My CA18DET Turbo Build by Battle Auto

This isn’t about what you think of Battle Auto/Ian/BAS, how he acts, or how others act towards him.

All this thread is about is what work you had done by BAS and what your impressions of it are, Good OR Bad.

What I had done:

A full replacement of the entire turbo system of my car. It was VERY reasonably priced and he gave me the estimate before any work begun. Along the road there were a few hiccups and issues (like I wanted a specific design of the manifold but figured out it wouldn’t work so had to redo a few things) but he was very good about dealing with my questions and giving me updates. There were a few things that went over budget but he was very upfront about it and gave me the option to take a cheaper route or to pay a little extra and get things done right.

This included:
Custom top mount tubular Manifold for CA18DET and T3 turbo.

  • Ian made each flange (CNC), he used cast bends and all stainless steel.

New Turbo, T3, Super60 intake .48 exhaust, bought through Ian I got a brand new Garett for the price people pay for USED ones.

Downpipe
Welds are amazing, all 3" mandrel bend stainless.
I don’t plan to replace it anytime soon :slight_smile:

Intercooler piping

  • All aluminum
  • To save money Ian said he could make the piping using pie-cuts instead of dicking around with getting mandrel and making it fit. This is a temporary solution until I get some cash for bling bling mandrel, there are other places the money would be (and was) better spent. People say the welds on the piping aren’t clean but look how many he did, I todl him from the start not to waste a lot of time on it because I don’t care how it looks as long as it works and it won’t be there forever. The downpipe was mandrel because I plan to keep that.

Intercooler
I originally had a Bing’s intercooler but traded it for a better made one that was more suited my application. Got that intercooler from Ian and he mounted it. You can shake my whole car by pusing on the intercooler and it does NOT budge. He also modified my bumper etc so that it would all fit.

Braided stainless lines and AN fittings.
All bought through Ian, all priced below what I’ve seen it selling for here.
This is one of the places that money I would have spent on mandrel was spent on something else :wink:

T-clamps and silicone couplers.
Wherever he could use t-clamps he did. Again this is one of the things I spent the money on instead of mandrel.

S-AFR
He supplied me with an S-AFR he had around and installed it for me.

I am INCREDIBLY pleased with my setup.
Here are a few pics when it was ALMOST finished, I’ve been lazy and haven’t taken any new engine bay pics.
Remember the intercooler piping I told him not to waste time on so don’t judge THOSE welds, turbozee and brianphung can comment on his aluminum welding when he actually takes time with it. He also ground out the inside of the piping after to keep it fairly smooth. Check out the downpipe.


http://www.westd.ca/gallery/albums/userpics/10002/IMG_0423.JPG
http://www.westd.ca/gallery/albums/userpics/10002/IMG_0426.JPG
http://www.westd.ca/gallery/albums/userpics/10002/IMG_0425.JPG

I have a side by side comparison of the stock turbo vs the new turbo somewhere but can’t find it.

The turbo is SIGNIFICANTLY larger than the stock T25 (which is SMALLER than the stock SR T25G turbo, it’s like .48/.42) yet even before my new turbo is fully “worked in” I’m hitting 10psi of boost just after 3000rpm. This is not a ball bearing turbo, it’s a regular wet/thrust bearing one.
This is on a 1800cc engine, and I haven’t even fully tuned my car yet!

So that’s my experience with Battle Auto.

It was 100% turn key.
I dropped the car off, told him what I wanted done. We conffered on MSN a whole bunch and I visited a few times to check it out. When it was done I drove to Barrie, turned the key and drove 100km home!

is that a compression fitting on the oil inlet or a crimped fitting?

Shite, that is ALOT of welding done there. If you dont mind telling us what was the cost of the piping?

What was the turnaround time for this job? I heard it took a while but never heard the length.

I’ve seen the car in person, IAN definitely did a pretty nice job overall, especially with the minor details… .like zip tieing wires in the engine bay and overall making things look a lot cleaner.

I’ve done lots of SR swaps but i have to admit, he’s not bad.

where’s the boost controller if you have the actuator hooked up to the inlet of the turbo?

Those pictures are not that new. He cut the actuator line and it was intalled right there, took like 2 minutes.

