carl h

i think its the fact that the aem has so many more pretty buttons than the pfc that a person who is not familiar with it can do more damage, granted both can cause equal destruction....... i have heard from a few friends who run a aem ems that they dont like the fact that the ems uses gm sensors, while cheap they seem to fork out at the most inopertune times, mebey its just them or mebey its a the dodgy gm sensors. again as i said before while i would love to have a aem ems, i simply could not justify the price when the pfc can do what i need it to for a fraction of the cost.

i wholey agree on the rev bit, redline was set to 8.5k but i tried to shift before that (usualy shifted round 7.5-7.8). im looking into doing some head work and possibly a rb24 bottom end but the cost of the build may be out of my budget as im a full time student and work on the side to pay for my misc bits. i did know about the r32 short snout problem and was looking for a r33 bottom end, if i were to go with the 2.4 i would just get tomei pistons and not even worry about it. the oiling system is going to be upgraded as well, an oil cooler should help prolong not only oil life but bearing life as well by keeping viscosity up and some kind of highflow oil pump (n1 looks to be the pump of choice right now, nismo is *affordable* but still overkill and expensive) to suit. there really wasnt any reason to rev the motor out to 8.5, but sometimes you miss a gear or just are trying to wind it out, upon visual inspection of the bearings when i tore the engine down almost all of them were nearly mint and frosty looking with very little wear on them a few did have some shine to them but nothing out of the ordinary, not too bad for a motor that was constantly thrashed end on end for over 4 months. i like the displacement of the rb20 simply because it sips gas on cruise and i dont really need to push it hard unless i want to make power, altho greater average power certianly is much nicer than peak power (which was at 7k or so, so revving past only kept peak); but some how i have a soft spot in my heart for the little 2.0. i suspect that the reason the car was laggy on boost and torqueless off boost (yeah yeah, its a 2l....) was also due to poor compression (140psi across) coupled with a bad tune, right now im in a bit of a toss up in what to do rb20 is fairly easy with just a good set of pistons or a rb24 with a bit more cash and time........

im going to say that i would suppose it really depends on what kind of goals you have for the car. for most ppl the pfc will cover almost any thing that they could throw at it, it does its job and does it well. while the aem ems is superior in almost every way (ive seen wonders done with it, local civic hatch makes nearly 600fwhp using a aem unit) it really is overkill for what most ppl need. the one feature that might make me buy the aem over the pfc is the knock and autotune ability, 2 options the pfc doesnt have, however i simply could not justify the nearly 2k$ usd price tag the unit comes with. for me it was simply a better idea to go with a pfc and hand commander for my setup as it works and will cover the power level i want. as the local shop put it (they are a apexi power excel dealer and a aem dealer) the pfc is best for most applications, and the aem even better, but the aem gives you the ablility to f**k something up a whole lot quicker than the pfc......... i guess it really comes down to how much you want to spend and your overall goals, 400whp on my rb20 came pretty easily and i think that the pfc will have no problems keeping up with it.

lol latest news is i blew a hole in cyl 5's piston and am currently deciding on what pistons to go with, once its rebuilt and back together a good breakin and trip to the tuner should provide interesting results.

buddy of mine had that same turbo mounted to the stock exhaust manifold on his rb20 which was in a s14 as well, like stated above all that needs to be done is clocking the compressor housing and you will be mint. on my personal car ive got an rb20 with the hks cast manifold along with the r32 xmember for mounting and even on a lhd car i have had no problems with clearances........you should be good assuming the engine mounts are good.

i would sugest cleaning the maf and also replacing the engine coolant temp sensor, the ect sensor has a nasty habit of going bad slowly and causing odd problems..... sensor is fairly cheap (14$usd) so its worth a go.

the only diffrence that can be seen on the wiring loom side is that on the rb20 there is no vtc control and injector triggers for cyls 5 and 6 are swapped. i just got a rb25 pfc for use on my rb20 and i plan on swapping pins for clys 5 and 6 and it should be mint.

sydneykid, if i were to run a uprated pump on my little rb20 (such as a n1, nismo, trust, ect) would i have the same problem with too much oil going to the head? when my motor was running i noticed it would throw some oil into the catch can but i suspected it to be the rings/pistons failing.........but perhaps it was also some of the oil vapours from revving so high (8k redline). if so would putting a restictor in the head not cause oil starvation to they hydro lifters?

i made 288rwkw's on my rb20 before my poor tune melted a piston..... stock bottom end to boot, better tune should have made more power reliably.

well ive finaly gotten my hands on some goodies to tune with and ive got the motor on the stand torn down ready to be rebuilt, however ive got some questions about setting the pfc up. first off according to what i can make out in the apexi manual i need to know the injector lag time setting for the old injectors as well as the new injectors to compensate for the upgrade, so ive got a set of greddy/denso 720cc squirters but no idea what lagtime is for them. anyone have an idea?

while thats nice and all where can one source one, im in the usa not au so any help in the right direction is appreciated.

i know jun makes a crank collar to fix the slippy oil pump problem for the short snout cranks but where can i get one? also iirc there was some one on SDU which sold a 'copy' collar for a reasonable price, and since im almost postive that my rb20 was affected by this drive issue i would like to correct it while it is out of the car..... thanks.

i'd rather not damage the gear as finding little bits like that here in the US its not that easy......

since my little rb20 has seemed to melted a hole in one of the pistons i tore it down to have the damage inspected and for machine work. however i cannot seem to remove the timing cog off of the crank shaft snout. how do i get it off and is there a trick to it? little bastard is wedged on there right nicely.

i hear the hks gt2530 is mint on the rb20, granted you have the proper exhaust housing.

excelent! however still looking for pn's for wiseco or cp pistons, found the arias ones on the above links.

old girl blew up last weekend and we suspect ringland damage, thus a new set of pistons is in order. who has had rb20det pistons made up for their cars and what suppliers? if you have an order number to go with the pistons please let me know about it as i can use that since the manufacturer would be able to do up a set against a previous order. interested in wiseco or arias or perhaps even cp pistons......

i would use the det block simply because its setup for boost to begin with. depending on whats fubard i would mix and match to get a reliable engine......

statement retracted.

ditch the jun headstuds and rod bolts and fit some arp bits. http://www.paceparts.com/index.asp?PageAct...S&Category=7740 sells the head studs at a very reasonable price but you will proly have to look around for the arp rod bolts (tomei use arp bolts).

sooooo whats the definative answer.......?

question at hand is what are the standard rb cranks made out of? cast? forged? chizzled out by some japanese sweatshop worker forced to gind them with nothing but bits of rocks? trying to figure this out as there is a current war building over this topic on one of the stateside rb related forums.....

the problem is that the rb20's head flows like poo. compare it to sucking thru a coffee stirrer and then sucking thru a large bore straw, the large bore straw is significantly less restrictive. increacing displacement without modifying the head is almost a back step as now the motor has the ability to suck in more air but the air to be had isnt there due to the restrictive head. oh and fwiw a rb25 crank and rods yeild 2.3, a 2.2 can be had by an overbore.

sounds like it might blow you off the road when boost hits .

willdo. however the old girl let go tonight, busted ring lands are suspect as car still runs smooth (well as smooth as it can go on dead cylinders) and doesnt make any horrible noises. i'll be recieving the pfc before i get the car back together so it might be a while, but from what research ive done it should work no worries, but we will see. however im gonna be helping a friend do a rb20 swap into his s14 soon and he's got my old 550's so while a chip will do fine on it we'll see if the pfc does indeed work on the rb20.