1.4 16v Hillclimber Project

[Sandy 189]

I haven't been talking about it, because it's been highly experimental and i'm having to be quite secretive about the spec, because of competition. But for the last 6 months or so I've been building a 1.4 16v TU engine for a local hillclimb 205. It had to be 16v to maximise the power potential for the class (Modifed Production). It was very difficult, given all the possibilities, to decide on the exact specification I should use. I became aware of a few other 1.4 16v's that have been built, using the obvious 77mm stroke and custom pistons, in 106 XSi blocks. Because of the modified production rules, I had to start with a 205 1.4 block, which would have meant either modifying the alloy block to accept the idler and sticking with 77x75mm bore/stroke or simply drilling the Iron 205 TU block for the idler and have a wide choice of bores and strokes. I decided after much deliberation and analysis to use the Iron 205 block and some perfect Accralite 1.6 pistons (unused pre-owned) came up for sale, which helped me to decide. The pistons were perfectly sized for a short stroke 1370cc and had exactly the crown shape I wanted.

The rods were another matter! To use a short stroke crank in the 1360 block means long rods and decking the block. I toyed with the idea of custom rods, but decided "off the shelf" rods would be a better choice in case one needed replacement later at short notice; you can miss alot of events waiting for parts. Catcams apparently produced kit car rods which on the face of it seemed a perfect choice. The length and bearing sizes were suitable for my needs. Sadly after ordering them, it turned out they weren't "on the shelf" at all and the build was delayed for 3 months while I waited for them, I couldn't do hardly any other work on the build until I had the rods to confirm clearances and dimensions! This took the build out of my lazy winter period and into the very busy spring preparation period, which has been less than ideal. When they did arrive, the small end bearing size was different to what I expected (interference fit) and I had to get them re-bored to fit the standard sized Accralite pins.

Moving on... the block preparation ended up being much more intensive than i'd expected, but the end result was satisfyingly perfect for my needs!

Mark Shillaber prepared the head for me. The work that's been done on the head is pretty minimal really and I elected to retain the standard valve sizes to get the power delivery and flexibility I wanted. The cams are a mix of Catcam profiles, chosen to provide a broad spread of power. The solid lifters I used were shim less, the clearances are achieved by machining the stem to the right height, you only get one chance to get it right! Colin and I developed a good routine for it though and thankfully there was no wastage! The springs are single Catcam items, also using Catcam retainers.

I used genuine Peugeot consumables throughout and this time they were all correct. I have had bearings in the past packed in the wrong boxes though, so ALWAYS check them, and check the installed clearance with plastigauge to be double sure! The OE 1.6 multi layered steel head gasket turned out to be a perfect fit for the oversized pistons, a rare stroke of luck!

The induction was chosen before I started making my own 16v manifold design and based around some 40mm Jenvey SF bodies that my customer had acquired already. It uses a Jenvey SF inlet manifold that I have ported to match Mark's head and to get the tract shape I wanted. the Jenvey Manifold is a little undersize as it comes, but this is useful if you're wanting a certain profile. I've employed two sets of SF spacers to carry two sets of 150cc injectors. Twin injectors can provide alot more resolution for an easy, clean map and arguably improve mixing at high gas speeds too. The air filter is a bike sized Pipercross one, which makes a neater fit on the TU than the usual DCOE sized ones.

The exhaust manifold is a Raceland and given that this is one of the cheapest on the market, who can argue with the value? I can't understand how they do it for the price. The pipe shapes aren't perfect, but they're damn close and the geometry of the pipes turned out to be close to what I wanted! The Exhaust system was fabricated by Colin, it's a straight pipe back form the manifold (requiring a "bridge" in the subframe and strengthening), to a single re-packable silencer; a real challenge for our Col.

Management came courtesy of a cheap DTA E48 from Bic (Thanks!!), I made the custom loom for it and mapped it.

The flywheel is a lightened and balanced (with the other rotating components) 1.4 injection one, with a standard 180mm cover, using revised preload and 180mm cerametallic paddle plate. It's very light and easy to modulate and is handling the torque fine.

