Steve Phipps

I have an US 83' 928 that is in great shape. Looking to swap in a 83' Euro motor.

1. Can I keep the US fuel injection and swap it to the 83' Euro? Looking to get the increased HP but keep the the fuel injection. If possible what would be needed and how much $?

2. If not possible, would the complete engine swap work?

Thanks in advance,

Steve

karl ruiter

I think the US injection would bolt on, but I am not sure how well it would work. Seems like you would loose something of the Euro power just due to the smaller size of the L ject intake. Also, I am not sure how well the S cams would work L jet. There in an very old article from VW-Porsche in which Greg Brown upgraded a US4.7 with big valves, MSDS headers, and (I think) S cams. If that did have S cams and L jet, perhaps they are compatible. Complete engine swap would be possible and pretty easy.

Steve Phipps

Karl, Thanks! I'll see if I can find the article on line.

Anyone out there do this kind of swap before? I've gone through engine swap posts and didn't see this exact swap.

Steve Phipps

Would I be better off to install a 84 - 86 Euro motor with the LH ?

danglerb

Early Euro is CIS a mechanical type of fuel injector, the US 83 is Ljet electronic, and the fittings for the injectors in the intake are different. Intake tubes etc are smaller on the US car, but the CIS intake won't have the sensors etc. to make the Ljet work.

If you put in a whole motor with intake I suspect you could get it to function as CIS, but could be a lot of interesting wiring.

If you use a newer Euro S with LH injection some sort of hybrid seems possible using the US Ljet brain and injectors in the Euro intake, but could be weird to get tuned etc.

Best way IMHO is to use the newer Euro S LH with the brains out of a US LH using some SharkTuned chips.

What sort of smog rules do you have?

What are you looking to accomplish?

What sort of budget?

karl ruiter

Yes, if you change over the CIS motor to Ljet you would want the change everything above the cylinder heads . There is almost no wiring involved with the CIS, and what there is: aux air valve, warm up injector, etc. is pretty much the same as the Ljet. You might want to look in the WSM to see if there is much of a difference in the setup of the 14pin connector between the engine and the chassis, but I think there is not. The main concern I would have would be the fuel lines and pump setup which is slightly different between Ljet and CIS, I think. I don't know if the lines that feed over to the motor are different, but I suspect they are. On the CIS you have a damper in the fuel system that you don't have on the Ljet.
I think the 84-86 swap might be a good choice but I would worry about a couple of things: I think parts are expensive and rare in the US (the motors too), and you are going to have more electronics to transplant.
If you are real comfortable with the electronics side of it then the LH would be a great choice. But then again you can get adaptors that screw into the CIS injector ports which allow electronic injectors to be installed, which allows you to build and install the aftermarket injection system of your choice onto the CIS manifolds.
Also, there is always the possiblity of dropping an S4 motor in there. Still takes some comfort on the electronics side, though. But there is more room to grow. The 16v motors kinda top out at 300rwhp, while on the 32V motors that is just the starting point.
If you really want a copy of the VW-porsche article I can probably eventually dig up my copy. But you might also just discuss with Greg Brown. Mike (bdangler) has his contact info, I think.
Another choice might be to retrace Greg's steps from the article. Have the heads reworked for bigger valves, put on the MSDS, and get some S cams. I think his starting point was exactly the car you have and he ended up with about 300rwhp. And it would leave your car much more origonal.

shmark

Find an early euro engine, junk the CIS and install a modern EFI system, bolt it in and go. Nah I have not thought about this at all.

GlenL

No. This would be even more work and money. A few more HP.

The CIS engine swap would be relatively easy to do. Get the engine and spark box and then it's a few wires to power it and drive the fuel pump. A study of the wiring diagrams will let you figure out which to connect.

John Speake

You can use the 85/86 LH and EZ-F ECUs with a Euro 16v, they are pretty easy to get hold of.

Just need to swap the EPROMS for the correct ones.

Steve Phipps

Mike,

I'm in WA State, so no smog rules because the car is 25 years old. Was planning on pulling the air pump, cats, and putting in a 2.5" pipe as I've heard 3" is too big and you can possibly lose power.

I just wanted to get euro HP into my nice US 928. No plans on racing etc. Like most, I'd like to spend as little as possible, but want to do the job right so that it will last. I already have the complete 83 euro 928, just wasn't sure I had bought the correct year, because of the CIS vs Ljet difference.

I know Tom and Adam and watched their inplant of a CIS euro motor into a 79 CIS US 928 body and that seemed almost plug and play, yet they still had a few problems they incountered and figured out, because of parts that were broken or didn't work. They ended up with a few parts from the US motor on the Euro motor.

Steve Phipps

Karl,

I'm not real comfortable with the electronics side, in fact I'd have to get someone that was.

I'm leaning toward your and Mark's suggestion of:
"can get adaptors that screw into the CIS injector ports which allow electronic injectors to be installed, which allows you to build and install the aftermarket injection system of your choice onto the CIS manifolds."
Where would I get the adaptors ? Any idea on the cost of adaptors and EFI system? How does this compare to Glen's ideas of just swaping the engine and spark box?

Steve Phipps

John,

what would be the pros and cons with your idea compared to the others?

Steve Phipps

Mark,

I see you have a 83 as well. My car is metallic gray. Looks very much like yours or Glen's 1980, if I'm seeing the color correctly.

You say EFI like many others, but looks like I would also need adaptors for the CIS injector ports?

Steve Phipps

Guys, Thanks for all the info and ideas. I really appreciate it!

Looks like I have a number of options. Trying to figure out which way to go, so sorry for all the additonal questions. I'm not an expert by any means on 928's, but I've had mine for almost 25 years and love it. Guess that's why I didn't choose to sell it and get an S4, even though there are more power options that way.

Tom. M

Hey Steve,

I think Chuck Briggs was running his euro motor with the stock 83 L jet upper bits. I'm heading over to Ken O's today and will ask him how the car ran and inquire on some details. (Ken now owns Chuck's car).

We also have Sean's 83 US 928 in the shop now (has a 84 Euro motor transplant). You are welcome to stop out and check out the details on that one too. Aside from the clutch issue's he is having, when he had the engine put in, he got someone to wire in the brains into the existing 83 fuse panel. There are still issues with the way they did that (we will be troubleshooting that in the near future).