned out engines that made 320 BHP + in 2.3 litres guise and that was on pump fuel . So my basic understanding on this mass produced engine is that it is niether cheap to build, nor produces any more power than a well built BDG of 40 years ago, or am i missing something ??? Anyway i am going to stick with my HEAVY XE unit as i qiute like it, and second hand engines are even cheaper at £300. 😬 Carbon Components from K9 Composites Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dannylt Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Dave, Peak torque on mine was 193lbft just below 5800, but more relevantly, it's over 180lbft from 4500 to over 7000 - as Mick said - this is with 270 cams. I'm not sure I'd like the powerband starting at well over 5000 which is why I'm curious to see the dyno chart from the 280 cam engines. As for overtaking cars on track - power is surely almost irrelevant considering the variables of tyres, skill and circumstances (e.g. on cool down or warm up). :-p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WILL FLY Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 I'd be interested to know what 'bog standard' 2.0 and 2.3 engines are producing and then a sliding scale of cost vs power to see where the sensible priced engines are. For 90% of people a 280 BHP engine is OTT for the road, whereas a 200 or 220 BHP engine with good torque, a sensible rev limit and good reliability and longevity are what people are looking for. I have a 200BHP cheese engine which provides more than enough oomph for what I want even though you have to rev it to get there, that's my only criticism of the K series in this state of tune. If I use a self imposed rev limit of 7000 then I get 188 BHP, which while almost a hundred down on this duratec provides me with plenty of fun. Congratulations to Rob and Tom on the engine and for everyone who has freely given up information so that we can all be older and wiser. I don't have any axe to grind vis-a-vis engine makes, if I could have bought a new car with a VX in 2000 then I probably would have done, but I'm happy with what I've got. Roy. See willfly.net for more info. If you don't spin you ain't trying Happiness is knowing you have just a tad too much power Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edmandsd Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 I'll bring my car down to the dyno curry, hopefully with the Hart fitted and a dyno plot to hand as a comparison. I'm still waiting for the pistons from Wahl in Germany. Steve Greenauld's r'road is the only one of it's type in the country currently, and the way all rolling roads will go in my opinion. I know that Sanspeed's rolling road in Bexleyheath reads 20 bhp more than HTR's dyno at this level and wouldn't be surprised if Dave Walker's is the same, although I can't be sure of course. Are any of these cooking 2.3lt Duratec cars going to be at Curborough next week ? Home of BDR700 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMMO Posted May 5, 2005 Author Share Posted May 5, 2005 Peter T You certainly did miss something. The bit where I said I was totally blinkered and biased! 😬 We do retain the valves which are tuftrided as standard. Of course we throw away the stupid Ford springs and top collars. We replace them with Kent single springs and steel top collars. £150.00. There are bigger valves available from Paul Ivey but looking at the head it would require valve inserts that then make the head an expensive proposition. Ok if you want the ultimate. Valve sizes would be 36 or 37 inlet and 31 exhaust. Same as my old Guzzi racer and old Ducati Superbikes and Supermonos from the mid '90's. We could get good power out of these in the olden days. You compare a cooking, low bhp / litre Duratec with a 30 year old, balls out racing engine. What would happen if we made a Duratec an expendable racing lump like a Nissan? Race it a few laps and throw it away jobbie? We know that 140 bhp / litre + is acheivable. 280 bhp for a 2 litre, 320 for a 2.3? In reality we reduce the bhp / litre and revs to keep the engine tractable and make it last. In the real world people want everything. Power, lightness, reliability, good fuel consumption etc etc. I think that at the moment the Duratec can provide this. We will never agree, but I like to think we have some fun discussing the pros and cons. AMMO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter T Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Certainly steve's rolling road is bizarre in the way it only uses one roller Dave. Are you still going to sell you BD than Dave ? Carbon Components from K9 Composites Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Walker Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 PeterT, You are correct the major saving is in the amount of time required to port and modifiy the head probably not necessary to do anything to get 250 bhp also the head comes with solid followers if your new cams are ground to the same base circle as the OE there is no need for any reshimming this saves a lot of time. The valve guides are recessed below the port line and are of good quality so they