simmomi

My stock '87 951 went into the shop to have the cracked exhaust manifold replaced with a B&B stainless header. In the process of removing the manifold, they found that one of the bolts on the 2nd pipe from the front was broken off in the head. Per the technician, there isn't enough room for him to be able to properly get the bolt out without taking the head off. I'm trusting his word on this as he is a very honest and knowledgeable technician.

So, now we are in the process of removing the head so that he can get the bolt out, and while we're at it, the head will be sent off to be checked. This may be a blessing in disguise as I recently checked my oil consumption and found that I used around 1 1/4 quarts of oil in about 600 miles. The car does infrequently blow some blue smoke. We are suspecting the turbo to be the major cause of this, but there could be some issues in the engine as well - we will see on the latter.

My question is this: since I use the car as a daily driver, and want to maintain the reliability of the engine and not put a lot of additional stress on it, what modifications could I make to the engine and/or turbo that might help make the car a little quicker off the line? I don't like the long turbo lag the car has (it is unchipped), but the top end performance is plenty fast for me.

I don't really want to dive into any extreme upgrades. But, I would like to take advantage of the situation to make any "subtle" changes that might help the low end speed.

Thanks in advance...

nwehtje944

hum, I can't help you with the performance part. but I do want to offer my support with your project. one of my exhaust bolts also broke. Mine was the first bolt on the fourth part of the exhaust manifold. And yes your technician is correct, there is basicly no way to remove the broken bolt without taking the head off. I had to do the same thing.

It has taken a month, is far, and I still don't have it back running. but three weeks of that has been waiting for the machine shop to get done rebuilding my head.

I went ahead and replaced the water pump, seals, gaskets, timming belt, basicly anything that needed to be replaced.

you live in atlanta? we'll have to get together sometime and compare notes over a few <img src="graemlins/drink.gif" border="0" alt="[cherrsagai]" /> . I'm only a hour and a half away.

best of luck

simmomi

Three weeks waiting on the machine shop??? That won't fly... I hope that's not the time table I'll be dealing with.

The part that really stinks is that it was less than 2 months ago that I had the timing belt, water pump, thermo, seals, etc, etc. replaced.

I must have really pissed in someone's cherrios.

<img src="graemlins/cussing.gif" border="0" alt="[grrrrrrr]" />

billybones

Sent off? to check what? any checks should be done by the guy pulling your head off? You can look at the seals if they are ok and parallelism. done with a straight edge.. Valve seats and guides are another thing.. sounds like you are about to get a head rebuild to me.. you your self said you think the turbo is most likley the cause of the occasional puff..