The amount of time is skewed by a few factors.
I dropped the car off at Ian’s before he could actually work on it (he was doing someone’s SR swap and some other stuff) so it sat there for a long time before he could actually start on it. I had a buddy with a truck and a car trailor and he was available that weekend to take it up there for just the cost of diesel and dinner.

It also was delayed because we were trying a few different things and some of them didn’t work out requiring a large number of things to be redone.

I’d say the FINAL manifold, downpipe and pre-turbo side piping took maybe 2-3 weeks. He also installed my S-AFR, Z32 MAF and DSM 450cc injectors and got the car running (but not ‘tuned’) in that time.

I had to do a lot of stuff on the cheap, so like the classic story Ian gave me three options and was told to pick TWO.

a) Cheap
b) Fast
c) Reliable

I picked a and c and was very happy.

Also this isn’t my daily driver, and I was in no rush to get the car back before the weather was nice so there was no push for him to hurry up.

Those pictures are not that new. He cut the actuator line and it was intalled right there, took like 2 minutes.[/quote]

Yea, I picked up a turbosmart MBC and installed it just recently.

I then promptly blew a heater hose hah
But that’s got nothing to do with Ian and everything to do with 17 y/o rubber tubing.

:ugh: You seroiusly need to stop misleading people. :slap:

Honestly, there too much bitching about BAS; primarily his online personality.

Frankly, I don’t get too involved in the post and only on one occasion I
recall where I made a post towards him.

I don’t know him or have met him but I’ve seen noc’s car in person and I
was impressed; I liked it.

People get a bad vibe from him because his posts tend to be very
technical, and in most cases, very judgemental of other people’s
products, techniques, etc.

To be honest, what I gather from his post is that people are too afraid to
hear the truth or the facts. For example someone will post something
they did and BAS will make a comment on its structural integrity for
example; a whole debate will ensue; people will get pissed, BAS gets
banned, ya know, the usual drill. :rolleyes:

I’m not saying he’s right because I can’t confirm what he speaks, but
people don’t seem to give thought in his opinions and assume he’s wrong
because 5 other people (who may not know just as much) oposes him.

Frankly I’m sick of it. If you are stupid to do something to your car,
without knowing fully of its consequences, you shouldn’t be doing it in the
first place.

Research, then do.

Hopefully I don’t sound too contradictory or hypocritical from this post;
feel free to point out where you think I am. :dunno:

And sorry if I got a little OT or rambled on here.

Also it’s not buyer/seller, it’s technical because he actually MADE my setup not just sold me a pile of parts.

Again ill drop in about the Quality of his work, Everything I have seen is Fantastic, and again not only is the actually work great. He is ALWAYS willing to help with honest Tech Questions. and will take a long time to go through everything and teach you while you are trying to figure something out. Ya things can get heated but all in all a very valuble Member.

still wondering if the oil inlet line is a compression fitting or a crimped fitting.

what was the line pressure tested to if it’s compression fitting?

Looks like a reusable hose end.

if you are asking what type of AN fitting that is on the brainded hose then it is a standard speed fit/ auto fit hose end… rated at WAY WAY more psi bleed by pressure then your oil bump could ever produce…

there was no need to use a crimp fitting in this application, you gain nothing from the added expense of having the lines made.

I don’t think it would be apporriate to duscuss the pricing online as I’m not a sponser of the site and it could be seen as 'selling ’ but the main reason is if the customer did not really feel the need to say then I shoudn’t either… however if you’d like to talk to me about pricing PM me and I can give you a rough idea of costing on speicifics of your choice…

Honestly I don’t see the reason for this post, other then to provoke some
kind of heated debate.

It’s an AN fitting; they are capable of high pressure and according to the
law of obviousity, your oil pressure will likely reach 100psi. If it does,
something ain’t right.

the -4 hose when built right , which it was, is rated to more then 100x ( very conserative est.) the max pressure the -4 hose will see in this application… that’s is a considerable margin of overbuilding…

i wasn’t attacking, i was only asking as, i was recomended by my employer NOT to use a compression fitting on the oil inlet.

We build and pressure test hydrolic lines in house and reservice cylinders.

[/quote]

Agreed. Im not actually looking to have work done but I was merely curious since the welding on a FMIC piping kit like that would be quite time consuming and costly, so much so that it would have been cheaper to buy mandrel bends, rather than make all those welds. Or would it have?