The gearbox is a BE4R hybrid, which I won't go into in much detail, but with Colin's rose jointed linkages it's pretty bloody nice to use for a Peugeot Box! Mixing and matching BE ratios gives you a good gearset and bullet proof durability, for about £600 less than an MA Quaife box, and if it does break, it'll cost little to replace the internals. The BE onto TU is simpler in a 205 than a 106.

 

I got the car running a couple weeks ago and road mapped it for a brief running in period (unusually for its class, it's road legal). The owner was sent off to put some miles on it before the final rolling road session. He entered it into a small local hillclimb this last Sunday, just to get a feel for it. With a 7000rpm limit and a bag of nerves, he wasn't going to do anything blinding, but it looked and sounded good, I was encouraged!

 

I finally put it in the rollers to finish the map today. I can't tell you how nervous I get before this, it's not something I can get used to at all! We stripped the car of the bumper and bonnet to improve cooling and started mapping. On the first run to 7000 it was making 137bhp at the wheels (about 160bhp typically) and as we tried more ignition, it just seemed to keep getting better, it made more than that at 7000rpm in the end! It made more than the peak power I'd hoped for by 8500rpm, but wasn't falling away, given that that is enough we decided not to run it to 9000rpm, just in case. After all, engine wear rapidly increases for every extra 500rpm and it was already doing what I wanted, and a bit more! I can't divulge the final figure publicly, because the owner would prefer it that way, but peak torque was roughly 125lbft, and it makes more than 80% peak torque from 4500-8500rpm. I hoped it would be this good, but they reality is a little hard take take in! here come the tearful Gwyneth Paltrow moment......

 

I have a huge debt of gratitude to Colin Satchell, Mark Shillaber and my wife obviously!

 

I must also thank suppliers QEP, Pete Willis, Bill @ Hawkins Peugeot, Mill Auto and also those who've provided help and support, Neil Attwood, Nick Benton, Sam Potts, Rich Edwins and the rest!

 

i'll shut up now, here are the pics:

 

 

[DrSarty 90 1 Cars]

What a great read and it has to be said Sandy, you build a bloody good engine!

 

Rich

Edited June 5, 2007 by DrSarty

[Baz 421]

Another excellent build, obviously producing the minerals! Looks great too, not that we'd expect any less from your great work Sandy!

[Mandic 0]

Nice work and great read! Good job, hope it will do just as good on track.

 

Cheers

 

Ziga

[Arahan 4]

Excellent! Always love reading things like this!

 

As an estimate, how much was spent?

[GazRallye 0]

Fantastic! Wish i had the time/patience/ability to do something like this, top job.

[Sam 4]

Another quality Sandy build. That engine bay looks better than new!

 

Very nice looking inlet too.

 

Can't wait to build mine (with your help) now.

[Sandy 189]

Thanks all, i'm pretty chuft with it!

 

The total cost including gearbox was a shade under £7000

[Boris 0]

Sandy ,man .... very good project

Every post of you is in compliment of all cars (pug's)

more pics

[SPGTi 2]

How does this compare with Bowyer's 1.4 16vs ? Would be nice to see some competition for his engines in the 1400 rally cars.

 

Steve

[Butler 0]

A work of art!

[RossD 43]

Fantastic project, I've seen these pictures previously on your webspace and were wondering what they were from! Is this the TU5 head or the 1.4 16V head from this oddball ET3 engine used in the last 206's / 307's? The output is something else... I'm guessing around 170bhp peak?

This has made me even more motivated to get on with my engine build now, still waiting for QEP to machine my block though!! (Hint hint Matt! )

Any pics of the exhaust manifold? The raceland manifold is the one I'm going to butcher to fit my 205.

 

What's it like to drive, say compared to a TB'd TU5 8v?!?!

Edited June 6, 2007 by RossD

[Anthony 1,000]

Good read as always Sandy, and sounds like another cracker of an engine there

[RossD 43]

Also, out of interest, what radiator are you using? I imagine that this engine will kick out a fair bit more heat than a standard TU or XU engine?

[Sandy 189]

Thanks again, all the +ve feedback is great!

 

The Rad is a Nissens 205GTi alloy one. It copes fine out on the road and cooled well after each run on the rollers, no need to be bigger, but that's not a great suprise to me, we've used 1.1 rads on the 2.0 and 2.2 XU hillclimbers previously without any problems. There's no oil cooler fitted and it took a while to climb over 105C and was back to 95C after a short break, runs at about 90-100C out on the road, no need for a cooler.