can be retained and do not need removing to gain access to work on the ports. The 280 engine that I built had a fair amount of work done on the inlet ports and only a tidy up on the exhaust ports and combustion chambers. The stock valves were retained as they are of good quality and have the benifit of 5.5mm stems . The valve springs ,retainers,cams sprockets were replaced. The bottom end had the crank pulley keyway mod, balance of the crank checked, Arrow rods, omega forged pistons,titan steel lightweight flywheel,pace dry sump system. I don`t want to get into quoting prices as this depends on what bits you fit and the parts supply is in state of flux with different bits becoming available each week and different ways of doing things based on past experience. My biggest problem was trying to get the Pace dry sump System to both fit the engine and plumb it into the car. Altrenatives will shortly be available. Imo this is a very good engine and I can see no reason why it will not prove to be reliable. My only concerne is its slightly heavier then the K but we must remember that we comparing a 1.8 with a 2.3. Rob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dannylt Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Dave, The Road'n'Track TaT road is actually owned by the other Steve. Steve Greenald works in collaboration with Steve P who does the driving. I agree this road is the way forward - I don't know why AMMO thinks having to put loads of weight in the boot to stop wheelspin is such a great thing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Walker Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Putting sand into the boot is certainly kinder on your arse. Sitting on the back rail of a caterham for hours is not nice. Rob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dannylt Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Sorry - I meant vs the TaT road where extra weight is not required. I agree sitting on the back can be scary! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dobuy Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Lets not forget the good old 2.0 Duratec, if you want a budget engine, you can get one from a scrappie, use the standard rods, pistons and get 226bhp fairly easily. Mods needed for this bhp are: ARP big-end bolts, cams, springs, retainers and pocketing of the standard pistons. No need to do the crank mod, unless you want total peace of mind. I believe Cosworth is not doing the crank key mod. That's a lot of horsepower for little money, but then who wants JUST 226bhp Duratec Se7en SV, built in Dubai, pics here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robmar Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 edmands - I would have thought both Brodie and Rob Grigsby will be at the marshalls and club sprints (14th/15th may) althought I think they only put out a mere 250 bhp and 200 ft/lbs 😳 😬 not 280 bhp.... rob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Shurvinton Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Still not convinced about that TaT road. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter T Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Why not bill, surely it reduces the amount of drag that normal two wheel versions induce. 🤔 Carbon Components from K9 Composites Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AMMO Posted May 5, 2005 Author Share Posted May 5, 2005 Just spoke to Dave Walker. We have a date for Dyno / Curry 5. Sunday 5th of June. Hope to make it an fun event like last time. Cost is £25.00 each of which £5.00 goes to NTl. Neil I have a 220 bhp spec. 2 litre in my car. Probably enough to scare myself in. 😬 Danny Sand in the boot and three people in the car is not neccessarily a good thing but it does make me giggle. 😬 Dave It will be good to see how different the figures from Emerald and HTR differ. That will be another bit of the jigsaw puzzle. Hope you can make the 5th of June. Look forward to meeting you. WILL FLY Not a fan of the stock engine as the cams and valve springs are rubbish. However you could fit 260 degree cams and valve springs in a 2 litre and get good results. Around 200 bhp at a guess. You could probably do this without taking the head off. The 2.3 has low compression pistons so I don't think that would be as good. Dunno because I have never tried it. AMMO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Shurvinton Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Drag? Drag is an aerodynamic phenomena. I have yet to see a coherent argument for a single roller being better in any parameter other than cost. That TaT roller is very cheap. Tat also do twin rollers. Why? If I can find some hard facts I can make up my mind. At the moment its all pub talk. For years everyone said that the emerald brixton rollers were spot on. Sadly they were not, but this was only discovered when they were decommissioned. The new ones WERE calibrated, and seem to read 5% less than at Brixton. So now when anyone who is not an accredited engineer says a rolling road is accurate I put the onus of proof on them to show