I have yet to release a post of my z's history that has since been untold. May of last year, I was involved in a serious accident in my Z, I was T-boned, and flipped into an unplowed field (rural MN) which totalled my previously mint '91 TT w/501whp.
To make a long story short, after the accident, the car was totaled by the insurance company. I then bought back from them, for a measly $1250. Here are some pics of the car after I bought it back...
I stripped the car of any worthwhile goods including my built drivetrain, and went in search of a mint donor vehicle. I came across another mint ’91 TT, identical to mine (although one month prior in production dates), on the TT.net classys for sale by Doug Wesp (MisterZ (OKC)). Doug had bought the car in 2000 and had it in storage pretty much since then, only putting on 2k miles since he had bought it. I took delivery of the car from Doug during over Halloween of ’07. Thanks again Doug for the GREAT car!
Here are pics of me picking the car up from her home @ the storage unit, and at the wall outside the Alamo in downtown San Antonio...
I drove the car home from San Antonio to Minneapolis, and after swapping motors and all other upgrades from the old car over, and adding a few additional goods such as; MSP manis, 60mm T-bodies, Ashspec MASSIVE smic’s, JWT 500 cams, and SSR D5R wheels, I called on Ash’s tuning knowledge to reawaken the cars peak power potential.
On the 53rd dyno run, after thorough heatsoak had set in, we were capable of 522whp on the dyno with a much more desirable powerband. Ash and I are both quite confident that the car would have reached the 550whp goal, if it weren’t for the intense heatsoak the car underwent due to the 93+ degree ambient temps and high humidity at the time.
Here are the Dynocharts on Race fuel and on Pump fuel, we had impressive gains with the new parts considering the minor issue we were having with the wastegates holding peak boost. The charts don’t show too much, we couldn’t get the torque+AF lines to show up on the printed charts with the crappy DynoDynamics software, so this is all we got.
After the build and tuning was complete, it was noted that the VTC’s were making the hellacious noise which comes with adding the 500 series JWT cams. Along with that issue we were also getting a decent amount of smoke coming from the turbos under load (mainly the driver side). Ash insisted that he could solve these issues, and upon his return home from tuning my car, he immediately undertook the task of solving the noise and smoking issue. He sent me a set of his new VTC’s a few weeks later and also machined the faces and clear powder coated them to give them a like-new appearance. As far as the smoke issue, we decided to put a restrictor into the banjo bolt off of the block (on both sides) which supplies the turbos with oil. I didn’t have smoking issues when the motor was in my other car, so Ash and I were skeptical if this would solve the issue, but we figured it would be a good starting point. Ash had fabbed up some of his own restrictor bolts, of which I swapped in for good measure.
These are Ash’s fabbed restrictor bolts, made from OEM banjo bolts w/.030 restrictor machined into it.
OEM oil restrictor Banjo bolt side by side with an OEM Coolant Banjo bolt
Ash’s restrictor bolt next to the OEM oil restrictor bolt
I installed these parts along with the usual Timing belt replacement parts, and while doing so came across the culprit of the turbo oil smoke issue. It seems as though when we were assembling the motor back together I mistakenly exchanged a coolant banjo bolt with the turbo oil feed bolt, on the driver side only. The turbo oil feed banjo bolts have a built-in restrictor to keep the turbo shaft seals from getting too much oil pressure and thus, leaking into the turbine. The Coolant banjo bolts do not have this restriction as you can see in the pictures. Since then, 2000 Miles have passed with the new VTC sprockets + Restrictors. The car continues to be noise and smoke free. The pieces are top notch, and I am VERY pleased with them. More importantly, I really appreciate the hard work and perseverance Ash has put into these issues and my car, to help me out. For this reason alone, I will always support his knowledge and consistently help him out in anyway I can, as he has proven time and time again that he will do the same for me.
Anyways, I just thought I would fill in the masses on some of my recent background, and why I have been rather intermittent on the boards, as I have been buried at work, at work with the car, and at work with the purchase of my new home which is in the BG of the latest photos, along with some pictures from last weekend’s trip along the Mississippi down to Lacrosse, WI. Thanks for listening, and happy Z ing to all !!!
Z update: 3rd build - 522whp (pic intensive) - 
