So... I'm sitting at home, extremely sick and bored and it finally hit me. Let's start a build thread! Sadly, I don't have many pictures of what I've done along the last year I've had the car, but I have a decent amount. Anyways, I live in South Florida, and I routinely go to car meets and the West Palm Scion meet down here. I absolutely love my car, and I continue adding things religiously... and expensively. I picked up the car with 9 miles, for only 15k out the door. No payments. Mucho room for upgrades! Keep in mind, most of this was done within the last three months. I just started and I cannot stop! Here we go!

Below is a car like mine, since I do not have a fully stock photo. I kept it like this for a long while, contemplating what to do.


I then got window tinting... I do not have a photo of my car stock w/ window tint, but you will see it in subsequent photos.

I figured next I would have some fun with HIDs and under-car lighting. I also did interior lighting as Scion would not throw it in. These lights are quite interesting. They are RGB (red, green, blue) and with a controller, I am able to make any color. I chose to make it simple, and instal three switches. I will show a picture with blue, and with red. I currently use white on public roads due to two tickets and a warning. And here is the interior also.






Moving on now... I decided to TURBO MY CAR! (I know, big step... I did this before I lowered it... before I added rims... wow.) DESCENDANT TURBO KIT! From here, it just keeps on going. Before and after.




Added a Carbon Fiber spoiler.

Decided to finally mount my A/F gauge.

Rims... before lowering.

and now after lowering with Eibach Sportlines...

Added Borla Dual Exhaust... 2" pipes.

Window tint all around, and a few stickers.

Added a blow-off valve.

Now, this was a track run with my tune from Olympic Motorsports. This is BEFORE THE PHOTOS THAT FOLLOW. I will have an updated track time after.

Added a Short Ram Intake, fabricated by Olympic Motorsports.
Before and After shots.

Then installed a new, and very pretty boost gauge.
View My Video

Decided to get rid of my 2" exhaust piping, but I really wanted to keep my dual exhaust. Had to fabricate a 3" turbo-back to dual exhaust. Sounds amazing.
View My Video

Now, we had a huge problem with this. Due to the design of descendant's manifold, the 38mm Tial wastegate could not keep up with the deletion of the 2" piping and catalytic converter. There was no back-pressure to push the air back out of the wastegate, this caused extreme boost creep. As we were tuning my car for the addition of the 3" piping, we saw constant 15 PSI, 18 PSI, and 20 PSI by the time I was hitting 80 MPH... Now, I'm automatic. This is a problem. So..... we devised a plan to add a second wastegate to the BACK of the manifold to alleviate the pressure and allow the air to flow out of two wastegates. A tial 38MM and a turbosmart 40MM. Here is the picture of the dual wastegate set-up, tuning will be tomorrow (Monday 5/21/2012) and I will update everybody on how that turns out.

I hope everybody enjoyed the build, there will be much more to come - Also, I'm sure I missed a bunch of upgrades I did here and there. Feedback is appreciated!

I just wanted to show my thanks to DESCENDANT... Mike and Kareem were a bunch of help, and they still to this day are available for all of my questions and concerns regarding anything turbo-related. Also, thank you to OLYMPIC MOTORSPORTS for the flawless tuning, beautiful machining, and wonderful customer service.

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hell of a car man. I love my xb to death I really don't want to drive anything else, so DAMN if I had that turbo too, I would go nuts. congrats on such a nice ride, keep up the good work

 

Thank you! There is still so much I want to do! Hopefully this next week I will have a few more updates... New built valvebody, and torque converter from IPT are on my list, along with some new window stickers (front), engine bay upgrades, and FASTER TRACK TIMES!

 

Really sweet my friend...thanks for the heads up on the amazon deals......

Looks like it was a certified used 11(front plate and used as is tag in the back right window....with only 9 miles???

 

I pick up everything on Amazon.. Haha - I have Amazon Prime, cause I'm a student. Got my Nitto INVO's (150 each on sale) on there with 3.99 next day air shipping!!

 

I think I might pick your Kenwood system up. It looks pretty darn nice.

 

That's not my car as I said in the post. Just wanted a fully stock photo to start. That dealership isn't even in my state. Lol www.google.com

 

Jealous... seriously. I want the Descendant setup. So legit!

Car looks good!

 

interesting RGB LED set up. im currently doing that to my car right to except going a little beyond and using custom built RGB drivers. what kind of kit did you use? because of my custom drivers i had to scratch build my RGB LED tubes using 5050 SMD RGB LED strip and 5/8" polycarbonate tubing with siliconed end caps. the good thing about that was i was able to make them any length i needed. what sucked is i had to also solder all the wires, clip connectors and LEDs my self. took me all weekend. how long did it take you to install of you stuff?

