ATT: engine builders and st162 owners. durability of gen1 3sge?

[ashleyw]

another issue with the gen 1 is that you don't have oil squirters, again its not too big a problem with a standard car, but straighten it up and your gudgens will go if you are flogging it. I am nearly finished putting a gen 3 into an ra23 NSW IPRA car, some of the basics I have done to the oil system are

tapped the 6mm drain in the head, put in a plug with a 3mm hole in it to keep some oil in the sump. also has the advantage of a higher oil pressure in the bottom end, and lower up top

baffled the sump, also extended it with wings, and put in a pot, so that all the baffles pour oil towards the pot and the oil pickup sits in the pot, also running remote oil filter. the oil system now holds 3.75 litres more oil than standard.

All the bearings have been replaced with Race bearings, after the crank was linished.

And I will still be inspecting all the bearings after every meet.

You can either save for the beams or go for the gen 3, the gen one will bite you, after you have sunk impressive amounts of money into it anyway.

Also consider that to fit a FWD 3s into RWD mounting you will at the minimum need the following: RWD or custom inletmanifold, RWD or custom exhaust, custom flywheel (there are other options but for the price get it done once and done right) and then to get the power of the beams you need bigger cams, new valve springs, new valves, aftermarket ecu............its a big list.

If I was to start again it would be beams from the start. But, each to their own

Ash

[Dimitri]

i am a former employee of kaizen garage. During my time there Ant did both a gen2 gte and his own gen 5 beams.

the conversion wont be a problem. Also The gen1 has its attractions when it comes to rwd'ing.
from what i can tell i wont need a custom flywheel. just the wider spigot bearing. (starter is engine side on the 162)

the standard exhaust manifold will also work with some custom secondaries.

the engines are $500. i would be surprised if the whole conversion cost me 2 grand. you cant do a 20v for that much. in fact thats not much more than a big port 4age costs most people.

i can understand you logic with the 5 being the way to go over a 3. Absolutely. if my budget was 5-6 grand on the engine/box combo, thats what id do, but spending that much isnt a consideration at all.

[Munki]

I would love to see how this turns out, although i would imagine all gen 1 to be a bit tired now! But they are the most ascetically pleasing of the 3sge's. haha

[rolleraction]

The biggest prob (after oiling) for gen 1 is small cam buckets (28mm same as 4ag buckets - so you can use the 4ag shim under settups in a gen 1 3S)

So if you want any lift over about 9.2mm, you will have to machine out the cam lifetr bore from 28mm to 31 (or whatever later 3S runs - memory fading now) to fit larger diamere buckets

Therefore, another reason to go later gen if you can or are after big hp. Trevor on this forum uses a gen 1 GTe and it has big hp and is reliable.(les relaint on crazy sized cam profiles as opposed to NA)

If a steet car, you'll be fine dimitri as you will basically end up with a larger capacity 4AGE really...and as you say, Gen 1 are the easiest to convert to rwd in terms of engine mount, flywheel etc..

Good luck.

[Dimitri]

exactly, the small cam buckets is not a problem, infact its kind of a bonus, as if i am to do cams, theyre never going to be huge, but the availability of shims (being same as 4ag) is a plus.

Munki you bring up a good point - they are getting pretty long in the tooth.

in the event i do end up needed to reco, am i right in assuming 3sfe cranks will be compaitble?

is there a table anywhere with the crank specs relating to differant verision of 3sge/3sfe/5sfe?

[rolleraction]

I thought 3sfe was same crank as 2s & both has 6 bolt flysheels, not 8??

[Dimitri]

definately not all.

in the 3sgte car ant used a 3sfe flywheel from a rwd 3s from some jap taxi (had spigot in flywheel, but still needed bolt holes offset bored.....)

also pretty sure ive seen alot of import wrecker engines are 8.

[takai]

All 3SFEs i have seen are 6 bolt, 3SGE and 3SGTEs have been 8 bolt.

[Dimitri]

hmm. ok, will look into that a little further.

[RobST162]

yeah just a quick thought here

the oil starvation in the gen1's that has been described IS the most common method of these engine's destruction.

Those conversations usually go along the lines of "I had low oil and was working it around a big right hander..."

If the oil is watched, ie, engine looked after, they will go for ages and ages with no issues to speak of.

Why I thought I'd post, is that, when the Gen1 is in a RWD configuration, remember, that main bearing #1 starvation issue becomes really a moot point, because a big right hander in a east-west engine is very different story than a big right hander for a north-south engine.

Someone may have said this already.. I'd put some additional baffling for acceleration, but really, I think this most significant and avoidable issue on the Gen 1s can be overcome in a RWD setup quite easily.

But if you're an enthusiast, what's the excuse for having low oil anyway. In my 162 I was anal AS about keeping it up near the F and never had any issues.

once had a slight rattle when I did a big rhs with oil about 50% up the indicator