this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dannylt Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Sigh - we've been through this already - and you're not interested in looking at it, or talking to the people first hand. So it's going to be hard to convince you. That the contact patch of the tyre on the roller is much closer to that on the road should be clear just from the increased diameter of the roller, and not needing to use extra weight means no extra tyre distortion - but you don't even accept this argument. From my point of view, the number match the engine dyno, and I very happily remapped my car on them with less drama than I've had on other roads. So, it's not pub talk - it's my real-life experience. danny Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter T Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 And surely a dynoe is only as good as the person who interprets the information and can release power through knowledge ? IMO it seems a very good set up. Carbon Components from K9 Composites Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjp Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 This is certainly not the only single roller dyno in the country. Ricardo have two. All of the manufacturers and consultants have them. They are becoming the industry standard and are insisted upon by the regulotory(?) bodies in Europe and the US for emissions certification for all of the reasons stated above (they more accurately simulate the road). Tyre losses (tyre drag if you like) are as valid as aero losses (but smaller at high speed, they form the bulk of the not v^2 term in the road load curve). I guess for these reasons they will give a different (more accurate?) answer when measuring power but the results will still be effected by how hard you pull the vehicle down and vagories of coast down corrections, so never as good as an engine dyno. Typically 48" single rollers are more expensive than twin 12" rollers (certainly for good ones) and require a big old hole in the ground. Ken P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Shurvinton Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 But do you mean friction or hysteresis? There are 2 different phenomena. For a rolling road where you do a coast down test either of these are corrected out, so the magnitude is of little impact. If you are after an accurate measure of the actual torque you should be looking at hub drive anyway.If you are on a slippery, old, ill maintained set of rollers wheel spin will of course mess everything up. You will have to excuse me being a little cynical about being chosen for emissions testing being a measure of goodness. Its like saying the EU mandates catalytic converters, so they must be the best way to reduce emissions. Thought: most american nuckle draggers take their hopped up cars to dynojet dynos to get their willy waving print outs. These are all single roller. They are pure inertial units and about as accurate as a wet finger. BUT they are cheap, so lots of speed shops buy them. The hot rodders are happy, as they give inflated Wheel HP figures. But if everyone uses them, then they are the defacto standard for willy waving wars between racers. Doesn't mean they are good. Possibly the TaT roller IS very good. If so its a bargain at around 20K. I will find our more. I am happy to be proven very wrong in my concerns. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Woo Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 In my experience nothing is 100% accurate 100% of the time and tbh it doesn't matter. Run a car on the same rollers on different days with different atmospheric conditions and see if the results are identical... The only real way to compare two cars is to use the same rollers on the same day to eliminate as many variables as possible. Out of interest if you were buying a s/h car with the idea to upgrade to a duratech which version would be best/easiest? Tim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonbell Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Well I`m running a 2.0litre with the following mods: Keyed Crank / Pulley ARP big end bolts Vandervell main shells Pocketed pistons std cams std head ARP main stud kit ARP front pulley bolt That should give me 185bhp...some say 190bhp...we`ll see What`s interesting is that Webcon are selling an alpha kit which doesn`t appear to change anyting else and they are claiming 204bhp????? SBD were also quoting higher bhp than 185/190 for a similar spec. My engine has been prepared so that I can now replace the cams and have a little head work done to take me to 220/230bhp.........I think that is as much as I`ll ever need. As for cost........I haven`t added it up and like everyone says it depedns what you include......just engine or all the ancilliaries. Simon Bell - Caterham 7 Duratec R I`ve seen the future.....and it`s powered by duratec Check out the website here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Walker Posted May 5, 2005 Share Posted May 5, 2005 Mr Woo an SV chassis would be the easyiest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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