 

Nice build! Bizarre boost creep problem though. In one of your photos it appears that you have vacuum lines going to both chambers of the wastegate? That can't be right though since they would cancel each other out and the WG would never open. The bottom chamber should get boost pressure from the compressor housing and the top chamber should be vented to atmosphere. When boost pressure on the diaphragm exceeds the spring pressure the WG valve opens and exhaust back pressure on the WG valve is never a factor.

 

Ignore the vacuum lines. I'm sure they were cut recently as we're going to be running new ones.. We were switching them wondering if we had a leak in one of the lines and lost our place. Anyways, actually the exhaust back pressure has everything to do with the boost creep. When I installed my boost gauge, Fred, I was getting 8.5 PSI of boost. You know what spring I had in my wastegate? 4 PSI. Yes, 4 PSI. That's a problem. Well, I mean, it's not because I WANTED 8.5 PSI and it worked out PERFECT. But what I didn't know was that the backpressure of the HUGE catalytic converter and 2" piping was helping keep the exhaust gases from flowing right down into the turbo and out the exhaust. When we removed the cat, we INSTANTLY started getting creeps going to 15, 18, and 20 PSI depending how I floored it. Added a boost controller solved absolutely nothing. We figured out that the manifold design was the problem. The back two tubes of the manifold was shooting exhaust gases directly through into the turbo, totally bypassing the wastegate regardless of it being opened or closed. This is why we decided to cut a hole in one of the back tubes, and one of the front ones, to mount a 40MM wastegate.

 

These LEDs were from the eBay store that I used to manage down here. We specialized in LED lighting on the side. I can't remember for the life of me the specifications, I have had them installed under the car for over a year now. The installation was a huge hassle, in all honesty. Not HARD, but annoying. We had to find a way to control all three of the colors, as we didn't use a RGB controller... I didn't want to have to change my colors constantly, I just wanted RGB. I ended up actually using a PHONE JACK, to route the colors (and power) into. Then we used an old 56K jack router, and plugged in two jacks (from both sides of the car) and then one jack OUT to the three switches, and one line to the power. It worked PERFECTLY. It's like a little networking hub, but for LEDs! I'll try to get a picture of the phone lines later.

 

Thank you! The Descendant set-up is the absolute best. Their customer service is second to none. Also, I get endless compliments on every single part in my car... they use nothing but the best.

 

I just looked at the photos, and I see how you could see this. Actually, there are no boost lines going to either part of the wastegate. It just looks like that. One I believe is the oil feed line going to the turbo housing. The other one is just running right across the car. We had to tear everything off because we took the wastegate apart to see if we had any issues with the ACTUAL wastegate because it wasn't allowing enough gases to escape. We didn't. We should have had only 4 PSI if it was working properly, maybe 5 or 6. Not 15.

 

Do it!! Wish I would have done it earlier....

I'll trade ya for the turbo kit....LOL

 

well keep up the good work! hope the turbo works out. i havent seen anyone with the boost creep problem on the auto yet. so i hope you dont over boost and thro the tranny lol. you got a big tranny cooler in there? you should

 

Yes, of course. I've been holding 300 WHP for about 4,000 miles now. No problems so far. Go to the track a lot and everything. The boost creep I believe we'll have figured out today. Also, the dual wastegate should give me more control over my boost rather than what I had before... I had a 4PSI spring and I had 8.5 lbs of boost...

 

The 300whp is what worries me. I have read a lot and I mean a lot of threads on out auto tranny with boost. Typically ~250whp/tq is wear it has slipped on other rides. One day its fine then the next it’s slipping and grinding all day long. Just don’t want you to get too far ahead of yourself. That’s all lol. Although it seems if the tranny was to fail you may have the funds to fix and or swap to manual. IMO. Do you have a temp gauge for your transmission? What kind of temps do you see under high load?

 

What I said was that exhaust gas backpressure is not a factor in causing the wastegate to open. You're talking about how the increased exhaust flow exceeded the bypass capabilities of the wastegate. Descendent obviously screwed up big time if their manifold design produces 20 psi boost from a 4 psi spring.

The reason I asked about the WG vacuum connections is because in the first engine photo where you still have the stock Descendant kit, it pretty clearly shows hoses attached to both chambers of the wastegate. I have no idea where those hoses go to but it prompted my question.

Anyway, thanks for posting this build thread, best of luck getting the boost under control and may your tune be perfect!

 

On another note. You said you have 300whp. Is this number from a dyno or are you just guessing? The reason I ask is your time slip says 14.106. scion fred got 14.12 and he only has ~220whp. I think. Would 80whp really only net you .04 seconds? Not haten or anything just wondering if you really only have ~220whp and that’s why your tranny is still in one piece lol.