69 Camaro at Best of Show

[FETorino]

Originally Posted by Matt.A

I'm going to bring this back up to post a rant. NEVER, ever do any work with Turn Key engines, ever.
So, for everyone out there building a car, and trying to save a little money along the way, don't. Save for what you want, or just bite the bullet and spend the money, because fixing things later costs twice as much, and takes twice as long.

It really sucks to hear your engine dilemma is ending up even worse. The thread on "how to get a deal on parts" spells it out just like you say. A deal is when your vendor stands behind the stuff they sell. When things sound to good to be true they usually aren't.

[randy]

Originally Posted by Matt.A

So, for everyone out there building a car, and trying to save a little money along the way, don't. Save for what you want, or just bite the bullet and spend the money, because fixing things later costs twice as much, and takes twice as long.

this shouldnt be taken lightly. Do it right do it light. Alot of people build their car to only have to rebuild it. Most of the time they end up running out of money and selling the car only to lose the reason why they started building the car to begin with.

plus this was the excuse i gave my wife to let me mini tub, dse subframe, rear quadralink and to purchase my forgelines. lol.

" honey would you rather me spend $1000 now and another $3800 later on rims or just spend the $3800 now?"

if that doesnt work i always use the

" honey im spending the money i had before i met you not our money " lol

[Flash68]

Originally Posted by Matt.A

And Dave, I might just have to get you one of those jackets.
Matt

Where's my jacket?

Originally Posted by randy

this shouldnt be taken lightly. Do it right do it light. Alot of people build their car to only have to rebuild it. Most of the time they end up running out of money and selling the car only to lose the reason why they started building the car to begin with.

plus this was the excuse i gave my wife to let me mini tub, dse subframe, rear quadralink and to purchase my forgelines. lol.

" honey would you rather me spend $1000 now and another $3800 later on rims or just spend the $3800 now?"

if that doesnt work i always use the

" honey im spending the money i had before i met you not our money " lol

I've been using the "but honey I sold other car parts to pay for these new car parts"

[Rybar]

Sorry to hear Matt, another buddy of mine from this forum is having an issue with thier tune on his Turn-key crate motor.

[transam]

That would be me. Car wont rev past 2000. Turn key said send them the ecm and tb. They said it had a break in lock which they removed. Got ecm back in car still same issue. Im just going to yank out the marine delphi and go oem ls wiring and ecm. I dont trust a 700hp motor with no o2 sensors.

[Matt@BOS]

Originally Posted by Flash68

Where's my jacket?



I've been using the "but honey I sold other car parts to pay for these new car parts"

I can't believe you have been able to pull that one off. I figured it would have been caught by the innate inner Asian accounting gene. I got that gene (well part of it) from my mom and every now and then I am horrified by these cars.

[Matt@BOS]

Originally Posted by transam

That would be me. Car wont rev past 2000. Turn key said send them the ecm and tb. They said it had a break in lock which they removed. Got ecm back in car still same issue. Im just going to yank out the marine delphi and go oem ls wiring and ecm. I dont trust a 700hp motor with no o2 sensors.

Transam, that is a really wise choice to just ditch the MEFI 4B while you can. I would, but that would open up an entirely new can of worms, and I just want to be driving my car again. The OLC is using a MEFI 4 as well, and I think it has proved that the computer can be reliable behind power, so long as you aren't using a crazy high power, high boost turbo motor, or anything else complicated. One last thing, if your motor puts out considerably less power than advertised, do something about it. My original LS2 from them was advertised as their "510hp" crate motor. Even after spending an additional 3k on better heads and cam with them, which they claimed would give me another 50hp it only made 430whp. Similarly, that El Camino that I was talking about is a 402 with a Kenne Bell on it, and it only made 520/540 on the chassis dyno. While I was unhappy with the power my LS2 made, I can believe that there is that much of a disparity in power readings if they are advertising gross horsepower. If the 402KB motor was mine though, I would be knocking down the door after dropping almost 25k for something that is supposed to make in excess of 700.

