Hey everyone,
I'm sure glad I found this discussion forum, a lot of good ideas and good people. I have been pondering the question, how can I improve the performance of the PT Turbo without drasticly changing parts or voiding the warrenty? Well the PT Turbo is as good as it gets, but I have always felt that a little tweaking hear a little adjustment there an presto chango your engine is running better.
1st thing I want to concetrate on is improving the air intake system and cooling charecteristics of the engine. I have read that turbos are notorious for generating heat, and I have noticed that the Intake Manifold and Carb gets really hot because of this. Just drive around for 10 miles, stop, pop open the hood and put your hand on the manifold. Where it should just be warm to the touch, it is actually burning hot. As a result hot engine air creates an environment for poor combustion.
My first thought was to vent the hot air out through induction and ram cold air into the air filter. I'm not interested in altering my PT's apperence so a Good Hood or Cal-Hood is out of the question. What I want to do is modify what is already in place, re-engineer it for higher performance.
Venting hot air out is easy, just remove the wheather strip at the back of the engine compartment, presto chango you now have an induction hood. There is enough air pressure at the base of the windsheild to force air into that little crack where the stripping used to be. I have been driving around this way for two days and every time I check the temp. of the Manifold and Carburetor it is actually cool to touch, unless I am just doing city driving. then temp. is higher.
Ramming cold air into the air intake is easy too. Chrysler in their infinite wisdom has designed a simple but easily overlooked way of getting cold air to the intake. There is a small port just behind the driver side fog light, this path leads to the air intake. I have been trying to come up with a simple way of scooping undercarriage air into this port to increase the air flow. If anyone knows of a cheap part nuumber that could do the job please let me know. Otherwise I will post again once I construct the piece. And if anyone else has a cheap idea of modifying and improving engine performance please share it.
Here are some links to som interesting info
http://www.minimania.com/MM/Inductio...ers_1 289.htm
http://www.ptdoityourself.com