Ok, I was cruising along the interstate last Saturday, when I suddenly felt a decrease in power. Immediately, smoke started coming out of the back of the car and even into the cabin. I recognized the smell as burning oil. So, I immediately exited and popped the hood. Sure enough, oil was pouring out of the valve cover breather hose. My first thought was a broken ring. After I towed it back home, I took out the spark plugs and the #1 plug was drenched in oil, supporting the broken ring theory. This leaves me confused, as mine only has 130k, and I really took care of it. Do 16Vs have a history of this type of problem? I can't recall ever reading about one case. The next day, I was at the LeMans race in Mid-Ohio and was talking to a business associate from Germany who mentioned that his 190E (8V I think) did the same thing with under 100k miles on it. So...I'm going to pull the engine tomorrow and open 'er up. I'm going to go through the entire engine and beef it up for a turbo.
I've got a few questions:
1. My main question concerns pistons...Where can I acquire turbo pistons? Does anyone make them, or do I have to go with custom JE's? I'd like to lower the compression ratio to about 9.0:1 or so.
2. Where can I find the dimensions I need to get custom ones like compression height, deck height, diameter, etc? Does anyone have these?
4. What about cams? I've heard that stock cams are the best for most turbo applications because turbo cams just increase efficiency. Does anyone have the specs for the stock cams (lift, duration)?
3. Is there anything special I should know about building this engine? I'm aiming for 300HP, which shouldn't be too awful hard to obtain.
Any hints and tips would be greatly appreciated. Oh, and I accept cash, checks, and all major credit cards...
Later,