Individual Throttle Bodies - Castrol Syntec - Super Street Magazine

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I'm glad people are starting to talk about our Honda build; it means we're doing something right. A fellow enthusiast recently shared with me an old saying by a gentleman called Bertrand Russell; he said, "The trouble with this world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt." I saw the videos online: swapping 2.0 Nissan engines isn't advanced science, but designing parts that harness amazing power from internal combustion is. Opening a shipment containing sleeves and saying "oh snap!"? Welcome to 1997. And why does a box of pistons require two guys to open the packaging? I rest my case.

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Meanwhile, our engine is ready to go. It's time for a thrashing and I want to show the other competitors the kind of reliable power we can make. People say our choice of engine is old but the key to making power is in the cylinder head, and that will never change with time! If enthusiasts took the time to study and look at the intake ports on our F22A, they'd find it to be quite similar to that of the highest flowing factory head from Honda: the F20C, from the S2000 roadster. Yes, this is a power per displacement competition which, by the way, drag racers like myself are very akin to building. I know; this isn't a drag race, but engineers who design and build engines for drag racers know how to make power and this is what it's about. Above and beyond that, it's about reliability. I cannot wait for the torture test so we can see who has the last laugh. Everyone talks about the power. We're going to make the power and reliability to boot. Unless the torture test is weak, these turbocharged guys are going to blow their engines left and right. But we'll see.

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Our engine is affordable and it is the kind of base powerplant that the average enthusiast can easily have access to. We know that NA power begins with the head and the accessories that work in orchestration with it are important as well, like the induction, valvetrain dynamics and exhaust manifold. In our build, we are using a Dasa-Portflow head of our specifications, a Bisimoto F22 header, with Bisimoto-Webcam level 3 camshaft and valvetrain, and Supertech valves. The one key setback of the F22A from the factory is the intake manifold and it's very restrictive; great for economy and low-end torque, but it does not provide proper mass flow rate of air for power. This is where Kinsler comes into play, and the reason why we're using individual throttle bodies.

Here's how it helps: Having individual runners per cylinder helps to equalize the air delivery to each cylinder in order to produce the most power; you don't have a plenum in place that can adversely affect distribution of air to the cylinders. We have also elected to use eight injectors: four primary for low rpm duty and four top feed ones to atomize fuel more efficiently, because the finer the mist of fuel that is ingested into the combustion chamber for the induction cycle, the more power you make. A combination of ideal fuel pressures and optimal injector distance from the intake valve head allows for the perfect fuel particulate size for efficient combustion (read: power!), based on our research and hours of dyno testing on our Dynapack dynamometer. This is pure F1 technology. AEM's EMS will allow us to use an additional injection table (aka, fuel difference MAP) to control all eight injectors with amazing precision: primary injectors for low RPM duty, and as throttle position and RPM increases, those injectors are slightly weaned off and the top feed secondary injectors gradually, and seamlessly, merge into the air stream. An Innovate LM-2, combined with four LC-1 units will allow us to monitor air fuel ratios per cylinder. Isn't technology grand?

Another very exciting part of the manifold design is the throttle plates, which open on a vertical axis (left to right) configuration instead of on a horizontal axis (up and down). As air flows into the velocity stack down the throat of the throttle bodies and into the intake port, the intake port splits into each valve. Air, particularly at higher velocities, does not like to change flow configuration. In order to keep efficiency up, splitting the air latitudinally with the throttle plates, and then longitudinally (due to the intake port split) in a rapid sense is a big no-no. The new Kinsler manifold allows us to split the air in one configuration to mimic and optimize smooth flow into the port, and ultimately to each intake valve. The rolled intake stacks were designed using the latest computerized fluid dynamics software, and the runners have properly engineered tapers to improve intake charge velocity. It was made especially for Super Street for this competition, so it's a one-off I know will work very well when it comes to making power. Based upon our research data, we could easily gain 80 whp over a stock intake manifold! That's how restrictive the factory intake manifold is. Even the injectors were custom-made in "Syntec green," so we're sure to earn some points there. The new manifold looks so great, I am planning to also install one on my own race car, and convince Kinsler Fuel Injection to put it in production!