 

How does this compare with Bowyer's 1.4 16vs ? Would be nice to see some competition for his engines in the 1400 rally cars.

I've no idea who Bowyers are, or what they're doing tbh, i'm not really interested in building engines full time, just the occasional ones that interest me. the other stuff I do is more profitable/predictable and less stressful!

 

Fantastic project, I've seen these pictures previously on your webspace and were wondering what they were from! Is this the TU5 head or the 1.4 16V head from this oddball ET3 engine used in the last 206's / 307's?

It's a TU5J4 head with the standard 28.75mm inlet valves, using 40mm bodies too, it would probably make a little more peak with bigger valves and bodies, but it's already better than I'd projected and I wanted the reliability that comes from keeping the piston speeds lowish! I bought and stripped an ET3 as part of the research, but the ET isn't much use tbh, the cams are a bizarre modular design, the valves are slightly smaller than TU5J4's and the valve actuation is by feeble pressed steel rockers, a la Clio 2 litre. The ports look workable, but it's far easier to get a TU5J4 or JP4 head onto it. I couldn't use the ET3 block, because it wasn't OE in the 205.

The output is something else... I'm guessing around 170bhp peak?

Brucey says: "Higher!"

 

This has made me even more motivated to get on with my engine build now, still waiting for QEP to machine my block though!! (Hint hint Matt! )

Any pics of the exhaust manifold? The raceland manifold is the one I'm going to butcher to fit my 205.

 

What's it like to drive, say compared to a TB'd TU5 8v?!?!

Good luck with that Ross and keep me posted

Don't have any other pics of the raceland, but i'll try and get a better one.

To drive it's amazingly flexible, it idles happily at 1000rpm with 14.7:1 AFR (haven't checked gases though ) and pulls clean from about 1500-2000rpm full throttle, part throttle doesn't have any hiccups and it feels properly strong from about 5000rpm. It's difficult to compare to a TB'd TU5 8v, it's a totally different delivery to the ones i've built so far, it doesn't have the "punch" when you hit the next gear of the bigger capacity 8v, but it revs out much harder obviously.

Edited June 6, 2007 by sandy309

[Rippthrough 98]

And you didn't build me one at the same time.

 

Well that's just selfish.

[RossD 43]

Brucey says: "Higher!"

 

180bhp

Good luck with that Ross and keep me posted

Don't have any other pics of the raceland, but i'll try and get a better one.

 

Of course, I'll start a thread when I eventually start the build. Engine build should be very soon, I have all the parts needed, just waiting for QEP now!

 

In fact, I was day-dreaming the other day of building a 1.4 16v after the 1.6!

[Sandy 189]

Sorry Ripp I forgot :)

[Rippthrough 98]

Sorry Ripp I forgot

 

 

Shocking, and here's me just trying to break 3 figures from one...

[Jrod 7]

Wow that's impressive.

 

Wish I had 7k to spare for an engine! Still, makes me glad your doing mine with the great work you do.

[calvinhorse 870]

absolutly stunning!

 

whats your website sandy?

[Sandy 189]

I haven't got one as such, I know it's a bit of a cliché round here, but I really am too busy to contemplate marketing.

 

But Sam hosts my pics for me, my pages of various dubious pictures are here:

http://noboost.com/temp/sandy/ (some of the pics aren't mine btw)

http://www.dcoe.net/gallery/

[Sandy 189]

Dunkeswell yesterday:

The owner managed a 63.73 in practice on the new layout, which would have been a class win if he'd repeated it in the timed runs (which he didn't sadly), not bad for the first event in anger They haven't got to grips with the car yet, it's a huge leap forward from the near standard XS on Toyo T1-S's they were using last year; but when they did have it hooked up, it was rapid.

The Beacham's 205 (with the 233bhp 2 litre Colin built recently) took a class win afaik.

Edited June 11, 2007 by sandy309

[drmo 5]

speachless...emm...can I marry you?

[Sandy 189]

speachless...emm...can I marry you?

LoL, are you the one that's been sending me emails?