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Dean... Your write-up sounds very convincing but as someone who has been around this board for several years and remembers the brouhaha when this whole "manual boost controller" craze started, I can try and offer some caution.
You said and I quote:
>The Abbott ECU crowd was quite hostile, or threatened... But no one cares anymore.
No one cares anymore? About what? Their ENGINE?
Then you went on to say:
>When a MBC is fitted, the ECU cannot tweak the boost pressure to control
>knocking, but timing and enrichment changes are all that the ECU requires
>to manage combustion. A year and 1/2 ago, folks were going nuts about
>this issue. Their predictions, or wishes, that my engine would self
>destruct were not realized.
Maybe YOUR engine hasn't self-destructed in the year and a half that you've been "bleeding" off the boost pressure that the wastegate actuator sees, but I can tell you FROM EXPERIENCE that I've heard of several turbo replacements on engines that have been tweaked! This is exactly as I predicted... There is no "free lunch"...
In fact a new turbo costs over $900 with four hours of labor to replace it (at $75/hour around here) so we're talking at least $1200! And that's not counting engine damage... Let's not think about the damage that running high boost can cause when you're at wide open throttle, the boost is spiking at 20+ psi, and the exhaust gas temperatures are extreme. Did you know that Saab has special piston coatings and other engine mods for the 9-5 Aero model? Gee, why did they do that I wonder...
Hey, if it's only a "lease" car then you won't have to worry about the long-term damage... Go nuts! But if you OWN the car and want to keep it past 100K miles without breaking the bank, then you ought to think about the consequences of this "cheap" manual boost controller.
BTW, did you ever install a calibrated boost gauge to actually monitor how much boost you're running? Or do you back off the gas when you hear the engine knocking? ;-)
posted by 64.12.1...
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