96 5vz xcab 4x4 TACO TURBO BUILD

That probably means you are pinging. You pull your plugs and see if there is some carbon build up on them or in the cylinders?

 

Nope... Plugs are tan like they should be and the cylinders are still clean from a seafoam cleaning I did a couple months ago. It was the first startup after replacing my cam position sensor (which has been a pending code for almost 5 years) that it started acting funny, so I know for a fact that I wiggled the harness loose from the sensor while messing with the CPS, because the two harnesses are in the same area above the timing belt.

 

So four months later... it turned out my timing belt was advanced 3 or 4 teeth on the crank and since the camshaft sensor wasn't working properly, the ECU was getting its timing reference strictly from the knock sensors. When I replaced the cam position sensor, it started to basically fight with the knock sensors, and that obnoxious advance in timing was causing the knock sensor codes (because of the timing advance). That explaines the fact that it started running crappy the very first startup right after I changed the cam sensor.
Anyway I have a family friend X-Toyota dealership mechanic replacing all my belts, the water pump, thermostat, hydraulic tensioner, idler pulley (I think) as I type this. Hopefully I'll be driving it home tonight.

 

Holy moly! Awesome man! You fell off the map for quite a while. Mechanical issues are no fun. Glad to hear from you!

 

Frankly I'm surprised it ran at all in that condition. Glad you got it sorted and now you know you're up on your maintenance too.

 

I know! It ran like a dream up until like May, then it progressively started to buck and hesitate slightly until it was fully warmed up. I did a little research and learned that a failing or unresponsive cam sensor can cause this (and I've had a pending cam position sensor code on the ECU for years that I never did anything about). Sure enough my timing had been jacked up... probably for a long time.

 

Hey man sorry to intrude on your thread but i'm in the process of assessing what i need for turbo-ing my 99 and was wondering what you had for injectors? My plan was to just upgrade my current injectors and to run everything using MapEcu3 and not add the extra 6.

 

Good plan.........or a standalone ecu

 

lol stand alone would be a bit much for me

 

I went with the fic-6, somewhere down the line I heard it was better than the map3, all accept for 1 feature, timing maybe, I forget......getting mine tuned soon so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

 

Let me know how that works out...Mine will be a dd lol so emissions is must XD

 

If you can find and afford a super legit tuning shop, then I would swap out the stock injectors with 400-500cc injectors and have them tune it with a mapecu3 or AEM FIC unit. If you are going to be doing most of the work yourself then I would try to source a URD port fueler and some ford injectors (350~cc range) and tune it with either choice controller. The AEM unit can be bought cheaper and already wired for your trucks ECU harness, but mapecu arguably has more support and available help, and they are easy to use (from what I've read). It's all up to you. Depending on how much boost you want to run, you could also use meth injection (70+% meth) solely to fuel the remainder and leave your stock injectors alone. Of course that's another bottle of liquid under the hood to keep full.
Right now I personally am good with my stock injectors and no tune at 5 psi for now. With the fuel pressure regulator hooked up to a boost reference, my WOT AFRs are exactly where they need to be.

 

Hmm alright...I wasnt wanting to spend to much money on injectors idk..if you don't mind me asking how much did the port and extra injectors cost? I'm looking on LCE and a set of 450cc injectors are $526 that doesn't seem bad they even fit the stock location.

 

Ebay has them for tacomas in any size. Got mine for around $250. 42lb. Make sure they are reputable. Or craigslist.

 

Well I got my extra injectors and port fueler used right before URD jacked up the price from $200 to $1250 (causing the used prices to rise everywhere else too), so it's kind of useless to put a price on that as of now. You will see the port fuelers on eBay from time to time, but you definetely can't go wrong by just buying bigger primaries and having a professional tuning shop set them up right.
Be prepared to empty out the savings account for this build... nothin cheap about it.
You're lookin at at least $1500 for the injectors, controller, and man-time/labor to get them tuned right. That doesn't include the turbo ($300-$1200), the headers ($600+), the rest of the exhaust ($500+ to have it done, or $150+ to source the stuff and weld it yourself), the intake ($125+ at the cheapest to source and fabricate the aluminum tubing, couplings, cheap Chinese intercooler, ect) and all of the other BS it takes to get it working reliably and professionally (like oil lines and a wastegate and a few other things).

You don't want to skimp on the turbo or wastegate either.

 

Gio and chris, I want to thank both of you. You have helped me along the turbo path, you guys were my mentors. Really couldn'thave done it without you.



And don't buy stuff you don't need!

 

Im saving a few hundred already by having a turbo...and injectors aren't much plus the mapecu (or whatever i choose) will be free

 

Try 3k to 5k, at least.....!

 

lol

 

Of course buddy! We all get to help each other along the way. I just wish I could have found the info that I now know over two years ago though... a ton of the crap I've experienced and learned wasn't in a convenient thread on the Internet.