I have one last thing to rant about. First, I want to say, I understand that shops make mistakes, I also understand that sometimes things don't go as they should, and that not everything should be blamed on a shop. When we pay a shop to hot rod something, and experiment with parts, etc. there are certainly no guarantees on the outcome. This scenario is different though. When Turnkey put the heads and cam on the LS2 of mine, they somehow lost an o-ring shaped gasket that goes in the valley cover plate that caused all kinds of oil to shoot out of the cone shaped casting (used in displacement on demand vehicles) and get sucked up through the pcv tract. I only found this out when I was transferring parts from the LS2 to the 454. Which reminds me, when I pulled the valley cover plate off Rupp's 454 it only had one, yes ONE, of the eight gaskets in place. I only gave them the benefit of the doubt to tune my car because they had tuned it several times before. Looking back, that was an idiotic mistake on my part, but it probably wouldn't have mattered at that point anyway.

[Flash68]

This does really suck. I thought Turn Key had a really good rep.

Originally Posted by Matt.A

I can't believe you have been able to pull that one off. I figured it would have been caught by the innate inner Asian accounting gene. I got that gene (well part of it) from my mom and every now and then I am horrified by these cars.

I am lucky. She admittedly did not get the math gene. I have it in our family.

[transam]

Mine is the ls2 kenne belle supercharged engine, the guy i spoke with at turn key sounds nice enough,i overnighted the parts to them,didnt hear anything so i called a week later and he said he didnt have my phone number or email or contact info,even though i enclosed a printed piece of paper with all my info. The reason i would like to switch aside from the lack safety in the efi is nobody in my area wants to work with mefi,and the mefi burn is another investment on its own.Also if i go with gm wiring i can control my 4l60e using an oem ecm not the aftermarket controller it currently uses. Its my fault,i shoukd have done my research before i bought the set up. I wish you luck with your car

Originally Posted by Matt.A

Transam, that is a really wise choice to just ditch the MEFI 4B while you can. I would, but that would open up an entirely new can of worms, and I just want to be driving my car again. The OLC is using a MEFI 4 as well, and I think it has proved that the computer can be reliable behind power, so long as you aren't using a crazy high power, high boost turbo motor, or anything else complicated. One last thing, if your motor puts out considerably less power than advertised, do something about it. My original LS2 from them was advertised as their "510hp" crate motor. Even after spending an additional 3k on better heads and cam with them, which they claimed would give me another 50hp it only made 430whp. Similarly, that El Camino that I was talking about is a 402 with a Kenne Bell on it, and it only made 520/540 on the chassis dyno. While I was unhappy with the power my LS2 made, I can believe that there is that much of a disparity in power readings if they are advertising gross horsepower. If the 402KB motor was mine though, I would be knocking down the door after dropping almost 25k for something that is supposed to make in excess of 700.

I have one last thing to rant about. First, I want to say, I understand that shops make mistakes, I also understand that sometimes things don't go as they should, and that not everything should be blamed on a shop. When we pay a shop to hot rod something, and experiment with parts, etc. there are certainly no guarantees on the outcome. This scenario is different though. When Turnkey put the heads and cam on the LS2 of mine, they somehow lost an o-ring shaped gasket that goes in the valley cover plate that caused all kinds of oil to shoot out of the cone shaped casting (used in displacement on demand vehicles) and get sucked up through the pcv tract. I only found this out when I was transferring parts from the LS2 to the 454. Which reminds me, when I pulled the valley cover plate off Rupp's 454 it only had one, yes ONE, of the eight gaskets in place. I only gave them the benefit of the doubt to tune my car because they had tuned it several times before. Looking back, that was an idiotic mistake on my part, but it probably wouldn't have mattered at that point anyway.

[James OLC]

FWIW I would definitely change out the MEFI 4 although at this point I'm sticking with it because the next step for me with the ECM is a big step. IF I were to be starting all over with a simple build I would probably stick with a GM piece.

IF you want to give the MEFI another chance, reach out to Mike Norris - he can steer you in the right direction.