The Stickman

So shoot down the dreams of a young kid rather than help him learn on his own. Fact is today one can find out and learn darn near anything on the net. To make a manifold all you need are some welding skills. What better way to learn? Again a cheap Ebay turbo. Probably last only 35K miles. But guess what most motorheads don't keep their rides that long so who cares. A 350 will easily take 5-7psi without going boom. So again what's the harm? What big expertise is needed? What is so costly that he couldn't do it?

The Stickman

Step one:Build a header. And a simple log type would be tons simpler, and yet work fine.


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http://sdsefi.com/techheader.htm

5998DownUnder

Perhaps this man:
Specialises in Olds engines. Very handy in your state. Could be some info there.


Tony Lombardi at ROSS RACING ENGINES
Niles Ohio.
(Is a member here).


Has a Supercharged 371 on the website.


As for under bonnet, not sure what Tony has but other companies have them, easily Googled though.


Above all have fun on your quest.

olds 307 and 403

A turbo on #8 headed 350's are a perfect fit. He can do it, take time and learn. Stickman, not all of our wives are great welders and fabricators. My welder is out of gas and a broken speed **** makes my welds ***** not that they were great before.

66ninetyeightls

OMG there is a hell of a lot more to a forced induction engine than how many PSI you can force down its intake.

How about:

• Maintaning proper air fuel ratio under different boost conditions and RPM ranges
• Ignition timing. How do you think a stock distributor is going to react when it sees a positive pressure in the intake?
• Do you go intercooler or water injection
• etc etc etc

Only a person who has never built a turbo system could think you could learn how to do it properly on the internet.

The Stickman

Uh people and companies have been running turbos for almost as long as there have been cars. How did they do it? Oldsmobile had it's own turbo engine. Hell there was a twin turbo monster in Can-Am. All before electronic FI and electronic timing. Who said you need to use a stock distributor? You can run either none of the above, or an intercooler, or water/meth inj, or both. Where is the problem? There are tons of DIY water/meth inj tuitorials. Pretty simple to make. As for intercoolers I bought my monster with all the intercooler tubing I need at a junk yard for $50. All out of a Fed Ex truck. SO where is all this massive budget coming from that everyone talks about? Again what is so hard? It's not that expensive like many posters have said. And no one has answered the question of what special expertise you need. One big smoke screen.

The Stickman

Thanx for the back up. BTW the wife and I put a full dual exhaust on a Buick hearse with an Olds 350 over the weekend. Sounds great. On my wife's welder the liner is taking a crap so it's making welding a bit tougher. Doesn't want to feed wire like it should.

70cutty

Stickman, why don't you build one and start your own thread documenting steps and explaining how to do it and what's needed.
I wouldn't mind learning.

coppercutlass

In all honesty I would like to see someone do it but years ago in hotrod magazine there was a foxbody stang with a stock shortblock minus the cam and it had the gt40 heads. The guy built his set up using tractor turbos and made his own piping and bought cheap ebay manifolds and bov etc etc. The set up cost 2k I belive. I will try to look for the article and post the link up. I can be done guys its not rocket science there is tuning involved but if you are willing to put the effort in it can turnnout half decent. Lots of guys have done it on sbc's and ford with relatively stone stock shortblocks. The only diffrence with the olds is your manifold situation . Take that with a grain of salt. I have had subscriptions to car craft and hotrod and my guys have done it with no so expensive and exotic parts. Look it up and I'm sure you will find something along the lines of a junk turbo build.

The Stickman

That was my plan a few years ago, but medical problems and bills have gotten in the way. With my migraines I can easily be down for 3 months at a time. Anyone that knows me knows I used to go to the GM Nats in Carlisle. That ended years ago too. Last one I was at I made Friday, and was out for the rest of the weekend. That is also the reason my wagon is being parted out and the shell will go for scrap. Can't fix it like I want and need the cash.

70cutty

Sorry to hear that, I honestly wouldn't mind doing a 67 turbo cutlass as my next project.

captjim

This sounds very reasonable, it really does. 7-8 lbs of boost on a 350 should add 75 HP and 100 ft/lbs of torque on a DD using pump gas, all fairly straight-forward for less than a grand. To me, there is no doubt that a stock engine can handle that.

So, here is my question; if all that truly is the case, why aren't there turbo charged Oldsmobiles running all over the place? That is a VERY good bang-for-the-buck and fairly easily done, as you state.

I humbly submit that you guys (who, to be fair, have never actually done it) are underestimating the work, complexity, and cost involved. Just my humble opinion.

From the outside looking in, the most cost-effective way to add forced induction is probably to buy a used SBC Procharger and fab up the bracket and pulley. Way less work that a turbo, though you still have the whole blow-through or EFI issues. Roots style superchargers do not have that problem and add stupid amounts of off-idle torque, but are expensive and pose hood clearance issues. Again, IMHO.

The Stickman

Here is a cost of parts I bought for the build which is most of it.
Turbo $200
Greedy External wastegate $100
Greedy BOV $50
Large Intercooler w/tubes $50
1/2 inch exhaust flanges $50 or $75 I forget
Spectre air plenum Lists $100 although I don't remember it being that

You could run a stock cam
you could do a blow though carb or a pressurized one.
Or you could go EFI. For that I bought these parts


MegaSquirt computer $500
4 barrel TB $150
8 used Injectors $150 if that.


The TB I have can either be run dry or as a TBI. So depends on if you want to do port injection and get your manifold modified. You would need a few more sensors. The TB already has throttle position and IAC. Even with the FI parts it is far cry from thousands of dollars.

captjim

That is all great, some good deals in there. However, at this point all it is is a bunch of parts and not a good running engine. I would like to see you (or someone else) do it and prove that it works and is reliable. Until then, I remain skeptical.

STLOLDS

I don't know if anyone has seen this video, it's a great example of a budget turbo build.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cI9abUVy0Uc


The specs are in the video comments, he made 823HP on accident! They had to detune the engine to keep it in a safe operating range. Keep your boost in check and you'll be fine on a stock bottom end, you don't necessarily need a intercooler either, this guy didn't run one. Just food for thought.